The Deadly Hands of Kung Fu #12

History

Bill Mantlo wrote and the young George Pérez penciled the Sons of the Tiger feature 'The Crack of the Whip,' continuing what was by this point an established Mantlo-Pérez collaboration on the strip that had been building across multiple consecutive issues. The issue fell during the editorial tenure of Don McGregor, who oversaw issues #10–15 of the run and emphasised diverse anthology content while navigating distribution guidelines that required toning down excessive gore. Doug Moench scripted the Shang-Chi lead story, 'Blood of the Golden Dragon,' with art by Rudy Nebres — the same core creative pairing that anchored the magazine's flagship strip throughout much of its run. The magazine itself was published by Magazine Management (Curtis Magazines), Marvel's black-and-white periodical arm, which distributed through Curtis Circulation rather than the Independent News network used for Marvel's color titles, keeping it firmly in the magazine-rack ecosystem alongside other Code-exempt publications.

Trivia · 8 facts

• First appearance of Blackbyrd (Nathaniel Alexander Byrd), a former NYPD officer turned private investigator, in the Sons of the Tiger story 'The Crack of the Whip.'
• Blackbyrd's full name is Nathaniel Alexander Byrd; his street nickname originated, per the story itself, from friends on 125th Street and Lenox Avenue — a detail the narrative frames as an in-universe 'off-color joke.'
• The Sons of the Tiger story uniquely focuses on Abe Brown alone rather than the full trio, pairing him with the debuting Blackbyrd in a corruption-and-murder plot centered on a rogue oil company (Caxon Oil) and illegal plutonium smuggling.
• First appearances of Shadow-Thief (Cho Lee), Kwai, and Shareen occur in the Shang-Chi lead story 'Blood of the Golden Dragon,' scripted by Doug Moench with art by Rudy Nebres.
• Bill Mantlo (writer) and George Pérez (penciler) are the credited creative team on 'The Crack of the Whip'; the inking credit is variously listed across sources as 'The Tribe' or Rico Rival (see Flagged).
• The issue was published May 1975 (cover date) by Magazine Management/Curtis Magazines, a black-and-white periodical operating outside the Comics Code Authority.
• Blackbyrd went on to appear across the later issues of the 'Deadly Hands' run and crossed into mainstream Marvel continuity via 'Peter Parker, the Spectacular Spider-Man' #9–10, where he appeared alongside the White Tiger in a Bill Mantlo story.
• The entire run, including this issue, was collected in 'The Deadly Hands of Kung Fu Omnibus Vol. 1' (Marvel, November 2016), which gathered issues #1–18 plus the Special Album Edition.

Cast · 3 characters

Full credits

Key issues in The Deadly Hands of Kung Fu

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#22 1st appearance — Jack of Hearts

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#19 1st appearance — Hector Ayala

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#8 1st appearance — Lotus Shinchuko