Tarzan
and Paul d’Arnot find Major James Barton and his niece Ruth Barton, who
are searching for the lost city of Tohr. Their safari deserted them. Tarzan
agrees to take them to a native village.
Tarzan fights with natives
as the others take a native’s canoe down river. Tarzan swims to join them.
They round a bend in the river
and are carried into a hole in cliff. On the other side by a waterfall,
Mungo and other yellow men with claw feet approach them. They are taken
to the Tohr.
Mungo brings them to Queen
Ahtea. She leads them to the Hall of Pantu where they witness the death
of a rebel placed on a grill between the arms of the statue of Pantu, a
solid gold idol with a lion’s head and a man’s body. The fires of Tohr
consume the victim. Ahtea says the others can leave if Tarzan becomes her
husband. Otherwise their fates are doubtful.
In an arena, Toldo, the lion
guardian of the treasures of Tohr, is released on Ukah, son of Attar, the
rebel leader. Ahtea throws Ruth into the arena. Tarzan leaps into the arena
and kills Toldo. Everyone brought to the throne room. Tarzan refuses Ahtea’s
offer. They are thrown in a dungeon.
In the dungeon, Tarzan takes
them up to a ledge and into a tunnel. A black panther confronts them. Tarzan
holds sheeta at bay while the others slip into the passageway. They cross
the natural bridge over the fires to Tohr and into an armory.
They are recaptured and taken
to the Hall of Pantu. Tarzan again refuses the Queen’s offer. Ahtea shoves
Ruth towards the fire of Tohr. Ukah pushes Ruth from Ahtea’s arms, grabs
his Queen. Ahtea slips from Ukah’s grasp and falls into the fire. The people
of Tohr choose Ukah’s father as their new leader. Mungo will lead Tarzan
and his friends to a settlement. End.
Tarzan
and the Fires of Tohr is based on a radio drama of the same name, which
never aired. There are many similarity and differences between the two
stories, but essentially they are both the story of Ahtea’s obsessive love
for Tarzan and her ultimate demise. If one has no knowledge of the radio
play, you would find this to be a very tight story that allows Tarzan to
be very heroic and has a familiar female antagonist similar to La and Nemone.
This reviewer also questions why the writer changed Burton to Barton and
Jeanette to Ruth when all the other names and places remained the same.
Mungo and his people have claw feet in the comic probably to make them
more mysterious whereas the claw-footed yellow men in the radio are viscous
mutants of the yellow people of Tohr. With the knowledge of the radio play,
one wonders why they cut so many great scenes and limited this to just
thirty pages. They included a second story to this issue of eighteen pages
that could have very easily been used to extend The Fires of Tohr
and illustrated more of this interesting tale.
Tarzan
wears leopard skin tights reminiscent of previous Tarzan in the funny papers.
The Tarzan is the monthly series will sport a lion-skin loin cloth. Paul
d’Arnot wears a kaki shirt, blue shorts, and a pith helmet. His face and
goatee will be exactly same as when drawn for Dell #1. At one point d’Arnot
smokes a pipe. Marsh uses a good blend of close up and middle distance
drawings, which creates a nice variety for your eyes. Every once in awhile,
he will use a bird or worm’s eye view or foreshortening, which produces
the same effect. The native warriors are depicted as fierce and menacing.
As the party travels through the mountain tunnel in the canoe, a complete
black panel is used. (Something Marsh will use again in future issues.)
Mungo, a leader of the claw men, is drawn with a Mohawk and corn rowed
hair. The city of Tohr from a distance is a strong panel as well as the
interior drawings of Tohr, which includes the green statue(s) from the
front cover. An attempt to make Ahtea look sexy and provocative is weak
as she has a Barbie doll figure. The inclusion of bats in the dungeon is
a nice touch. Bats are not mentioned in the radio play. And finally, the
fires in the Fires of Tohr are colored red and yellow when they
are specifically referred to as blue in the radio play. My guess is that
the colorist or the editors felt that red flames would be easier for the
reader to accept than blue ones. They did permit a bit of blue flame on
the cover.
“Tarzan the Black Panther”
Arab Slaver - Rescue White Woman
At the burned out ruins of
the Molunga River Trading Post, Tarzan and Muviro find Sala, a Swahili,
who tells them that an Arab slaver named Sidi Ben Yemlik, The Black Panther,
has destroyed the post and taken Helen Robertson captive. On the way to
the Arab camp, Tarzan removes a spear from an elephant’s trunk.
That evening, Tarzan swims
the moat, climbs the stockade of the Arabs, and subdues a guard. Tarzan
opens the gate for Muviro and Sala. Tarzan and Muviro gather guns and ammunition.
They free the slaves. They arm Timaru, the chief of the Swahili, and his
men with fire sticks. They are to wait for Tarzan’s signal before attacking.
Meanwhile, the guard Tarzan
had subdued revives, discovers the missing weapons, and tells Sidi Ben
Yemlik what has happened. Tarzan, Sala, and Timaru find Helen. Tarzan approaches
Sidi Ben Yemlik and demands that he release Helen. The Black Panther laughs.
Tarzan signals Muviro and the Swahili. A huge battle takes place. Helen
hears elephants. Tarzan calls to them. The elephants crash through the
stockade and rout the Arabs. Tarzan will lead Helen to safety. End.
“Tarzan
and the Black Panther,” is a new story with a few leftover elements from
the radio drama “The Fires of Tohr” thrown in for good measure. They are
minor points: Sala telling Tarzan that the Arabs threw the wounded to the
crocodiles is like the claw-footed yellow men throwing their dead to the
crocs, Tarzan suggesting that the freed slaves use their chains as a weapons
against the slavers reminds one that Tarzan used a chain against the yellow
men when they freed the jewel pit slaves, and the basic idea of a slave
revolt against there enslavers has a familiar ring to it. The story is
a nice little tale of Tarzan rescuing a white woman from Arab slavers.
The best ERB-type line is when an Arab guard describes Tarzan as having,
“... the strength of the buffalo and the silence of a shadow!” It is slightly
surprising that Sidi Ben Yemlik calls his guard a ‘swine’ rather than something
Arabic. But this was published in 1947, just after the war. Tarzan sustains
a wound to his shoulder, something which is rare for the comic book Tarzan.
The only flaw is to have Tantor save the day in the end like a Johnny Weissmuller
movie. It is too bad that a different conclusion could not have been developed.
Three
very nice half panel pages are used: Tarzan, Muviro, and Sala sighting
the Arab encampment which contains canes or flamingoes flying across the
sky; Tarzan with an Arab over his head as he prepare to throw him to the
other Arabs during the slave revolt; and the elephants crashing through
the stockade to the dismay of the slavers. The weakest drawings are the
panel that contain swimming. The people in the water do not really look
like they are swimming as walking on the bottom and pretending to swim.
Inside
Back Cover: The black and white ink drawing are highlight with tints
and tones of red. The title of the page is: ‘Jungle Animals...’ The six
drawings features: numa, pacco, sheeta, gimla, duro, and dango
Back
Cover: The colored drawing depicts Tarzan holding a pith helmeted white
man upside down over his head. A pistol falls from the man’s hand. The
background is a battle scene that includes Arabs, a fallen native, and
a pith helmeted white man. A thatched roof building is on the right, and
a similar building is ablaze on the left. Smoke billows up to the left
hand corner of the page. The sky area is colored red.
The back
cover relates to the second story in this issue. Tarzan and the man he
holds upside down are the dominate feature and are diagonally arranged
on the page, which creates a good feeling of action. The red background
used on both covers helps unify them. Tarzan’s body is extremely long -
closer to the length that Hogarth uses than what Marsh will use in future
issue.
