Post 09 2020 June Huntress Trade
Stories Collected in
The Huntress: Origins Trade
That are in our Comic Book Library
Stories come from
DC Super Stars #17,
Batman Family #18-20,
(20 unavailable)
Wonder Woman #271-287, 289-290, 294-295 (Not available 271-273, 278-284, 294-295)
The Huntress Fact Sheet
PERSONAL DATA
Alter Ego Helena Wayne
Occupation Lawyer
Marital Status Single
Known Relatives Thomas and Martha Wayne (grandparents, deceased) Bruce and Selina Kyle Wayne (parents, deceased), Karl Kyle (uncle)
Group Affiliation Justice Society of America, Infinity Inc.
Base of Operations Gotham City
First Appearance ALL STAR COMICS 69
Height 5’ 10" Weight 127 lbs.
Eyes Blue
Hair Black
HISTORY
Helena Wayne was the only child of Bruce Wayne (Golden Age Batman) and Selina Kyle Wayne (Golden Age Catwoman) and grew up in the quiet household of Wayne Manor after her father’s semi retirement and her mother’s reformation. From birth Helena was trained to an extraordinary peak of physical and mental development, not because her parents had any special plans for her, but because they assumed such development was good for its own sake. At the same time she was exposed to the basics of crimefighting in stories her father told and watching the training he was giving to his ward, Dick Grayson.(Golden Age Robin)
Helena completed law school at the age most people graduate from college. She was about to begin her career when two tragedies ohanged her life. Cernak, a former Confederate of Selina Wayne surfaced and blackmailed Selina into one last crime. It was during this crime that Selina was killed by a bullet driven wild when Batman intervened. Bruce Wayne burned his cosume at Selina’s grave and a few days later Helena swore an oath of vengence and became the Huntress.
The Huntress captured Cernak and unknown to her father, she embarked on a heroic career with her father’s comrades in the Justice Society of America (JSA.) After Batman donned his costume one last time, and laid down his life to save Gotham from a super powered criminal, the Huntress, with the JSA, avenged Batman’s death.
Now alone, the Huntress became Gotham’s principal guardian and devoted far more energy to her secret udentity than to her conventional career as a lawyer. Helena worked for Cranston Grayson and Wayne, a public interest firm that counted Dick Grayson as a partner (although an inactive one). She later worked as a police liaison officer with the district attorney. Coincidentally Gotham DA Harry Sims was her lover.
POWERS AND WEAPONS
An Olympic level athlete , the Huntress is a master in many forms of physical combat, armed and unarmed. And is a skilled criminologist She also has an unusual ability to pick locks and other criminal techniques .
The weapons in her arsenal include a cross bow, dagger, and various items in her utilty bag or belt. Like her father, she has never used a gun.
The Forward To the Helena Wayne Huntress Trade:
Introduction by Paul Levitz
How about two introductions instead of one?
First, the contextual one:
In the seventies, comic fans turned professional had become, for the first time’ the dominant force in steering the destinies of their favorite characters. Ar DC Comics, that resulted in a lot of stories that experimented with continuity and the “Muitiverse” of worlds built up by that time: Earth-1 (where the heroes of the Silver Age had their adventures), Earth-2 (the Golden Age DC heroes), Earth-3 (where the super-villains ruled), Earth-S (with Captain Marvel and the Fawcett characrers), Earth-X (the Quality heroes) and even Earth-Prime (where heroes such as Julie Schwartz who along with Gardner Fox started this whole madness). Many of these stories were amazing explorations of alternate histories, opening up the imaginations of later generations to such an extent that in recent years Scientific America had a cover pay homage to the way the Schwartz titles depicted multiple Earths, and a horde of science fiction writers have made alternate history almost a separate genre. (many were, to be kind, a wee bit more self-indulgent.)
The storles in this book came about when DC relaunched Alll-Srar Comic, the traditional home of the Justice Society, the orginal Super-Team from tne 1940s. Gerry Conway instigated wrote and edited the relaunch but left after a few issues to briefly become editor in chief of Marvel. He left behind a style for the book, a cast of characters and a young assistant editor passionate about the JSA, would try to fill his more experienced shoes. The young man would take over as writer (with experienced vet Joe Orlando as editor), and procedes to add still more characters to the series,. largely because they were parts of the DC Golden Age mythology that he loved, and wanted to share with the readers.
Within a year, the young wrter was joined by two young artists who would both go on to have long and accomplished careers in the field. Joe Staton as penciler and Bob Layton as inker. Both were interested in the characters and prone to offer their own story suggesions as well. Layton argued for an Eath-2 Batgirl, Staton supported adding another woman to the team. Longtime colorist and then proofreader Anihony Tollin nudged the writer at a party and somehow the Hunress emerged. Staton added a sketch of the visual, and off she went into ation,
The stories in this volume were written over the four years that followed. After making a cameo in AIl Stor Comics #69. Her origin was featured in DC Super Stars i#17. and then the other short stories were serialized first in an anthology entitled Batman Family (don’t ask) and then as backups in Wonder Woman. The character gained a following and sustained her momenrum into the mid-1980s, when Crisis on Infinite Earths made her origin impossible as the Multiverse collapsed. and her then-series writer Joey Calvalieri shifted her to being a crime lord’s daughter instead.
Now, the personal one
When you read these stories. please remember that I began writing them when I was 20. Joe Orlando taught me many things over our years of friendship but the wisest was that readers can sense a storyteller’s sincerity (or lack of) and forgive many sins of craft on a sincere work. That certainly seemed to be true three decades ago when these stories came out. I had much more sincerity than craft, yet people seemed to enjoy the work, The Huntress became my most lasting contribution to the DC Universe, and remains a favored child. I write these words with Joe Staton’s painting of her staring down at me (a house warming gift for my first solo apartment, long ago), and the page of Helena swearing her oath still hangs on the wall opposite
I’ve learned many things in the decades since I wish I knew when I wrote these stories: craft, skills of writing, knowledge of human behavior, understanding of how men and women differ ( I simplified my approach in those early days by assuming that being a superhero was so much different from ordinary humanity than the mere differences that gender offered), and more. And I even had a daughter of my own,’ whose now is grown and gone to work for a real-world group that advocates in the public interest. But I also learned that Joe was right about sincerity and its importance and I hope you still can feel that youthful passion as you read these stories.
Welcorme Back
Paul Levitz
October 2006
Paul Levitz was DC’s youngest editor and contributed to the company as a writer, editor, and, ultimately, as its president and publisher