Posted by Bill Reed, Friday, June 29th, 2007 7:32 PM DITKO WEEK Day Six is here! You know, I had an epiphany last night where I realized the true hidden theme amongst most of these Ditko entries. I shall reveal it in a few days time, because Ditko Week is extending through the middle of next week.
Steve Ditko gave us too much cool stuff for one week to contain. Today: An intriguing pair of characters who can t catch a break. (And remember to browse the archive.
) Hank and Don showed up in several guest appearances after their series ended, but they never gained prominence as a feature. In Crisis on Infinite Earths, Don was killed whilst saving a child, leaving Hank alone fighting crime as an even more violent and off-the-rails Hawk. That is, until Karl and Barbara Kesel brought in a new Dove, Dawn Granger, and launched a new series comprised of a five-issue mini and a 28-issue ongoing.
Yes, this was the book that jump-started Rob Liefeld s career. From Steve Ditko to Gil Kane to Rob Liefeld. Hawk and Dove were here revealed to be agents of the Lords of Chaos and Order, and, uh, other stuff happened.
I m afraid I ve never read the series, so I don t know if it was any good. Did any of you guys read it? What did you think?
I do know it was doomed, however. In the Armageddon 2001 crossover, a last-minute surprise twist was pulled, and Hank Hall was revealed to be the evil Monarch while Dawn Granger was killed. Originally, Monarch was going to be revealed as another Ditko creation, Captain Atom, but an early leak caused Hawk to become the fall guy.
The character never recovered, later becoming Extant and murdering half the Justice Society in Zero Hour. The less said of this, the better. Mike Baron came up with a completely new iteration of Hawk and Dove in a 90s mini-series, but I m told it wasn t very good.
Recently, yet another new Hawk and Dove were introduced Dawn Granger showed up all resurrected and stuff, and her never-before-seen British sister Holly became the new Hawk. They ve appeared in Teen Titans a few times, but that s about it. Man, Hawk and Dove have been treated badly in the grand scheme of comics, haven t they?
That really sucks, because there s just so much potential in the concept, and I absolutely hate to see potential go to waste. Take two politically and philosophically opposed characters who have a bond, be they siblings or lovers or what have you, give them super-powers reflective of their personalities, and send them out into a crazy world. I mean, it sounds good in theory, right?
So where s my awesome new Hawk and Dove comic? Huh? Bah.
But hey, at least they showed up in the JLU toon, voiced by, of all people, Fred Savage as Hawk, and Jason Hervey as Dove yes, the brothers from the Wonder Years, in a cool case of character role reversal. That was neat. Scott of Polite Dissent is probably the blogosphere s biggest Hawk and Dove fan.
Here s a link to his archive of Hawk and Dove reviews.
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