Sunday, April 27, 2008

Lancelot Strong: The Shield #1 & #2 (1983)



From Wikipedia:

In June of 1959, a new Shield was published by Archie that had no connection to the previous version.

Joe Simon and Jack Kirby had been hired by Archie to create characters for a new "Archie Adventure Series" line of superheroes (later known as Mighty Comics). They created a new Shield, whose real identity was Lancelot Strong, who appeared in a new title, The Double Life of Private Strong. Most collectors refer to this Shield as "Lancelot Strong" to differentiate him from the previous one.

Lancelot's scientist father developed a method to create a superhuman by expanding the mind, which he used on his infant son. After his father was killed by foreign agents, Lancelot was adopted by a farm couple and raised as their son. Once he hit his teens, he discovered the truth of his background and his powers: strength, flight, near-invulnerability, vision powers, generate lightning, and a few more. His father had created a patriotic costume for him, and he started off as the new superhero, the Shield. He soon joined the Army, acting like a Gomer Pyle-style country bumpkin, while leading a double life as the Shield (hence the title of his comic). DC cried 'foul', claiming this new Shield was too similar to Superman, so after 2 issues, his comic ended.

He would also appear in a few issues of The Fly (#4, 8, 9). He would not again appear until Archie again revised their superheroes under the Red Circle Comics line of the 80s. There he appeared in the Mighty Crusaders and got his own title Lancelot Strong, Shield. It lasted 2, issues, was retitled Shield-Steel Sterling with the third issue. In that issue he would be killed off, and the title continued as Steel Sterling until issue 7.

Joe Simon, his creator, is the owner of this character. The first issue of The Double Life of Private Strong was reprinted, almost in its entirety, in Blue Ribbon Comics volume 2, issue 5. There have been no attempts at a comprehensive reprint of the original stories and issue 2 still remains unreprinted anywhere.



Download Links (Hosted by Rapidshare)

Lancelot Strong: The Shield #1 CBZ file

Lancelot Strong: The Shield #2 CBZ file

1 comment:

Doc Savage said...

I really never saw any similarity to Superman aside from
the similarities all super heroes share with him.