Beware The Creeper Comes All Over!

Above was the first glimpse of Steve Ditko's new creation for his new employer DC Comics. The Creeper offered a strange silhouette for an eager fan. I remember thinking he must look something like a lion given what appears to be a robust mane. He does have that classic Ditko oddball elegance of movement. 

It turns out the first Creeper story I ever read was The Brave and the Bold #80 yarn title "And Hellgrammite is His Name!', a potent tale of weird crime by Bob Haney and Neal Adams, an artist just beginning to put his stamp on the "Darknight Detective". This is a story in which the Creeper comes to Gotham City to warn one and all about the danger of a new villain, the Hellgrammite, some bizarre blend of human being and insect. No one knows him save for his reputation as a likely criminal and so his partnership with Batman for this one issue is a tenuous one at best, but they deliver. And it's a cracking good story. 

Oddly the next Creeper story I got hold of was the Justice League of America issue by Denny O'Neil and Dick Dillin with Sid Greene inks in which a wannabe hero dubbed "Mind-Grabber Kid" is jealous of the League and makes  a compact with some aliens to defeat them, convincing said aliens that the JLA are actually tyrants. The Creeper is in them mix but it's a busy issue and despite Batman's recommendation he's still seen with skepticism by the other heroes. Sadly the copy I read and had for many years was coverless and I didn't get to enjoy this awesome Neal Adams cover for a long while. 

I did not get hold of this issue of Detective Comics in which The Creeper confronts Batman again, this time seemingly a villain and an especially crazed murderous one at that. It appears the Creeper's powers have spun out of control and he's being used by a scientist with a peculiar tie to his past, but who does not have Jack Ryder's interests at heart at all. The Creeper does survive this encounter and it seems almost at the end of his 1971 story dedicated to Steve Ditko that the Creeper's career might be over. Denny O'Neil seemed to want to give him a proper send off. The art by Irv Novick and Dick Giordano is especially good, and in black and white as I have it in a Showcase volume really shines. 

But it's not the end as some years later the Creeper comes back in Detective Comics and gives Batman both a hand and fits as he's wont to do. In these issues he and the Bat deal with The League of Assassins and its leader Ra's Al Ghul. 

His clash with the Joker in that infamous villainous clown's own series is wonderful issue drawn by Ernie Chan and written by O'Neil. The two cackling creations are wonderful together and despite this being Joker's house the Creeper gets the advantage. 

Apparently the story written again by O'Neil and this time drawn by Ric Estrada and Bill Draut which appears Super-Team Family #2 was originally intended for another issue of 1st Issue Special. Maybe it's a follow up or maybe it was replaced when a Ditko story was available. 

One of the nifty things about DC's later Bronze era output was their attempts to play with format and offer the reader more value for their dimes. DC did a much better job of that than Marvel, but alas they were not rewarded with additional sales, just the opposite. Those additional pages created space for back-up stripos and Creeper had one for three issues of Adventure Comics written by Mike Barr and drawn by Joe Staton. 

Given the Creeper's muddled reputation as a hero or a villain he's a perfect choice to play a role in The Secret Society of Super-Villains. He is tapped by the team in the ninth issue for possible membership and sees a chance to go in as a mole to break up their plans. His scheme only lasts a few issues.  

Joe Staton is the artist again for a masterpiece of the Bronze Age, the one hundredth issue of Showcase which tried its best to feature all the varied characters which had appeared during its healthy run of debuts and such. It's wild adventure which I've always regarded as a prototype for the Crisis on Infinite Earths which ended the Bronze Age some years later. It's a fun fun book and the Creeper is a key character. 

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Aside from that it was left to The Brave and the Bold to keep the Creeper's light lit. Writers Bob Haney and Alan Brennart respectively and Jim Aparo do their best in a couple of issues several years apart. 

As the Bronze Age of comics comes skidding to a halt and a new era blooms, the Creeper is again tagged for a back up feature, this time in the pages of The Flash. It's a trio of tales written by Carl Gafford and drawn wonderfully by Dave Gibbons. 

When the Creeper returns it will be into a brand new refurbished DC Universe, all neatly reshaped and polished for a new era. Alas Steve Ditko will never return to draw any more. 

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