"The Ikons of Ikammanen" is the two-issue story by John Byrne that begins Marvel's The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones comic book series. Issue one was published in October 1982 with part two, "22-Karat Doom!", following in November.
Although the arc was released without a title, "The Ikons of Ikammanen" name–taken from the fourth chapter of the first issue–was later used by The Adventures of Indiana Jones role-playing game for its adaptation and Trident Comics called it as such for their reprint of the story.
Plot summary[]
Issue 1[]
Marshall College, 1936[]
Indiana Jones is escorted to his office by Marcus Brody for a reunion with Charlie Dunne, a former student, who tells the professor that his sister, Edith, and he have learned the location of the legendary Ikons of Ikammanen, a set of statues said to be capable of becoming living avengers. Jones is skeptical of their existence but Dunne suddenly drops dead from a knife thrown into his back from outside the window by an unseen assailant.
The killer escapes. With the only trail to follow being the address of Edith's hotel in Liberia among Dunne's belongings, Jones sends Marcus to contact the police while he sets off to meet Edith in Africa.
Krikamibo, Liberia[]
After a twenty-eight hour flight and thirty hours by steamer, Indiana Jones arrives in Krikamibo, a port town on the Liberian coast that reminds the archaeologist of Cairo. Edith Dunne rendezvous with him. She sticks out like a sore thumb in her khaki safari outfit, pith helmet and circle-framed glasses, and as they head for the hotel, Jones has to warn her to be more discreet about speaking of the Ikons so publicly: while they're predominantly of scientific interest, the Ikons of Ikammanen are reputed to be made of solid gold.
When they check in, Jones privately wonders to himself whether or not Edith is more capable than his initial impressions of her given the state of the establishment holding the Dunne siblings' research. However, just as they discover the upstairs hotel room has already been ransacked, they're suddenly attacked by a pair of robed figures who were shadowing them. In the brawl, Edith is hurled out of the window and carried away by a third man.
The vegetable stall that cushions Jones's fall as he follows the kidnapper outside is not a graceful landing but it fulfills his desire to avoid time lost tackling the stairs. Despite the maze of back streets, and the locals minding their own business, Jones keeps up which raises the archaeologist's suspicions as he is led alone into a dead end. A metal gate slams shut behind him then he's dropped into a rat-infested dungeon. He overcomes the exit door's lock with bullets and a well-placed kick then steps out into the subterranean throne room of Solomon Black, a local gangster and self-proclaimed "business man" awaiting his arrival surrounded by piles of gold and flanked on each side by a hooded individual, one of whom holds Edith Dunne at knifepoint.
Black explains that he has been helping keep Edith safe in Krikamibo in anticipation of luring her brother to him so that they could come to an 'arrangement' in order to acquire the Ikons of Ikammanen. Edith bristles at Charlie being solely credited for their joint-effort but warns Jones that Black's interest in the statues is purely for profit not the historical significance of the find. Jones doesn't doubt it; nevertheless, with Edith's life on the line, the archaeologist stands down and makes a deal.
Atlantic Ocean[]
Indiana Jones, Edith Dunne, Solomon Black and his men charter a Czech vessel to a small island encased in fog two days away from Liberia using Dunne's map. With the waters off the coast littered with shipwrecks and Black having no interest in risking himself, he sends the archaeologist, Edith and two of his enforcers to the island in a motorized dinghy. Edith notices that the jungle is unusually dark but Jones is preoccupied wondering about whether or not the locals are friendly. When one of Black's underlings makes footfall on the beach, he's showered with arrows and killed, sending the remaining trio ducking for cover. Finding the volley of projectiles too convenient for the necessary number of natives required to just so happen to be on the same stretch of beach where the boat came ashore, Jones correctly deduces that the ground is actually booby-trapped instead by lobbing a knapsack onto the sand.
At gunpoint, Jones and Edith are encouraged by Black's man to go on ahead to navigate a safe path across the beach. On the other side, the pair make their way through the jungle and climb a mountain though the geology leads the archaeologist to suspect that they're actually on a volcano. At the summit they find an old, deserted village that isn't easily identifiable as African surrounding a 15-story tall temple which reveals the Ikons inside.
The all-too realistic gold statues encircle a single chamber with an inscription beneath said to be the words that awaken them. However, Jones is distracted by the chain and pulley system linked to the ceiling—situated over the much older altar at the center of the room—undoubtedly salvaged from one of the wrecked ships offshore. When he turns his attention to the statues themselves, he notices that the precious metal has also been used secure each of them in place for their own individual alcove up on the wall. A challenge, the archaeologist decides one will be enough to show to Solomon Black before they return for the rest of the Ikons. The effort to remove one of the artifacts sees it break off at the legs and human bones tumble out. Jones realizes that the Ikons of Ikammanen aren't statues at all just as he's knocked unconscious.
Indiana Jones recovers suspended over the altar by the chain, tied back-to back with Edith Dunne, an unpleasant reminder of his experience with Marion Ravenwood and the Ark of the Covenant earlier in the year. The pair then notice that the gathered village population has been reduced to a group of old men. The locals move the altar aside to reveal a pit of molten gold and begin to lower the adventurers down into it.
Issue 2[]
Ikammanen Village, 1936[]
As Indiana Jones and former archaeology student Edith Dunne descend towards the pit of molten gold which is to see them join the Ikons of Ikammanen, the African temple in which they are suspended is rocked by explosions outside. The hostile villagers go to investigate and the tremors start to move the chain that Jones and Edith are tied back-to-back to. The archaeologist uses their new-found momentum to swing the pair back and forth which affords just enough time for them to collide with the lever operating the pulley system and dump them safely to the floor.
While Jones undoes their bonds, Edith remarks on her good fortune that her brother, Charlie, was knifed in Jones's office, and the two adventurers exit the temple to find gangster Solomon Black waiting with his armed entourage who have eliminated the villagers. As Jones and Edith are no longer of use to find the Ikons, Black orders their deaths but the arrival of more angry natives convinces the gangster to forestall their executions. The group fends off the attackers when Jones improvises a barricade by toppling one of the settlement's huts which neutralizes their opponents' spears, allowing the gangster's automatic weapons to put down the villagers with little resistance. Afterwards, the archaeologist tricks Black into sparing Edith and himself by saying that an inscription on the Ikons reveals the location of further statues.
Atlantic Ocean[]
Back on board the Czech ship that was their passage to the island and locked in a cabin with an armed guard positioned outside, Jones reveals his deception to Edith and regrets that Black's security has thrown a wrench into his plan to reach the radio room to call for help. Edith proves more resourceful than her former teacher gave her credit for by switching into a gown from her luggage to lure the guard inside with the promise of keeping her company. Jones then lays out the man with a sucker punch and arms Edith with the guard's gun before heading off to find the radio room.
Jones knocks out the radioman and starts broadcasting a signal in Morse code which is cut short by a bullet that destroys the machinery. A minute later, Black's men converge on and disarm Edith. Out of patience, the gangster has his prisoners taken to walk the plank, a decision which turns out to be fortuitous for Jones and Edith: the archaeologist's distress call caught the attention of a passing Nazi U-boat which, with hostilities brewing between Czechoslovakia and Germany, fires on the vessel. Jones notices the approaching torpedo right before it hits, grabs Edith and jumps ship. Everybody else on board is lost in the explosion, including the recovered Ikons of Ikammanen, except for one lone crate carrying a statue that floats to the surface which the surviving adventurers use as a makeshift life raft.
The Nazis fish them out of the water and Jones arranges passage back to the United States of America by convincing the captain of the folly of firing on US citizens.
New York City[]
Back in the US one month later, Indiana Jones joins Edith Dunne and her Ikon at Idlewild Airport. There, Dunne has hired a private plane to take her back home with the statue, eager for the glory that the discovery, hers and hers alone, will bring, caring little for the loss of her brother Charlie in the process. When Jones asks to join her on the journey, Edith accuses him of trying to horn in on the find to which the archaeologist assures her that he simply feels an obligation to Charlie to take care of her.
On the flight out of New York, Jones tells Edith that he knows she had her brother murdered, pointing out that he never told her that Charlie had been killed in his office, and that Solomon Black's entourage only reached the radio shack on board the Czech ship after the radio had been shot out. The archaeologist was simply lucky that Edith had lost her glasses back on the island so she never hit her intended target: him.
What Jones can't figure out is, with Edith Dunne back in Africa, who delivered the killing blow? The plane's pilot, Jerry, answers that by stepping out of the cockpit with a gun pointed at Jones. Although Edith is adamant that Jerry loves and appreciates her, Jones suspects that the golden Ikon of Ikammanen was the real lure. When the pilot offers the choice to Jones of either being shot or falling to his death, the archaeologist offers a third possibility. Having had a few weeks to translate the inscription on the statue, Jones reanimates the golden avenger which, true to its legend, climbs out of its crate to bring justice upon the wicked.
As the statue, immune to gunfire, slowly advances on the murderous couple, Jones directs the autopilot of the aircraft out across the Atlantic Ocean then escapes the plane with a parachute, leaving the Edith and Jerry to their fate.
Appearances[]
Characters[]
- Solomon Black
- Marcus Brody
- Charlie Dunne
- Edith Dunne
- Miss Greebley
- Jerry
- Indiana Jones
- Marion Ravenwood (Mentioned only)
- Voht
Artifacts[]
- Ark of the Covenant (Mentioned only)
- Ikons of Ikammanen
Creatures[]
Locations[]
- Atlantic Ocean
- Cairo (Indirect mention only)
- Germany (Indirect mention only)
- Ikammanen Village
- Ikammanen Temple
- Liberia
- Krikamibo
- Hotel Faud
- Krikamibo
- United States of America
Organizations and titles[]
- Bedford Police Department (Mentioned only)
- Nazi
Vehicles and vessels[]
- Ben
- Douglas DC-3
- VP-NOJ
- PRN8
- U-boat
Weapons[]
Miscellanea[]
Behind the scenes[]
- "It went like this: I wrote the plot, submitted it to LucasFilm for approval. It was approved. Drew the pictures, likewise submitted, likewise approved. Wrote the script, submitted it -- she asked for plot changes. Er, no, we said -- that was two steps ago. No, she said, want plot changes!! And when the first issue was finally complete, she decided she liked the plot I'd submitted months earlier for the third issue even better, and wanted that to be the first issue. We talked her out of that one. After two issues of this insanity, I gave up the ghost."
- ―John Byrne[src]
John Byrne wrote "The Ikons of Ikammanen" as the first story for The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones comic book series by Marvel Comics. However, Byrne quit the series after finishing his work in the two-parter out of frustration that an unnamed Lucasfilm Ltd. liason with Marvel, who had no experience in the turnaround time for comic books, demanded that the proposed third issue with a plot Byrne had come up with months ago become the series' premiere despite that was first part of "The Ikons of Ikammanen" already being finished and ready. While Marvel talked the liasion out from doing this, Byrne quit after finishing the second part as he couldn't deal with her.[1] Another reason Byrne left the series, according to Kerry Gammill, was Lucasfilm not allowing him to transform either Indiana Jones or another character into a zombie for the story, forcing him to come up with the titular living statues instead.[2]
Collections[]
Cover gallery[]
Notes and references[]
| ADVENTURE TIMELINE | ||
|---|---|---|
| previous | next | |
| 1936 | 1936 | 1936 |
| Indiana Jones in Revenge of the Ancients | The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones: "The Ikons of Ikammanen" |
The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones: "The Devil's Cradle" |