Wind Eagle in Flight

Now

The Black Panther has been chained to water wheel where is finds himself at risk of drowning. His plight is observed by the man who put him in this situation, the mysterious Wind Eagle. As T’Challa struggles to get free, his mind drifts back on how he found himself in this predicament…

Earlier

The Black Panther continues his investigation into the death of Monica Lynne’s sister, Angela. Although the death has been ruled a suicide, they have learned she may have been murdered in order to cover up a crooked land deal involving the Ku Klux Klan.

In order to get some answers, T’Challa, Monica, and reporter Kevin Trublood seek out the last person to see Angela alive, Leroy Carter. They find Leroy, who works for the telephone company, working on a line on the outskirts of town. When they question Leroy about Angela’s death, he tells them the truth of the matter, as there are some facts that he kept from the police out of fear. He tell T’Challa that he was a player who dated many women, but expected the women he dated to see only him. On the night he walked Angela home, Leroy decided to watch Angela’s home to make sure she wasn’t going off to see some other guy. He followed Angela when she went to the real estate office owned by Ambrose Ellis where she worked. There, she was confronted by someone but in the darkness Leroy couldn’t tell who it was. It was this man who shot Angela in the head. Leroy was the one who reported the shooting to the police. He concludes his story by saying Sheriff Roderick Tate came to the conclusion that it was a suicide based on preconceptions, saying that you can’t trust the cops.

After speaking with Leroy, T’Challa decides the next person they should speak with is Ambrose Ellis himself. With Sheriff Tate as their escort, they are brought to the exclusive Water Crest Country Club, where the wealthy in town hang out and play golf. Ambrose offers his condolences to Monica, but has little to say, finding the Black Panther’s costume and presence amusing. Seeing that Ambrose is tight lipped, they all decide to leave. That’s when T’Challa was ambushed by Wind Eagle. As it turns out, Wind Eagle is a minion of the mysterious Dragon Circle whose motivations in the shady goings on in this town are unclear. During the fight, the Panther finds himself at a disadvantage as Wind Eagle’s costume allows him to fly.

T’Challa is busy dealing with his opponent he is too late to avoid a car speeding his way. Struck by the vehicle, the Black Panther is knocked out. Emerging from the vehicle are members of the Dragon Circle who order Wind Eagle to eliminate the Panther. This is how T’Challa ended up tied to the water wheel….

Now

While recalling these events, the Black Panther has been struggling against the chains that keep him shackled to the water wheel. Using all of his strength the hero manages to break free by shattering the wooden wheel with his strength. Now free, T’Challa heads to the cliffside where Wind Eagler had bee nobserving his struggle and prepares for the final battle….[1]

Recurring Characters

Black Panther, Dragon Circle (Wind Eagle), Kevin Trublood, Monica Lynne, Roderick Tate, Leroy Carter, Ambrose Ellis, Angela Lynne

Continuity Notes

1. The resolution to this story is not revealed and unresolved until the events of Black Panther #14-15 and Marvel Premiere #51-53. It explains that the Black Panther was defeated in battle and then apparently brainwashed by Dragon Circle to forget about the goings on in Georgia.

Topical References

• It is stated here that Leroy works for “Ma Bell”, aka the Bell Telecommunications Company. This should be considered a topical reference as Bell was broken up for having a monopoly on the telephone industry in 1982.

What the Fuck is Going On?

The Black Panther vs. The Klan story arc is one marred with a lot of problems. Firstly, Jungle Action was cancelled and replaced with the first volume of the Black Panther, which featured stories and art by Jack Kirby. Kirby ignored the cliffhanger and went off and did his own thing. It wasn’t after Kirby departed from Marvel and left the book in a lurch that other writers picked up the threads left unresolved by Don McGregor. Black Panther #14-15 and Marvel Premiere #51-53 were tackled by writer Ed Hannigan. While these stories dealt with Dragon Circle getting defeated, an explanation as to what the fuck was going on in Jungle Action was never properly explained.

Dragon Circle faded off into obscurity until the got a profile in Marvel Legacy: The 1970s Handbook #1. Later, when Marvel put out the Official Handbook hardcovers, the writers tried to tie up all the loose ends because nobody else was going to do it. However, there are still a lot of maybes and unknowns. I couldn’t tell you why they didn’t just fill in all the blanks as the handbooks have taken those steps before. The only explanation for why it wasn’t done was maybe some current writer on Black Panther wanted to do something with Dragon Circle? That never came to be.

Anyway, here’s he best of what can made of this confusing mess, according to the Dragon Circle profile in Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe A-Z #3:

• So the Soul-Strangler seen last issue created a splinter group of the KKK that may have been a precursor to Dragon Circle.

• In the Modern Age Dragon Circle was created by Addison Blackburn merging a KKK offshoot with the Spiritual Light Society, a charity group from New York. The Dragon Circle was supposed to be an egalitarian group seeking to make life better for everyone, but Blackburn used it for his own personal gain.

• This personal gain was apparently getting involved with a crooked land deal with Ambrose Ellis, who is in fact, a member of the KKK. It was, apparently, disguised as strictly a Klan transaction for …. reasons?

• Anyway, the attacks on the Lynn home in issue #19 were to keep the Lynne family from talking but also to apparently obfuscate who was responsible.

• The person who shot and killed Angela is never revealed.

• Due to Wind Eagle’s flying suit there is a suspicion that Dragon Circle had a connection with the scientific elite of Wakanda, but this has never been explored.

That’s about the most sense you’re going to get out of this storyline I’m afraid.