The Defenders #51
☆ Be the first to review + Add to your collection — Join freeThe Defenders #51 serves as the direct epilogue to David Kraft's acclaimed 'Who Remembers Scorpio?' arc, closing out Moon Knight's Bronze Age stint with the team and pivoting the series toward new territory with two fresh character debuts. Anthony Davis — the Ringer, a gadget-villain built around a conceit of titanium hoops — makes his first appearance here, going on to become a recurring presence in the Marvel street-level pantheon. Equally significant for the book's long run are the simultaneous first appearances of Dollar Bill and Horace Ledge, two civilian characters who would anchor Valkyrie's college-life subplot and give the Defenders' chaotic found-family dynamic a distinctly '70s, campus-politics flavor. The issue also quietly marks the end of Moon Knight's extended guest arc — one of his highest-profile appearances before his 1980 solo launch — cementing the Defenders as the unlikely proving ground for the character's growing heroic identity.
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We Buy Collections ▸History
Written by David Anthony Kraft and drawn by Keith Giffen with inks by Klaus Janson, the issue was edited (and overseen at the editorial-in-chief level) by Archie Goodwin, whose steady hand shaped the Defenders through this particularly fertile stretch of Bronze Age storytelling. The cover — penciled by George Pérez and inked by Pablo Marcos — depicts Nighthawk in a bondage-adjacent struggle with the Ringer, a composition that became a minor touchstone of mid-period Pérez cover work on the title. Giffen's penciler credit is misspelled inside as 'Keith Giffin,' a production error preserved in the original printing. The issue shipped in June 1977 with a September 1977 cover date, placing it squarely in Marvel's transitional summer distribution window, and appeared in at least four simultaneous formats: the standard 30-cent edition, a limited-distribution 35-cent price variant, a Whitman variant, and a British 12-pence edition.
Trivia · 8 facts
- First appearance of the Ringer (Anthony Davis), a ring-based gadget villain who later also operated under the alias Strikeback.
- First appearances of Dollar Bill and Horace Ledge (Ledge), civilian supporting characters introduced through Valkyrie's new college life at Empire State University.
- Serves as Moon Knight's farewell appearance in his extended Defenders guest arc (issues #47–51), a key bridge between his Marvel Spotlight solo stories and his 1980 ongoing series.
- Written by David Anthony Kraft, penciled by Keith Giffen (misspelled 'Giffin' in the credits), inked by Klaus Janson, with a cover by George Pérez and Pablo Marcos; Archie Goodwin was editor.
- Released June 14, 1977 (September 1977 cover date); published in a standard 30-cent edition, a limited-distribution 35-cent price variant, a Whitman variant, and a British 12-pence edition.
- Nick Fury offers Jack Norriss a position at S.H.I.E.L.D., while a parallel subplot shows Red Guardian (Tania Belinsky) being taken to a mysterious Russian project — threads seeded for future issues.
- Reprinted in Essential Defenders Vol. 3 (2007) and Marvel Masterworks: The Defenders Vol. 6 (2018); excerpts also appear in the Moon Knight Omnibus Vol. 1 (2022) and Moon Knight Epic Collection Vol. 1: Bad Moon Rising.
- The cover's Nighthawk-in-bondage composition is sometimes cataloged under that descriptor in collector shorthand, distinguishing it visually from the ensemble covers typical of the run.
Cast · 24 characters
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Reprints
Reprinted in I Difensori #11 (1980), Les Défenseurs #2 (1981), Essential Defenders #3 (2007), Moon Knight Epic Collection #1 (2014), Marvel Masterworks: The Defenders #6 (2018), Moon Knight Omnibus #1 (2020)
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