MOON KNIGHT (1978-1980)

This weekend’s light-hearted, escapist superhero post from Balladeer’s Blog takes a look at the Moon Knight backup series in Hulk! For my look at earlier Moon Knight stories click HERE.

HULK! Vol 1 #11 (Oct 1978)

Title: Graven Image of Death

Villains: Joel Luxor and Fenton Crane

Synopsis: A murder investigation leads Moon Knight to a plan to steal a statue of the Egyptian god Horus from a New York museum. Our hero tries to thwart the robbery and learns from the perpetrator that amoral black market art collector Joel Luxor wanted the theft pulled off.

While Moon Knight goes off to confront Luxor he sends Marlene Fontaine, the girlfriend of his three secret identities – Mercenary Marc Spector, Millionaire Steven Grant and Cab Driver Jake Lockley – to get information from museum curator Fenton Crane. Luxor gets killed by goons working for the real brains of the operation – Fenton Crane, who captures Marlene.

HULK Vol 1 #12 (Dec 1978)

Title: Embassy of Fear (Is this a Quinn Martin production or something?)

Villains: Fenton Crane and Alphonse Leroux

Synopsis: Moon Knight arrives in time to save Marlene from Crane and his men. They learn that behind Crane was the real mastermind – Ambassador Alphonse Leroux. As Steven Grant, Moon Knight finagles an invitation to an embassy party where he tries to simply buy back the stolen Horus statue from Leroux.

At the covert Midnight meeting where Leroux is to sell the Horus statue to Grant, the Ambassador pulls a double-cross, but as Moon Knight our hero defeats all of the villain’s hired thugs and learns the Horus statue has already been passed on to new owners.

HULK Vol 1 #13 (Feb 1979)

Title: The Big Blackmail

Villain: Lupinar

Synopsis: An unknown amount of time after the previous story, Moon Knight tracks the stolen Horus statue to a group of terrorists commanded by a wolf-like mutant called Lupinar. Our hero also learns that with the money Lupinar got for the stolen Horus statue he and his troops obtained a nuclear weapon with which they plan to blackmail millions from New York City.

In his identity as mercenary Marc Spector, our main character gets hired to work for Lupinar’s army. Marc plans on getting the nuke away from the vllains as Moon Knight, but before he can do that a fake Moon Knight shows up and attacks Marc and the others.

HULK! Vol 1 #14 (Apr 1979)

Title: Countdown to Dark

Villain: Lupinar

Synopsis: Marc Spector immediately attacks the fake Moon Knight and discovers it is one of Lupinar’s men called Franco, whose impersonation of Moon Knight was meant to force Spector to show his hand. Lupinar has his men kill both Moon Knight AND Marc, then leaves with his troops and the nuke.

Marc faked his death, however. He now dons his Moon Knight costume and takes on Lupinar and his terrorists while having his helicopter pilot Frenchie lead government agents to the nuke in order to disable it. Moon Knight beats Lupinar’s men and then the two fight one-on-one. The villain planned on detonating the nuke even if New York City had paid the ransom. Lupinar is killed in the battle. As Steven Grant our main character takes Marlene out to dinner.

MARVEL TWO-IN-ONE Vol 1 #52 (Jun 1979)

Title: A Little Knight Music

Villain: Crossfire

Synopsis: The Thing is on hand when an assassination attempt happens at a scientific award ceremony. So is Moon Knight, who knows the killer is mercenary villain Crossfire, a former acquaintance of Marc Spector. The heroes trail Crossfire to his latest hideout and attack him and his troops. Moon Knight and the Thing triumph, of course, and thwart Crossfire’s plan to use sonic mind control to make superheroes and nations fight each other.

NOTE: Crossfire seems to be killed at story’s end but turns up alive and still trying to develop his sonic mind control technology in the Hawkeye miniseries. Hawkeye and his soon-to-be-wife Mockingbird stop that plan for good.

HULK! Vol 1 #15 (Jun 1979) 

Title: An Eclipse Waning

Villains: A trio of robbers

Synopsis: One of Steven Grant’s wealthy friends invites him to watch an impending eclipse from his mansion’s mountaintop observatory. Grant, curious about how an eclipse might affect his powers as Moon Knight, accepts. NOTE: At this point in Moon Knight stories his strength varied according to the phases of the moon, making him as strong as Spider-Man during the full moon and no stronger than an ordinary man during no moon periods.

During the eclipse a trio of burglars break in to steal some of the owner’s valuables. Steven becomes Moon Knight and takes down the would-be robbers. As a comedy bit that didn’t quite work, the Hulk and Moon Knight had a crossover during the eclipse but never saw each other or realized they were in the same adventure.   

HULK! Vol 1 #16 (Aug 1979)

NOTE: No Moon Knight story in this issue.

HULK! Vol 1 #17 (Oct 1979)

Title: Nights Born Ten Years Gone

Villain: Hatchet-Man

Synopsis: Moon Knight investigates a serial killer who has knocked off several nurses so far. The media call him Hatchet-Man because of his weapon of choice. Our hero senses something familiar about the killer but refrains from telling Marlene and Frenchie what it is. Marlene goes undercover as a nurse to try drawing out the murderer.

She is attacked by Hatchet-Man and Moon Knight takes him on. The killer escapes in the end after seriously wounding Marlene. She is taken to the hospital as Moon Knight reproaches himself for not telling her the truth – Hatchet-Man is really Marc Spector’s brother Randall Spector, a former CIA man who killed Marc’s romantic partner 10 years ago.

HULK! Vol 1 #18 (Dec 1979)

Title: Shadows in the Heart of the City

Villain: Hatchet-Man

Synopsis: Moon Knight’s attempt to capture Hatchet-Man is complicated by the police trying to take him in for questioning. Marlene is near death in the hospital. Soon, Marc’s brother snaps even further and begins using his axe on anyone who crosses his path.

Moon Knight follows the trail of hacked-up bodies through Central Park and catches up with the villain. After a brutal battle in which our hero is wounded several times, Hatchet-Man seems to die. Moon Knight checks on Marlene and learns she may not last the night.

HULK! Vol 1 #19 (Feb 1980)

NOTE: No Moon Knight story this issue.

HULK Vol 1 #20 (Apr 1980)

Title: A Long Way to Dawn

Villains: New York City Night People

Synopsis: The staff at the hospital tell our hero it will be hours til they know about Marlene so he takes to the rooftops and the streets. As he kills time while on edge, he stops a security guard from drinking and when a cab driver deflates his rival’s tire, the irritable Moon Knight deflates his in turn.

Next he saves a tripping junkie from drowning in a fountain, then tries to stop a pimp from beating one of his prostitutes but the hooker angrily tells our hero to just mind his own business. Finally, Moon Knight saves a homeless man from a mugging and hears the man’s tragic life story. The sun is up by now and he races to the hospital for the good news that Marlene will live.

MARVEL PREVIEW Vol 1 #21 (Mar 1980)

Title: The Mind Thieves

Villains: The CIA and Project Cobra

Synopsis: Marc Spector receives a large package containing the dead body of his old friend – CIA Agent Amos Lardner. As Moon Knight, our hero investigates with Marlene and Frenchie along, too. He learns that Lardner’s last mission involved the CIA’s Project Cobra. That leads to Ravencraig Asylum, where it turns out the Agency experimented on human guinea pigs (like they did in real life, too), turning them into Michael Myers type killers via electrodes in their brain. The electrodes control them and stop them from feeling pain.

At the asylum Moon Knight clashes with one of the Operation Cobra killers. After their fight the asylum is destroyed to prevent further investigation. Going on to Paris, our hero takes on CIA Agents, only for one of them to abduct Marlene (right). At Paris’s strangest cemetery Moon Knight beats more agents and Amos Lardner’s brother James – himself now a mindless killer for Operation Cobra.

During the fight, James is killed in an explosion. Our hero frees Marlene and mails James Lardner’s remains to the CIA. 

*** Moon Knight went on to his own first solo series after these appearances.