KILLRAVEN 347
he chose to withdraw from the project, enlisting Gerry Conway to script it in his stead
(Conway would provide the lead character’s name, Killraven). Preferring to work with
Th omas, Adams in turn then withdrew as well, with the result that the fi rst issue was
co-plotted by both Th omas and Adams, scripted by Conway, and drawn by both Adams
and Howard Chaykin , each of whom did half the issue. Th ough published in Marvel’s
Amazing Adventures title, the series’ covers would read either “War of the Worlds” or
“Killraven, Warrior of the Worlds” in large letters, and subsequently Killraven’s series
was occasionally, if inaccurately, referred to by those names. Conway and Chaykin each
remained with the book for only one more issue, to be replaced by Marv Wolfman
and Herb Trimpe; after one issue Wolfman was followed by Don McGregor. Trimpe
remained for fi ve issues, and after one-shot penciling fi ll-ins by Rich Buckler and Gene
Colan the artistic duties were assumed by P. Craig Russell with issue #27.
After this early creative turnover, the writing and art team of McGregor and Russell
became the series’ signature team, remaining with Amazing Adventures throughout its
run, excepting one fi ll-in issue. Russell’s art was highly detailed and had a distinctive
fantastic tone that, while potentially awkward in Marvel’s mainstream superheroic titles,
elegantly suited Killraven’s science fi ction / fantasy future world. Under McGregor
and Russell’s stewardship, Killraven would refl ect the social concerns of the 1970s
(McGregor’s simultaneous work in Jungle Action , featuring the Black Panther , would
be similarly noted for its social consciousness). Th e book’s cast included both sexes and
characters of diff erent race and ethnicity fi ghting side by side, and in 1975’s issue #31,
two regular cast members shared what is believed to be color comics’ fi rst interracial
kiss, an event which stirred much debate within the company beforehand, but very little
outside notice once it was actually published. Several Killraven stories dealt with the
eff ects of technological changes on humanity, while many others dealt with the roles of
innocents pulled into a war against their wishes (refl ecting the recent Vietnam confl ict).
In issue #34 two regular cast members were killed (then a rarity in mainstream serial
comics), as the creators felt that portraying a group as fi ghting a war without suff ering
personal losses was dishonest.
As the book took place in the future years of 2017–18, it had few ties to the superhero
characters of the Marvel universe. Issue #38 included a virtual reality simulator in which
an aging Earth astronaut visualized the heroes of his youth, while outside Amazing
Adventures , Marvel Team-Up #45 had a time-lost Spider-Man aiding Killraven. During
this same period, a far-future series, the Guardians of the Galaxy (in Marvel Presents ),
was stated to take place 1,000 years into Killraven’s future. Despite these loose ties, Kill-
raven’s series stood on its own, a post-apocalyptic science-fantasy series. Years later, a
diff erent future Earth’s Killraven would appear in 1999’s Avengers Forever , and in 2007
the Wisdom series, set in Marvel’s mainstream universe, would feature a heroic Maureen
Raven and briefl y mention very her young son Jonathan.
Amazing Adventures was canceled in 1976 with issue #39, but McGregor and Rus-
sell would return in 1983 to create an oversized Killraven graphic novel (originally
intended for serial publication in Epic magazine) titled Killraven: Warrior of the Worlds.
