Enter the Dragon Lady

Enter the Dragon Lady: 1934 - 1935 by Milton Caniff
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This collects the Terry and the Pirates strips from 1934,-1935, dailies and Sundays.

So I've been more into reading newspaper comics this year and this one is a whopper.

Young Terry Lee and his adult friend Pat Ryan are adventuring in China, initially searching for a gold mine Terry's grandfather left to him. Basically, it's more adventure than you can shake a stick at: pirates, caves, guns, dames, etc.

So it isn't all peaches and gravy, though. The racism is balls deep and Caniff's style is still evolving, though halfway through 1935, it's very close to what other comic artists have been borrowing from for the last 70+ years. I'm going to mention the racism again because it really hampered my enjoyment. It's the racism of the time and not malicious but it's still a little hard to read at times.

Anyway, back to the good stuff. This is an influential strip in almost every way. Artwise, it's not hard to see echoes of Caniff's style in the comic art of the 1950s and the Silver age. The adventure stories are pulpy fun. The funny pages must have been a joy when Terry & The Pirates and Captain Easy were coming out regularly.

I'm giving this four stars but some of that is due to reputation and influence. The strip is a little rough in it's embryonic form but you can see where it's going by the 66% mark.

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