Elon Cody Starbuck is a fictional space pirate created by Howard Chaykin

Howard Chaykin

Howard Victor Chaykin is an American comic book writer and artist famous for his innovative storytelling and sometimes controversial material...

, who first appeared in Star Reach

Star Reach

Star Reach was an influential, American science fiction and fantasy comics anthology published from 1974 to 1979 by Mike Friedrich...

magazine issue #1, and also appeared in various issues of the graphics magazine Heavy Metal

Heavy Metal (magazine)

Heavy Metal is an American science fiction and fantasy comics magazine, known primarily for its blend of dark fantasy/science fiction and erotica. In the mid-1970s, while publisher Leonard Mogel was in Paris to jump-start the French edition of National Lampoon, he discovered the French...

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Starbuck is the earliest example of a character that later became characteristic of Chaykin's work: a swashbuckling, morally ambivalent, free-wheeling good/bad guy in a decadent, sexually explicit universe, who looks more than a little bit like Chaykin himself.

Starbuck is the darkest of these characters; in early stories he is gleefully venal and treacherous, generally doing good only if the price is right. He can be seen as a more amoral version of Ironwolf

Ironwolf (comics)

Ironwolf is a fictional character who appeared in the last three issues of Weird Worlds.Wednesday, December 15, 2010Weird Worlds and Howard Chaykin's Ironwolf...

, a character previously drawn and plotted by Chaykin for Weird Worlds

Weird Worlds (comics)

Weird Worlds was a short-lived science fiction anthology title from DC Comics that was published between 1972 and 1974. It lasted 10 issues.At first, Weird Worlds published series from Edgar Rice Burroughs that DC had the rights to...

in 1973. He also resembles Dominic Fortune

Dominic Fortune

Dominic Fortune is a fictional comic book character, owned by Marvel Comics.Created by Howard Chaykin and based on the Scorpion, Chaykin's character for the failed Atlas/Seaboard Comics company, Dominic Fortune was originally a 1930s costumed, fortune-seeking adventurer.-Publication history:Dominic...

, created by Chaykin in 1975 for Marvel Comics

Marvel Comics

Marvel Worldwide, Inc., commonly referred to as Marvel Comics and formerly Marvel Publishing, Inc. and Marvel Comics Group, is an American company that publishes comic books and related media...

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Publication history

Cody Starbuck first appeared in Star Reach

Star Reach

Star Reach was an influential, American science fiction and fantasy comics anthology published from 1974 to 1979 by Mike Friedrich...

#1.
The story was 16 pages, black and white. A planetary lord hired Starbuck to rescue his bride, who had been kidnapped for ransom by a monk of the Sanctuary of St.Berryl, a former leper colony

Leper colony

A leper colony, leprosarium, or lazar house is a place to quarantine leprous people.-History:Leper colonies or houses became widespread in the Middle Ages, particularly in Europe and India, and often run by monastic orders...

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• Star*Reach #1
• Star*Reach #4: The Return of Cody Starbuck (1976)
• Cody Starbuck one-shot, published by Star*Reach, 1978
• Portfolio of four full-colour prints, published by S.Q. Productions, 1980
• Heavy Metal Vol. 5 No. 2, May 1981, p.48-59 and back cover
• Heavy Metal Vol. 5 No. 3, June 1981, p.82-89
• Heavy Metal Vol. 5 No. 4, July 1981, p.82-89
• Heavy Metal Vol. 5 No. 5, August 1981, p.82-89
• Heavy Metal Vol. 5 No. 6, September 1981, p.34–43

Reference

• Forgotten Comics: Howard Chaykin’s Cody Starbuck.
• John Clute and John Grant: The Encyclopedia of Fantasy
  The Encyclopedia of Fantasy
  The Encyclopedia of Fantasy is a 1997 reference work on fantasy, edited by John Clute and John Grant. Other contributors include Mike Ashley, Neil Gaiman, Diana Wynne Jones, David Langford, Sam J. Lundwall, Michael Scott Rohan, Brian Stableford and Lisa Tuttle.The book was well-received upon...