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Would U Buy It #90: "Black Lightning, Vol. 1-2"

Welcome Back to Would U Buy It! :^D

DateWUBI # 90:View:Attached to Forum:Back/ Next
09/04/13Black Lightning, Vol. 1-2(Blog) (Forum)Black Lightning(Back) (Next)
Special Note:
Would U Buy It has been on a long hiatus! The site redesign wreaked havoc on the images for the previous installments, and it's taken some time to figure out what I was going to do. I've finally figured out how to fix the ones I could, and the rest are waiting on the fantastic team of CV engineers to debug, so I can get back into them! Until then, I can at least create new ones, so here's hopefully just the first of many more WUBI's! -cb
Update 2/24/16: The last two finally unlocked! All WUBI's are now fixed and updated! Thanks, CV! -cb

We all have trade paperback (TPB) collections we'd like to see. Here are two of mine:

Proposed Title:Black Lightning, Vol. 1 & ...Vol. 2.
Vol. 1 Collecting 12 Issues:
  • Black Lightning (1977) #1-11
  • Cancelled Comic Cavalcade #1.
Vol. 2 Collecting 13 Issues:
  • DC Comics Presents #16.
  • Justice League of America #173.
  • Brave and the Bold #163.
  • World's Finest #256-261
  • Detective Comics #490-491, 494-495
Covers: (click to enlarge)
Vol 1 TPB Cover: Black Lightning (1977) #8
Vol 1 TPB Cover: Black Lightning (1977) #8
Vol 2 TPB Cover: Brave and the Bold #163
Vol 2 TPB Cover: Brave and the Bold #163

DC Comics' 1977 Black Lightning series deserves to be in trade paperback. The title post-dates Marvel's last issue of Black Goliath by several months, and is even two issues behind their Black Panther title, but this is the first series for DC's premiere black superhero! It's a little whacked out that a guy with so much power is trying to be a street vigilante, fighting gangs and pushers, but that was the times- if he was black, he had to be hood. He picks up his own sort of Kingpin in the form of Tobias Whale, and has an interesting encounter with Merlyn. Unfortunately, the title was victim to the infamous DC Implosion, and was cancelled with issue #11. There was a planned issue #12, and black-and-white copies of that were included in Cancelled Comics Cavalcade #1. I would include that material in the Volume One trade paperback, just for fun.

His title having ended in September, 1978, Black Lightning languished less than a year. By May, 1979, he was appearing in back-up tales of World's Finest, followed by a stint in back-ups of Detective Comics, and peppered with appearances in DC Comics Presents, Justice League of America and The Brave and the Bold. It's worth noting that the story from World's Finest #260 uses the material that was planned for Black Lightning #12, and previously only seen in Cancelled Comics Cavalcade. Thirteen issues of appearances in all, I'd collect these into Volume Two, in chronological order of publication:

Comic Title#Pub. DateStory Title
World's Finest256May 1979"Encounter With a Dark Avenger"
World's Finest257July 1979"Death Ransom"
World's Finest258Sept 1979"Blood of the Lamb, The"
World's Finest259Nov 1979"Last Hideout, The"
DC Comics Presents16Dec 1979"De-Volver!, The"
Justice League of America173Dec 1979"Testing of a Hero!"
World's Finest260Jan 1980"Lure of the Magnetic Menace" (aka BL #12)
World's Finest261Mar 1980"Return of the River Rat"
Detective Comics490May 1980"Black Lightning Strikes Out!"
Detective Comics491June 1980"Short Circuit"
The Brave and the Bold163June 1980"Oil, Oil... Nowhere!"
Detective Comics494Sept 1980"Explosion of the Soul!"
Detective Comics495Oct 1980"Animals"

For the cover of Volume One, I'd use Black Lightning #8. It's a cool shot of him fighting Tobias Whale. For Volume Two, there's less to choose from, because he wasn't on most of the covers. I'd go with The Brave and the Bold #163, because he's at least on the cover, and centered in the picture pretty well.

I think that's a whole lot of Black Lightning in two fantastic books! How 'bout you?

Would you buy it? Let me know in the comments, and thanks for reading.

*******

No Caption Provided

Moving this to the Black Lightning forum! Woohoo!

Thanks again for reading! -cb :^D
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