Karate Kid #15

Welcome to Karate Kid #15, the final issue of the series! Issue #15 is bittersweet. What started off as a fantastic start way back in issue #1, slowly turned into a villain of the month (or in this series, every two months), that ended here with a promise of change and taking the book into a different direction. But sadly, that different direction would not bear enough fruit to allow it to continue. But I will have more thoughts on this in the Creative Team section when we do a bit of a dissection and thoughts on the series as a whole, as well as this particular interesting, if not bizarre issue. 

So take that gee out of the closet for the last time, stripe on that white belt, and move to the center of the dojo to do one final battle in the heroics that is Karate Kid in his own book.

Bring Back My Future To Me

We pick up from last issue with Karate Kid carrying Iris Jacobs who is still in the form of Diamondeth in his Time Bubble in order to return to the 30th Century and use the future’s technology to cure her. However, as he alights from the craft he quickly sees two man-sized dogs wearing clothes and knows that he is not in the 30th Century. At least the one he knows.

He makes a pact that he will do whatever it takes to help Iris even if it means compromising on the deal he made with King Voxv and potentially losing Princess Projectra forever. But first thing is first and he suspects that the Lord of Time has sidetracked him once again and is forcing him to face yet another test.

Speaking of the devils, we return to Major Disaster and the Lord of Time watching Karate Kid on the monitor. Major Disaster asks him where he is because it is not the 30th Century and the Lord of Time confirms he is in the 30th Century, but in an alternate future. Major Disaster cannot believe that the Earth would be populated by walking and talking dogs and the Lord of Time suggests he observe some more for he will be in for some interesting surprises.

We return to Karate Kid who approaches the two ‘dogs’ and hears that one is speaking English with a British accent. One calls the other Mr. Bloodstalker and acknowledges that Karate Kid resembles another animal he knows, a human named Kamandi. Karate Kid warns them to stand back and he still believes the two of them were sent by Major Disaster. Bloodstalker and his companion try to reassure him that this is not the case, but Karate Kid decides to go on the offensive, and kicks Bloodstalker’s companion in the face. Bloodstalker declares him to be dangerous and takes out his gun to kill him, but Karate Kid has learned many fighting techniques, including one on a planetoid with low gravity. He launches himself in the air, does a backflip over the fired bullet, and delivers a mighty kick to Bloodstalker. As he studies the unconscious Bloodstalker and continues to wonder if they are costumes, he is zapped with a weapon and falls to the ground. 

A group appears out from the bushes and Doile congratulates Pyra for taking the shot. Bloodstalker slowly gets up and we get a pretty good look at him and see that he is wearing a tweed deerstalker hat, much like Sherlock Holmes. Bloodstalker deduces that this individual must have arrived from another era in that strange looking craft. In fact, it proves his theory that animals like Karate Kid and Kamandi must have once ruled the world as the animals now do and is from an era long ago. Karate Kid interrupts their thoughts and admits that he was wrong about them being part of Major Disaster’s plans, and quickly makes amends. With the misunderstanding out of the way, they introduce themselves. We learn that Bloodstalker’s companion is named Dr. Canus and we see another human like person named Spirit. They tell Karate Kid they are looking for their companion, Kamandi, who was abducted by lobster beings and they were unable to stop them. Karate Kid has heard enough and decides to reenter his time sphere to try to go back to the right era, but as he tries to activate it it does not respond. To his dismay he seems to be trapped in this strange world.

We zoom out once more and find The Lord of Time and Major Disaster watching the occurrence on their monitor. They are very pleased with themselves and decide to initiate phase two. We then move to an island off the coast of the Island of God-Watchers and view the same lobster beings who are currently surfing. Phase Two is creating another disaster, which is causing the tidal waves to run in reverse, completely baffling the surfing lobsters. They continue riding the waves and we quickly learn their destination is the current location of Karate Kid and his new friends. The waves are humongous and he suggests they get away as quickly as possible and to help him carry Diamondeth. He tells them to be careful because if they create too much contact it might cause her to go on a rampage. 

The waves launch the Lobsters from their surfboards and they land right in front of Karate Kid’s party. They look at Karate Kid and believe that they were brought to this location because of the gods, and that Karate Kid must be a god. They then ask Karate Kid to accompany them back to the Island of God-Watchers, which will be his home forever. Karate Kid responds with another flying kick, but it barely moves the Lobster. He then goes after another one, and hits it with his first, and pain rages up through his fist and to his arm. 

Studying the group of Lobsters, Karate Kid recalls how on Sirrili-XII, the human colony had to battle rock-creatures who were similar invulnerable to blows but they found one weak spot. And he takes a handful of sand and throws it in the Lobster’s face, blinding him. He then moves in to attack but a Lobster hits him from behind with one of his claws and knocks Karate Kid down. 

Meanwhile, not far away, Dr. Canus tells Pyra that this Diamoneth creature used to be human like Karate Kid. Pyra understands what Canus is telling her, and since she is able to change her own form, she can do the same for Diamondeth and it is worth an attempt. 

Now imagine you are Iris Jacobs. You have somehow been changed into a creature of solid diamond and in that form you have no comprehension of what goes on around you. Suddenly, you feel a second change coming over you, as you revert back to your original, human form, and the first thing you see, are two dog-like creatures and Pyra. And Iris screams in terror. Pyra quickly turns her back into Diamondeth because the sight terrified her so much it might have destroyed her mind and they cannot take another chance. But they can ask Karate Kid for guidance when he returns. 

When they return to the beach, to their disappointment they watch the Lobsters place Karate Kid on a surfboard and surf away. Dr. Canus and Bloodstalker jump in the water and just manage to reach the surfboard Karate Kid is bounded on just in time and grab it. If the Lobsters are taking Karate Kid back to their base, they just might lead them to Kamandi. 

And soon, on the Island of the God-Watchers, a strange ritual takes place, as Karate Kid is placed into a weird projector-like contraption. Meanwhile, Dr. Canus and Bloodstalker have stumbled onto the most fantastic outdoor drive-in ever imagined. They look at the movie screen and see Kamandi as the star of a movie, with the title Bruce Lee in Enter the Dragon on the screen. Bloodstalker points and exclaims that it is some kind of cinema and they recognize Kamandi. And then suddenly to their horror they see Karate Kid in mid-air about ready to kick Kamandi in the face. 

To be continued in…Kamandi #58, on sale May 2nd! And see our letters page for an important message about Karate Kid!

Creative Team

How far we have come to end things here, at a very weird crossover between Karate Kid and Kamandi. Now, Kamandi being the last human on Earth in the far far future, is actually inline with the whole time travel thing. But if you were not reading Kamandi, or have absolutely no clue as to what his books were about (this author included), you were probably scratching your head throughout the entire issue.

The cast of characters are weird, and the antagonists even more so. These big red surfer Lobsters, basically speaking in what I guess was ‘surf-talk’, using phrases such as Daddio, Far out, etc, just did not seem like a big threat to me. Other than Karate Kid not being able to knock them down, they did not do much of anything. 

And speaking of not doing anything, what is the point of the Lord of Time and Major Disaster? They were literally just standing around, doing nothing, and smply observing. Their reasoning for being a part of this issue or how they are manipulating events is not paying off at all. This has been a big waste of story. The only interesting, dramatic moment in this story was when Iris Jacobs turns back to herself for a brief moment of time and was forced to return to the form of Diamondeth, otherwise her mind would be destroyed from the shock. But the question is, do we even care at this point? Probably not. 

The obvious savior of the issue was Juan Ortiz. He had come a very long way in such a short amount of time with his art. He rocked the issue with the Robin team-up and he handled the moves and depictions of Karate Kid really well here. It is just too bad that he had some weird goofy characters to deal with. Kamandi barely appears in this issue and you just manage to get tiny glimpses of him, but it does look like Ortiz went with the Kirby look, which was not a bad thing.

With the series now finally over, it is obvious to me that their new approach was simply a Brave and the Bold/DC Comics Presents (which was actually starting up at the time this was released interestingly enough) approach and team Karate Kid up with characters in that time period. That is usually a last ditch effort because you hope to pull in fans from those books to the fledging one and obviously it did not work out.

Interestingly and in context, it does look like the book was one of the many victims of the so called DC ‘Implosion.’ I go to a bit more detail in this below within the Karate Comments section, but long story short, their advertised DC Explosion turned out to be the exact opposite. And they even knew it while the ads for the Explosion were running.

Regardless, this issue does have an ending and the editors do make the final announcement in Karate Comments. So unlike other comic book lines at the time, this does not include a next issue slug then only to silently end. So there is at least that.

When I sit back and think about this series, I definitely have mixed emotions. The series was all over the place, but there were definitely good, strong moments, such as the culmination of all the plot points when Val had to save Princess Projectra and King Voxv. Michelinie, writing as Barry Jameson, also had a couple of interesting villains, when it was basically a villain of the month book, but I think that is about it. It is painfully obvious that the editors and creators started something that they did not know what to do with or perhaps did not even care about. 

So there it is. Karate Kid does not end on a bang, but on a weird crossover with the Kamandi book, which also would end up being cancelled at issue #59. But because we, as comic collectors, are anything but completionists, we will include Kamandi #58 next week as part of our ad interim series so this is not the end of Karate Kid yet. Stay tuned Legionnaires!

Karate Comments

And what was that important message about Karate Kid? Well we have it at the bottom of Karate Comments. We also have around four letters, but they are not interesting because they are all about praise for the new direction despite the book being cancelled. I will mention one letter from Neil Durbin because the message also addresses it. Neil basically mentioned that if changes were not made, etc, the magazine would be cancelled…so I will post the important message below in full:

“To all of you who wrote in, praising our new direction for Karate Kid, and suggesting further renovations, we offer our thanks. Unfortunately, we will not have the opportunity to enact them, because what Neil predicted would not come to pass has happened; this is the last issue of KK! There are some big changes coming from DC in a couple of months and to make way, the books at the bottom of the list had to be cut. 

However, sales reports on our “new direction” issues are not yet in, so there is still a chance we could be back again in the future. Meantime, our current saga wraps up in Kamandi #58, on sale in early May, and then watch for our hero back where it all began in Superboy & the Legion of Super-Heroes!

For editor Al Milgrom, artists Juan Ortiz and Bob McLeod, and all the rest of the people who had a hand in KK, thanks for your support…and we’ll see you in the comics –Bob Rozakis”

So there you go. There are a few things we can read from this.

First, it looks like the book stopped doing well, if it ever did well. And based on the fact that it never came back, sales probably did not increase because of the new direction.

Secondly, there is an in-house add of the famous (or infamous depending on who you are talking to) of the DC Explosion, promising a bunch of new books starring some of the greatest characters in the DCU. But this turned into an implosion, because DC would actually end up cutting a bunch of books and not adding any new ones. If I had to guess and make an educated one, I would say that Karate Kid and Kamandi were probably not selling well and were at the bottom of sales.

If you are interested in this period, I can heartily recommend Rob Liefeld’s podcast, Robservations, who dedicates an entire episode to this. It is insanely interesting and worth the listen and you can see the same advert on the podcast page that is in this issue. 

Super-Karate Hour

With the final book in the series we have our second to last moment of Super-Karate Hour. The final one of course will be next week Tuesday’s ad interim as we look at Kamandi #58. 

So which moment is deserving for this penultimate edition? We had basically two moments, that looked very much the same. But it definitely was when Bloodstalker decided to put Karate Kid down with this gun. KK did a quick backflip, twirled in mid air, and delivered a descending kick right to Bloodstalker’s dog face. And it all lasted 0.18 seconds. That was pretty darn cool.

And that is it fellow Legionnaires! We do say goodbye to Karate Kid’s own book. I will write down some more thoughts and might create a little essay later, but I think we can conclude that although the whole series was a bit of a mess, there were still enough fun moments that put smiles on our faces. And if you are a big fan of Karate Kid as a character, picking up this series could really do you no harm. 

Until next time when we meet in Kamandi’s penultimate issue of his series, if you ever find yourself facing a giant dog-like creature, just remember what Bob Rodi said…

Keep kickin’.