Who's Who... SHADOW-THIEF

Who's Who: The Definitive Directory of the DC Universe was the first comic book I bought regularly, which led to a lifetime of comic book collecting.  The original series was published by DC Comics from cover date March 1985 to cover date April 1987, with updates and spin-offs published in the following years.

In all my years of collecting Who's Who, this is the most obscure find to date.

Following a miniseries (The Shadow War of Hawkman #1 to #4) and a special (Hawkman Special #1), Hawkman was given an on-going series, with issue #1 cover dated August 1986.  It included a single Who's Who entry (minus the trademark yellow border) for Shadow-Thief, a long-time Hawkman villain who was featured in that issue.  In the letter column which follows, writer Tony Isabella (now Jenny Blake) asks "Would you like to see more Who's Who pages like the one in this issue?  Or do you prefer two full pages of letters and answers?  Inquiring editors want to know."  

One of the things that makes this entry so interesting is that by the time Shadow-Thief appeared in the pages of Who's Who in issue #20 (cover dated October 1986) the artwork was drawn by a different artist: the legendary Joe Kubert.  


Did the fans write to Tony Isabella and request more Who's Who entries in Hawkman #2?  We will let you know when we track it down.  

The idea of including Who's Who entries in the back of a comic book would resurface in 1989, when many of DC's Annuals included entries.  Sadly, though, Hawkman's book was cancelled by that point.  It concluded with issue #17 cover dated December 1987.



  




 

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