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Maybe it’s the foundational grit of many of creator Howard Chaykin’s later characters. Maybe it’s the lost potential. Whatever it is about The Scorpion, something about him that kept us thinking “What if...?” Back when it was launched there was something truly compelling about The Scorpion, and that seemingly lost potential has not dimmed with the passing years.

The Scorpion, as the series debuted, was a man presently called “Moro Frost,” but who had many different identities over many different generations. Using themes he would continue to explore over the next 15 years, Chaykin created a pulp-type adventure hero set in the days just before World War II. He was just beginning to define the style of storytelling he would explore with American Flagg!, The Shadow and his other work.

To be sure, it wasn’t the more sophisticated Howard Chaykin that we would come to know through his work on American Flagg or The Shadow, but there were already more than trace elements of his trademarked multi-faceted characters and multi-layered stories present in what was perhaps the most dynamic series of the original Atlas-Seaboard line.

Take a pass on the third issue, which has just about nothing to do with the first two. With a Gabe Levy-Jim Craig story set 30 years later, the main character became a Daredevil-like costumed crime fighter. Only the logo remained.

– J.C. Vaughn

Editor’s Note: Chaykin’s unused cover for The Scorpion #2 finally saw print 36 years later as the special variant cover for the Comic Book Marketplace issue that served as a companion to the Geppi’s Entertainment Museum exhibit “Atlas At Last!” in 2011.