Showcase #74
☆ Be the first to review + Add to your collection — Join freeShowcase #74 marks the first appearance of Anthro, DC's prehistoric 'first boy' and the publisher's debut foray into caveman adventure comics — a genre attempt that stood entirely apart from the superhero dominance of 1968. By rooting a coming-of-age adventure in the Ice Age rather than the present, the issue demonstrated that DC's flagship try-out title could champion character-driven survival drama with no superpowers whatsoever. Though the original series was short-lived, Anthro's conceptual footprint proved durable: Grant Morrison later chose him as the literal first human in DC's cosmology, bookending Final Crisis as the 'first boy' to Kamandi's 'last boy.' The issue therefore sits at an unusual intersection of late-Silver Age genre experimentation and foundational DC Universe mythology.
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Anthro was conceived and executed entirely by Howard Post — a veteran animator and cartoonist who had previously worked at Paramount Cartoon Studios and Harvey Comics — working under editor Joe Orlando, who was himself newly elevated to editorial duties at DC during Carmine Infantino's 1968 restructuring of the publisher. Post developed the concept out of a personal interest in paleoanthropology, aiming to tell grounded Stone Age stories driven by wit and family bonds rather than fantasy. Showcase #74 was published in March 1968 (cover-dated May 1968), and its story — titled 'It Could Be You!' — served directly as the first chapter of what became the six-issue Anthro solo series launching that same year.
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- First appearance of Anthro (the 'first boy'), a Cro-Magnon teenager born to Neanderthal parents, establishing him as DC's earliest chronological human character.
- Created, written, and drawn entirely by Howard Post (Howie Post), under the editorial supervision of Joe Orlando — making it one of the rare Showcase try-outs to be a complete auteur package.
- Published March 12, 1968; cover-dated May 1968 — appearing during Carmine Infantino's sweeping editorial overhaul of DC Comics that marked the transition from the Silver to Bronze Age.
- The debut story is titled 'It Could Be You!' and introduces Anthro's family: his Neanderthal father Ne-Ahn (chief of the Bear Tribe) and his intertribal conflicts.
- After a single Showcase appearance, Anthro was given his own six-issue ongoing series (Anthro #1–6, 1968–1969) — all written and drawn by Post, with Wallace Wood and Ralph Reese inking the final issue.
- Anthro made a notable later appearance in Crisis on Infinite Earths #2 (1985), connecting the prehistoric character to DC's first major continuity-restructuring event.
- Grant Morrison made Anthro a structural pillar of Final Crisis (2008), with Metron of the New Gods gifting him fire at humanity's dawn; in the final issue, an elderly Anthro dies in a cave as a time-displaced Bruce Wayne watches over him — directly linking the 'first boy' to Batman mythology.
- The character has appeared in the animated series Batman: The Brave and the Bold, was referenced in the Arrowverse (The Flash), and appeared in the video game Scribblenauts Unmasked: A DC Comics Adventure.
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Reprinted in Tomajauk #175 (1970), Etranges Aventures #20 (1971)
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