By Robert Kanigher, Joe Kubert, Bob Haney, Russ Heath, Jerry Grandenetti & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-1984-0 (TPB)
Sgt Rock and the “combat-happy Joes†of Easy Company are one of the great and enduring creations of the American comic-book industry. The gritty meta-realism of Robert Kanigher’s ordinary guys in life-or-death situations captured the imaginations of generations of readers, young and old. So pervasive is this icon of comicbook combat that’s it’s hard to grasp that Rock is not an immortal industry prototype like Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman – with us since the earliest moments of the industry – but is in fact a late addition to and child of the Silver Age of Comics: debuting as just another tale in war anthology G.I. Combat (#68, January 1959, by Kanigher & Joe Kubert).
The archetypal sergeant was an anonymous boxer who wasn’t particularly skilled but simply refused to be beaten, absorbing any and all the punishment dealt out to him.
When ‘The Rock!’ enlisted in the US Army, however, that same Horatian quality attained mythic proportions as he held back an overwhelming Nazi attack by sheer grit and determination, remaining bloody but unbowed on a field littered with dead and broken men.
The tale inspired an instant sequel or two before, in Our Army at War #83 (June 1959), the story really began…
This second titanic tour of duty collects as a paperback and in stark and stunning monochrome the groundbreaking tales which made Sgt Rock a comics legend. These grim and gritty, epically poetic war stories are taken from the then still-anthological Our Army at War #118-148, bracketing May 1962 to November 1964, a period when American comics were undergoing a renaissance in style, theme and quality. Sadly, there’s no news on when these classic yarns will enter the 21st century either in modern colour editions or in digital formats…
Scripted throughout by then-editor Kanigher, the terse episodes herein begin with ‘The Tank vs. the Tin Soldier!’ – illustrated by the magnificent Russ Heath – wherein movie idol Randy Booth is mustered in to Easy Company and spends all his snobbish energy trying to get out again. By the time he learns how to be a real soldier, his moment in the limelight has turned from cinematic melodrama to Greek tragedy…
The artist most closely associated with Rock is Joe Kubert, who illustrated #119’s memorable fable ‘A Bazooka for Babyface!’ as a kid who lied about his age makes it to the Front, but doesn’t fool the indomitable topkick. Of course, by the time the fighting dies down enough to send him back, the Babyface is a seasoned combat veteran…
Kubert superbly limned the majority of stories in this volume, such as #120’s ‘Battle Tags for Easy Co.!’, which deployed brief vignettes to illustrate how squad stalwarts Ice Cream Soldier, Wild Man and Bulldozer earned their nicknames, before showing the latest “Green Apple†recruit why the Sarge was called Rock, after which ‘New Boy in Easy!’ (#121) introduced a chess-obsessed replacement who takes a lot of convincing that war is no hobby and men aren’t just pawns…
This narrative device of incorporating brief past-action episodes into a baptism of fire scenario played over and over again in Sgt. Rock and never got old. OAAW #122 featured ‘Battle of the Pyjama Commandoes!’, comprising more portmanteau tales as a number of Easy Joes recuperate in a field hospital, until the Germans break through and the wounded must pick up their weapons again…
High-energy stylist Jerry Grandenetti illustrated ‘Battle Brass Ring!’ in #123 as a pushy new replacement antagonises the entire unit until he learns to his cost the value of teamwork and price of command, after which Kubert returned for ‘Target – Sgt. Rock!’
When the indomitable warrior is captured and brainwashed by a Nazi tank commander into leading an attack on Easy, Bulldozer has to balance Rock’s life against his beloved sergeant’s unflinching standing orders…
More moral dilemmas punish the valiant warriors in #125 (illustrated by Heath) as the unit is cut off from the main Allied force and ordered to ‘Hold – At All Costs!’, whilst ‘The End of Easy Company!’ (#126 and illustrated by Kubert) pits the unstoppable dogfaces against impassable fortifications and a veritable mountain of Germans who severely underestimate the sheer stubbornness of tired, angry GIs…
With Kubert settling in for the long haul as regular artist on the strip, issue #127 offered an epic 25-page blitz of stories-within-a-story, as a quartet of combat-happy Joes relate personal tales of their unbeatable boss in ‘4 Faces of Sgt. Rock’.
OAAW #128 headlined ‘The Battle of the Sergeants!’ as Rock meets his Nazi counterpart in the deserts of Africa, after which #129 reveals that ‘Heroes Need Cowards!’: exploring Rock’s earliest days in the Army, whilst ‘No Hill for Easy!’ in #130 sees the battered band of brothers go above and beyond to placate a shell-shocked Major and finish the suicide mission of a deranged last man standing…
In #131 ‘One Pair of Dogtags … For Sale’ introduces Easy to a woman warrior every inch their equal, who literally spills her own blood to keep Rock alive, whilst in ‘Young Soldiers Never Cry!’ the sergeant becomes a combat babysitter after rescuing a toddler on the battlefield of Normandy.
In #133 ‘Yesterday’s Hero!’ depicts how a decorated veteran joins Easy to a rapturous welcome, but flounders, unable to escape the shocking circumstances that made him an unwilling example of both heroism and cowardice, after which, in ‘The T.N.T. Book’ another replacement insists on playing the odds in war as he had on the track… until discovering the true stakes of battle…
Our Army at War #135 pits Rock against a German non-com who was in almost every way his ‘Battlefield Double!’, whilst in #136 a desperately frightened new kid arrives, begging the indomitable topkick to ‘Make Me a Hero!’
Issue #137 sees a cavalry holdover from WWI finally achieve his long-delayed charge to glory in ‘Too Many Sergeants!’, before close skirmish separates Rock from his greenest new man in #138, and the weary warrior goes through combat hell to find ‘Easy’s Lost Sparrow!’ The next mission results in capture for four of the unit’s best and a ‘A Firing Squad for Easy!’ at a German Submarine dock. Happily, the team of Frogmen they’d been protecting return the favour…
OAAW #140 offers another full-length thriller – with cameos from fellow comicbook combatants Captain Johnny Cloud and French Resistance fighter Mademoiselle Marie – revealing the wry story of how Rock keeps winning deserved but wholly unwelcome battlefield promotions. His dilemma as a ‘Brass Sergeant!’ is only resolved after reuniting a misunderstood son with his “spit-and-polish†General father under most exceptional circumstances…
An timid old school friend turns up in #141, still needing Rock’s protection until “Shaker†finally pulls the ‘Dead Man’s Trigger!’, whilst in the next issue Kanigher pushed the envelope with the tale of a boy who held the sergeant to ransom and became ‘Easy’s New Topkick!’ in order to finish his dead Maquis comrades’ last mission. This stirring saga inspired the creation of Unit 3 – a French Resistance squad of battle-hardened children who appeared sporadically in later issues.
In #143, the US soldiers are back in the desert where embattled dogfaces honour fallen comrade Farmer Boy by planting ‘Easy’s T.N.T. Crop!’ to harvest a victory built on sand, after which ‘The Sparrow and the Tiger!’ sees Rock at last succumb to battle fatigue and the constant loss of his “kids†until a scared replacement shows him the true value of persistence and grace under fire…
Our Army at War #145 offers the backstory on the squad’s Native American rifleman in ‘A Feather for Little Sure-Shot!’, whilst in #146 imagination runs wild as ‘The Fighting Guns of Easy!’ compare stories about the men who fire them.
This second searing selection of combat actions concludes with a rare 2-part yarn, beginning in #147 as ‘Generals Don’t Die! Book One’ finds the hands-on topkick the envy of all his commanding officers. However, after helping desk-jockey General Bentley die in glorious battle, Rock is obliged to fulfil a promise to a dying man and forced to impersonate Bentley.
Things get even trickier when the impostor must lead the troops in breaking a stalled advance: a classic conundrum spectacularly resolved in the blockbuster conclusion ‘Generals Don’t Die! Book Two: Generals are Sergeants with Stars!’ Here Rock keeps a dead man’s secret and maintains the Bentley family honour until he can pass on those unearned “brass stars†to the next Bentley generation…
Kanigher at his worst was a declarative, heavy-handed and formulaic writer, but when writing his best stuff – as here – his work was imaginative, evocative, iconoclastic and heart-rending. He was a unique reporter and observer of the warrior’s way and the unchanging condition of the dedicated and so very human ordinary foot-slogging G.I.
With superb combat covers from Kubert, Grandenetti, and Heath fronting each episode, this battle-book is a visually perfect compendium and a certain delight for any jaded comics fan looking for something more than flash and dazzle.
A perfect example of true Shock and Awe; these are stories every comics fan and combat collector should see, and are too long overdue for collection in modern archival editions
© 1963, 1964, 2008 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.