HERCULES: PRINCE OF POWER #2

Cover shows strong gloss and bright colors with sharp corners visible in this image. There is minor edge wear along the top and right edge, and a faint crease line near the bottom right corner. The book is in a protective sleeve which obscures fine surface detail; interior and back cover were not assessed. No major creases, tears, or color-breaking stress lines are visible on the front cover.

Hercules: Prince of Power #2, cover-dated April 1984, is the second chapter of Bob Layton's four-issue sequel to his 1982 miniseries, with Layton handling script, pencils, inks, and cover in a rare full-package credit for a Marvel limited series of the period. The story, "Red Wolf Stalks the Stars!," sends the exiled Hercules and his companions — the Rigellian Recorder and the Skrull Skyppi — against a bounty hunter operating under the Red Wolf identity centuries after the Marvel Universe's present day, while Zeus continues purging his immortal children on Olympus and Apollo flees for his life. Christie Scheele colored and Rick Parker lettered, with Bob Budiansky editing. The book is remembered less for continuity milestones than for tone: Layton's broad, self-aware comedy and space-opera staging established a version of Hercules that later writers, including those working on the character in the 2000s, treated as a touchstone.