Your First Look at the new Lone Ranger and Tonto

Robert Greenberger

Robert Greenberger is best known to comics fans as the editor of Who's Who In The DC Universe, Suicide Squad, and Doom Patrol. He's written and edited several Star Trek novels and is the author of The Essential Batman Encyclopedia. He's known for his work as an editor for Comics Scene, Starlog, and Weekly World News, as well as holding executive positions at both Marvel Comics and DC Comics.

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5 Responses

  1. John Fluker says:

    For me, the definitive version will explain why they call each other ‘Fool’ (Tonto) and ‘He Who Does Not Understand’ (Quien no sabe).

  2. Rick Keating says:

    “This is a clear departure from the more traditional blue fabric outfit the Ranger has been depicted in since the radio series began in the 1930s. The Ranger’s outfit has gone largely unchanged in comics, serials, television and tons of merchandise so this will help set it apart from what has come before.”
    .
    Sorry, that’s incorrect. The powder blue outfit only first showed up in the 1956 movie. Dave Holland writes in From Out of the Past: The Pictorial History of the Lone Ranger (page 158) of his generation’s reaction to seeing the Ranger depicted in a blue costume: “up there on the motion picture screen (in living color at last) he looked considerably different than the Sunday comics Ranger we had grown up with. It was as extreme and disconcerting as suddenly confronting MacArthur in a Mufti or Christ with a crew-cut.”
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    Holland goes on to write that the Lone Ranger, as depicted in the comics, wore a red or maroon shirt, and dark blue or black pants. And that his clothes certainly weren’t form fitting. “He wore clothes that any other male characters might have worn,” Holland writes (pages 158-159).
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    As to the radio show, Holland writes (page 159) that in the May 9, 1945 episode the Ranger merely removes his mask to blend in with a posse that was chasing him. “Can you imagine someone in powder blue getting away with that?” he writes.
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    I have about 800 Lone Ranger radio episodes, some 500 of which I’ve listened to in the last several months. The one Holland describes isn’t one of them, but several involve the Lone Ranger wearing a disguise. The only instances where a change of clothes is specifically mentioned is when he’s portraying a grizzled old prospector (or someone else whose clothes might be a bit threadbare), an Indian or a Mexican. Otherwise, a scene might go something like this:
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    “I’m convinced Jake knows more than he’s told the sheriff about the men who robbed the stagecoach. So I’ll disguise my features and get a job as a hand on his ranch. He might let something slip.”
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    The implication in such scenes where the Ranger impersonates a ranch hand or cowboy is that the radio Lone Ranger does his Lone Rangering in everyday clothes. He doesn’t need to do anything more than disguise his features to blend in.
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    Regarding the upcoming movie, I’ll wait to see it before venturing an opinion as to whether it’ll be any good. Not sure why the Ranger would be wearing a badge (if the photo above depicts how he’ll look in the bulk of the movie). Yes, he’s a former Texas Ranger, but that fact wasn’t widely known in either the radio or TV series. Nor was he the leader of his company (his older brother was). Maybe it’s meant as a symbol, representing all lawmen.
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    I hope the movie at least treats the character and the source material with respect. People who’ve never heard the radio show or watched the TV series (or haven’t seen or heard an episode in many years) sometimes say or suggest that the plots were simplistic, with one-dimensional characters. Not at all. At least not on the radio show. Yes, there were some broad stereotypes (as there were on almost all radio shows), because you only had about 22 minutes of air time; but it wasn’t always “good” cowboys vs. “bad” Indians or “good” farmers vs. “bad” ranchers. In many episodes the conflict might revolve around a man’s stubborn pride getting the better of him, something a bad guy (who might be a fellow rancher or farmer or army officer or Indian or lawman or stage line owner or prospector or whatever) might try to exploit.
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    I also hope the Ranger and Tonto aren’t unrealistically “perfect.” On the radio show, the Ranger made mistakes from time to time. Some nearly proved fatal. In the Lone Ranger and Tonto Graphic Album, written by Joe R. Lansdale (and which I just noticed has an afterward by Dave Holland), the Ranger makes some big mistakes which leads to a split with Tonto. But that’s realistic. He’s still human, however fast he is with his guns, and however idealistic his goals. From what I recall of Clayton Moore’s comments in his autobiography I was that Masked Man he wouldn’t have approved of a story depicting the Ranger as having made such mistakes as the Masked Man in Lansdale’s story did. Even if it were his first day behind the mask. Instead, the man once known as Reid should have been The Lone Ranger from the get-go. But he would have been wrong. There’s a point of balance between a Ranger who’s either a joke or little more than a “grim and gritty” thug (both of which interpretations I’m sure that more than one person in Hollywood has suggested to “improve” the character) and one who is all but perfect. I hope the movie strikes that balance, giving us someone who’s inspirational but also recognizably human.
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    As to the “John Reid” stuff, the Lone Ranger’s first name was never given in either the radio or TV series. In fact, in the 1938 serial (the first time an ambush was mentioned; it wouldn’t show up on radio until Oct. 13, 1941; the Lone Ranger started his adventures in 1933 already Lone Rangering) the Ranger’s real name was Allen King. On radio and TV, all we knew was that his last name was Reid (something established subsequent to the serial), he had an older brother named Dan, and a nephew named Dan Jr.
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    Who would subsequently father Britt Reid, the Green Hornet.
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    But “John Reid” got into some radio reference books and the 1981 movie (which would improve a thousandfold if they’d excise that annoying balladeer), so I guess we’re stuck with it.
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    Of course every true Lone Ranger fan knows the Lone Ranger’s real first name.
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    It’s “The.”
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    Rick
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    P.S. speaking of radio shows, the final Cincinnati Old-Time Radio and Nostalgia Convention (unless someone picks up the reins) will take place April 13-14 at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in the Cincinnati suburb of Blue Ash. A copy of the flyer can be found here: http://artofeverycolor.com/2012cincyflyer.htm
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    Bob Hastings, one of the guests every year, played Commissioner Gordon on Batman: the Animated Series, as comics fans (or at least Batman fans) will likely remember.

  3. mike weber says:

    Is that a bird on his head?

  4. steve says:

    The lone ranger outfit is horrible and not traditional, it makes him look like a bad guy, a big mistake, why cant they ever get it right, also the white hat is to big and doesn’t go with the ugly suite, they need to have a good look at Clayton Moore, his hat fitted perfect to his head wasn’t overly big, even if they didn’t want the light blue suite [buckskin] they should have just made the original buckskin design a little darker, but this new design is like a city guy or lawyer and gives no impression of the lone ranger what so ever, a big mistake on Disney part, they need to speak to the costume designers and start again.

  5. johnny says:

    yeah I agree, Tonto looks okay but that’s not the lone Ranger.