Warlord Wednesday: Deathwatch

Let's re-enter the lost world with another installment of my issue by issue examination of DC Comic's Warlord, the earlier installments of which can be found here...

"Deathwatch"

Warlord #102 (February 1986)

Written by Michael Fleisher; Penciled by Paris Cullins and Martin King, Inked Pablo Marcos

Synopsis: Morgan veers slightly from his destination of the Greenfire Sea (where he hopes to find a wizard who can cure Jennifer from her aging illness) so he can go by his crashed jet and get more ammo from his stash.  He finds it (again) being used as a place a sacrifice by some cultists.  Morgan routs them and frees there intended victim, who turns out to be a bit on the haughty side:

She’s Zupara, Queen of the Q’enara Amazons, and rather than walk all the way back to her valley, she decides she’ll ride with Morgan until she can steal a horse.  Along the way, she tells the story of her tribe, who came to Skartaris from the surface eons ago to escape “the patriarchal domination of males.”

Zupara became queen on the death of her mother, but the attack of a river monster on the funeral barge caused her to be swept over a waterfall.  She wound up in the cultists’ hands.

It just isn't her day: No sooner has she finished her story, than they’re ambushed and netted by slavers!

Elsewhere, Machiste and Mariah encounter a beggar on the road from Shamballah to Kiro who knows who Machiste is and prophecizes that his reign will be marked by prosperity and he and Mariah will have many descendants.  As soon as the couple passes, the mendicant ties a message to the leg of a pigeon and sends it off.  Sometime later, it’s received in an opulent mansion in Kiro, where to conspirators learn of Machiste’s impending return and hint menacingly that he will never arrive.

Meanwhile, Morgan and Zupara are tied up in the slaver’s camp.  A dice game keeps their captors distracted long enough that they can cut their bonds and attack.  Beating up the slavers, they steal too horses and make for a nearby town for a good meal.

In a tavern, Zupara is disgusted by the behavior of men in regard to a dancing girl.  Worse yet, when a patron gets too friendly with Zupara herself:

Morgan finds himself in a tavern brawl. He fights his way to the door, pulling the reluctant Zupara along. She'd would rather stay and continue the fight.

Finally, they reach the borders of Zupara’s homeland, and they prepare to part ways.  Before they can, a contingent of amazons show up and seize Morgan!  It seems a big bald amazon has usurped Zupara’s throne in her absence and doesn’t want to relinquish rulership.  She challenges Zupara to trial by combat—with Morgan’s life in the balance, too!

After a pitch battle, Zupara wins and sees her foe topple into the flames. Zupara regains her throne and frees Morgan. She thanks him for his help—but tells him to be gone and never set foot in the land of the amazons again!

Morgan rides on.

Things to Notice:   

• Morgan's crashed SR-71 was used by lizardmen as a place of sacrifice back in issue #3.
• The amazon's have a sort of Kirby-esque aesthetic to their material culture.

Where it Comes From:
Amazons are sort of a comic book and pulp fiction stable who have there origins, of course, in Greek mythology. It seems odd it took them a 102 issues to show up in Warlord.

This issue may be inspired by to Warlord issues from the Grell run.  The "plane as altar" from the aforementioned issue #3. Issue #48 bears some similarities with its sacrifice that's more than she seems and Morgan himself having to be rescued (by a woman in both cases).

Contest Submissions Closed

The deadline for submitting entries for the Gimme Your Weird Adventures contest has passed. The response was bigger than I anticipated.  Thanks to everyone for their entries!

I've been reading them as they've come in, but the tough job of trying to choose between them looms.  If enlisted some help from a panel culled from my face to face gaming group.  I'll announce the results as soon as we finish our deliberations.

Hell's Hoods: The Bull

A river of blood arises from slaughterhouse and rendering plant runoff flowing through a maze of ditches and channels.  This is the Malebolge: the territory of an infernal crime family of the same name. Besides running the processing facilities for damaged souls, the Malebolge family promotes violent crimes and extortion on the Material Plane.

The family’s boss is the arch-devil Moloch. Whether dressed in a butcher’s apron or a suit, he’s imposing: a hulking figure with the head of a bull.  His upper body and head are skinless, and his horns and eyes are black as onyx.  Smoke periodically snorts from his nostrils. His shadow is thick and the color of congealing blood.

Combat: Moloch fights like a minotaur--and one of great strength.  He prefers to kill foes with his hands, horns, or hooves as opposed to weapons; He particularly disdains firearms.

Diabolical Abilities: Moloch’s presence can cause fear within a 20 ft. radius. He can cause pain in anyone he touches, but he only uses this to aid coercion or intimidation. Moloch has a special interest in drawing the young into the criminal life, and despite his horrific form, has an unusual affinity with adolescents.

Pacts: Moloch may be summoned by burning money (taken from another) within a circle drawn in blood on the floor of a meat locker. Moloch can cause an “accident” to happen to a place of business. He knows the location of any secreted stashes of money, and where the remains of any individual murdered and hidden on the prime material plane may be found.   

The City by Gaslight

Weird Adventures presents the City and it’s world in the year 5888, an era of automobiles, machine guns, and jazz.  Of course, that’s not the only age when there’s adventure to be had:

Roughly a hundred years ago, alchemical gaslamps began to appear in the streets of the City. For about forty years, their flickering lights held sway--but banishing the night didn’t always banish the darkness.

The little wars in the South and West created battle-hardened veterans and  returned them to the streets of the City ,where times were hard and opportunities few. Political corruption was the order of the day.  Immigrants streamed from all over the world to be crammed into the most crowded slums in existence where disease and crime were rampant.

And then, of course, there were the monsters.

Foes: Serial killer thaumaturgists, street gangs, corrupt politicians and their cronies, mad inventors.

Media Inspirations: Film/TV: Copper, Gangs of New York, Sherlock Holmes, Vidocq, The Wild Wild West; Books: The Alienist, The Dante Club, The Devil in the White City, the John Silence stories, the Carnacki Ghost-Finder stories; Comic Books: Batman: Gotham by Gaslight, From Hell (the movie, too), League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Weird Western Tales (2001).

Miscellaneous Inspirations: Jack the Ripper, Spring-Heeled Jack, Spiritualism,Steampunk.

The End is Near

The deadline for the Gimme Your Weird Adventures adventure seed contest draws nigh: Monday the 17th. So if you've been procrastinating, get those in!

For some further inspiration, here's Shane "Swords Against the Outer Dark" Mangus's great entry.

Lenny Goes Undercover

In last nights Weird Adventures WaRP game on Google+, the gang followed up on some leads but were still left with no clear idea of who killed the body of the now disembodied brain William Carmody or kidnapped his fiancee.  Without Diabolico in attendance, they had no car, so that meant a lot of cab rides.

First, they crashed the Cobalt Club to check try to dig up something on industrialist Hew Hazzard, who Carmody had been working with. This involved overall wearing Lenny having to wear a coat and tie. Loone pretended to be a reporter out for an interview, but no headlines were made from his chat with Hazzard.

Next, Lenny went undercover to infiltrate Waxy Moldoon's gang.  He had impressed Two Teeth (a suboordinate) with his moxie last time and got offered a job. Lenny got a chance to prove himself in front of the boss by applying "harsh interrogation" to an Eisenmensch they had captured.  What did thaumatosurgically altered cyborgs from the Great War have to do with this?  Well, Waxy seemed to think they had the dodecahedron (or "dingus" as he called it).

Either the guy didn't know anything or wasn't talking, and Lenny contrived to bust him out and escape, which he did with the help of a fire started by Boris, telepathically coordinated by Loone.  Before that, though, Lenny almost lost control to his "imaginary" rabbit-like companion who wanted him to kill them all:

After they made their escape under the goons' guns, they used a bit of gentler interrogation on Karl the Eisenmensch.  he still claimed to no nothing, but Loone's peaks into his mind revealed he did know of a group of Eisenmensch that were good candidates for having the device, and a place called "Greasy Lake" seemed important.  Boris recalled there was a big junkyard at a place called Greasy Lake.

The gang decided to find Diabolico and check it out.

Warlord Wednesday: Temple of the Demigods

Let's re-enter the lost world with another installment of my issue by issue examination of DC Comic's Warlord, the earlier installments of which can be found here...

"Temple of the Demigods"

Warlord #101 (January 1986)

Written by Michael Fleisher; Penciled by Adam Kubert, Inked Pablo Marcos

Synopsis: Mariah, Machiste, and Tara stand at the now mysteriously aged Jennifer’s bedside.  They helpfully fill us in on events since last issue. Morgan has decided that Jennifer’s malady was the result of mystical spillover from Cykroth, and has headed off to find a warlock he’s been told might be able to help.

On his journey, Morgan has already run into trouble. He’s ambushed by a group of Vashek assassins—now cut loose with the defeat of their master. Morgan dispatches them all not before taking an arrow in the shoulder, himself.  After tending the wound, he rides on.

Arriving at the warlock’s abode, Morgan finds him to be a bit unusual even by Skartarian magical practitioner standards:

The warlock (Muldahara) thinks he can help, but he wants Morgan to steal a “pair of lovely baubles” called the Eyes of Arachnar (or “Ankanar” as it appears the rest of the issue) for him.  Morgan (oddly given his former behavior) is iffy about stealing from a temple, but Muldahara assures him this is a bad cult that strong-arms the people.  Morgan agrees.

Arriving at the temple, he climbs it and enters through an open window.  In case he needed proof of their badness, he overhears a group of priests gloating about robbing the peasantry.  He makes his way to the treasure room:

Then, Morgan notices two saddlebags brimming with gold.  The implication of that only begins to dawn as the garrote slips around his throat.  The Warlord doesn’t go down that easy!  He throws the assailant:

They briefly tussle until she realizes Morgan must be a thief like her.  She suggests they split the take and get out quick. 

They aren’t quick enough as a priest arrives.  The thief puts a bola around his neck, but he’s still able to mumble an incantation as they’re gathering treasure.  The idol undergoes a startling transformation:

Morgan whips out his pistol, but it turns out Ankanar is immune to normal weapons.  The thief has heard the creature will only go dormant again after it’s devoured a human soul.  Luckily, it’s not picky as to where that soul comes from.  The thief drop kicks a priest into its jaws.  Ankanar turns back into a statue again.

The two thieves grab up some treasure and make a break for it, the understandably irate priests at their heels. Morgan shoots a chandelier, dropping it on their pursuers. The thieves climb out the window and make it to their horses.  They go their separate ways, but not before:

Morgan takes the eyes of Ankanar to the warlock—who promptly makes them into earrings. When Morgan tries to claim his payment, it turns out the Muldahara misled him.  He can’t actually help Jennifer—but he quickly adds he knows who can: V’Zarr Hagar-Zinn, wizard and surviving member of an ancient race. He dwells in the House of the Celestials on the shores of the Greenfire Sea.

Morgan heads out, promising to come back and see Muldahara if he has lied.  The warlock watches him go:

Morgan returns to Shamballah only long enough to say good bye to his wife and daughter before he’s off on his quest.

Things to Notice:   

• This issue sports a Grell cover just like the last.
• Mariah seems really broken up about Jennifer's condition. She's the only one crying.
• Shakira is no where to be seen in this issue.

Where it Comes From:
Looking for a magical practitioner with knowledge, only to be sent on a quest to steal something from a temple is the same plot as Warlord #16.  There, the practitioner was Saaba, and the child Morgan was trying to save was Joshua. Morgan has qualms about robbing a temple in this issue and justifies it to himself with the knowledge the priests are thieves, themselves.  He expressed no such reservations when he stole the eye (and again the eye!) from the Tree People's idol in the aforementioned issue.

The blonde thief in this issue fills a role (at least for one issue) not dissimilar to Bashir (in terms of thieving, not flirting with Morgan), who disappeared completely when Fleisher took over.