Whose Idea Was it to Introduce the White Tiger, Marvel’s First Puerto Rican Superhero?

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Welcome to the 946th installment of Comic Book Legends Revealed, a column where we examine three comic book myths, rumors and legends and confirm or debunk them. In this second legend, we take a look at who came up with the idea to introduce a Puerto Rican superhero, the White Tiger!

While the White Tiger is now best known for the tragic ending of his superhero career (a tragedy recently adapted into the Marvel Cinematic Universe as part of the Daredevil: Born Again TV series on Disney+), he is also notable for being the first Puerto Rican superhero in the Marvel Universe.

The White Tiger was co-created by George Pérez, one of the most iconic artists in comic book history (in our Top 100 Comic Book Writers and Artists poll back in 2022, you all voted him literally your TOP comic book artist of all-time), who happened to be Puerto Rican himself, so naturally, fans have assumed that Pérez came up with the idea of introducing a Puerto Rican superhero, and yet, it actually didn’t turn out like that!

How did George Pérez start on the Sons of Tiger series?

The Sons of the Tiger were a group of three martial artist superheroes, who each wore an amulet given to them by their shared master that, when used together, would allow them to increase their abilities to superhuman degrees. The heroes were notable in that they were Chinese, White, and Black, which was unusually diverse for 1973. The original writer on the feature, Gerry Conway, left after four issues, and the original artist, Dick Giordano, left after just two. In Deadly Hands of Kung Fu #6, a young George Pérez made his debut as the artist on the strip, working with writer Denny O’Neil and inker Frank Springer. It was Pérez’s first regular comic book feature…

An issue later, Mantlo joined as the new regular writer. In Martin Lock’s BEM Magazine #24, Bill Mantlo shared how he became the writer on the feature starting with the next issue:

So one day Tony Isabella, a Marvel writer and then editor of the black & white line, rushed into [Marvel Production Manager John] Verpoorten’s office in a panic and cried that he needed someone to script a Son’s of the Tiger story for Deadly Hands of Kung-Fu overnight. He’d plotted the job, which was drawn by then novice artist George Perez, but was caught in a deadline crunch and couldn’t script it. John Verpoorten, who delighted in torturing poor Tony, said he didn’t have anyone who could turn in the job by the next day without screwing up their own schedules. Tony, he said, would have to do it himself. It was then that I heard myself say almost involuntarily, ” Tony, I’ll do it.” Tony looked at me incredulously. I mean, I was a paste-up man who’d just recently began coloring Marvel books. But Tony had the decency not to laugh, and he gave me the job. I scripted it overnight, turned it in the next day, and with very few editorial changes, it was accepted. The rest is history.

So now Mantlo and Pérez were the regular creative team on the feature (Pérez, by the way, would be inked by a number of different artists during this run), and they would work together for the next year, missing only Deadly Hands of Kung Fu #15 (which was an all-reprint issue) and Deadly Hands of Kung Fu #18 (Mantlo still wrote the issue, but Pat Broderick would fill-in for Pérez). Things were going well, but Mantlo had some thoughts about the feature.

In that same BEM interview (which, again, I’m assuming was conducted by Martin Lock), Mantlo explained why it was his idea to introduce a Puerto Rican superhero:

There was more freedom in the black & white books at the time I did Sons of the Tiger primarily because no one cared. George Perez and I pretty much did as we pleased, and George began perfecting some of that wonderful multi-panel experimental storytelling of his free from editorial oversight, or concern. George of course is Hispanic, Puerto Rican to be exact, and had an intimate knowledge of the gritty city/slum that is the South Bronx. So I said, “Hey George-let’s do a character that reflects that grim reality!” I described the costume as Spidey’s without and details (remember, in black & white comics color is nonexistent) and George went hoe and designed it. The conception was mine, but nobody brings a character to life like George Perez, so we share the credit of having created Hector Ayala/the White Tiger.But again, though reader interest was massive, no one in editorial at the time cared to see Hector in his own mag. Why? Perhaps they feel the sales potential of the character is poor, perhaps they’re afraid of Marvel’s predominantly white middle class ignoring a Hispanic super hero.

So the Sons of the Tiger broke up (I’ll explain WHY in a newsletter post very soon), and discarded their amulets, which were found by Hector Ayala, who put them on and became the White Tiger…

In a classic Comics Interview #50 interview with George Pérez by Andy Mangels, Pérez agreed that it was Mantlo who came up with the idea of having a Puerto Rican superhero:

[I]nterestingly enough, it was Bill Mantlo who wanted to create the first Puerto Rican superhero. Whether it was because he was working with a Puerto Rican artist at the time — there were only two of us in comics, myself and Ernie Colon — whether that was the impetus or Bill’s social conscience, he wanted to create a Puerto Rican hero. And we came up with the concept of the White Tiger. I came up with the name, mostly ‘cause I knew more names — I didn’t want the standard ‘*Paco”’ or ‘‘Chino’’ or that type of name. ‘‘Hector Hayaba.”’ Give him a real name like people that I know! (Laughter.) You know, my name is not “‘Juanito Perez,’ it’s George Perez. And my father is ‘Jorge,’ not ‘‘Jorgeito.””

Suddenly getting rid of the lead characters of the strip and replacing them with another, was something that was innovative at the time. And with my then wife Yvie handling the Spanish — my Spanish was not good enough to write as it is now — we ended up with a character who ended up being quite popular.

Pérez based Hector’s appearance on Perez’s brother, David. Sadly, Pérez was becoming such a star at Marvel that he had to leave the feature after just three White Tiger stories for other, more prominent assignments, and White Tiger never quite recovered from his departure.

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“}]] In the latest Comic Book Legends Revealed, discover the origins of Daredevil: Born Again’s White Tiger  Read More