When Luke Cage, Hero for Hire #1 hit the stands I was mostly blissfully unaware of the concept of "Blaxploitation". I'd doubtless heard of Shaft but that was about it. I didn't realize that Luke Cage was Marvel's bid in a larger trend in popular culture.
All I knew was that the story of a tough guy in wrongly accused and in jail only to be given superpowers and then escaping to become not just another superhero, but a rather practical "hero for hire" was a fantastic premise for a series. Add to that the powerful layouts of George Tuska and the lush inks of Billy Graham and you had a near-perfect comic.
One of the key details that gets lost in later versions of the character is that the boots are blue. This really helps tie the design down and when the boots later became yellow, Cage looked a bit weird I thought, a bit too bright for his mileau somehow.
The debut issue features one of my all-time favorite covers. John Romita's Cage is a great design. The crouching figure suits his attitude, but also fits perfectly Marvel's then-standard box cover design. The cover was used a few more times, on some promotional items and on the much more recent Essential volume collecting Cage's early adventures. The Essential is the best version I think.
The cover was homaged by Dwayne Turner and Chris Ivy on Cage's 1992 series.
And here is a variation on the classic by Xurxo Penalta. To see more of these check out the blog Covered at this link.
And here's one where a guy took an "action figure" and replaced the classic Cage image.
As the cover says...Sensational!
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