Because publishers want you to buy their product every month, comics are typically serial in nature. However, occasionally (and more often nowadays than ever before) publishers launch a comic title that is only meant to last for one issue. While ongoing series often have multiple chances to hook in new readers, the comics highlighted in this ongoing investigations only had One-Shot At Greatness!
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Cover Date: November 1973
Cover Price: 20ยข
Writer: Larry Lieber
Artist: Larry Lieber
Back in the 1800s, Wayde Morgan convinced his father to hire the Rawhide Kid to herd cattle, despite his outlaw status. Unfortunately for Wayde, some true rustlers decided this was a wonderful opportunity for themselves. They killed Wayde, stole the herd and the blame naturally fell to the Rawhide Kid, due to his past reputation. The task fell to Wayde’s brother, Cliff, better known as the Dakota Kid to take in the Rawhide Kid. But, when he found the framed gunman, the Rawhide Kid was able to convince the Dakota Kid who the real criminals were. You can bet there was a lot of lead flying as Rawhide went after the guys who framed him … and Dakota avenged his brother’s death.
Larry Lieber (that’s Stan Lee’s younger brother, for those not in the know) actually managed to avoid the almost unavoidable hero vs hero battle in this story … twice! This is a very impressive feat, if you ask me … as it rarely passes that two “heroes”, meeting each other for the first time, don’t fight each other first. The art’s quite good, too although I’ve got to take some points away for leaving so many backgrounds completely blank. Also, every sentence ends with an exclamation mark! That kind of gets annoying after a while! It seems like everyone is yelling! Even if it’s just a regular sentence!
I’d say this is an important comic as it introduces the Dakota Kid but, even with my limited knowledge of Marvel westerns, I don’t think he ever appeared again. That being said, it’s yet another story in the well-documented life of the Rawhide Kid but, a rather unimportant one for him.
On Ebay: Rawhide Kid | Larry Lieber