Issue(s): Ka-Zar the Savage #34
Cover Date: Oct 84
Title: "Savage in a strange land"
Credits:
Mike Carlin - Writer
Paul Neary - Penciler
Carlos Garzon - Inker

Review/plot:
Originally i stopped following Ka-Zar when Bruce Jones left the series and then i guess at some point i decided to stop back in to see how the series ended, but whoo-boy is this not the sort of story you want to pick up mid arc. I've subsequently filled in the remaining issues and it turns out that this is pretty much a standalone story. The discovery of the bone happened last issue but that's nearly incidental. So the feeling that i was missing something is really just due to the deliberate genre-crossing plus Mike Carlin's not exactly great writing style.

We've got Bones of Teleportation...

...aliens, other dimensions, space battles.

Not the sort of thing you expect to see in Ka-Zar. Not saying there's anything wrong with that, but it's an odd way for the series to go out. You'd think you'd have him fighting a dinosaur or something. And with Carlin writing, there's not much going on characterization-wise.

This issue also has the origin of the Savage Land. The area was one of many such zoological preserves created by the Nuwali aliens that appear in this arc.

They did so on behalf of a "greater race". We'll eventually learn that their employers were the Beyonders. And their employers failed to pay them, and the plot of this issue is actually their long-term plan for vengeance getting foiled by Ka-Zar.

Frankly, it's not exactly an inspired origin. For some reason, i was always under the impression that the Celestials created the Savage Land. Don't know where i got that from. Probably inferred it after Terminus finds a Celestial device in the Savage Land in Avengers #256. But that story never says anything more about that.

But regardless, the Nuwali are pretty cool looking.

The Nuwali's plan is to poison their former employers, and their choice of poison is human adrenaline, which is toxic to them.

So over the years, they've been using the bone of teleportation - the Motyka Bone - to transport members of the Savage Land's Karem tribe to their planet, where they drain their adrenaline and their willpower.

Ka-Zar, of course, has lots of adrenaline.

It's not said how the Nuwali plan to actually poison the Beyonders since, as we'll learn in later stories, they've never actually met in person.

We also find out this issue that Shanna is pregnant.

Much more fun is the back-up story. Ka-Zar returns to the Land of Cancelled Heroes.

Heh. Ka-Zar tells the others that he's had his comic terminated more often than any other character in the Marvel Universe...

...but he'll continue striving and he'll be back eventually. Funny stuff.

Quality Rating: C-

Historical Significance Rating: 3 - origin of the Savage Land. Shanna the She-Devil is pregnant.

Chronological Placement Considerations: N/A

References:

• The reason the Savage Land continued to exist after the Nuwali stopped maintaining it was shown in Ka-Zar the Savage #31. Basically, the Atlanteans took over, and expanded it to create Pangea.

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A

The "coming soon" sign refers to Crystar, another book based on an action figure license.

In early 1984 there were stories for Shanna and the Angel announced for Marvel Fanfare by Claremont/Bret Blevins, but I don't know if they got published.

I remember the back-up story like it was yesterday. Fortunately, he got another chance in the late '90's when Mark Waid and Andy Kubert revived him. Loved that run, especially making seemingly mismatched foes like Thanos and the High Evolutionary work. That run did lose steam the last six issues, not because of Christopher Priest but Kenny Martinez' art style was such a dramatic departure from Kubert's cinematic renderings. Thought Martinez' Ka-Zar and Punisher looked like Cro-Magnon men!