Challengers of the Unknown Archives Vol. 2

Rating:
Summary: Kirby's Last Stories of the Challengers of the Unkown
Review: DC split Kirby's run on the Challengers of the Unknown between two slimmer than average (hence the smaller price) DC Archives.

The Challengers of the Unkown were a group of adventurers who on the way to a tv show about them are involved in a horrible plane crash. They all survive and dedicate themselves to challenging the unkown, in the belief that they are now living on barrowed time.

EC and Marvel legend Wally Wood and oddly enough Kirby's wife Roz Kirby ink the tales in this volume to great effect. Wood refines and adds polish to Kirby's dynamic pencils.

The stories are on par with what was being done in DC's Mystery and Science Fiction titles of the time with more of an adventure twist.

Of note is the story "Menace of the Invincible Challenger" from Challengers of the Unkown #3. In the story one of the Challengers, Rocky, gains super powers from a space flight ala the Fantastic Four, but three years earlier.

Kirby eventually had to leave DC due to a problem over a comic strip he was producing, going over to Atlas, which would shortly become Marvel (and the rest is history).

Bear in mind that the Challengers of the Unkown primed both the pump for DC's and Marvel's silver age.

A good volume of seldom or never reprinted silver age stories.