Joe Kubert
Joseph Kubert (; September 18, 1926 – August 12, 2012) was a Polish-born American comic book artist, art teacher, and founder of The Kubert School. He is best known for his work on the DC Comics characters Sgt. Rock and Hawkman. He is also kno ...
and
Norman Maurer
Norman Albert Maurer (May 13, 1926 – November 23, 1986) was a comic book artist and writer, and a director and producer of films and television shows.
Comic books
Maurer's lifelong association with the Three Stooges began about the time o ...
in the story ''1,000,000 Years Ago!'' (Sept. 1953), published by St. John Publications. The series' protagonist, Tor, is a prehistoric cave man who has fantasy adventures set in a realistically drawn setting. The original series only ran for five issues and ended in 1954. "Tor" was revived by
DC Comics
DC Comics, Inc. (doing business as DC) is an American comic book publisher and the flagship unit of DC Entertainment, a subsidiary of Warner Bros. Discovery.
DC Comics is one of the largest and oldest American comic book companies, with thei ...
in June 1975 for six issues. In June 1993
Marvel Comics
Marvel Comics is an American comic book publishing, publisher and the flagship property of Marvel Entertainment, a divsion of The Walt Disney Company since September 1, 2009. Evolving from Timely Comics in 1939, ''Magazine Management/Atlas Co ...
released new adventures of Tor.
Concept
Tor is a prehistoric warrior. He is a loner whose only true friend is his pet monkey, Chee-Chee. Despite being drawn in a realistic style the stories were full with notable fantasy elements, including humans and
dinosaur
Dinosaurs are a diverse group of reptiles of the clade Dinosauria. They first appeared during the Triassic period, between 243 and 233.23 million years ago (mya), although the exact origin and timing of the evolution of dinosaurs is t ...
s living together in the same era and many animals being portrayed as prehistoric monsters, even ones who actually were herbivores.
Publication history
After his debut in ''1,000,000 Years Ago'' (St. John, September 1953), Tor immediately went on to become one of the first comic book characters to star in 3-D comic books. The second issue of that series was renamed ''3-D Comics'' before being renamed ''Tor'' with issue #3 in May 1954. At this point the series was once again in the traditional two-dimensional format. This series lasted until issue #5 (October 1954).
In an interview, Kubert said: "Certainly in a superficial sense, Tor was my
Tarzan
Tarzan (John Clayton II, Viscount Greystoke) is a fictional character, an archetypal feral child raised in the African jungle by the Mangani great apes; he later experiences civilization, only to reject it and return to the wild as a heroic adv ...
. Of course, Tor wasn't raised by apes. He was raised by other primitive men and women. I suppose Tarzan and Tor are similar in that they are superior to the others of their clan. But with Tor, I chose to emphasize that he had an extra spark of humanity, and was instinctively striving for a better, more civilized way of life than that of his brothers".
In 1959, Kubert and inker Carmine Infantino unsuccessfully attempted to sell ''Tor'' as a newspaper comic strip. The samples consisted of 12 daily strips, reprinted in six pages in '' Alter Ego'' #10 (1969) and later expanded to 16 pages in
DC Comics
DC Comics, Inc. (doing business as DC) is an American comic book publisher and the flagship unit of DC Entertainment, a subsidiary of Warner Bros. Discovery.
DC Comics is one of the largest and oldest American comic book companies, with thei ...
' ''Tor'' #1. DC Comics would publish the ''Tor'' series for 6 issues from 1974–1975.
Eclipse Comics reprinted the two ''3-D Comics'' featuring Tor, both in 3-D and non-3-D versions in 1986. As well, the magazine '' Sojourn'' featured new Tor stories by Kubert, and in 1993,
Marvel Comics
Marvel Comics is an American comic book publishing, publisher and the flagship property of Marvel Entertainment, a divsion of The Walt Disney Company since September 1, 2009. Evolving from Timely Comics in 1939, ''Magazine Management/Atlas Co ...
' Epic imprint published the four-issue miniseries ''Tor'', with new stories by Kubert, who had acquired and maintained rights to the character.
''Alter Ego'' #77 (May 2008) has a long article on St. John comics by noted comic historian Ken Quattro. The cover reprints the cover of ''Tor'' #3 from the original artwork and there is a Roy Thomas interview with Joe Kubert about his experiences at St. John.
Between 2001 and 2003, DC Comics published a three volume hardcover reprint series called ''Tor'', while in 2008, they published a new six issue miniseries. In 2009, DC published a hardcover collection called ''Tor: A Prehistoric Odyssey'', while in 2010 they published it in the softcover format.
A two-page story drawn by comics legend
Lou Fine
Louis Kenneth Fine (November 26, 1914 – July 24, 1971)Louis Fine at the United States
Wham-O
Wham-O Inc. is an American toy company based in Carson, California, United States. It is known for creating and marketing many popular toys for nearly 70 years, including the Hula hoop, Frisbee, Slip 'N Slide, Super Ball, Trac-Ball, Silly S ...
Giant Comics'' (1967), starred a prehistoric man named Tor, but this character is unrelated to the same-name Kubert creation.
Reception
In ''The Dinosaur Scrapbook'', Donald F. Glut wrote about ''Tor'': "Thanks to the work and obvious love that went into the series, what might have become a standard adventure strip, with man battling monster within the usual prehistoric-world settings, and situations, was elevated to art".
Bibliography of the original publication
The first six comic books starring Tor were published under three different titles — the second of these in multiple 3-D editions:
*''1,000,000 Years Ago'' (Sept. 1953)
:Tor in "Dawn", 11 pages + 1 extra page, 11-page reprint in DC's ''Tor'' #2; "Danny Dreams", 7 pages, reprinted in DC's ''Tor'' #2.
*''3-D Comics'' #2 (Oct. 1953)
:"Tor" 8 pages; "Fire", 6 pages; "Imagine", 3 pages, both reprinted in DC's ''Tor'' #6.
*''3-D Comics'' #2 (Nov. 1953)
:"Killer Man", 6 pages, reprinted in DC's ''Tor'' #4; "Giant-One", 10 pages + 2 extra pages, reprinted in DC's ''Tor'' #5; "The Run-Away".
*''Tor'' #3 (May 1954)
:"Isle of Fire", 11 pages reprinted in DC Tor 3; "Black Valley", 9 pages. reprinted in DC's "Tor" #4 with 1 extra page; "Danny Dreams", by
Alex Toth
Alexander Toth (June 25, 1928 – May 27, 2006) was an American cartoonist active from the 1940s through the 1980s. Toth's work began in the American comic book industry, but he is also known for his animation designs for Hanna-Barbera throughout ...
Three hardback books published as the "DC Comics Joe Kubert Library" reprints the St. John comics from the 1950s, the stories of DC's 1975 ''Tor'' #1-6, and the 1993 Marvel/Epic miniseries ''Tor'' #1-4:
* ''Tor, Volume One'' -
* ''Tor, Volume Two'' -
* ''Tor, Volume Three'' -
* ''Tor: A Prehistoric Odyssey''
Other similarly named cavemen
In 1941
Willy Vandersteen
Willy Vandersteen (15 February 1913 – 28 August 1990) was a Belgian creator of comic books. In a career spanning 50 years, he created a large studio and published more than 1,000 comic albums in over 25 series, selling more than 200 million c ...
already drew a gag-a-day comic about a caveman named ''Tor''. Later
Johnny Hart
John Lewis Hart (February 18, 1931 – April 7, 2007) was an American cartoonist noted as the creator of the comic strips '' B.C.'' and ''The Wizard of Id''. Brant Parker co-produced and illustrated ''The Wizard of Id''. Hart was recogni ...
had a caveman named Thor appearing in his gag-a-day series '' B.C. comic'', named after a friend whose name was Thornton Kinney.