All-Star Western

All-Star Western was a renowned American comic book series published by DC Comics. The series, which centered around Western fiction, featured both continuing characters and anthological stories. It was not a single continuous series, but rather three distinct series that carried the All-Star Western name. The first run spanned from 1951 to 1961, the second from 1970 to 1972, and the third was part of The New 52 and ran from September 2011 to August 2014.

The original All-Star Western began with issue #58 in May 1951, taking over the number of its predecessor title, All Star Comics—a superhero omnibus that had introduced the enduring team, the Justice Society of America. With the postwar decline in the popularity of superheroes, DC Comics altered the series format and title. This first series of All-Star Western ran for 62 bimonthly issues, culminating with issue #119 in July 1961. The cover logo did not incorporate a hyphen until issue #108 in September 1959, when it was significantly reduced in size and placed above the much larger logo for what was then the title feature, “Johnny Thunder”. This character shared the cover space with Madame .44, the “masked outlaw queen”, for some issues, and remained on the cover until the final issue.

The first issue of All-Star Western contained the features "The Trigger Twins", created by writer Robert Kanigher and penciler Carmine Infantino and running through #116; "Don Caballero", drawn by Gil Kane, and "Roving Ranger", penciled by Alex Toth, the writer-creator uncredited; and "Strong Bow", created by writer David Wood and artist Frank Giacoia. Other features that appeared throughout the years included "Super-Chief", by writer Gardner Fox and artist Infantino; and, beginning with #67 in November 1952, "Johnny Thunder", featuring the masked, vigilante persona of a schoolteacher in an Old West Mormon settlement. This character had been created by writer Kanigher and artist Toth in DC's All-American Comics in 1948.

The series experienced a revival in the following decade, running for 11 bimonthly issues from September 1970 to May 1972 before changing its title and slightly its format to become Weird Western Tales. All-Star Western vol. 2, #1 starred Pow-Wow Smith, scripted by John Broome, with art by Carmine Infantino. The next four starred the characters Outlaw and El Diablo. From issue #5, the character Outlaw was dropped, with the cover logo "Outlaw" now referring to the replacement-feature star, Billy the Kid. The Western "all-stars" now included such historical characters as Wild Bill Hickok, Buffalo Bill, and Davy Crockett, in a mix of new stories and reprints, as well as DC stalwarts Pow-Wow Smith, El Diablo, and Bat Lash.

Issue #10 in February–March 1972 introduced the enduring and popular character Jonah Hex, created by writer John Albano and artist Tony DeZuniga. Jonah Hex continued as the star of the comic when it changed its name to Weird Western Tales with issue #12 in July 1972, and he persisted into issue #38 in February 1977 of the 59-issue series.

As part of the line-wide The New 52 relaunch in September 2011, the series was revived once more, written by

Justin Gray and Jimmy Palmiotti with art by Moritat. This iteration of the series followed the adventures of Jonah Hex and Amadeus Arkham in an Old West-version of Gotham City, with back-up tales featuring other Western characters.

All-Star Western was a magazine-format publication and was part of DC’s ongoing series during its runs. The series was published in English and ran from April-May 1951 to June-July 1961, comprising 62 issues from #58 to #119. The publication maintained standard dimensions, transitioning from standard Golden Age U.S. to standar