By Milton Caniff (Checker Book Publishing Group)
ISBN: 978-1-933160-55-9
Steve Canyon began on 13th January 1947, after a canny campaign to boost public anticipation following Milt Caniff’s very conspicuous resignation from his previous masterpiece Terry and the Pirates. Caniff, master of suspense and used to manipulating reader attention, didn’t show his new hero until four days into the first adventure – and then only in a ‘file photograph’. The primed and ready readership first met Stevenson Burton Canyon, bomber pilot, medal-winning war-hero, Air-Force flight instructor and latterly, independent airline charter operator in the first Sunday colour page, on 19th January 1947.
Almost instantly Caniff was working at the top of his game, producing material both exotic and familiar and, as always dead on the money in terms of the public zeitgeist and taste. Dropping his hero into the exotic climes he had made his own on Terry, Caniff modified that world based on real world events, but this time the brooding unspoken menace was Communism not fascism. Banditry and duplicity, of course, never changed, no matter who was nominally running the show…
Caniff was simply being contemporary, but he was savvy enough to realise that with the Cold War “hotting up†in Korea, Yankees were going to be seen as a spy in many countries, so he made that a part of the narrative. When Canyon officially re-enlisted the strip became to all intents and purposes a War feature…
This sixth volume covers the period April 9th 1952 to May 14th 1953 and shows how, as the Korean conflict stuttered to a weary impasse, Caniff began reinstating characters, plots and situations he had temporarily shelved when the fighting began. Now, his charismatic cast were edging into another post-war world…
Steve Canyon stories seldom had a recognisable beginning or end and the narrative continually flowed and followed upon itself, but for convenience the publishers have broken the saga into generally discrete tales which begin here with ‘Operation Stray’ which ran from April 9th to July 24th 1952. Following Steve’s tumultuous reunion with always out-of-reach true-love Summer Olsen the dutiful old warrior is hastily dispatched to the far North to shepherd a top-secret salvage joint-mission for the US Navy and Air Force.
Plucky Nimbus Neil lived with her meteorologist father on isolated Reynard Island in the Aleutians, where she taught Inuit children and read too much poetry. One night she spotted a Soviet secret weapon crash into the chilly seas, precipitating a desperate scheme to covertly retrieve the device before the Communists caught wise and started their own recovery plan. Further complications involved the lonely lass being irresistibly drawn to surly seaman Lieutenant Arthur Forge but being unwilling to desert her dad and educational dependents – and then the crafty Commies turned up…
The soap opera shufflings and Cold War shenanigans quickly transformed into a ruthless kidnap drama and shooting match which ended in tragedy and disaster…
As the uncharacteristically downbeat drama concluded Steve was frantic to reconnect with Summer, whom he’d abandoned to undertake this last mission. Determined to get back to her he cadged a ride with a motley crew of voyagers on bush pilot Tern’s charter plane which dropped him into a thoroughly different kind of adventure in ‘The Deep Woods’ (July 25th – December 11th).
When the plane crashed over rough country Canyon saved obnoxious businessman Roy G. Himmerskorn and his world-weary, abused and neglected spouse, scandalous good-time girl Miss Mizzou, in time to be “rescued†by charismatic bandit “Bonbon†Caramel. Of course, the murderous woodsman had heard that somebody on the plane had stolen diamonds on them, so his solicitousness wasn’t exactly a charitable act…
There’s a plethora of twists and turns in this sharp thriller beyond the criminal element and when morally uptight Mr. Himmerskorn makes an unwelcome play for the tarnished Miss Mizzou the trek out of the arboreal wilderness takes a decidedly nasty turn with spectacular consequences…
Meanwhile, Summer Olsen has also been forced into another tight corner and has taken a job with Steve’s nemesis Copper Calhoun… a deal with the devil that will have far-reaching repercussions…
With the “will-she, won’t-she†marriage to Summer on indefinite hiatus the lovesick, shell-shocked aviator took a position at an Airbase in definite need of his unique brand of problem solving.
‘Indian Cape’ ran from December 12th 1952 to May 14th 1953 and found newly promoted Lieutenant Colonel Canyon trying to explain the price of vigilance to an obstreperous community of NIMBY-Americans (Not In My Back Yard) who fully appreciated the protection of jet fighters – as long as they didn’t fly over their heads or make any noise.
The happy townsfolk of friendly Middle America weren’t too keen on servicemen hanging around their wives and daughters, either.
As if the bristling animosity wasn’t enough to test Canyon’s coping skills, hotshot flyboys Pipper the Piper and Murky Murphy seemed hell-bent on exacerbating every situation with their high-jinks, a generation-gap was growing between Indian Cape’s kids and elders, town businessmen were trying to blackmail the Air Force and military contractor Calhoun Industries seemed to be involved in some underhand, if not criminal, activity. To smooth things over the company sent in their own trouble-shooter, Summer Olsen…
This skilful passion-play perfectly shows Caniff’s sublime ability to delineate character and the art is some of the most subtly refined of his later period. This sharp and brilliantly enacted drama firmly put the series back on its original narrative tracks and there was even better to come…
Most cartoonists – or workers in any field of artistic endeavour – go to their graves never attaining the giddy heights wherein they are universally associated with a signature piece of unequivocally supreme work. How incredible then when somebody achieves that perfect act of creation, not once but twice – and does so seven days a week for 64 years? Enticing, enthralling, exotic, action-packed and emotionally charged, Steve Canyon is a masterpiece of graphic narrative: a full-immersion thrill and a passport to the halcyon best bits of another age. Comics just don’t get better than this.
© Checker Book Publishing Group 2006, an authorized collection of works © Ester Parsons Caniff Estate 1952. All characters and distinctive likenesses thereof are trademarks of the Ester Parsons Caniff Estate. All rights reserved.