While you may think some daytime soaps are the longest - running , continuous narration in media , nothing holds a wax light toPrince Valiant . The Sunday - only legal action - escapade comic strip about a 5th century Scandinavian prince who findsrefugein King Arthur ’s England was make by Hal Foster and has been publish without interruption since 1937 . If you ’ve only glanced at the comedian , prepare thyself for some fact about its origins , its mistiming , and why it is n’t precisely a funny strip .
1. WILLIAM RANDOLPH HEARST PERSONALLY REQUESTED IT.
newsprint magnate William Randolph Hearst — the intake for Orson Welles ’s myopic character inCitizen Kane — isn’t usually intend of as a cartoon strip fan , but he was the one whoinsistedthat cartoonist Hal Foster move away from his comic adaptation of Tarzan to mount a new strip exclusively for Hearst ’s newspaper . When Foster delivered a Medieval epic titledDerek , Son of Thane , Hearst was overjoyed — except he hated the name . RetitledPrince Valiant , it debuted in newspaper publisher on February 13 , 1937 and has been running ever since .
2. THE PRINCE WAS JUST A KID.
The early weeks of Foster ’s strip were lacking in the brawny , gallop prince with the pageboy haircut that reader typically associate with the funnies . The artist decided tobeginwith “ Val ” at age five , with the male child and his parent in deportee after their land had been ravaged by enemies . Val ’s mother dies shortly thereafter , and the prince joins the courtroom of King Arthur in his late teens , battling oppressors like the Huns , Goths , and Saxons .
3. IT WAS ORIGINALLY SUPPOSED TO BE A FANTASY EPIC.
Prince Valiantis far from a historic account of Medieval meter , but Foster ’s original intention was to put in morefantasticalelements into the serial publication . “ I wanted to show magicians , ogres , dragons , and knights , ” he once said . “ However , afterPrince Valiantbegan , the characters in the landing strip became too real to do much fantasy . ”
4. THE STRIP WAS SURPRISINGLY CONTEMPORARY.
Though Prince Valiant never adopted a more current hair style , his creator didfactor inthe state of the human beings . In the 1940s , Val fought off the “ Huns , ” a martial subspecies that threatened the Roman Empire that was also used as a derogative term for Germans in both world wars . ( Val ’s action got him canned in German newspaper . ) When soldiers were regress home , predate the do baby boom of the 1950s , Val and his wife , Aleta , had a son .
5. HAL FOSTER WAS A STICKLER FOR DETAIL.
When he was n’t drawing , Foster wastouring armoriesand soliciting information about other - 100 weaponry to make surePrince Valiantwas as period - exact as it could be . Valiant ’s heavy sword , for example , was used for cut motions , rarely duel , since Foster learned such a sword was impractical to wield with any agility . Foster would also dismiss armor that his characters might not have been able-bodied to yield .
6. IT ISN’T EXACTLY A COMIC STRIP.
Whether they ’re single - panel gag strips or four - panel nonparallel stories , comic cartoon strip typically provide insight into their eccentric ' behaviour by sneak in spoken communication and thought balloon into the artwork . Foster ’s approaching — and one keep on by his successors after he stepped aside from the landing strip in 1971 — was toblendcaptions with his example , extend oneValianthistorian , author Brian Kane , to declare it a “ massive illustrate novel portray in a comic artistic creation - like style . ”
7. IT HAS SPAWNED SEVERAL MOVIES.
laughable strips - change state - films likeDick Tracywere hits , but none of the attempts to portPrince Valiantinto live - natural action received a lot of care . Afeaturestarring 24 - year - former Robert Wagner flirt the title quality was release by twentieth Century Fox in 1954 . In recalling the film , Wagner wrote in his 2008 autobiography that the hair give him break . " If I ’d been pay a little more attention , " he write , " I would have know something was wrong . primarily it was the wig . One day Dean Martin visit the set and spent 10 moment spill to me before he actualise I was n’t [ actress ] Jane Wyman . ”
A 1997versionwith Katherine Heigl and Stephen Moyer as Valiant was no more successful , go away to video shelves without much fanfare .
8. SOME CHARACTERS WERE MODELED AFTER REAL PEOPLE.
