The X-Men #10
The X-Men #10 is the Silver Age debut of Ka-Zar (Kevin Plunder) and his saber-toothed companion Zabu, two characters who would go on to anchor decades of Marvel storytelling and spawn five self-titled series of their own. Equally significant, the issue formally introduces the Savage Land — Marvel's dinosaur-populated Antarctic lost world — giving writers and artists a recurring playground that has figured into major storylines from the Kree-Skrull War to Secret Invasion. By bringing the X-Men into contact with a non-mutant hero and a setting consciously rooted in lost-world adventure fiction, Stan Lee and Jack Kirby demonstrated the breadth the young Marvel Universe could accommodate. The issue also plants an early seed of the Scott Summers–Jean Grey romance, a relationship that would define the X-Men for generations.
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Writer Stan Lee and penciler Jack Kirby created the Silver Age Ka-Zar specifically to resurrect a name Martin Goodman's publishing empire already controlled: a jungle-hero Ka-Zar had appeared in Goodman's pulp magazine as early as 1936 and carried over into Marvel Comics #1 (1939) under Timely Comics. Rather than simply updating that Golden Age character — an American boy lost in the Congo — Lee and Kirby reconceived him entirely as Kevin Plunder, a British lord's son raised by a mutated saber-toothed tiger in an Antarctic prehistoric preserve, drawing on the 'lost world' tradition of Arthur Conan Doyle and borrowing liberally from the Tarzan template (Lee later admitted he had never read the original Ka-Zar pulps). The issue, inked by Chic Stone and lettered by Sam Rosen, carried a cover date of March 1965 with an on-sale date confirmed by Library of Congress records as January 5, 1965.
Trivia · 8 facts
- First Marvel Universe appearance of Ka-Zar (Kevin Plunder), created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby; cover-dated March 1965, on-sale January 5, 1965.
- First appearance of Zabu — depicted in the Marvel Universe as the last living Smilodon, possessing near-human intelligence due to mutation by radioactive mists in the Savage Land.
- First appearance of the Savage Land in its modern, named form: a hidden tropical prehistoric preserve in Antarctica, maintained by alien technology; a version of the location had appeared in Marvel Mystery Comics #22 (1941), but the familiar name and setting were established here.
- First appearance of Maa-Gor, presented as the last of the Man-Ape tribe; his role as the killer of Ka-Zar's father and Zabu's mate would not be revealed until 1971's Savage Tales Magazine.
- First appearance of the Swamp Men, the tribal antagonists who capture Marvel Girl (Jean Grey) and Angel (Warren Worthington III) and plan to sacrifice them.
- Full creative credits: script by Stan Lee, pencils by Jack Kirby, inks by Chic Stone, letters by Sam Rosen (with Artie Simek credited on at least one caption); cover by Kirby and Stone.
- The issue's main story was reprinted as the lead feature in Ka-Zar #1 (August 1970), the character's first self-titled series, and also appeared in the UK anthology Fantastic! #18–19 (1967), The Super-Heroes (Marvel UK, 1975), and the Marvel Masterworks line.
- Ka-Zar's early characterization in this issue was deliberately Tarzan-adjacent — Lee even phonetically spelled out the character's name ('Kay-Sar') on the splash page — though the character was substantially deepened in later years by writers including Roy Thomas, Gerry Conway, Bruce Jones, and Mark Waid.
Cast · 16 characters
Full credits
Full plot ⚠ may contain spoilers
▸ Reveal full plot — may contain spoilers
Even though he is not a mutant, Xavier allows the X-Men to travel to Antarctica and enter the Savage Land to investigate the noble savage, Ka-Zar. They end up having to save Jean and Warren from being sacrificed by the savage Swamp Men.
Plot details indexed by the Grand Comics Database (CC BY-SA).