Shadowhawk Special #1
☆ Be the first to review + Add to your collection — Join freeShadowHawk Special #1 is a genuinely unusual artifact from Image's mid-1990s expansion — a double-sided flipbook that splits its pages between two completely different registers of superhero storytelling. The contemporary front half bridges the gap between the death of Paul Johnstone and the launch of The New ShadowHawk, giving readers a transitional adventure that contextualizes the post-Johnstone status quo. The Silver Age back half introduces Lady ShadowHawkette (Marge Hatfield) and Luke Hatfield Jr. (Squirrel) in their first comics appearances, presenting the Hatfield family as a deliberate, affectionate parody of the campy Jack Schiff-era Batman books — a satirical move that retroactively deepens the entire ShadowHawk mythology by planting its legacy roots in a fictional Silver Age. Those characters would go on to have lasting narrative consequences, with Squirrel eventually revealed as the villain Hawk's Shadow.
In "Images of Tomorrow," Shadowhawk returns to a city still haunted by his absence, clashing with the Junkyard Dogz before uncovering a shocking truth: their leader, Hotspur, is the heir to the Scrapelli crime family. As old wounds resurface and long-buried secrets rise, Rieves is driven to resurrect the memory of Paul Johnstone to prove Shadowhawk’s death was real—though not all truths are as they seem. Written by Kurt Busiek and illustrated by Walter McDaniel, with inks by Jason Gorder and Chance Wolf, and colors by Gloria Vasquez and Rob Schwager, this 1994 Image Special features a cover by Walter McDaniel and Jim Valentino.
In "Images of Tomorrow," Shadowhawk confronts the Junkyard Dogz, a crew of petty thugs whose leader, Hotspur, hides a dangerous secret—his true identity as the heir to the Scrapelli crime family. As tensions rise, Rieves, shaken by Shadowhawk’s return, goes to extreme lengths to confirm whether the man he believed dead—Paul Johnstone—is truly gone.
In "The Hyena's Revenge!" from Shadowhawk Special #1, the unlikely duo of Shadowhawk and Squirrel go on a wild chase after the Hyena, who’s stolen an Expando-Ray capable of turning ordinary objects—like pennies and typewriters—into giant, unwieldy versions of themselves. With the city’s everyday life thrown into chaos, the heroes must outwit the prankster before the ray’s power spirals out of control.
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We Buy Collections ▸History
Published in December 1994 by Image Comics under editor Len Senecal, the issue arrived during the franchise's most turbulent transitional period — Paul Johnstone had died of AIDS-related complications in the ongoing series, and Kurt Busiek had been brought in to pilot The New ShadowHawk beginning in 1995. The Special served as a bridge project, with Busiek writing the modern story (penciled by Walter McDaniel and inked by Jason Gorder) while Jim Valentino handled the Silver Age parody half himself, with Murphy Anderson on colors — lending the back section an authentic Golden/Silver Age visual texture. Alan Moore is also credited among the issue's contributors per the Image Comics Database, though the precise extent of his contribution to this specific issue (as opposed to the later Shadowhawks of Legend anthology) could not be pinned down with certainty across multiple independent sources.
Trivia · 8 facts
- Published December 1994 by Image Comics; formatted as a double-sided flipbook with a modern story on one side and a Silver Age parody on the other.
- First appearance of Lady ShadowHawkette (Marge Hatfield) and Luke Hatfield Jr. (Squirrel) — the wife and son of Silver Age ShadowHawk Luke Hatfield Sr. — who serve as his crime-fighting partners in the Hatfield family unit.
- The Silver Age ShadowHawk is an explicit parody of the Jack Schiff-era Batman comics, complete with a Shadowcave, Shadowcar, and Shadowdog (Buddy), deliberately evoking the kitschy 1950s–60s Batman aesthetic.
- The Silver Age back half contains two stories: 'The Hyena's Revenge,' in which ShadowHawk and Squirrel hunt the Hyena (a villain conceived as a Joker analogue), and 'The Phantom Gorillas from Dimension-Z!,' in which ShadowHawk and Lady ShadowHawkette battle intangible gorillas committing petty crimes.
- The modern front story, written by Kurt Busiek and penciled by Walter McDaniel, features Christina Ried and Lieutenant Lou Jacks and is set after the death of Paul Johnstone, acting as a narrative bridge into The New ShadowHawk series (1995).
- The issue includes a fake Silver Age letters page, three satirical period-style toy ads, and a 'slightly offensive' mock public service announcement about racism — all period-parody framing devices.
- Squirrel (Luke Hatfield Jr.), first appearing here, is later revealed in ShadowHawk continuity to have grown into the villain Hawk's Shadow, making this issue his character-origin appearance.
- Writers credited across the issue include Kurt Busiek, Jim Valentino, and Alan Moore; artists include Walter McDaniel, Jim Valentino, and Murphy Anderson, with Len Senecal as editor.
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