KMC Forums - what if Karate Kid had found the Cytorrak gem

quote: (post)
Originally posted by Max Spidey 24
ha all this time i thought karate kid was that show with the old man and crap.

Yes please read:

The Karate Kid was the name of a character in DC Comic's "Legion Of Superheroes" who was a member of the Legion. DC Comics, which owned the name, gave special permission for the title to be used. There's a thank you to DC Comics for allowing the use of the name at the end of the credits.

QUOTE=4207100]Originally posted by CorderaMitchell
Put some pics up. [/QUOTE]

Of course but first a DC history lesson younguns big grin

except Karate Kid (awww). From DC's on-again-off-again attempts of the Seventies, here's what I believe to be the only comic book featuring a kung-fu artist from the future ... though I expect to be proven wrong.

Our Karate Kid is actually Val Armorr, a citizen of 30th-Century Earth and a member of DC's perennial fan-favorite team book, the Legion of Super-Heroes. Feeling his "powers" don't quite match up to the earth-shattering abilities of his allies -- and how could he compare to super-powered teens who make "zap," "bam," "pow," and "bzzzz" noises with such relative ease -- he hops a Time Bubble and heads for an era where his intensive training in assorted martial arts could be put to better use.

The Boxer Rebellion!

No no, I kid. He goes to (naturally) 20th century Earth* where - instead of having to match up to human-powerhouses like Mon-El, genius intellects like Braniac 5 and energy wielding wonders like Sun Boy - he merely has to compete in the same arena with human-powerhouses like Superman, genius intellects like Batman, and energy-wielding wonders like Firestorm, the Nuclear Man.
Despite his timely themes, the Kid actually predates the martial arts craze that raged through comics in the mid-Seventies; he is far less contemporaneous with Bruce Lee's Enter The Dragon than he is with Bruce Lee's Kato ... Karate Kid first appeared in Adventure Comics' Legion feature back in the Sixties.

However, Lee's seminal Enter the Dragon debuts in 1973 and by 1974 martial arts comic books are beginning to flood the market. As Marvel (and several 'upstart' companies) start to find a sufficiently profitable cult success with martial arts-themed books like Shang-Chi, Master of Kung-Fu, DC promotes Karate Kid to his own title while creating another equally short-lived kung-fu book, Richard Dragon. Karate Kid sure did try, and there's a few things I enjoyed about it. Like a number of DC's short-lived Seventies titles, the Kid got to test his skills out on perennial bad guys Neo-Nazis - in this case, the thinly-disguised snappy dressers in bright red costumes, the NuRike (One-half the calories of a regular Reich)!

Also - and this is wholly the effect of artists Ric Estrada (no, not that Ric Estrada) and Joe Staton - Val's New York is a cartoony, desolate landscape or surreal proportions. Buildings are terrific monoliths in an indeterminate distance, often lonely pillars against a red background unmarked by similar towers and buildings. And the splash panel of issue two is a dreamy Eisner-esque ... well, sort of, I guess ... liquid landscape that peels itself right off the page and into a Riverdance performance. It's bizarre. I kinda like it.

And although the splash page of the second issue promised "Martial Arts Action like you've never seen before!" it actually delivered Martial Arts diagramming like you've never seen before. Perhaps taking its lead from DC's long tradition of adding "scientific facts" to its stories (Anyone here remember "Flash Facts?" or those Planetary Science bits they used to run in Mystery In Space?), KK:the book doesn't actually so much show the martial arts action as it does an occasional diorama explaining the action

*Seems whenever a Legionnaire gets a mini-series, it's to introduce him to modern day 20th century Earth. Valor (nee Mon-El) started off as a twentieth century hero, and although his fan base was created in the pages of the futuristic Legion of Super-Heroes, his series placed Valor in the early Nineties. Cosmic Boy's mid-Eighties miniseries had him travel to then-modern-day America, and Timber Wolf - in a miniseries which ran shortly after Valor's - ends up in San Francisco, also modern day.

Now Nemesis Kid is the real deal big grin

learn padawans big grin

History

Val, named for his mother, Valentina, who died shortly after he was born, was the only son of Kirau Nezumi, a Japanese super-villain also known as the Black Dragon. Japan's "siuper-hero," the Sensei, killed Black Dragon, then promised to raise the villain's son as his own, teaching him not only the martial arts but also an appreciation for more peaceful pastimes such as sculpting and painting. Val grew up in Japan, later moving to Metropolis to join the Legion. He viewed it as a challenge: how to make himself, a non-powered human, into a Legionnaire. By that time, he had established a proficiency in all forms of hand-to-hand combat and hand weaponry, with a special talent for karate. Focusing on this self-created super-karate, he tried out for the Legion on the eve of the Khund invasion and was accepted along with Princess Projectra, Ferro Lad and Nemesis Kid.
Successful in his Legion career, he eventually served as leader for one half-year term. He and Projectra fell in love and were married after Val took a trip back to the 20th Century to prove his fortitude to her father. Val and Projectra left the Legion and moved to Orando, staying away from super-heroics until the LSV invaded that world. Karate Kid was severely beaten by Nemesis Kid, then nearly died trying to destroy a device the villains had erected to shunt Orando into another dimension.

Keep the faith big grin

Keep it Whirly angel