The Green Hornet #1

History

NOW Comics—a Chicago-based independent publisher best known for Speed Racer—acquired the Green Hornet license in the late 1980s and tapped Ron Fortier to script the series; Fortier later asserted to the Grand Comics Database that he personally created the book's continuity and generational framework. Interior art was handled by penciller Jeff Butler and inker David Mowry, with painted colors by Suzanne Dechnik, giving the book a cinematic, photo-realistic look that suited Fortier's grounded crime-story tone. The cover—a striking painted image of the Hornet, Kato, and Ruth—was contributed by industry veteran Jim Steranko, whose participation lent the premiere issue significant marquee appeal; NOW later released that painting as a standalone lithograph. Editor Tony Caputo oversaw the release, which shipped as a double-sized, 52-page 'Premier Collector's Edition' and sold through enough copies to warrant a second printing with an alternate cover.

Trivia · 8 facts

• Published by NOW Comics, cover-dated November 1989; a 52-page double-sized premiere edition edited by Tony Caputo.
• Written by Ron Fortier with pencils by Jeff Butler, inks by David Mowry, and a painted cover by Jim Steranko—who also contributed interior painted colors via Suzanne Dechnik.
• The single story, 'My Last Case,' is structured as a memoir written by the original Britt Reid in 1955, recounting his final case as the Green Hornet in December 1945 against crime boss Gatland Tobias.
• First comic-book appearance and formal naming of Ikano Kato as the original Kato—depicted as Japanese, with the in-story revelation that Britt Reid publicly identified him as Filipino during WWII to prevent him from being sent to an American internment camp.
• The issue includes the Reid Family Tree and the Kato Family Tree bonus features by Fortier, establishing the full multigenerational continuity that would drive the entire NOW series.
• The story establishes Britt Reid's ancestor John Reid (the Lone Ranger, unnamed due to legal separation of the two properties) as the inspiration for the Green Hornet identity, and closes with young Britt II expressing his desire to one day carry the mantle.
• The issue received a second printing with an alternate cover, and the story was also reprinted in The Green Hornet Special Hard Bound Collector's Edition (NOW, 1990).
• Steranko's cover painting was subsequently released by NOW as a limited lithograph, as announced in a later issue of the series.

Cast · 7 characters

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Variants (1)