Larry Hama

Larry Hama, born June 7, 1949, is an American comic book writer, artist, actor, and musician whose career in entertainment and publishing began in the 1960s. He attended Manhattan's High School of Art and Design, where Bernard Krigstein, a former EC Comics artist, was among his instructors, and he graduated alongside Frank Brunner and Ralph Reese. Having planned to pursue painting, Hama sold his first comics work at age sixteen to the fantasy film magazine Castle of Frankenstein, and subsequently collaborated with Bhob Stewart on pages for the underground tabloid Gothic Blimp Works.

After high school, Hama served in the United States Army from 1969 to 1971 during the Vietnam War, where he developed expertise in firearms and explosive ordnance. His military experience later informed his editorial work on the Marvel Comics series The 'Nam, which ran from 1986 to 1993. Following his discharge, he became active in New York City's Asian community. His former classmate Ralph Reese, then an assistant to artist Wally Wood, helped Hama secure a similar position at Wood's Manhattan studio, where he worked on the comic strips Sally Forth and Cannon. During this period, his illustrations appeared in Esquire and Rolling Stone. Through connections formed at Wood's studio, Hama joined Neal Adams' Continuity Associates, where he became part of a comic-book inking collective known as the Crusty Bunkers, alongside Reese, Brunner, and Bernie Wrightson.

Hama's Broadway career came about through an unexpected chain of events. Casting director Joanna Merlin contacted him after an actor friend supplied his name when asked if he knew other Asian actors. Despite informing Merlin that he had no acting experience and could neither sing nor dance, Hama agreed to audition after learning the casting office was less than a minute from his workplace at Continuity Comics. He was ultimately cast in three roles in the original 1976 Broadway production of Stephen Sondheim's Pacific Overtures. During roughly the same period, he appeared in the 1976 M*A*S*H episode "The Korean Surgeon" and in a Saturday Night Live spoof of Apocalypse Now. Although he earned a living as an actor for approximately a year, Hama ultimately stepped away from the field, stating that he had always seen himself primarily as an artist.

At DC Comics from 1977 to 1978, Hama edited Wonder Woman, Mister Miracle, Super Friends, The Warlord, and the licensed title Welcome Back, Kotter. He then joined Marvel as an editor in 1980, where he edited the humor magazine Crazy and the Conan titles in the early 1980s. Hama is most widely recognized among comic book readers as the writer of G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero, the Marvel Comics series based on Hasbro's military action figure line. He received the assignment after every other Marvel writer had declined it, according to a 2006 interview in which Hama credited then editor-in-chief Jim Shooter with offering him the job. Hama drew on a previously pitched concept called Fury Force, a Nick Fury spin-off about a special mission force, as the foundation for the G.I. Joe narrative. The series incorporated military terminology, Eastern philosophy, martial arts, and historical references drawn from his own background, and ran for 155 issues from February 1982 through October 1994. Hama also wrote the majority of the biographical file cards packaged with G.I. Joe action figures, which were reprinted in 2007 for the line's 25th anniversary. In 1987, Hasbro released the Tunnel Rat action figure, an explosive ordnance disposal specialist whose likeness was modeled on Hama himself.

Beyond G.I. Joe, Hama wrote for Marvel series including Wolverine, Nth Man: The Ultimate Ninja, and Elektra. He co-created the character Bucky O'Hare with artist Michael Golden, a property that expanded into a comic book series, a toy line, and a television cartoon. In 2006, he returned to G.I. Joe with the Devils Due Publishing miniseries G.I. Joe Declassified, and in 2008 he contributed to IDW's G.I. Joe Origins. IDW subsequently revived the Marvel Comics continuity with Hama writing a new ongoing series beginning at issue 155½. In June 2023, Skybound announced a further continuation of G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero at Image Comics, picking up from the IDW run with issue 301. In October 2024, Hama was inducted into the Harvey Awards Hall of Fame.