Kamandi and Mark Evanier

Drawn by Bruce Timm, colored by Jeremy Mace

DC Comics has announced that part of their celebration of the upcoming Jack Kirby Centennial will be their publication of a 12-issue Kamandi Challenge series with a different top creative team for each issue. What a great idea!

But as I read the news item announcing the series, a glaring omission from the list of creators shone so brightly as to nearly blind me. How could it be that the name Mark Evanier was not in that roster?

Mr. Evanier worked directly with Jack Kirby in the early 1970s including being involved during the preparation of 1972's Kamandi #1, and the gentleman went on to write the 1989-1991 incarnation of The New Gods as well as the first and last issues of the DC Challenge series of the 1980s. Surely these credentials qualify Mark to be invited to play in the Kamandi Challenge sandbox! If Mr. Evanier was asked to take part in this new Kamandi project, I wish he would have come along for the ride; if he was not asked to participate, the editors should be ashamed of their oversight.

Drawn by Jack Kirby