Category: Comics/Academic

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Superman: The War Years – 1938-1945


By Roy Thomas, Jerry Siegel & Joe Shuster with Don Cameron, Mort Weisinger, Fred Ray, Jack Burnley, Wayne Boring, Leo Nowak, Ed Dobrotka, John Sikela, Sam Citron, Ira Yarbrough, George Roussos, Stan Kaye & various (DC/Chartwell Books)
ISBN: 978-0-7858-3282-9 (Album HB)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

The creation of Superman and his unprecedented adoption by a desperate, joy-starved generation quite literally gave birth to a genre if not an actual art form. Within three years of his debut in the summer of 1938, the intoxicating mix of eye-popping action and social wish-fulfilment which hallmarked the early exploits of the Man of Tomorrow had grown to encompass cops-and-robbers crime-busting, reforming dramas, science fiction, fantasy and even whimsical comedy: all deep and abiding issues for the American public at that time.

However, once the war in Europe and the East snared America’s consciousness, combat themes and patriotic imagery dominated most comicbook covers if not interiors and the Man of Steel was again in the vanguard.

In comic book terms Superman was master of the world and had already utterly changed the shape of the fledgling industry. There was a popular newspaper strip, a thrice-weekly radio serial, games, toys, foreign and overseas syndication and the Fleischer studio’s astounding animated cartoons. Thankfully, the quality of the source material was increasing with every four-colour release and the energy and enthusiasm of Jerry Siegel & Joe Shuster informed and infected the burgeoning studio that grew around them to cope with the relentless demand.

Superman was definitely every kid’s hero, and the raw, untutored yet captivating episodes reprinted here were also completely embraced by the wider public, as the new so very portable entertainment medium of comic books became a vital tonic for the troops and all the ones they had left behind…

I sometimes think – like many others of my era and inclinations – that superhero comics are never more apt or effective than when whole-heartedly combating global fascism with explosive, improbable excitement courtesy of a myriad of mysterious, masked marvel men. All the most evocatively visceral moments of the genre seem to come when gaudy gladiators soundly thrashed – and I hope you’ll please forgive the appropriated contemporary colloquialism – “Nips and Nazis”. Isn’t it great then that they’re political legacy remains and a whole new diverse, multinational bunch are back again for the latest costumed cavorters to knock around some more?

This superb hardcover archive – unavailable digitally but still readily accessible in paper formats – has been curated by comic book pioneer Roy Thomas, exclusively honing in on the euphoric output of the war years, even though in those long-ago dark days, publishers and creators were wise enough to offset their tales of espionage and imminent invasion with a barrage of home-grown threats and gentler or even more whimsical fare…

A past master of WWII era material, Thomas opens this tome with a scene-setting Introduction and prefaces each chapter division with an essay offering tone and context before the four-colour glories commence with Part 1: The Road to War, as following the cover to Action Comics #1, the first Superman story begins.

Most of early tales were untitled, but for everyone’s convenience have in later years been given descriptive appellations by editors. Thus, after describing the foundling’s escape from exploding Planet Krypton and explaining his astonishing powers in nine panels, with absolutely no preamble the wonderment begins in ‘Superman, Champion of the Oppressed’ and ‘War in San Monte’ from Action Comics #1 & 2 (June and July 1938 by Jerry Seigel & Joe Shuster) as a costumed crusader who masquerades by day as reporter Clark Kent began averting numerous tragedies.

As well as saving an innocent woman from the electric chair and delivering rough justice to a wife-beater, the tireless crusader works over racketeer Butch Matson – consequently saving suave and feisty colleague Lois Lane from abduction and worse, since she was attempting to vamp the thug at the time! The mysterious Man of Steel made a big impression on her by then outing a lobbyist for the armaments industry who was bribing Senators on behalf of greedy munitions interests fomenting war in Europe…

The next breathtaking instalment ‘Revolution in San Monte’ sees the mercurial mystery-man travelling to the war-zone and spectacularly shutting down hostilities already in progress…

Maintaining the combat theme, the cover of Action Comics #10 (March 1939) follows and the cover and first two pages of Superman #1 (Summer 1939): an expanded 2-page origin describing the alien foundling’s escape from Krypton, his childhood with unnamed Earthling foster parents and eventual journey to the big city. A back-cover ad for the Superman of American club and the October 1939 Action Comics #17 cover precedes Fall 1939’s Superman #2 cover and rousing yarn ‘Superman Champions Universal Peace!’, depicting the dynamic wonder man once more thwarting unscrupulous munitions manufacturers by crushing a gang who had stolen the world’s deadliest poison gas weapon…

After another concise history lesson Part 2: War Comes to Europe re-presents a stunning outreach article thanks to Look Magazine commissioning a legendary special feature by the original creators for their 27th February 1943 issue. ‘How Superman Would End the War’ is a glorious piece of wish-fulfilment which still delights, as the Man of Tomorrow arrests and hauls budding belligerents Hitler and Stalin to a League of Nations court in Geneva.

Accompanied by the March 1940 cover, Action Comics #22 & #23 then declares ‘Europe at War’: a tense, thinly disguised call to arms for the still neutral USA, and in a continued story – almost unheard of in those early days of funnybook publishing. Here Lois and Clark’s fact-finding mission (by Siegel, Shuster and inker Paul Cassidy) spectacularly escalates, and after astounding carnage reveals a scientist named Luthor to be behind the international conflict…

The anti-aircraft cover for Superman #7 (November/December 1940) and an ad for the Superman Radio Program precede Siegal, Wayne Boring & Don Komisarow’s ‘The Sinister Sagdorf’ (Superman #8 January/February 1941). This topical thriller spotlights enemy agents infiltrating American infrastructure whilst ‘The Dukalia Spy Ring’ (Superman #10 May/June 1941) references the 1936 Olympics and sees the Action Ace trounce thinly-veiled Nazis at an international sports festival and expose vicious foreign propaganda: themes regarded as fanciful suspense and paranoia as the US was still at this time still officially neutral in the “European War”.

Behind Fred Ray’s Armed services cover for Superman #12 (September/October 1941, ‘Peril on Pogo Island’ (Siegel, Shuster & Leo Nowak) finds Lois and Clark at the mercy of rampaging tribesmen, although spies from a certain foreign power are at the back of it all, after which a Fred Ray gallery of covers – Action Comics #43 (December 1941), Superman #13 (November/December 1941), Action Comics #44 (January 1942) and Superman #14 (January/February 1942) – concludes the chapter.

All of these were prepared long before December 7th changed the face and nature of the conflict…

After Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor everything changed and Part 3: America Goes to War reflects the swift shift to a war footing, beginning with the notorious Siegel & Boring ‘Superman Daily Strips’ from January/February 1942, wherein an overeager Clark Kent tries too hard to enlist and only succeeds in getting himself declared 4F (unfit to fight)…

Timeless Fred Ray patriotic masterpieces from Superman #17 (July/August 1942) and #18 (September/October 1942) precede a stirring yarn from the latter. ‘The Conquest of a City’ (Siegel & John Sikela) sees Nazi agents using a civil defence drill to infiltrate the National Guard and conquer Metropolis in the Fuehrer’s name… until Superman spearheads a counter-attack…

The other great patriotic cover master was Hardin “Jack” Burnley and a quartet of his very best follow – Action Comics #54 (November 1942) & #55 (December 1942), World’s Finest Comics #8 (Winter 1942 with Batman & Robin thrown in for good measure) and Superman #20 (January/February 1943). That last also provides ‘Destroyers from the Depths’ wherein Hitler himself orders dastardly Herr Fange to unleash an armada of marine monstrosities on Allied shipping and coastal towns. Of course, they prove no match for the mighty magnificent Man of Steel…

After Burnley’s Action Comics #58 cover (March 1943), Siegel, Ed Dobrotka & Sikela detail the saga of ‘X-Alloy’ from Superman #21 (March/April 1943) as a secret army of Nazi infiltrators and fifth columnists steal US industrial secrets and would have conquered the nation from within if not for the ever-vigilant Man of Steel. Sikela’s cover Action Comics #59 (April 1943) concludes this section as Part 4: In for the Duration discusses the long, hard struggle to crush the Axis. By the time of these tales, the intense apprehension of the early war years had been replaced with eager anticipation as tyranny’s forces were being rolled back on every Front…

Following Burnley’s May 1943 Action Comics #60 cover, Superman #22 May/June 1943 provides Siegel & Sam Citron’s ‘Meet the Squiffles’: a light-hearted but barbed flight of whimsy wherein Adolf Hitler is approached by the king of a scurrilous band of pixies who offer to sabotage America’s mighty weapons. Neither nefarious rogue had factored Superman – or patriotic US gremlins – into their schemes though…

Action #62 (July 1943) and Superman #22 (July/August 1943) showcase two of Burnley’s very best covers, with the latter fronting an astounding masterpiece of graphic polemic. Don Cameron scripts and Citron illustrates ‘America’s Secret Weapon!’: a rousing paean to US military might wherein Clark and Lois report on cadet manoeuvres and the Man of Steel becomes an inspiration to demoralised troops in training. Covers by Burnley for Action #63 (August 1943) and Superman #24 (September/October 1943) – which latter provides ‘Suicide Voyage’ – follow. This exuberant yarn by Cameron, Dobrotka & George Roussos finds Clark (and pesky stowaway Lois) visiting the Arctic as part of a mission to rescue downed American aviators. Of course, no one is expecting a secret invasion by combined Nazi and Japanese forces, but Superman and a patriotic polar bear are grateful for the resultant bracing exercise…

‘The Man Superman Refused to Help’ comes from Superman #25 (November/December 1943) and follows Burnley and Stan Kaye’s November 1943 cover for Action Comics #66. In a far more considered and thoughtful tale from Siegel, Ira Yarbrough & Roussos expose the American Nazi Party – dubbed the “101% Americanism Society” – whilst offering a rousing tale of social injustice as an US war hero is wrongly implicated in the fascists’ scheme until the Man of Steel investigates…

Next up and from the same issue is a much reprinted and deservedly lauded patriotic classic.

‘I Sustain the Wings!’ by Mort Weisinger & Fred Ray was created in conjunction with the Army Air Forces Technical Training Command under Major General Walter R. Weaver, designed to boost enlistment in the maintenance services of the military. In this stirring tale Clark attends a Technical Training Command school as part of the Daily Planet’s attempt to address a shortfall in vital services recruitment (a genuine problem at this time in our real world) but the creators still find space for our hero to delightfully play cupid to a lovestruck kid who really wants to be a hot shot pilot and not a mere “grease monkey”…

Wayne Boring & Roussos’ cover for Superman #26 (January/February 1944) precedes Boring’s ‘Superman Sunday Strips #220-227’ for January -March 1944, with the Metropolis Marvel heading to multiple theatres of War to deliver letters from loved ones on the Home Front after which Roussos’ ‘Public Service Announcement’ (from Superman #28, May 1944) urges everyone to donate waste paper – like comic books!

July/August 1944’s Boring cover for Superman #29 finds Lois greeting the USA’s real Supermen – servicemen all – before Action #76 (September 1944 and Kaye over Boring) leads to anonymously-scripted ‘The Rubber Band’ from World’s Finest Comics #15 (Fall 1944). Illustrated by Sikela & Nowak and concentrating on domestic problems, it details the exploits of a gang of black market tyre thieves who are given a patriotic “heads-up” after Superman dumps their boss on the Pacific front line where US soldiers are fighting and dying for all Americans…

Drawn by Boring, ‘Superman Sunday Strips #280-282? (March 1945) then rubbish and belittle the last vestiges of the Third Reich as Hitler and his inner circle desperately try to convince the Action Ace to defect to the side comprised of Supermen like them…

In Superman #34 (May/June 1945) Cameron, Citron & Roussos attempt to repeat the magic formula of ‘I Sustain the Wings’ with ‘The United States Navy!’ as Clark is despatched to follow three college football heroes as they progress in different maritime specialisations through the hellish war in the Pacific.

The enthralling sally through Superman’s martial exploits conclude with one final Thomas-authored article as Part 5: Atoms for Peace? reveals how the fruits of the Manhattan Project changed everything…

As fresh and thrilling now as they ever were, these endlessly re-readable epics are perfectly situated in these gloriously luxurious editions; worthy, long-lasting vehicles for the greatest and most influential comics stories the art form has ever produced. Such Golden Age tales are priceless enjoyment at absurdly affordable prices and in a durable, comfortingly approachable format. What dedicated comics fan could possibly resist them?
™ & © 2015 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

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Willie and Joe: The WWII Years


By Bill Mauldin, edited by Todd DePastino (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-60699-439-9 (PB/Digital edition) 978-1-56097-838-1 (HB)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

During World War II a talented, ambitious young man named William Henry “Bill” Mauldin (29/10/1921 – 22/01/2003) fought “Over There” with the 45th Division of the United States Infantry, as well as many other fine units of the army. He learned to hate war and love his brothers in arms – and the American fighting man loved him back. During his time in the service he produced civilian cartoons for the Oklahoma City Times and The Oklahoman, and devastatingly, intimately effective and authentic material for his Company Periodical, 45th Division News. He also drew for Yank and Stars and Stripes: the US Armed Forces newspapers. Soon after starting, his cartoons were being reproduced in newspapers across Europe and America. They mostly featured two slovenly “dogfaces” – a term he popularised – offering their informed, trenchant and laconic view of the war from the muddied tip of the sharpest of Sharp Ends…

Willie and Joe, much to the dismay of the brassbound, spit-&-polish military martinets and diplomatic doctrinaires, became the unshakable, everlasting image of the American soldier: continually exposing in all ways and manners the stuff upper echelons of the army would prefer remained top secret. Not war secrets, but how the men at arms lived, felt and died. Willie and Joe even became the subject of two films (Up Front -1951 and Back at the Front – 1952) whilst Willie made the cover of Time magazine in 1945, when 23-year old Mauldin won his first Pulitzer Prize. If you’ve ever read a Bob Kanigher war story – especially any Sgt Rock and Easy Company – the cast are all wearing their war the Willie and Joe way…

In 1945, a collection of his drawings, accompanied by a powerfully understated and heartfelt documentary essay, was published by Henry Holt and Co. Up Front was a sensation, telling the American public about the experiences of their sons, brothers, fathers and husbands in a way no historian would or did. A biography, Back Home, followed in 1947.

Mauldin’s anti-war, anti-Idiots-in-Charge-of-War views became increasingly unpopular during the Cold War between East and West that followed “The Big One” and, despite being a certified War Hero, Mauldin’s increasingly political cartoon work fell out of favour (those efforts are the subject companion volume Willie & Joe: Back Home). Mauldin left the increasing hostile and oversight-ridden business to become a journalist and illustrator. He became a film actor for a while (appearing in, amongst other movies, Red Badge of Courage with veteran war hero Audie Murphy) then worked as a war correspondent during the Korean War and – after an unsuccessful campaign for Congress in 1956 – finally returned to newspaper cartooning in 1958.

Mauldin retired in 1991 after a long, glittering and award-studded career. He only drew Willie and Joe four times in that entire period (for an article on the “New Army” for Life magazine; for the funerals of “Soldier’s Generals” Omar Bradley and George C. Marshall and to eulogize fellow war cartoonist Milton Caniff). His fondest wish had been to kill the iconic dogfaces off on the final day of World War II, but Stars and Stripes vetoed it…

The Willie and Joe characters and cartoons are some of the most enduring and honest symbols of all military history. Every Veterans Day in Peanuts from 1969 to 1999, fellow veteran Charles Schulz had Snoopy turn up at Mauldin’s house to drink root beers and tell war stories with an old pal. When you read any DC war comic you’re looking at Mauldin’s legacy. Archie Goodwin even cheekily drafted the shabby professionals for a couple of classy guest-shots in Star-Spangled War Stories (see Showcase Presents the Unknown Soldier please link to 3rd June 2020).

This immense, mostly monochrome paperback (which includes some very rare colour/sepia items) compendium comes in at 704 pages: 229 x 178mm for the physical copy or any size you want if you get the digital edition, assembling all his known wartime cartoons as originally released in two hardback editions in 2008. It features not only the iconic dogface duo, but also the drawings, illustrations, sketches and gags that led, over 8 years of army life, to their creation.

Mauldin produced most of his work for Regimental and Company newspapers whilst actually under fire, perfectly capturing the life and context of fellow soldiers – also under battlefield conditions – and shared a glimpse of that unique and bizarre existence to their families and civilians at large, despite constant military censorship and even face-to-face confrontations with Generals.

George Patton was perennially incensed at the image the cartoonist presented to the world, but fortunately Supreme Commander Dwight D. Eisenhower – if not a fan – knew the strategic and morale value of Mauldin’s Star Spangled Banter and Up Front features with those indomitable everymen Willie and Joe…

This far removed in time, many of the pieces here might need historical context for modern readers and such is comprehensively provided by the Notes section to the rear. Also included are unpublished pieces and pages, early cartoon works, and rare notes, drafts and sketches. Most strips, composites and full-page gags, however, are sublimely transparent in their message and meaning: lampooning entrenched stupidity and cupidity, administrative inefficiency and sheer military bloody-mindedness. They highlight equally the miraculous perseverance and unquenchable determination of ordinary guys to get the job done while defending their only inalienable right: to gripe and goof off whenever the brass weren’t around…

Most importantly, Mauldin never patronised civilians or demonised the enemy: the German and Italian combatants and civilians are usually in the same dismal boat as “Our Boys” and only the war and its brass-bound conductors are worthy of his ink-smeared ire…

Alternating crushing cynicism, moral outrage, gallows humour, absurdist observation, shared miseries, staggering sentimentality and the total shock and awe of still being alive every morning, this cartoon catalogue of the Last Just War is a truly breathtaking collection that no fan, art-lover, historian or humanitarian can afford to miss.

… And it will make you cry and laugh out loud too.

With a fascinating biography of Mauldin that is as compelling as his art, the mordant wit and desperate camaraderie of his work is more important than ever in an age where increasingly cold and distant brass-hats and politicians send ever-more innocent lambs to further foreign fields for slaughter. With this volume and the aforementioned Willie & Joe: Back Home, we must finally be able to restore the man and his works to the apex of graphic consciousness, because tragically, it looks like his message is never going to be outdated, or learned from by the idiots in charge who most need to hear it…
© 2011 the Estate of William Mauldin. All right reserved.

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Setting the Standard: Comics by Alex Toth 1952-1954


By Alex Toth, Mike Peppe & various, edited by Greg Sadowski (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-60699-408-5 (TPB/Digital edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Alex Toth was a master of graphic communication who shaped two different art-forms and is largely unknown in both of them. He died on this day in 2006.

Born in New York in 1928, the son of Hungarian immigrants with a dynamic interest in the arts, Toth was something of a prodigy. After enrolling in the High School of Industrial Arts he doggedly went about improving his skills as a cartoonist. His earliest dreams were of a strip like Milton Caniff’s Terry and the Pirates, but his uncompromising devotion to the highest standards soon soured him on newspaper strip work when he discovered how hidebound and innovation-resistant the family-values based industry had become whilst he was growing up.

Aged 15 he sold his first funnybook works to Heroic Comics and, after graduating in 1947, worked for All American/National Periodical Publications who would amalgamate and evolve into DC Comics. He pursued his craft on Dr. Mid-Nite, All Star Comics, The Atom, Green Lantern, Johnny Thunder, Sierra Smith, Johnny Peril, Danger Trail and a host of other features and on the way dabbled with newspaper strips (see Casey Ruggles: the Hard Times of Pancho and Pecos)… and found that nothing had changed…

Ceaselessly seeking to improve his own work, he never had time for fools or formula-hungry editors who wouldn’t take artistic risks. In 1952 Toth quit DC to work for Thrilling Pulps publisher Ned Pines who was retooling his prolific Better/Nedor/Pines nested comics companies (Thrilling Comics, Fighting Yank, Doc Strange, Black Terror and dozens more) into Standard Comics: a comics house targeting older readers looking for sophisticated, genre-based titles.

Beside fellow graphic masters Nick Cardy, Mike Sekowsky, Art Saaf, John Celardo, George Tuska, Ross Andru & Mike Esposito and particularly favourite inker Mike Peppe, Toth set the bar high for a new kind of story-telling: wry, restrained and thoroughly mature. This quiet revolution took place in a wave of short-lived titles dedicated to War, Crime, Horror, Science Fiction and especially Romance…

After Simon &Kirby invented love comics, Standard – through artists like Cardy and Toth and writers like the amazing and unsung Kim Aamodt – polished and honed the ubiquitous fare of the nascent comics category, delivering clever, witty, evocative and yet tasteful melodramas: heart-tuggers both men and women could enjoy.

Before going into the military, where he still found time to create a strip (Jon Fury for the US army’s Tokyo Quartermaster newspaper The Depot’s Diary), Toth illustrated 60 glorious tales for Standard; as well as a few rare pieces for EC and others. On his return – to a very different industry on the defensive against public antagonism, and one he didn’t much like – Toth split his time between Western/Dell/Gold Key (Zorro and many movie/TV adaptations) and National/DC (assorted short pieces, Hot Wheels and Eclipso): illustrating scripts he increasingly found uninspired, moribund and creatively cowardly. Soon, after drawing X-Men #12 (cover-dated May 1965) over Jack Kirby’s layouts, Toth moved primarily into TV animation. At Hanna-Barbera from 1964 on he designed and storyboarded for shows such as Jonny Quest, Space Ghost, Herculoids, Birdman, Shazzan!, Scooby-Doo, Where Are You?, Sealab 2020, Fantastic Four and Super Friends amongst many others.

He returned sporadically to comics, setting the style and tone for DC’s late 1960’s horror line in House of Mystery, House of Secrets and especially The Witching Hour, as well as illustrating more adult fare for Warren’s Creepy, Eerie and The Rook. In the early 1980s Toth redesigned The Fox for Red Circle/Archie, produced stunning one-offs for Archie Goodwin’s Batman and war comics (whenever they offered him a “good script”) and contributed to landmark or anniversary projects like Batman: Black and White.

His later, personal works included Torpedo (look for a fully updated review of the series here soon!) and the magnificently audacious Bravo for Adventure!

Alex Toth died of a heart attack at his drawing board on May 27th 2006.

After reprinting an extensive informative and almost exhaustive interview with the artist from Graphic Story Magazine – conducted by Vincent Davis, Richard Kyle and Bill Spicer in 1968 – this fabulous full colour chronicle then reprints every scrap of Toth’s superb Standard fare beginning with impressive melodrama in ‘My Stolen Kisses’ from Best Romance #5 (February 1952), after which light-hearted combat star Joe Yank nearly lost everything to ‘Black Market Mary’ in the debut issue of his own title (#5 March 1952).

Perhaps a word of explanation is warranted here: due to truly Byzantine commercial and promotional considerations, all Standard Comics premiered with issue #5, although the incredibly successful Romance comics were carried over from their earlier Better Comics incarnations such as New Romances #10 (March 1952) for which Toth illustrated the touching ‘Be Mine Alone’ and the parable of empty jealousy ‘My Empty Promise’ from #11.

The hilarious ‘Bacon and Bullets’ offered a different kind of love in Joe Yank #6 (May) – a very pretty pig named Clementine – after which witty 3-pager ‘Appointment with Love’ (Today’s Romance #6 May) provides a charming palate cleanser before the hard-bitten ‘Terror of the Tank Men’ from Battlefront #5 (June 1952) offers a more traditional view of the then-raging Korean War.

‘Shattered Dream!’ (My Real Love #5 June) is an ordinary romance well told whilst ‘The Blood Money of Galloping Chad Burgess’ (The Unseen #5 June 1952) reveals the sheer quality and maturity of Standard’s horror stories, with ‘The Shoremouth Horror’ (Out of the Shadows #5) from that same month proving Toth to be an absolute master of terror and genius at the pacing and staging needed to scare the pants off you in pictorial form…

‘Show Them How to Die’ (This is War #5 July) is a superbly gung-ho combat classic whilst the eerie ‘Murder Mansion’ and ‘The Phantom Hounds of Castle Eyne’ – both from the August cover-dated Adventures into Darkness #5 – again demonstrate the artist’s uncanny flair for building suspense. The single pager ‘Peg Powler’ (The Unseen #6 September) is reprinted beside the original artwork – which makes me wish the entire collection was available in black & white – after which the highly experimental ‘Five State Police Alarm’ (Crime Files #5) displays the artist’s amazing facility with duo-tone and craft-tint techniques before salutary saga ‘I Married in Haste’ (Intimate Love #19, September) offers a remarkably modern view of relationships.

Science Fiction was the metier of Fantastic Worlds #5 which provided both contemporary ‘Triumph over Terror’ and futuristic fable ‘The Invaders’ to finish off Toth’s September commissions after which ‘Routine Patrol’ and ‘Too Many Cooks’ offer two-fisted thrills from This is War #6 (October). ‘The Phantom Ship’ is a much reprinted classic chiller from Out of the Shadows #6, with October also releasing the extremely unsettling ‘Alice in Terrorland’ from Lost Worlds #5.

Toth only produced four covers for Standard, and the first two, Joe Yank #8 and Fantastic Worlds #6, precede ‘The Boy Who Saved the World’ from the latter (November 1952) after which service rivalry informed ‘The Egg-Beater’ from Jet Fighters #5. The cover of Lost Worlds #6 (December) perfectly introduces the featured ‘Outlaws of Space’, after which the single-page ‘Smart Talk’ (New Romance #14) perfectly closes the first year and sets up 1953 to open strongly with ‘Blinded by Love’ from Popular Romance #22 January) in which the classic love triangle has never looked better…

This was clearly Toth’s ideal year as ‘The Crushed Gardenia’ from Who is Next? #5 shows his incredible skills to their utmost in one of the best crime stories of all time. ‘Undecided Heart’ (Intimate Love #21 February) is a delightful comedy of errors whilst both ‘The House That Jackdaw Built’ and ‘The Twisted Hands’ from Adventures into Darkness #8 perfectly reveal the artist’s uncanny facility for building tension and anxiety. The cover to Joe Yank #10 is followed by splendid aviation yarn ‘Seeley’s Saucer’ from March’s Jet Fighters #7, whilst the clever and racy ‘Free My Heart’ (Popular Romance #23, April) adds new depth to the term “sophisticated” and ‘The Hands of Don José’ (Adventures into Darkness #9) is just plain nasty in the manner horror fans adore. ‘No Retreat’ (This is War #9 May) offers more patriotic combat, but ‘I Want Him Back’ (Intimate Love #22) depicts a far softer, more personal duel whilst ‘Geronimo Joe’ (Exciting War #8 May) proves that in combat there’s no room for rivalry…

Toth was rapidly reaching the acme of his design genius as ‘Man of My Heart’ (New Romances #16 June), ‘I Fooled My Heart’ (Popular Romance #24 July – and reprinted in full as original art in the notes section) and both ‘Stars in my Eyes’ and ‘Uncertain Heart’ from New Romances #17 (August) saw him develop a visual vocabulary to cleanly impart plot and characterisation simultaneously. He often stated he preferred these mature, well-written romance stories for the room they gave him to experiment and expand his craft, and these later efforts prove him right: especially in the moving ‘Heart Divided’ (Thrilling Romances #22) and compelling ‘I Need You’ (September’s Popular Romances #25).

‘The Corpse That Lived’ (Out of the Shadows #10) is a historically based tale of grave-robbing, whilst deeply moving ‘Chance for Happiness’ (Thrilling Romances #23 October) is as powerful today as it ever was. ‘My Dream is You!’ (New Romances #18) turned fresh eyes on the old dilemma of career vs husband and far darker love is depicted in ‘Grip on Life’ (The Unseen #12 November), before true love actually triumphs in ‘Guilty Heart’ (Popular Romance #26). Another ‘Smart Talk’ advice page ends 1953 (New Romances #19) and neatly precedes an edgy affair in ‘Ring on Her Finger’ (Thrilling Romances #24 January 1954), after which ‘Frankly Speaking’ from the same issue leads to terrifying period horror in ‘The Mask of Graffenwehr’ (Out of the Shadows #11).

February saw a fine crop of Toth tales, beginning with charming medical drama ‘Heartbreak Moon’ (Popular Romance #27), spooky mining mystery ‘The Hole of Hell’ (The Unseen #13), 1-page amorous advisory ‘Long on Love’ (Popular Romance #27), lesson in obsession ‘Lonesome for Kisses’ and two more advice pages – ‘If You’re New in Town’ and ‘Those Drug Store Romeos’ – from Intimate Love #26. These last stories were eked out in the months after Toth had left, having been drafted and posted to Japan. However, even though he had (presumably) rushed them out whilst preparing for the biggest change in his young life, there was no loss but a further jump in artistic quality.

One final relationship ‘Smart Talk’ page (New Romances #20 March 1954) precedes a brace of classic mystery masterpieces from Out of the Shadows #12: ‘The Man Who Was Always on Time’ (also reproduced in original art form in the copious ‘Notes’ section at the back of this monumental book) before the graphic wonderment regrettably concludes with the cynically spooky ‘Images of Sand’ – a sinister cautionary tale of tomb-robbing…

After all that, the last 28 pages of this compendium comprise a thorough and informative section of story annotations, illustrations and a wealth of original art reproductions to top off this sublime collection in ideal style.

Alex Toth was a tale-teller and a master of erudite refinement, his avowed mission to pare away every unnecessary line and element in life and in work. His dream was to make perfect graphic stories. He was eternally searching for how to best tell a story, to the exclusion of all else. This long-ignored but still utterly compelling collection shows how talent, imagination and dedication to that ideal can elevate even the most genre-bound vignette into a paragon of form and a mere comic into high art. Get this book, absorb it all and learn through wonder and delight.
All stories in this book are in the public domain but the specific restored images and design are © 2011 Fantagraphics Books. Notes are © 2011 Greg Sadowski and the Graphic Story Magazine interview is © 2011 Bill Spicer. All rights reserved.

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The March to Death – Drawings by John Olday


By John Olday with Marie Louise Berneri, edited by Donald Rooum (Freedom Press)
ISBN: 978-0900384806 (TPB)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times

We tend to remember World War II as a battle of opposites, of united fronts and ubiquitous evil – Us vs Them. In these increasingly polarised days where any disagreement or demurring opinion on any issue is treated as heresy punishable by death or flogging, it’s valuable and comforting to be reminded that even under the most calamitous conditions and clearest of threats, dissent is part of the human psyche and our most valuable birthright.

Comics strips and especially cartoons are an astonishingly powerful tool for education as well as entertainment and the images rendered by London born, German émigré of Scottish descent John Olday (neé Arthur William Oldag) were, are and remain blistering attacks on the World Order of all nations that had led humanity so inexorably and inescapably to a second global conflagration in less than a generation.

Born illegitimate in London on April 10th 1905, the boy Oldag was raised in New York before ending up in Hamburg – in 1913, left in the charge of his German grandmother. By 1916 as the chaos of the Great War unfolded, 11-year old John was an active participant in workers’ strikes and protests against starvation and uncontrolled black marketeering. He was an activist in the Kiel Mutiny and subsequent German revolution (1918-1919) and fled the country when it was crushed. A gifted draughtsman and cartoonist, he graduated from Communism (in the Kommunistischer Jugend Deutschlands/KJD) to find a true ideological home as an anarchist. Unceasingly politically active, he resisted the rise of Hitler and National Socialism before being forced to flee, initially to England before moving to Australia in the 1950s. He died in 1977, having returned to his birthplace.
The March to Death was an unashamed political tract, a collection of antiwar cartoons and tellingly appropriate quotations generated immediately before and during his war service, and first published by Anarchist publishing organisation Freedom Press in 1943. He drew the majority of the images whilst serving in the British Royal Pioneer Corps, before deserting in 1943. For that so-typical act of rebellion, Olday was imprisoned until 1946.

The accompanying text for this edition was selected by his colleague and artistic collaborator Marie Louise Berneri, a French Anarchist thinker who had moved to Britain in 1937.

Still readily available, the 1995 edition has a wonderfully informative foreword by cartoonist, letterer, and deceptively affable deep thinker Donald Rooum painting with powerful precision the time and the tone for the younger and less politically informed. This is a work all serious advocates of the graphic image as more than a vehicle for bubble gum should know of and champion.

Makes you think, absolutely. Hopefully it will make you act, too.
© 1943, 1995 Freedom Press.

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Take That, Adolf! – The Fighting Comic Books of the Second World War


By Mark Fertig and many & various (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-60699-987-5 (TPB/Digital edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Long the bastion of the arcane, historic, esoteric and the just plain interesting arenas of the comics experience, Fantagraphics Books here celebrates the dawn age of Fights ‘n’ Tights funnybooks with a magnificent collection of (mostly) superhero covers culled from the fraught period which most truly defined the comics industry.

Comic book covers are a potent and evocative way of assessing the timbre of an era and a captivating shortcut into worlds far removed from our own. They are also half the sum total of fun generated by narrative art and arguably an art form all their own. In this torrid tome, educator, scholar and writer Mark Fertig (Chair of Art and Art History at Susquehanna University, Pennsylvania and revered film noir expert – check out his Where Danger Lives for more populist fun) offers an erudite, wide-reaching treatise comprehensively addressing every aspect of the four-colour Home Front’s graphic endeavours in support of America’s WWII war effort.

Detailing how Jewish émigré artists’ and writers’ creative influences advocated America surrender its isolationist stance in ‘Four Color Fantasies’ and ‘Building Towards War’, Fertig then traces the development of ‘Red, White, and Blue Heroes’ such as The Shield and Uncle Sam before ‘The Coming of Captain America’ sparks the invention of ‘An Army of Captains’.

After the USA finally enters the war ‘All-Out Assault: August & September 1941’  is followed by an examination of female masked fighters in ‘She Can Do It!’ and reveals how Wonder Woman became ‘An Amazon for the Ages’.

‘Kids Can Fight Too!’ reveals the impact of junior and underage crusaders as well as the sub-genre of Kid Gangs whilst ‘Attaboy, Steamboat!’ confronts head-on the depiction of ethnic characters – both vile foreign predators and monstrous conquerors and decent Pro-democracy non-white types…

From here in the distant future, some of the appalling jingoism and racism is even more disturbing than the tortures, torments and buckets of gore liberally scattered through the images of Evil Nazis and “Japs”…

Next ‘Into the Breach’ addresses the reasons omnipotent heroes such as Superman and Captain Marvel left the actual fighting in Europe and the Pacific to ordinary mortals before ‘Pulling Together’ details the promotion of Home Front solidarity munitions manufacture and the arming of the armies of Freedom. Then Hitler repeatedly gets his just deserts (in graphic effigy at least) ‘In Der Führer’s Face!’

‘Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, and Marines!’ follows the development of more human fictional soldiers and heroes whilst ‘More Thrilling Than Fiction’ sees the beginnings of fact-based accounts of true champions such as President Roosevelt and General Eisenhower before ‘Pitch Men’ follows the numerous examples of masked warriors and kiddie-characters inciting readers to help pay for the war through selling war bonds and liberty stamps before ‘On to Victory’ celebrates the end of hostilities and the aftermath.

The fact-packed lecture is also supplemented at the back of the book by creator biographies of industry giants and iconic cover crafters Charles Clarence Beck, Jack Binder, Charles Biro, Hardin “Jack” Burnley, Reed Crandall, Will Eisner, Lou Fine, Irv Novick, Manuel “Mac” Raboy and Alex Schomburg (regarded as the most prolific cover illustrator of the period) but the true merit of this enchanting tome is the covers gathered for your perusal.

Designed to incite patriotic fervour and build morale, the awesome majority of this tome features a potent avalanche of stunning covers from almost every company, displaying not only how mystery men and superheroes dealt with the Axis of Evil in those tense times but also the valiant efforts of “ordinary fighting men” and even cartoon fantasy stars such as Bugs Bunny, Porky Pig and Walt Disney stars such as Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck…

Shopping List Alert: Feel free to skip if you must…

This book celebrates an absolute torrent of spectacular, galvanising scenes of heroes legendary and obscure, costumed and uniformed, all crushing tanks, swatting planes, sinking U-Boats and decimating enemy ranks, and unleashed before your assuredly goggled eyes by artists long forgotten, and never known as well as more familiar names. This battalion of the worthy includes Joe Shuster, Joe Simon & Jack Kirby, Eisner, Harry G. Peter, Jack Burnley, Frank Harry, Irwin Hasen, Al Avison, Bob Powell, Edd Ashe, Harry Lucey, Paul Gustavson, Bill Everett, Jerry Robinson, Gus Ricca, Al Gabriele, Charles Sultan, Gene Fawcette, Louis & Arturo Cazeneuve, Gill Fox, Sam Cooper, Jim Mooney, Elmer Wexler, Fred Ray, Dan Zolnerowich, Don Rico, Max Plaisted, Howard Sherman, Everett E. Hibbard, Ramona Patenaude, Pierce Rice, Harry Anderson, Lin Streeter, Dan Gormley, Bernard Klein, Stephen Douglas, Martin Nodell, Charles Quinlan, Dan Noonan, Sheldon Moldoff, Henry Keifer, Marc Swayze, Carl Buettner, Charles A. Winter, Maurice, del Bourgo, Jack Warren, Bob Montana, Bob, Fujimori, Vernon Greene, George Papp, John Jordan, Syd Shores, John Sikela, Alex Blum, Ray Ramsey, R. Webster, Harry Sahle, Mort Leav, Alex Kotzky, Dan Barry, Al Camy, Stan Kaye, George Gregg, Art Saaf, George Tuska, Alexander Kostuk, Al Carreno, Fred Kida, Ruben Moreira, Sidney Hamburg, Rudy Palais, Joe Doolin, Al Plastino, Harvey K. Fuller, Louis Goodman Ferstadt, Matt Bailey, Ham Fisher, Walt Kelly, Wayne Boring, John Giunta, Creig Flessel, Harold Delay, Lee Elias, Henry Boltinoff, L.B. Cole and George Marcoux – plus oh so many more who did their bit by providing safe thrills, captivating joy and astounding excitement for millions.

These powerful, evocative, charming, funny, thrilling, occasionally daft and often horrific images are controversial these days. Many people consider them Art with a capital ‘A’ whereas close-minded, reactionary, unimaginative, bigoted die-hard poltroons don’t.

Why not Dig back in time (For Victory!) and make your own decision?
© 2017 Fantagraphics Books, Inc. Main text © 2017 Mark Fertig. All comics covers and illustrations herein © 2017 the respective copyright holders All rights reserved.

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The Eagle Book of Cutaways


By L Ashwell Wood, edited by Denis Gifford (Webb & Bower)
ISBN: 978-0-86350-285-9 (HB)

It seems inconceivable today, but one of the most popular features in the most popular comic of the 1950’s wasn’t a comic strip at all. When Eagle launched on April 14th 1950, it was a black & white, tabloid-sized periodical, combining strip and prose on good paper with a fuller-than-full-colour front, back and inner cover. The same high quality photo-gravure was used on the centre sheet: four more glorious colour pages for drab, grey, austere post-war Britain. Across the very centre of those was a painted spread depicting ‘The New Gas Turbine-Electric Locomotive – The 18000’. That was a magnificent train with the engine and operating system exposed, pertinent points numbered and an explanatory block of text explaining every detail. Boys (and, I’m sure, girls) and their dads were transfixed and continued to be so for the next 999 issues. Each week a new technological marvel of the Space Age or emergent Modern World would be painted in mindboggling detail and breezy efficient clarity to captivate and fascinate the readers.

Most were crafted by the most marvellous L Ashwell Wood (of whom precious little is known; for what there is you should go to Steve Holland’s wonderful and informative Bear Alley website) and – although not a new concept – they have become part of the shared psyche of British comic fandom. Ever since, the fascinating allure of cutaway drawings has bewitched readers, from TV21 to 2000AD and every comic in between. Something similar affects many women in regard to cut-out paper dolls. I don’t think Eagle had any of those though…

This grand book reproduces 46 of the very best centre spreads, from that aforementioned wonder of the rails through other trains and boats and planes and even to that marvel of a future Age, Dan Dare’s spaceship Anastasia (originally revealed on February 7th 1958).

Unavailable digitally, the technically enthralling tome commands some pretty stiff prices – and even though I’m prepared to say that it’s worth it, the best solution would be for some enterprising history or popular culture publisher to get the thing back into print immediately – if not sooner. Isn’t that what anniversary celebrations are all about?

In 2008 Orion published The Eagle Annual of the Cutaways – a new hardback version by Daniel Tatarsky (ISBN: 978-1 40910-014 0) which is okay, but just not quite as spiffy and rewarding to my jaded aged eyes, but will do until you can get hold of the landscape compendium…

Illustrations © 1988 Fleetway Publications/Syndication International. All Rights Reserved.

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The Dan Dare Dossier


By Norman Wright, Mike Higgs, Frank Hampson, William Patterson & Don Harley, Keith Watson & various (Hawk Books)
ISBN: 978-0-94824-812-2 (tabloid HB)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Launching on April 14th 1950 and running until 26th April 1969, Eagle was the most influential comic of post-war Britain, and possibly in our nation’s history. It was the brainchild of a Southport vicar, the Reverend Marcus Morris, who was increasingly concerned about the detrimental effects of American comic-books on British children and wanted a good, solid, middle-class Christian antidote.

Seeking out like-minded creators he peddled a dummy edition around British publishers for over a year with little success until he found an unlikely home at Hulton Press, a company that produced general interest magazines such as Lilliput and Picture Post. The result was a huge hit which soon spawned age and gender-specific clones Swift, Robin and Girl which targeted the other key demographic sectors of the children’s market.

A huge number of soon-to-be prominent creative figures worked on the weekly, and although Dan Dare is deservedly revered as the star, many other strips were as popular at the time, with many even rivalling the lead in quality and entertainment value. Eagle’s mighty pantheon included radio and film star attraction P.C. 49, soon to be TV sensation Captain Pugwash, (BBC) radio cowboy Jeff Arnold/Riders of the Range and the inimitable Harris Tweed – who swiftly became stars of other media and promotional tie-in like books, puzzles, toys, games, apparel and comestibles as well as and all other sorts of ancillary merchandising.

At its peak Eagle sold close to a million copies a week, but inevitably, changing tastes and a game of “musical owners” killed the title. In 1960, Hulton sold out to Odhams, who became Longacre Press. A year later they were bought by The Daily Mirror Group who evolved into IPC. In cost-cutting exercises many later issues carried cheap(er) Marvel Comics reprints rather than British-originated material. It took time but those Yankee Cultural Invaders won out in the end. With the April 26th 1969 issue Eagle was subsumed into cheap ‘n’ cheerful iron clad anthology Lion, eventually disappearing altogether. Successive generations have revived the title, but never the success.

There is precious little that I can say about Dan Dare that hasn’t been said before and better. What I will say is that everything you’ve heard is true. Vintage Dan Dare strips by Frank Hampson and his hand-picked team of dedicated artists are a high point in world, let alone British comics, ranking beside Tintin, Asterix, Tetsuwan Atomu, Lone Wolf & Cub and the best of Kirby, Adams, Toth, Noel Sickles, Milt Caniff, Roy Crane, Carl Barks and Elzie Segar.

If you don’t like this stuff, there’s probably nothing any of us can do to change your mind, and all we can do is hope you never breed.

Accepting that there is a part of national culture which is Forever Dare, here’s a long overdue second peek at an item which will delight all boys (and many girls, even though they had their own comics back then!) of a certain age which – despite its own vintage – is happily still readily available through internet vendors. In fact there’s a true abundance of books to read out there, all economically priced, so why not go hog-wild in this 75th anniversary year?

The boldly colourful, magnificently oversized (333 x 242 mm), resolutely hardbacked Dan Dare Dossier was published in 1990 and offers everything any devotee could wish to know and see. It is completely packed with mouthwatering artwork and photos, tantalising examples of memorabilia, classic strips and even unseen/unpublished material by a phalanx of the original creators.

Heavily illustrated throughout, it all begins with ‘The Rise of Dan Dare’, detailing the history of science fiction, development of comics – especially Eagle – and by offering a potted biography of Hampson, his team and Dan’s serried exploits. Simultaneously, those great big pages present unseen monochrome strip adventure ‘Dan & Donanza’ by the master himself, wherein our doughty heroes go haring across the solar system in pursuit of a fallen dictator who has turned the moon into a giant bomb…

Following is an expansive itinerary of the major characters involved over the years in ‘Actors against a Solar Backdrop’ before ‘The Hardware File’ offers an eye-popping selection of plans, designs and extracted strip illustrations displaying the vast wealth of ships, kit and tech invented over the decades by the assembled strip-creators, paying especial attention to Space Transports and Dan & Digby’s venerable runabout Anastasia.

More bravura virtuosity is celebrated in ‘Aliens & Their Worlds’ as pertinent and beautiful clips and snippets highlight the amazing variety of extraterrestrial races and species.

Sharing a few pages with new black-&-white comedic strip ‘Digby – the Guinea Pig’ is a rundown of some of ‘The Artists’ who toiled collaboratively to produce the stunningly painted 2-pages-per-week (Hampson, Harold Johns, Eric Eden, Don Harley, Bruce Cornwell, Desmond Walduck, Frank Bellamy, Keith Watson and more); followed in turn by a fascinating trivia- and memorabilia-stuffed appreciation of the dauntless chaps’ five years on radio in ‘Dan Dare, Pilot of the Airwaves’…

Wisely taking a break from all that factual stuff, ‘Full Colour Adventure: Dan Dare in The Planulid’ reprints a rousing tale of a monstrous invasion of Earth (first seen in The Dan Dare Space Annual 1963) before the rousing envy/glee-fest resumes with a grand examination of the breathtaking wealth of ‘Merchandise & Ephemera’ the strip generated. On view is a procession of numerous ray guns and rocket pistols (none of which ever paralysed or disintegrated any of MY enemies worth a damn!); games; puzzles; buttons; badges; stencil-kits; clothing; models; action-figures; home picture-film strips and projectors; walkie-talkies; all manner of books and print novelties and so much more…

Adjacent and in parallel with a full ‘Dan Dare Chronology’ is the immensely rare and sadly unappreciated newspaper strip ‘Mission to the Stars’ by William Patterson & Don Harley, which ran every Sunday in The People from April to October 1964, all capped off by the demise of the dream thanks to changing tastes and commercial mismanagement, as detailed in ‘Changes – the Long Decline’…

Downhearted spirits are properly revived by another ‘Full Colour Adventure’ from The Dan Dare Space Annual 1963, specifically ‘The Planet of Shadows’ wherein our gallant lads uncover a lost civilisation on a new world, after which ‘Dan Dare – to Date’ describes our hero’s 1977 resurrection in the pages of apocalyptic, sardonically dystopian 2000 AD. The article tracks Dan’s reboot as a bombastic rebel, slow rehabilitation and transition to the newly revived 1982 Eagle, before neatly segueing into a delightful reprint of one of those 80’s retro-exploits as ‘Dan Dare by Keith Watson’ depicts a hazardous mission by the Space Fleet stars to transport Earth’s radioactive waste stockpiles to the depths of the void. It’s hard enough as is, but things get particularly dicey when arch-nemesis The Mekon raises his great big green head…

Big, bold, beautiful and ruthlessly nostalgia-driven, this epic tome will utterly enchant survivors and veterans of the baby-boomer years and sci fi fanatics in general, but it’s also packed with enough top-flight comics material to beguile any kid or newcomer to our medium in search of a little simple, awestruck wonder…
This edition © 1990 Hawk Books Ltd. Dan Dare © 1990 Fleetway Publications.

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Punk Rock in Comics


By Nicolas Finet & Thierry Lamy, illustrated by Joël Alessandra, Antoane, Will Argunas, Katya Bauman, Romain Brun, Céheu, Christopher, Janis Do, Benoît Frébourg, Thierry Gioux, Kongkee, Estelle Meyrand, Yvan Ojo, Gilles Pascal, Christelle Pécout, Lauriane Rérolle, Toru Terada, Martin Texier, Léah Touitou, Martin Trystram & various: translated by James Hogan (NBM)
ISBN: 978-1-68112-350-9 (HB) eISBN: 978-1-68112-351-6

This book includes Discriminatory Content included for dramatic effect and historical verity.

Having been (an extremely minor) part of the revolution and probably seen at most of the UK gigs and events cited here, I found it most difficult to remain dispassionate about the book under review today. It’s really very good, and I apologize if I seem less than my effusive self. Apparently, being fair and neutral is actually quite hard if one is involved. Moreover, it’s rather sad to realize that when all those disenfranchised kids warned of “no future”, right here, right now is what they were shouting about….

Graphic biographies are all the rage these days and this one is the most personally affecting yet. It’s strange to have lived long enough to find that the history people are writing and drawing is just “recently” and “remember when…” to some of us.

Part of NBM’s Music Stars in Comics series and guaranteed to appeal to a much larger audience than most comics usually reach, Punk Rock in Comics is a roundup of key bands and significant moments helpfully garnished with articles on the US and British antecedents and precursors, as well as a look at who joined late and what came next. It certainly deserves to reach as many as possible and will make a perfect gift if any of us make it to the next Great December fun-fest/Gig in the Sky…

… And just a note of clarification: between 1975 and 1981 us youth thought we were at the spear tip of a revolution, but it turns out it was a wave of similar-seeming local brush fires that were stamped out or died down of their own accord. Punk was music and fashion and guerilla graphics and SHEER ATTITUDE. All of it was primarily self-generated by triggered by example and a Do It Yourself philosophy sparked by the realization that no one in authority was ever going to help or rock a sitting status quo.

We concentrate on bands and music here but as a nod to the other great benefactor – self-publishing – this book is craftily delivered via distractingly faux-distressed pages meant to mimic the abundant and vibrant fanzine culture that came with us kids getting involved. Buying or trading a pamphlet did so much to popularise the movement in an era utterly devoid of social media and digital connection, but don’t whine you spend a few hours trying to flatten out wrinkle and glue stains that aren’t really there, okay?

Still with us? Okay then…

As if cannily re-presented popular culture factoids and snippets of urban history accompanied by a treasure trove of candid photographs, posters, badges fashions and other memorabilia aren’t enough to whet your appetite, this annal of arguably the closest we ever got to taking over the kingdom also offers vital and enticing extra enticements… but you’ll have to have your consciousness raised a bit before then.

Author, filmmaker, journalist, publisher, educator, translator/music documentarian Nicolas Finet has worked in comics over three decades: generating a bucketload of reference works – such as Mississippi Ramblin’ and Forever Woodstock. He adds to his graphic history tally (Prince in Comics, Love Me Please – The Story of Janis Joplin 1943-1970 and David Bowie in Comics) with this deep dive into the crazed career of the ultimate cosmic explorers and rebellious cultural pioneers. His scripts of the comics vignettes compiled in conjunction with frequent collaborator Thierry Lamy (Force Navale, David Bowie in Comics, Pink Floyd in Comics) are limned here by a spitting, pogo-ing posse of international strip artists, visually actualising vividly vocal and vociferous key moments in really recent history…

It begins with Céheu depicting ‘1969-1970 An American Prehistory’ as disillusionment in the1970s New World triggers reactions from young musicians like Jim “Iggy Pop” Osterberg and Richard Hell, and groups of iconic nearly-men such as MC5, Television and the New York Dolls set the scene and laid the groundwork for what came – quite unfairly – to be regarded as a British revolution…

Following a fact-packed essay, the state of our nation is assessed in ‘1971-1975 The United Kingdom of Pub Rock’, courtesy of Gilles Pascal. A growing hunger for cheap live music and short songs led to an extinction event for “Prog Rock” and the rise of bands and performers who would score no real chart success but reshape the industry for decades to come…

A text discussion of bands like (Ian Dury’s) Kilburn and the High Roads, Brinsley Schwartz, Nick Lowe, Eddie and the Hot Rods and more enjoying a growing London-centric live gig scene leads to Antoane’s proto-punk assessment ‘1974-1976 On the fringes of Punk Rock, a few Inspired Trailblazers’ (Dr. Feelgood, Graham Parker and the Rumour, Elvis Costello) before the cultural main event kicks off with Thierry Gioux’s coverage of ‘1975-1978 The Sex Pistols Endless Rebellion’ and a detailed biopsy of the Clash in ‘1976-1985 Combat Rock’ limned by Martin Trystram.

Further mini-bios follow in comics and essay combinations, exploring lesser gods of revolt such as ‘1976-1980 Buzzcocks Energy Made in Manchester’ by Katya Bauman, ‘1974-1996 We, The Ramones’ from Toru Terada, Benoît Frébourg’s ‘1976-2015 The Damned May the Farce be with You!’ and an assessment of lost wonders in Yvan Ojo’s ‘1975-1978 Johnny Thunders and the Heartbreakers’…

As I said, Britain got the lion’s share of global headlines (and reactionary authoritarian blamestorming) but the process and progress were international. Romain Brun illustrates ‘1974-1977 Meanwhile, in New York’ where the club CBGB was building a rep through outsider bands such Television, New York Dolls, Blondie, Talking Heads, the Dead Boys and poet Patti Smith, and by staging the first UK band to play America: The Damned…

A few more individualists are explored in ‘1976-1996 Siouxsie and the Banshees The Punk Sorceress’ by Léah Touitou, and Martin Texier reveals just how different The Vibrators were in ‘1976-2020 Never Stop Vibrating’ prior to Janis Do detailing the effect, influence and ultimate tragedy of Jimmy Pursey and Sham 69 in ‘1976-1980 Working Class Heroes’… It was a time of change, fervour and febrile opportunism and many acts were caught up in the money and mood, if not movement, usually against their will and at the behest of old-guard record companies. Christopher illuminates how The Jam rode the storm in ‘1974-1979 Not Quite Punks: a handful that can’t be put in a box’ and Lauriane Rérolle details ‘1975-1983 The Irish Wave’ that picked up and spat out The Undertones and Stiff Little Fingers but lost so many others.

‘1975-1982 Girls to the Front!’ by Christelle Pécout focusses on how “the kids” demand to be heard somehow didn’t apply to The Slits – until they put their big booted feet down – whilst Estelle Meyrand explores international wonders most of us missed at the time – no, not Belgium’s Plastic Bertrand but Australia’s The Saints and US phenomenon and political activist Jello Biafra and The Dead Kennedys in ‘1976-1980 Punks from Elsewhere’…

Despite constant accusations of nihilism Punk was always an inviting and inclusive arena and ‘1975-1981 Punks and Rastas’ from Joël Alessandra details cultural cross pollination and active inclusivity – leading to the Two Tone era – and Will Argunas recalls ‘1975-1983 Punks and Hard Rock: Loud, Fast, and in Your Face!’ via the life and achievements of Lemmy Kilmister and Motörhead, before Kongkee draws this tome to a close with a trip through ‘1981 and Beyond: The Post-Punk Legacy’ encompassing Electropop, New Wave/Romanticism, Grunge and more, citing bands such as Pere Ubu, Devo, et al…

This compelling and remarkable catalogue of cultural change and artistic hostage-taking includes a Selective Discography of the bands most crucial cuts, Further Reading, listings of Films and Videos, Photo Credits and a copious Acknowledgements section.

Punk Rock in Comics is a comprehensive and intriguing skilfully realised appreciation of a unique moment in time and society, boldly attempting to capture a too-big rocket in a very small bottle but still doing a pretty good of recalling the when, how and who, if not quite the why of the era. It’s also a true treasure for comics and music fans if they weren’t actually there: one to resonate with all those probably still quite angry and disaffected veteran kids who love to listen, look and wonder what if..?
© 2024 Editions Petit as Petit. © 2025 NBM for the English translation.

Punk Rock in Comics will be published on 18th March. 2025 and is available for pre-order now. NBM books are also available in digital editions. For more information and other great reads see http://www.nbmpub.com/

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Famous First Edition C-63: New Fun Comics #1


By Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson, Charles Flanders, Lloyd Jacquet, Dick Loederer, Adolphe Barreaux, Adolph Shusterman, Joe Archibald, Lyman Anderson, Sheldon Hubert Stark, Lawrence Lariar, Henry Carl Kiefer, Bert Salg/Bertram Nelson, Clem Gretta, Ken Fitch, Jack A. Warren, Bob Weinstein, Tom Cooper, Tom McNamara, John Lindermayer & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-7795-0119-6 (HB/Digital edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Times of hardship and sustained crisis often trigger moments of inspiration and innovation. That’s no panacea for all the hardship that correspondingly accrues but every silver lining brings a crumb of comfort, no? Perhaps we’ll see more clearly in four years’ time…

In 1933, at the height of the Great Depression, print salesman Max “MC” Gaines and editor Harry I. Wildenberg devised promotional premiums for stores to give away: cheaply made small booklets that reprinted some of the era’s hugely popular newspaper strips. By adding a price sticker these freebies were transformed into a mass market fixture as seen in 1934’s newsstand retail release Famous Funnies.

Monumental corporate megalith DC Comics began as National Allied Publications in 1935, another speculative venture conceived by controversial soldier-turned writer Major Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson. He had been writing military non-fiction and pulp adventure stories when he met Gaines and, fired up, took a shot that the new print vehicle had legs. Backing the belief invention with a shoestring venture, he set about mass-producing the print novelty dubbed comic books.

Wheeler-Nicholson’s bold plan was to sidestep large leasing fees charged for established newspaper strip reprints by filling his books with new material. Moreover, with popular strips in limited supply and/or already optioned, his solution to create new characters in all new stories for an entertainment-hungry readership must have seemed a no-brainer.

Cover-dated February 1935, and looking remarkably like any weekly comic anthology ever since, New Fun: The Big Comic Magazine #1 blended humour with action, intrigue and suspense, combining serialized adventure strips with prose fiction, and features. Tabloid sized, and largely scripted by “The Major”, it was edited by Lloyd Jacquet (who would later helm many of DC’s rapidly proliferating imitators and rivals) with pages filled by untried creators and lesser established cartoonist lights. Issue #6 launched the careers of Jerry Siegel & Joe Shuster with adventurer Henri Duval and supernatural troubleshooter Doctor Occult. Hopefully we closet comics historians will see those collected for the curious one day….

Despite initially tepid sales, the Major persevered, launching New Comics as 1935 closed. The anthology was renamed New Adventure Comics, before settling on Adventure Comics with #32 in 1938. The company was struggling when Wheeler-Nicholson’s main creditors -printer Harry Donenfeld and accountant Jack L. Liebowitz – moved in, taking more active roles in the running of the enterprise. Within two years the commercially unseasoned Wheeler-Nicholson had been forced out by his more adept business partners, just as Wheeler-Nicholson’s final inspiration neared its debut. Detective Comics was a themed anthology of crime thrillers, and when it launched (cover-dated March 1937) it was the hit the company needed. Its success signalled closure of National Allied and birth of Detective Comics Incorporated. Eventually his company grew into monolithic DC (Detective Comics, get it?) Comics. Surviving a myriad of changes and temporary shifts of identity and aims, it’s still with us – albeit primarily as a vehicle for the breakthrough character who debuted in #27 (May 1939). The Major was retained until 1938. Donenfeld and Liebowitz’s acumen ensured the viability of comic books and their editor Vin Sullivan inadvertently changed the direction of history when he commissioned something entirely new and unconventional by Seigel & Shuster for upcoming release Action Comics #1…

Supplemented by a wealth of ancillary articles and essays, the spark of this particular publishing revolutions is re-presented in full facsimile mode after introductory essay ‘The Start of Something Big’ by the legendary Dr Jerry G. Bails, fully supported by ‘A Second Introduction – This One by Roy Thomas’ and a reproduction of a rare insert letter from Lloyd Jaquet that came with some of the earliest copies printed…

Looking remarkably similar in format to any British weekly anthology from the 1930s to the 1970s, the comic had its first feature playing across the cover as Lyman Anderson depicted cowboy Jack Woods imperilled by a rascally bushwhacker.

Edited by Lloyd Jaquet, the inner front cover declaimed ‘New Fun Hello Everybody: Here’s the New Magazine You’ve Been Waiting For!’ before Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson & Charles Flanders debuted ‘Sandra of the Secret Service’; an elegant socialite in over her head…

The first six single page strips all came with an inbuilt star attraction. As Oswald the Lucky Rabbit an animated lepine tyke had hit cinema screens in 1927, courtesy of bright young men Walt Disney & Ub Iwerks. A year later the creators had been kicked out by Universal Pictures and got revenge by inventing Mickey Mouse. Oswald soldiered on under lesser hands until 1938 and enjoyed a strip of his own. Each 3-panel Oswald The Rabbit “topper” ran under New Fun’s new stuff, forming a sequence about ice skating and probably crafted by Al Stahl, John Lindermayer & Sheldon Hubert Stark.

Teen dating dilemmas plagued ‘Jigger and Ginger’ by Adolph “Schus” Shusterman and PI ‘Barry O’Neill’ (by Lawrence Lariar) faced Tong-&-Triad terrors before Adolphe Barreaux exposed Bobby & Binks to ‘The Magic Crystal of History’ and dumped the inquisitive kids in “4000 BC”, even as deKerosett (Henry Carl Kiefer) blended aviation and Foreign Legion licks in ‘Wing Brady – Soldier of Fortune’.

Oswald bowed out underneath the first instalment of ‘Ivanhoe by Sir Walter Scott’ courtesy of Wheeler-Nicholson & Flanders before Bert (Salg aka Bertram Nelson) enjoyed some judicial japery with ‘Judge Perkins’ before big sky sci fi kicked off in the Flash Gordon manner thanks to ‘Don Drake on the Planet Saro’ “presented” by Clem Gretta (Joseph Clemens Gretter & Ken Fitch) prior to Jack A. Warren introducing comedy cowpuncher ‘Loco Luke in “Nope He Didn’t Get His Man”’ and Wheeler-Nicholson & Flanders – as “Roger Furlong” – switch to illuminated prose to probe the mystery of ‘Spook Ranch’. It goes without saying, I hope, that many of these groundbreaking yarns are initial chapters of serials so don’t get too invested in what going on…

Joe Archibald taps into the varsity sports scene with comedic basketball titan ‘Scrub Hardy’ whereas Lyman Anderson plays deadly serious with the other, lesser kind of football in ‘Jack Andrews All-American Boy’ prior to the opening of a section of ads and features. Sandy beach-based bodybuilding revelations precede a prose vignette on ‘Bathysphere – A Martian Dream’ and segue into Joe Archibald’s ‘Sports’ review, a heads-up of what’s ‘On the Radio’ and ‘In the Movies’ whilst the secrets of ‘Model Aircraft’ and ‘Aviation’ lead to ‘How to Build a Model of Hendrik Hudson’s “Half Moon”’ …

Comic treats are topped up with Bob Weinstein’s maritime drama ‘Cap’n Erik’ and Tom Cooper taps into frontier history with ‘Buckskin Jim the Trail Blazer’ prior to learning and hobby craft taking over again with ‘Popular Science’, ‘Stamps and Coins’, and something for the little ladies…‘Young Homemakers’.

Tom McNamara heralds another bunch of comics with kiddie caper ‘After School’ and anonymous ‘Cavemen Capers’ take us to Barreaux’s ‘Fun Films 1st Episode: Tad Among the Pirates’ a faux cinema tale inviting readers to grab scissors and make their own stories, before New Fun’s art director Dick Loederer joins the fun with elfin romp ‘Bubby and Beevil’ and provides an untitled bottom strip to literally support a stylish penguin fantasy ‘Pelion and Ossa’ by John Lindermayer. Closing the interior amazement is another “Clem Gretta” wonder – ‘2023 Super-Police’ – leaving ads ‘New easy way to learn aviation’ and a full colour enticement for the ‘Tom Mix’ Ralston Zyp Gun (you absolutely WILL shoot your eye out!) to close the beginning of it all…

Fully supported by detailed biography ‘The Major Who Made Comics’ by granddaughter Nicky Wheeler-Nicholson and comprehensive listing ‘New Fun #1 – the Contributors’ plus reprint series overview ‘A Tabloid Tradition Continued’ and even more memorabilia bits, this is a historical artefact no serious comics fan should be without.
Famous First Edition: New Fun #1, C-63 Compilation and all new material © 2020 DC Comics. © 1935 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved. Biographical Essays © 2019 Nicky Wheeler-Nicholson.

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Walt Disney’s Donald Duck volume 21: Christmas in Duckburg (The Complete Carl Barks Disney Library)


By Carl Barks, with Bob Gregory & Vic Lockman, Rich Tommaso, Digikore, Gary Leach, Erik Rosengarten, Donald Ault & various (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-68396-239-7 (HB) eISBN: 978-1-68396-299-1

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Utter Acme of All-Ages Entertainment… 10/10

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Carl Barks was born in Merrill, Oregon in 1901, and raised in the rural areas of the West during some of the leanest times in US history. He tried his hand at many jobs before settling into the profession that chose him. His early life is well-documented elsewhere if you need detail, but briefly, Barks worked as an animator at Disney’s studio before quitting in 1942 to work in the new-fangled field of comic books. With cartoon studio partner Jack Hannah (another occasional strip illustrator) Barks adapted a Bob Karp script for an animated cartoon short into the comic book Donald Duck Finds Pirate Gold. It was published as Dell Four Color Comics Series II #9 in October of that year and – although not his first published comics work – it was the story that shaped the rest of Barks’ career.

From then until his official retirement in the mid-1960s, Barks worked in self-imposed seclusion, writing and drawing and devising a vast array of adventure comedies, gags, yarns and covers that gelled into a Duck Universe of memorable and highly bankable characters. These included Gladstone Gander (1948), Gyro Gearloose (1952), Magica De Spell (1961) and the legendarily nefarious Beagle Boys (1951) to supplement Disney’s stable of cartoon actors. His greatest creation was undoubtedly crusty, energetic, paternalistic, money-mad giga-gazillionaire Scrooge McDuck: the World’s wealthiest winged septuagenarian and the harassed, hard-pressed not-so-silent co-star of this show.

Whilst producing that landmark, material Barks regarded himself as just a simple working guy: generating cover art, illustrating other people’s scripts when required, and contributing characters and stories to the burgeoning canon of Duck Lore. Once Gladstone Publishing began re-packaging his efforts – and other selected Disney strips – in the 1980s, Barks discovered a well-earned appreciation he never imagined existed. So potent were his creations that they even fed back into the conglomerate’s animation output, although all his brilliant comic work was done for licensing company Dell/Gold Key, and not directly for the studio. The greatest tribute was undoubtedly animated series Duck Tales, heavily based on his comics output. Throughout his working life Barks was blissfully unaware that his work – uncredited by official policy, as was all Disney’s cartoon and comic book output – had been singled out by a rabid and discerning public as being by “the Good Duck Artist”. When some of his most dedicated fans finally tracked him down, a belated celebrity began.

Barks was a fan of wholesome action, unsolved mysteries and epics of exploration, which led to him perfecting the art and technique of the comics blockbuster: blending history, plucky bravado, wit and sheer wide-eyed wonder into rollicking rollercoaster romps which utterly captivated readers of every age and vintage. Without the Barks expeditions, there would never have been Indiana Jones…

In 2013 Fantagraphics Books began collecting Barks’ Duck stuff in carefully curated archival volumes, tracing his year-by-year output in hardback tomes and digital editions that finally did justice to the quiet imagineer. These will comprise the Complete Carl Barks Disney Library. Physical copies are sturdy and luxurious albums – 193 x 261 mm – that would grace any bookshelf, with volume 5 – Walt Disney’s Donald Duck: “Christmas on Bear Mountain” (for reasons irrelevant here) acting as debut release and re-presenting works from 1947 – albeit not in strictly chronological release order. Today however, it’s seasonal yarn ‘Christmas in Duckburg’ that lends its title to volume 21 of this unmissable publishing event.

It begins with the eponymous full-length Holidays thriller (from Walt Disney’s Christmas Parade #9; cover-dated December 1958 and scripted by Bob Gregory) as Barks’ most enduring creation Scrooge McDuck pressures Donald Duck and his miracle working nephews Huey, Louie & Dewey to head north and bring back a 100ft fir tree for Duckburg City square. This is not some aberrant act of civic largesse, but simply in response to being publicly joshed and barracked all year by obnoxious business rival “Jolly” Ollie Eiderduck who provided the previous prodigious record-breaking pine for the city’s seasonal blowout. Incensed and outraged, Scrooge gets the boys cheaply, since Donald has made another so-typical financial blunder and must find some way to pay for an entire Ferris wheel…

However, there’s no love lost between the turbulent tycoons, and as the poor young ducks head to a Canadian logging camp, enflamed ire turns to ridiculous wagers, and Jolly Ollie hires the nefarious Beagle Boys to sabotage the expedition. Nevertheless, despite their every spectacular attempt, most of the massive living monument makes it back to Duckburg, where the insidious Eiderduck has one last card to play… but so too do the ingenious nephews…

Undoubtedly, the greatest cartoon creation of legendary magnificent story showman Barks, Downy Dodecadillionaire Scrooge McDuck quickly took on a life of his own after appearing as simple throwaway miserly villain. The old coot was crusty, energetic, menacing, money-mad and yet honest and brave by his own standards and oddly lovable  and thus far too potentially valuable to be misspent. He returned often and eventually expanded to fill all available space in tales from scenic metropolis Duckburg, either as star or as a motivating engine for Donald and the boys.

Another sterling creation – and ideal story cog – was super-lucky butthead Gladstone Gander: eternal foil for Donald and rival for Daisy Duck’s attentions. In ‘Dramatic Donald’ (Walt Disney’s Comics and Stories #217, October 1958) the fortunate one gleefully tramples all over Donald’s thespian aspirations and efforts to score a leading role in Daisy’s Halloween play, bringing out our hero’s dark side and inciting a stage catastrophe. Then, Donald’s hunt for rare and valuable marine creatures sparks a manic sea hunt and nautical chaos only curtailed by a large pod of ‘Noble Porpoises’ (WDC&S #218 November 1958).

Cover-dated February 1959, the duck tale in Walt Disney’s Comics and Stories #221 reveals exactly how parsimonious Scrooge was made to pay for Duckburg’s magnificent new Junior Woodchucks of the World Hall of Science in ‘Tracking Sandy’: a tale of mystery, masked and masquerading gold miners, canny nephews, investigations and a dynamic detective deduction, whilst WDC&S #219 (December 1958) offers a rare moment of failure as Donald, Huey, Louie & Dewey and even wise old Grandma Duck all fail to tame an orphan coyote in ‘The Littlest Chicken Thief’.

Donald and Gladstone clash again at ‘The Beachcombers’ Picnic’ (WDC&S #224, May 1959) where a concatenation of bizarre events and fervent scavenger hunting antics result in a rare victory for “unca Donald” after which the loco parental displays an uncanny ability to transport anything anywhere in WDC&S #222 (March 1959). Typically, however, ‘The Master Mover’ goes too far only to come a crushing cropper after guaranteeing to shift an entire zoo to a mountaintop in one afternoon! A facility for lucky accidents and the nephews’ chemistry set results in a major step forward in ballistic science… until US military intransigence and Donald’s stubbornness reduce the race for space to a ‘Rocket-Roasted Christmas Turkey’ (WDC&S #220, January 1959), in advance of the accidental savant succumbing to ‘Spring Fever’ (WDC&S #223, April). With the sun out and flowers blooming, Donald craves a quiet day’s fishing, but his rush to relax causes chaos for the kids and makes him the target of a ticket-happy game warden…

Volunteer firefighter Donald finds respect, his happy place and victory over gloating Gladstone in all-action romp ‘The Lovelorn Fireman’ (WDC&S #225 June), before Scrooge resurfaces to fall foul of satellite technology after spotting and appropriating ‘The Floating Island’ (#226, July). It turns out to be a rare bad gamble and brutally depreciating asset, after which Donald becomes proxy prey for the Junior Woodchucks in fieldcraft test ‘The Black Forest Rescue’ (#227 August), again learning the kids know their stuff and that nature abhors a smug git…

Anthology Walt Disney’s Summer Fun #2 (August 1959) provides anthropological hilarity as Donald attempts to emulate explorer-documentarians’ ‘Jungle Hi-Jinks’ without leaving the house, only to end up lost, out of his depth and impersonating a caveman in Africa before a quartet of tales bucolic pastoral tales sees Barks as illustrator only. Scripted by Vic Lockman, ‘The Flying Farmhand’, ‘A Honey of a Hen’, ‘The Weather Watchers’ & ‘The Sheepish Cowboys’ all originated in Four Color #1010 (July-September 1959): a themed anthology entitled Walt Disney’s Grandma Duck’s Farm Friends.

With movie star guests such as Dumbo, Big Bad Wolf and Gus Goose augmenting Barks regulars Gyro Gearloose, Daisy, the nephews, Grandma, Scrooge and Donald, the vignettes detail how thieving Zeke Wolf fails to impress as a stand-in scarecrow, what Scrooge learns of the true cost of buying vegetables wholesale, why goats can derange meteorological predictions and where nephews seek size-appropriate steeds for their cowboy games…

With the visual verve done with again, we move on to a cover gallery and validation as ‘Story Notes’ provides erudite commentary for each Duck tale and Donald Ault details ‘Carl Barks: Life Among the Ducks’ before ‘Biographies’ reveals why he and ‘Contributors’ Alberto Beccatini, Craig Fischer, Leonardo Gori, Thad Komorowski, Rich Kreiner, Ken Parille, Stefano Priarone, Francesco “Franky” Stajano, Mattias Wivel and Daniel F. Yezbick are saying all those nice and informative things. We close for Christmas – and the meanwhile – with an examination of provenance with ‘Where Did These Duck Stories First Appear?’ explaining the somewhat byzantine publishing schedules of Dell Comics and origin points of all the fun we’ve just had…

Carl Barks was one of the greatest exponents of comic art the world has ever seen, and almost all his work featured Disney’s characters: reaching and affecting untold millions of readers across the world and he all too belatedly won far-reaching recognition. You might be late to the party but it’s never too soon to climb aboard the Barks Express.
Walt Disney’s Donald Duck “Christmas in Duckberg” © 2020 Disney Enterprises, Inc. “Story Notes” texts © 2020 the respective authors. “Carl Barks: Life Among the Ducks” © 2020 Donald Ault. Other text © 2020 Fantagraphics Books, Inc. All rights reserved.