Category: Drama

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No Refuge


By Patrice Aggs & Joe Brady (David Fickling Books)
ISBN: 978-1-78845-119-2 (PB)

I normally aim to review unpublished and new books relatively close to their release date because people have minds like sieves and seldom sustain interest for unavailable items, but this is a long and eagerly anticipated treat and one everyone needs to be aware of as soon as possible. I might even remind you all closer to the release date… just see if I don’t…

Just imagine a Britain where the leaders ignore laws, suspend Parliament and rule by fiat. Consider curfews and lockdowns, citizens attacking each other over differing views, shortages in shops and direct monitoring and control of what the press and even teachers can say and do. Further ponder on what happens when impassioned protestors organise into militant groups, systematically and violently resisting armed interventions and oppressions doled out by an ever more heavy-handed police force and too-readily deployed army.

That’s what Patrice Aggs & Joe Brady did for their award-winning all-ages thriller No Country. The resulting comic saga was set in contemporary England; following comic-loving middle schooler Bea, her little brother Dom and far-too-bossy older sister Hannah as they were forced to adapt to a rapidly-changing reality. Their dad used to work as a local councillor, but was sidelined on office and relegated to looking after the kids – although he spent his off-hours in quiet, secret meetings with other adults who all had worried faces…

Mum had been gone for a while, but still connected to them via the internet… whenever there was enough electricity. She was safely living in another country, trying to get exit visas and paperwork so the family could be reunited… somewhere safe.

Tensions ratcheted up when a long-declared Martial Law edict was shockingly enforced by New Army divisions who occupied the town and “requisitioned” everything not nailed down. Hannah was just getting to know her first proper boyfriend. He was part of patriotic rebel front Free Kingdom – the other side of a rapidly escalating, ideologically fanatical civil war, ripping sedate stuffy Britain to pieces.

Argumentative but always bonded by their “Sister Code” Bea and Hannah already knew bad days were coming. They didn’t care about stupid politics but as shortages mounted and hunger grew, with home raids and “searches” intensifying daily, friends and teachers started disappearing. When Mum finally contacted them, saying that their documents were ready the girls knew they must act immediately. Tragically, not everyone was there to get the message. Dad was missing…

However, he had wisely drummed a contingency plan into them. With no time to wait, the moment to run had come…

Picking up immediately after the close of No Country, the family history turns even more chilling here as the kids hunker down in a flimsy powered dingy, trusting everything to shady rogues in illegal boats… and the kindness of strangers they haven’t met yet.

How they got to this parlous state unfolds in a grimly harrowing, emotionally challenging flashback of tribulation that begins with Hannah taking charge and dragging Bea and toddler Dom across open country for days. Thankfully unaware of what both New Army and Free Kingdom forces are doing in equally determined searches for them, Bea argues constantly and leaves dangerously revealing picture messages for Dad, who she knows must be following them. She also forces fiercely pragmatic Hannah to let a huge dog join the group. That proves to both wise and ultimately heartbreaking…

Cold, starving, harried and hunted, the family experience hardship and the worst of civilisation in crisis, but are inevitably forced to give themselves up to get medical assistance when Dom succumbs to exhaustion and fever. Initial relief and gratitude turn to panic and fury as their baby brother is “disappeared” and they must escape their draconian girls’ boarding establishment to retrieve him. The frantic attempt takes them to the capital – a high-security oasis of calm and serenity where the rich and privileged have isolated themselves from the country’s troubles and its lesser inhabitants.

Utterly unstoppable, undaunted by continuing disappointment and prepared to face any risk, the girls make unlikely friends – such as a benevolent people trafficker – and persevere until a seeming miracle occurs…

Every bit as compelling and rewarding as its predecessor, this is another superb exploration of the world’s ongoing refugee crisis with the comfy, cosy UK all-too-convincingly substituting for Syria, Afghanistan, South Sudan, Myanmar, Ukraine and now also the USA (and please feel free to look up why I chose those countries). This is a brilliant treatment of real-world problems any kid can grasp and be moved by, in exactly the same way books like The Diary of a Young Girl AKA The Diary of Anne Frank, Animal Farm, A Kestrel for a Knave or Lord of the Flies ushered in new, transformational understanding for generations of youngsters.

Read carefully, read open-mindedly, but please do read.

This volume includes a Phoenix Comic Club feature steered by Aggs & Brady, providing discussion questions readers might want to think about after finishing the story…
Text & Illustrations © The Phoenix Comic 2025.

No Refuge is published on 11th September 2025 and available for preorder now.

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Jack Kirby’s The Losers


By Jack Kirby with D. Bruce Berry, Mike Royer & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-84856-194-6 (HB)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Despite there being a glorious profusion of Jack Kirby material around these days, much of the best and rarest stuff is still – unforgivably – hard to access. This astounding collection of his too-brief run on DC war comic Our Fighting Forces is, for far too many, an unknown delight. You can still find it in the original 2009 hardback edition, but as far as I know, there’s neither digital nor even n trade paperback edition – in English – to satisfy the desires of fans lacking an infinite bank balance.

Famed for his larger than life characters and gigantic, cosmic imaginings, the King was a decent, spiritual man from another generation, and one who had experienced human horror and bravery as an ordinary grunt during World War II. Whether in the world-weary Verité of his 1950s collaborations with Joe Simon or the flamboyant bravado of his Marvel creation Sgt. Fury, Kirby’s combat comics always looked and felt real: grimy, tired, battered yet indomitable. Back in 1974, with his newest creations inexplicably not setting any sales records at DC, and while he tentatively pondered a return to Marvel, Jack took over the creative chores on a well-established, compelling but always floundering series that had run in Our Fighting Forces since 1970.

The Losers were an elite unit of American warriors cobbled together by amalgamating three pre-existing war series that had reached the end of their solo star roads. Gunner and Sarge (supplemented by “Fighting Devil Dog” Pooch) were Pacific-based Marines; debuting in All-American Men of War #67, (March 1959). They patrolled for 50 issues in Our Fighting Forces (#45-94, May 1959- August 1965), whilst Captain Johnny Cloud – Navajo Ace and native American fighter pilot – shot down his first bogie in All-American Men of War #82 (December 1960) and flew (mostly) solo until issue #115 in 1966. The final component of the Land/Air/Sea team was filled by Captain Storm, a disabled PT Boat commander (he had a wooden leg) who had his own 18-issue title from 1964 to 1967. All three series were created by DC’s comics warlord Robert Kanigher.

The characters had all pretty much passed their sell-by dates when they teamed-up as guest-stars in a Haunted Tank tale (G.I. Combat #138 October 1969), but these “Losers” found a new resonance together in the “relevant-era” and disillusioned, cynical Vietnam years and beyond, when their nihilistic, doom-laden anti-hero adventures claimed lead spot in Our Fighting Forces #123 (January/February 1970). Once again written primarily by Kanigher, these episodes were graced with art from such giants as Ken Barr, Russ Heath, John Severin, Sam Glanzman, Ross Andru and Joe Kubert. With the tagline “even when they win, they lose” the squad saw action all over the globe, winning critical acclaim and a far-too-small, passionate following.

In an inexplicable dose of company politics, discontented Kirby was abruptly given complete control of the series with #151 (November 1974). His radically different approach was highly controversial at the time, but the passage of years has granted a fairer appraisal and whilst never really in tune with the aesthetic of DC’s other war-books, the King’s run was a spectacular, bombastic and singularly intriguing examination of the human condition under the worst of all possible situations.

The combat frenzy kicks off in ‘Kill Me with Wagner’ as The Losers infiltrate a French village to rescue a concert pianist before the Nazis can capture her. The hapless propaganda pawn has one tremendous advantage – nobody knows what she looks like. As with most of this series, a feeling of inevitable, onrushing Gotterdammerung permeates the tale: a sense that worlds are ending and a new one’s coming. The action culminates in a catastrophic wave of destruction that is pure Kirby bravura…

Most of DC’s war titles sported Kubert covers, but #152 featured the first in a startling sequence of hypnotic Kirby collations – almost abstract in delivery – to introduce the team to the no-hope proposition of ‘A Small Place in Hell!’ when they find themselves the advance guard for an Allied push, but dropped in the wrong town: one that has not been cleared…

The spectacular action here is augmented by a potent 2-page Kirby fact feature: Sub-machine guns of WWII, and it should be noted and commended that this collection is also peppered with un-inked Kirby pencilled pages and roughs.

Our Fighting Forces #153 is one of those stories that made traditionalists squeak. Behind a Kirby cover, the story of ‘Devastator vs. Big Max’ veers dangerously close to science fiction, but an admittedly eccentric plan to destroy a giant German rail-mounted super-cannon isn’t any stranger than many schemes actual boffins dreamed up to disinform the enemy during the actual conflict, actually…

That yarn – with two beautiful info-pages on military uniforms and insignia – is followed by a superb parable examining personal honour. A compelling Kirby cover segues into the team’s deployment to the Pacific to remove a Japanese officer whose devotion to ‘Bushido’ inspires superhuman loyalty and resistance to surrender among his men. The means used to remove him are far from clean or creditable…

Bracketed by 2 pages on war vehicles plus a wonderful pencil cover-rough, two more on artillery pieces and the pencils for the cover to that issue, OFF #155’s ‘The Partisans!’ takes the Losers into very dark territory, before they return to America for ‘Good-bye Broadway… Hello Death!’, wherein the boys experience home-front joys of New York whilst hunting a notorious U-Boat commander. Naturally there’s more to the story than first appears…

This fast-paced thriller is complemented by a history of battle headgear and another pencilled rough. Comprising a 2-part saga concerning theft, black marketeering and espionage, #157 & 158 introduce utterly unique personage ‘Panama Fattie!’ Her criminal activities almost alter the course of the war; and conclude in the highly charged ‘Bombing Out on the Panama Canal’, with accompanying pages on ships, subs and Nazi super-planes.

Behind the last Kirby cover (#159), ‘Mile-a-Minute Jones!’ details a smaller-scaled duel. With the Losers relegated to subordinate roles, the tale of a black runner who embarrassed the Nazis at the 1936 Olympics unfolds as a forced rematch with the Nazi ubermensch he defeated back then reignites old passions on the battlefield.

Indicating that Kirby’s attentions were being diverted elsewhere, Kubert & Ernie Chan handled the last three covers of this run, but the stories remain powerful, deeply personal explorations of combat. In ‘Ivan’ (OFF #160) the squad goes undercover, impersonating German soldiers on the Eastern Front, and have an unpleasant encounter with Russian Nazi sympathizers whose appetite for atrocity surpasses anything they have ever seen before. Supplemented by a 2-page tanks feature, the drama resumes in the hellish jungles of Burma which prove an unholy backdrop for traumatic combat shocker ‘The Major’s Dream’ before the volume and Kirby’s DC war work ends in a sly tribute to his 1942 co-creation Boy Commandos.

‘Gung-Ho!’ sees a young Gunner training a band of war orphans in Marine tactics, only to find fun turn to dire necessity after Germans overrun their “safe” position. This is an optimistic, all-out action romp ending on a note of hope and anticipation, even as the King made his departure for pastures not-so-new. From OFF #163 Kanigher picked up where he left off, with artists like Jack Lehti, Ric Estrada & George Evans illustrating, as the Losers returned to their pre-Kirby style and status, with readers hardly acknowledging the detour into another kind of war.

Jack Kirby is unique and uncompromising. If you’re not a fan or simply not prepared to see for yourself what all the fuss has been about then no words of mine will change your mind. That doesn’t alter the fact that his work from 1939 onwards shaped the entire American comics scene, affected the lives of billions of readers and thousands of creators in all areas of artistic endeavour around the world for generations, and which still garners new fans and apostles from the young and naive to the most cerebral of intellectuals. Jack’s work is instantly accessible, irresistibly visceral and deceptively deep whilst being simultaneously mythic and human.

These tales of purely mortal heroism are in many ways the most revealing, honest and insightful of Jack’s incredibly vast accumulated works, and even the true devotee often forgets their very existence. As Neil Gaiman’s introduction succinctly declaims, “they are classic Kirby” and even if you don’t like war comics, you may be in for a surprise…”

You won’t want to miss that, would you?
© 2009 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

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Savage Sword of Conan volume 1


By Robert E. Howard, Roy Thomas, John Jakes, Lin Carter, Barry Windsor-Smith, John Buscema, Pablo Marcos, Gil Kane, Neal Adams, Jim Starlin & Al Milgrom, Alfredo Alcala, Tony DeZuñiga, Alex Niño, Vince Colletta, Steve Gan, Tim Conrad, Yong Montano, Jess Jodloman, “The Tribe”, Rudy Mesina, Freddie Fernandez, Sonny Trinidad, & various (Dark Horse Books)
ISBN: 978-1-59307-838-6 (TPB)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

During the 1970’s the American comic book industry opened up after more than 15 years of cautiously calcified publishing practises that had come about as a reaction to the censorious oversight of the self-inflicted Comics Code Authority: a publishers’ oversight body created to keep the product wholesome after the industry suffered their very own McCarthy-style Witch-hunt during the 1950s. One of the first literary hardy perennials to be revisited was Horror/Mystery comics and from them came the creation of a new comics genre. Sword & Sorcery stories had been undergoing a prose revival in the paperback marketplace since the release of softcover editions of Lord of the Rings in 1954 and, by the 1960s, revivals of the two-fisted fantasies of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Otis Adelbert Kline, Fritz Lieber and so many more were making huge inroads into buying patterns across the world. Moreover, the old masters had been constantly augmented by modern writers. Michael Moorcock, Lin Carter and many others kickstarted their prose careers with contemporary versions of man against mage against monster. Even so, the undisputed overlord of the genre was Robert E. Howard with his 1930s pulp masterpiece Conan of Cimmeria.

Gold Key had notionally opened the field in 1964 – and created a cult hit – with Mighty Samson. Then in 1966 came Clawfang the Barbarian’ in Thrill-O-Rama #2. Both steely warriors battled in post-apocalyptic technological wildernesses, but in 1969 DC dabbled in previously code-proscribed mysticism with Nightmaster (Showcase #82 -84), following on from the example of CCA-exempt Warren horror anthologies Creepy, Eerie & Vampirella. Marvel tested the waters with barbarian villain – and Conan prototype – Arkon in Avengers #76 (April 1970) and the same month went all-out with short supernatural thriller ‘The Sword and the Sorcerers’ in their own watered-down horror anthology Chamber of Darkness #4.

Written by Roy Thomas and drawn by fresh-faced Barry Smith (a recent Marvel find just breaking out of the company’s still-prevalent Kirby house-style), the tale introduced Starr the Slayer – who also bore no small resemblance to the Barbarian-in-waiting…

Conan the Barbarian debuted with an October 1970 cover-date and – despite some early teething problems, including being cancelled and reinstated in the same month – the comic-strip adventures of Howard’s primal hero were as big a success as the prose yarns they adapted. Conan became a huge hit: a pervasive brand that prompted new prose tales, movies, TV series, cartoon shows, a newspaper strip and all the other paraphernalia of global superstardom.

And American comics changed forever.

In May 1971, Marvel moved into Warren’s territory for a second time, after an abortive attempt in 1968 to create an older-readers, non-Comics Code monochrome magazine: Spectacular Spider-Man. Now, Savage Tales offered stories with stronger tone, mature sexual themes, less bowdlerised violence and partial nudity… and no superheroes. It was the perfect place to introduce Futuristic Femizon Thundra and the macabre Man-Thing whilst offering more visceral vignettes starring the company’s resident jungle-man Ka-Zar and red-handed slayer Conan…

The anthology had an eventful reception and the second issue didn’t materialise until October 1973 under the aegis of Marvel’s parent company Curtis Distribution. Conan starred in the first five issues before spinning off into his own adult-oriented monochrome magazine which debuted in August 1974. Free of all Code-mandated restrictions, The Savage Sword of Conan became a haven for mature storytelling, with top flight artists queuing up to flex their creative muscles.

In 2007, after acquiring the license to publish Conan comics, Dark Horse began gathering Marvel’s Savage Sword canon in a series of 500+ page Essentials-style volumes. Today these stories are mostly available in heavy, costly macho-man-testing Omnibus editions too, but still not any kind of digital edition. Why, Crom? Why?

This first titanic tome – also available as an eBook – collects pertinent material from Savage Tales #1-5 and Savage Sword of Conan #1-10: collectively covering May 1971 through February 1976; a period when the unwashed lout was swiftly becoming the darling of the comics world, and chief scribe Roy Thomas was redefining what American comics could say, show and do…

It all starts here with a much-reprinted classic.

‘The Frost Giant’s Daughter’ is a haunting, racy tale written by Howard, originally adapted in line and tone by Barry Smith for Savage Tales #1. It was later coloured – and adulterated – for the all-ages comic book (#16) as it detailed how a lusty young Cimmerian chased a naked nymph into the icy winter and found himself prey in a trap set by gods or monsters…

By the time Savage Tales returned after a two-year hiatus, Barry Windsor-Smith had pretty much left comics but had agreed to illustrate ‘Red Nails’ one day if he could do it his way and at his own pace. The eventual result was an utter revelation, moody, gory, soaked in dark passion and entrancing in its savage beauty. With some all-but-invisible art assistance from Pablo Marcos this journey into the brutal depths of obsession and the decline of empires is the perfect example of how to bow out at the top of one’s creative game.

The adaptation began in ST #2 as Conan and pirate queen Valeria survive a trek through scorching deserts to fetch up in a vast walled city. Stealing inside they find immense riches casually ignored as the last members of the tribes of Tecuhlti and Xotalanc pick each off or wait for the monsters infesting the place to take them. All too soon, the visitors are embroiled in a simmering, oppressive war of extinction. The third issue completed the ghastly epic as the slow conflict between rival branches of a decadent race explodes into a paroxysm of gore and aroused monsters…

Savage Tales #4 (May 1974) held a brace of tales. ‘Night of the Dark God’ was limned by Gil Kane, Neal Adams, Marcos & Vince Colletta from Howard’s tale The Dark Man. It revealed how Conan came hunting abductors of his childhood first love and found them just as a terrify mystery idol began exerting its own malefic influence on a hall full of already-enraged warriors…

‘Dweller in the Dark’ was Smith’s swansong and saw the wandering warrior become a plaything for lascivious Queen Fatima of Corinthia. Her lusts were matched only by her jealousy, however, and it wasn’t long before she had turned against Conan and tried to feed him to the monster lurking below the city…

The fifth and final Conan appearance in Savage Tales was ‘Secret of Skull River’: a wryly laconic yarn Thomas adapted from a John Jakes plot, illustrated by Jim Starlin & Al Milgrom. The barbarian sell-sword is hired to remove a wizard whose experiments are polluting a town. The reward lusty Conan claims for his murderous services surprises everybody…

From there it was only a short jump to his own mature-themed starring vehicle, but although Savage Sword starred Conan it was initially a vehicle for numerous barbarian themed yarns – such as a serialised reprinting of Gil Kane’s epic Blackmark – and other Howard properties such as Bran Mac Morn or Red Sonja. Those aren’t included here, but are well worth searching out too…

The SSOC experience opens with the first issue and ‘Curse of the Undead-Man’ by Thomas, John Buscema & Marcos, adapted from Howard’s short story Mistress of Death. Here Conan encounters old comrade Red Sonja amongst the fleshpots of “The Maul” in Zamora’s City of Thieves before falling foul of sorcerer Costranno: a mage for whom being chopped to mincemeat is only a minor inconvenience…

Thomas wrote all SSOC Conan material included here: blending adaptations of Howard’s stories – Conan’s and his other fearsome fighting men as well – and such successor authors as Lin Carter or L. Sprague de Camp with original tales. A stunning visual tour de force, ‘Black Colossus’ in #2 was illustrated by Buscema & Alfredo Alcala; detailing how antediluvian priest Natohk returns from death to imperil the kingdom of Princess Yasmela… until stalwart general Conan leads her armies to a victory against armed invaders, uncanny occultism and a legion of devils.

SSOC #3 contributed two tales, beginning with Buscema & Marcos’ ‘At the Mountain of the Moon-God’ with Conan high in Yasmela’s court and attempting to head off the kingdom’s annexation from encroaching neighbours and encountering mountain-dwelling bandits and a demon pterosaur. The issue concluded with ‘Demons of the Summit’ – an adaptation of Bjorn Nyberg & de Camp’s People of the Summit – turned into comics by Thomas & Tony DeZuñiga as an encounter with more high-living brigands brings the Cimmerian into conflict with a dying race of wizards who want his latest curvy companion to mother their next generation…

Issue #4 features Howard’s ‘Iron Shadows on the Moon’, realised by Buscema & Alcala. Having lost a war whilst leading a Kozak horde, Conan flees into the Vilayet Sea with escaped slave Olivia after killing enemy general Shah Amurath. On an uncharted island they then encounter ancient statues which come to life at the moon’s touch. The bloodthirsty horrors fall upon a band of pirates watering on the island and after leading them to victory against the supernatural fiends Conan manoeuvres himself into the captain’s role and begins a life of freebooting piracy…

Howard’s ‘A Witch Shall Be Born’ took up most of Savage Sword of Conan #5. Illustrated by Buscema and The Tribe – a loose association of Marvel’s Filipino art contingent (DeZuñiga; Steve Gan; Rudy Mesina; Freddie Fernandez and others) it saw virtuous Queen Taramis replaced by her demonic twin sister Salome, who debauches and ravages the kingdom of Kauran whilst her accomplice Constantius has her guard captain Conan crucified. After (almost) saving himself, the Cimmerian recuperates with desert-raiding Zuagirs, and after ousting their brutal chieftain Olgerd Vladislav returns to save Taramis and revenge himself upon the witch…

The epic is balanced by two shorter tales in the next issue. ‘The Sleeper Beneath the Sands’ is a Thomas original limned by Sonny Trinidad revealing how Olgerd encounters a caravan of clerics en route to pacify an elder god buried since time immemorial beneath the desert. The rejected bandit-lord senses a chance for revenge but soon regrets allowing the beast to wake and luring Conan into its path…

Howard’s Celtic reincarnation thriller ‘People of the Dark’ is radically adapted by Thomas and stunningly illustrated by master stylist Alex Niño next as, in modern times, Jim O’Brien plots to kill rival Richard Brent to win the hand of Eleanor. However, a fall into an ancient cavern transports the would-be killer into antediluvian prehistory where – as Conan – he battles the debased descendants of things which were once men. In that forgotten hell a burden is placed upon him and, once returned to the present, O’Brien faces another monster and pays a millennial debt…

‘The Citadel at the Center of Time’ by Thomas, Buscema & Alcala in #7 finds the Cimmerian leading desert-raiding Zuagirs and attacking a caravan only to be confronted by a sabretooth tiger. After despatching the wanton killer, Conan learns from the surviving merchants of a great ziggurat with vast riches and only attendant priests to guard them. Ever-needful of loot to placate his greedy followers, Conan leads an expedition against the eerie edifice but soon finds himself captured and offered up as a sacrificial tool to time wizard Shamash-Shum-Ukin and battling dinosaurs, beasts and brutes from many ages before finally settling his score with the time-meddler…

SSOC #8 offered many short sharp shockers beginning with ‘The Forever Phial’, illustrated by Tim Conrad doing his best Windsor-Smith riff. Here immortal wizard Ranephi desires to end his interminable existence and manipulates a certain barbarian into helping him out. The main part of the issue continues Thomas & Kane’s adaptation of Howard’s King Conan novel The Hour of the Dragon, which had begun in Giant-Size Conan but foundered as Marvel ended their oversized specials line. Inked by Yong Montano, ‘Corsairs Against Stygia’ resumes the tale with shanghaied King Conan leading a slave revolt on the ship he’s been abducted upon. Back in Aquilonia, a cabal of nobles backed by Stygian wizard Thutothmes has usurped his throne…

Having taking control of the ship Conan opts to infiltrates the evil empire to rescue the stolen talisman known as the Heart of Ahriman and end the conflict…

Wrapping up this segment is Lin Carter’s evocative poem ‘Death Song of Conan the Cimmerian’ adapted by Thomas and Jess Jodloman…

Issue #9 offered another new tale by Thomas & Marcos as Conan’s Zuagirs raid another priest-packed caravan and come under the diabolical influence of a small statue with great power. ‘The Curse of the Cat-Goddess’ corrupts, divides and promises many great things: causing the doom of many brothers in arms before the iron-willed Cimmerian ends its seductive threat. The adaptation of The Hour of the Dragon concludes in this hefty tome’s final chapter as SSOC #10 reveals how ‘Conan the Conqueror’ (rendered by Buscema & The Tribe) sneaks into Stygian capitol Khemi to defeat snake-worshipping priests, immortal vampire queen Akivasha and Thutothmes’ inner circle, before stealing back the Heart of Ahriman and heading home to occupied Aquilonia to destroy wizard king Xaltotun and his human lackeys, and reclaim his stolen throne…

With a painted covers gallery – reproduced only in black-&-white here – by Buscema, Marcos, John Romita, Adams, Boris Vallejo, Mike Kaluta, Niño, Frank Magsino, Frank Brunner & Bob Larkin and pin-up/frontispiece art by Marcos, Adams & Esteban Maroto, this weighty collection provides a truly epic experience for all fans of thundering mystic combat and esoteric adventure.

If the clash of arms, roar of monsters, unwise gloating of connivers and destruction of empires sets your pulse racing and blood rushing, this titanic tome is certainly your cup of mead. There are plenty of Thrones in peril, but this all-action extravaganza of sex, slaughter, snow, sand and steel is no Game. Get it and see what real intrigue and barbarism look like…
Savage Sword of Conan® and © 2007 Conan Properties International, LLC. All rights reserved.

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Cannon


By Wally Wood & various, introduction by Howard Chaykin (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-60699-702-4 (HB/Digital edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

As with any historical perspective addressing popular mass-entertainments and evolving societies, a look back often finds uncomfortable material that can jar some modern sensitivities and set today’s collective hackles rising. That’s especially true of this lovely but confounding collection compiling seldom seen material by one of the industry’s greatest stars…

This is quite frankly a lovely book of beautiful work that I now find hard to recommend to a general audience. That’s more to do with how society has evolved rather than its admittedly always deeply flawed and often unsavoury content…

We all carry within us the seeds of our own destruction and probably none more so than troubled comics genius Wallace Allan Wood (June 17th 1927 – November 2nd 1981): one of the greatest draughtsmen and graphic imagineers our art form has ever produced. Woody was a master of every aspect of the business. He began his career lettering Will Eisner’s Spirit newspaper strip, readily moving into pencilling and inking as the 1940s ended and, ultimately into publishing. After years working all over the comic book and syndicated strip markets, as well as in book illustration, package-design and other areas of commercial art, he devised the legendary T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents franchise and even predated and anticipated the counter-culture’s Underground Commix phenomenon by launching in 1965s one of the first adult-oriented, independent comics: Witzend.

The troubled genius was frequently his own worst enemy. Woody’s life was one of addiction (guns, booze & cigarettes); traumatic relationships; tantalisingly close yet always inevitably frustrated financial security; illness and eventually, suicide. It was as if all the joy and beauty in his existence stayed on the pages and there was none left for real life.

Although during his time with EC Wood became the acknowledged, undisputed Master of Science Fiction art in America, he was equally adept, driven and accomplished in the production of all genres. He was a lusty man and was a pioneer of sexually explicit, ultra-violent (but always beautiful) and titillating comics where sex played a major role. Remember, even if everybody loves comics, it’s not always about superheroes and cosmic quests. Men like sexy comics and cartoons. I’m not saying that it’s right or proper to ogle women, but it is a sad fact of life and has made many publishers rich for centuries. This customer base especially likes looking at beautiful naked women and amongst so very many cartoonists over the decades, Wood was arguably the paramount exponent of the subgenre…

Remarkably and without in any way seeking to apologise for it, I can confirm that this gritty strip was made to entertain REAL-MEN!! It abounds with naked, nude, undraped and forcibly undressed women (and men, but not as many or as often as the women). Somehow less controversially it also heavily features mega violence, and both physical and psychological torture because that’s what the audience wanted. If you don’t believe me go and rewatch Goldfinger (1964) but this time watch and listen closely…

Cannon’s inbuilt misogyny is a feature not a bug with levels of abusive behaviour and conduct that seldom exceed those of any 1960-1970s Bond or Man from U.N.C.L.E. movie. There’s practically no gadgets either, but loads of fast flashy cars, planes and boats… and much sublimely rendered, awesomely accurate ordnance because that’s one thing your average GI or swabbie will spot instantly if fudged…

This cartoon series captures a moment in history that was deeply, deeply unfair to women, even if – for its time – the feature was uncharacteristically racially & socially diverse and most equitable in its treatment of African-American, Hispanic, Arabic and Asian guys. This was probably as much about the target readership – the desegrated but still mostly male US Military Service personnel – as Woody’s views on the Civil Rights movement. Wally was always utterly professional and diligent in all his work commitments and liberated from all editorial constraints, but his own experience gave the audience exactly what they wanted…

Following Howard Chaykin’s ‘Intro’ confirming the best and worst of the legends, the strip unfolds in one unbroken stream of non-stop blockbuster action heavily seasoned with geopolitical themes and contemporary headline fodder. It’s fitting to note here that Woody utilised and mentored dozens of guys who went on to their own notoriety. If you’re a fanatic, you’ll spot many of them – Pearson, Reese, Wenzel, Hama et al – as characters in the strip, but in-jokes aside, this one’s all about satisfying manly urges.

Guaranteeing sex, death and horror and NAKED WOMEN in almost every episode, Cannon by Wood and his ever-shifting studio ran from 1970-1973 in three separate editions of The Overseas Weekly: a tabloid specifically created and disseminated to US military personnel stationed overseas. He & Steve Ditko later recycled the character in an abortive indie publishing venture Heroes, Inc., which we’ll cover at the end.

John Cannon was a U2 pilot captured and tortured by the Red Chinese. Broken and turned into their assassin, he threw off the ministrations of their top brainwasher Madame Toy but suffered a psychological collapse that left him a relentless, emotionless living weapon pointed by the CIA at any target that needed killing.

His successes didn’t affect him at all but did make him a permanent target of the Chinese and Soviet governments. The latter tasked beautiful lethal killer Sue Smith to remove him by any means and at all costs, but her attempts were as frequent and futile as Toy’s, who doggedly and repeatedly seeks to recapture or kill him. Both curvaceous killers spent as much time shagging Cannon as shooting, stabbing, electrocuting, drowning, poisoning, bombing and running over the implacable agent.

Encountering and exterminating hundreds of spies Cold War spies and assassins, Cannon saves US-friendly middle-Eastern Ismiria from infiltration and insurrection; defends US ally Israel from subversion; shatters the schemes (and sleeper agent army) of Comrade Gorsk and saves Latin American San Sierra from both Red-backed rebels and the incumbent US-friendly fascist dictatorship. He even gets to save a few lives along the way, like his own Uncle Fred back in Iowa and charming conman/serial bigamist/accidental hitman Charles M. Fogarty…

At home, Cannon eradicates gangsters and spies as his conditioning begins to fade. No longer a reliable asset, he tries to retire to his old family home but trouble follows and the CIA soon re-recruit him. With Toy & Sue Smith perpetually hunting him and “cat-fighting” each other, Cannon even clashes with killer hippies in a murder commune and an ultra-conservative millionaire with his own private militia seeking to set the nation back on the Right path. John even has a couple of shots at true love and a Happy Ever After, but inevitably learns over and again that “women are just no damn good”…

Along the way he experiences every kind of action from scuba combat to aerial dogfights, and even battles a killer cyborg, He’s particularly adept at ferreting out leftover Nazis and dodges more than his fair share of atomic detonations. This is a strip very much of its time and for adults if not grown-ups, so like many of his audience, our hero even has to face up to the consequences of his actions when one paramour falls pregnant. The wedding is an utter disaster…

As much a document of art history as an expertly-targeted wank-book, Cannon comes with fascinating bonus features for comics fans, beginning a voluminous Appendix section with a brace of long lost cover paintings.

These augment the Roger Hill’s essay ‘The Overseas Weekly Discovery’ detailing the bizarre circumstance that led to the retrieval of the material forming this book, and compliments a

‘Letter by Wallace Wood’ exhorting how the industry must change. These are followed by the tamed down, general audience full-colour Cannon story by Wood & Ditko as seen by almost nobody in 1969’s Heroes, Inc. Presents Cannon, and another similar but monochrome lost Wood & Ditko treat from Heroes, Inc. No. 2 (1976) once again kicking the stuffing out of stubborn Nazis by Wood & Ditko. The experience ends as it should with a fulsome and fair “Bio” of Wally Wood by J. David Spurlock.

Fast, furious and ferociously unreconstructed and sexist, this can be a hard read: one packed with pitfalls, but undeniably honest in its intent and delivery. If you like this kind of thing you’ll love it, and if you find it offensive, you’re still free enough for the moment to reject and not buy it. However, if you do feel the urge to condemn, do us all the courtesy of reading it first…
“Intro” © 2014 Howard Chaykin. “The Overseas Weekly Discovery” © 2014 Roger Hill. “Bio” © 2014 J. David Spurlock. Photos © Bhob Stewart & Paul Kirchner. All other contents © 2014 Wallace Wood Properties LLC. All rights reserved.

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Barefoot Gen volume 10: Never Give Up


By Keiji Nakazawa (Last Gasp)
ISBN: 978-0-86719-601-6 (TPB) 978-0-86719-840-9 (HB/School Edition)

Whilst we are all commemorating the 80th anniversary of VJ Day (the Americans hold theirs on September 2nd), it’s only appropriate to remember how that war ended and what victory and defeat meant to a world forever changed after the conclusion. In comics, that means Keiji Nakazawa and Hadashi no Gen. A standby of anti-nuclear movements since first release in 1983, new hardback editions combining two paperback editions per volume are underway and will be on sale from January 15th 2026 – if we manage to live that long. You could wait or even check out our past reviews or simply save your time & energy by buying the still-available 10 tank?bon set right now.

After many years of struggle the entire piecemeal epic semi-autobiographical saga was remastered as an unabridged and uncompromising 10-volume English-language translation by Last Gasp under the auspices of Project Gen: a multinational organisation dedicated to peace and the abolition of nuclear weapons. Constantly revised and refined by its creator until his death from lung cancer in December 2012, Barefoot Gen is the quintessential anti-war tract and plea to humanity for peace. The combined volumes are angry and uncompromising, and never forgive those who seek to perpetuate greed, mendacity and bloody-handed stupidity.

Hadashi no Gen was first seen in Japan in 1973, serialised in Gekkan Shōnen Janpu Jampu (Monthly Boys Jump) following an occasional 1972 series of stand-alone stories in various magazines which included Kuroi Ame ni Utarete (Struck by Black Rain) and Aru Hi Totsuzen (One Day, Suddenly).

The scattered tales eventually led Shonen Jump’s editor Tadasu Nagano to commission 45-page Ore wa Mita (I Saw It) for a Monthly Jump special devoted to autobiographical works. Nagano clearly recognised that the author – an actual survivor of the world’s first atomic atrocity – had much more to say which readers needed to see and commissioned the serial which has grown into this stunning landmark epic.

The tale was always controversial in a country which still generally prefers to ignore rather than confront past mistakes and indiscretions and, after 18 months, Hadashi no Gen was removed from Jump, transferring firstly to Shimin (Citizen), then Bunka Hyåron (Cultural Criticism), and Kyåiku Hyåron (Educational Criticism). Just like his indomitable hero, Keiji Nakazawa never gave up and his persistence led to a first Japanese book collection in 1975, translated by the newly-constituted Project Gen team into Russian, English and other languages including Norwegian, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Swedish, Finnish, Indonesian, Tagalog and Esperanto.

Born in March 14th 1939 and changed forever on August 6th 1945, the hibakusha (“atom bomb survivor”) author first completed his account in 1985 and his telling testament of survival has since been adapted into live-action & anime films; operas; musicals and live television dramas; each spreading the message across every continent and all generations.

Today we’re looking again at the concluding volume which brings the story of irrepressible, ebullient Gen and his friends to a close. One last time we see the forceful vitality of a select band of bomb survivors pitted against the constant shadow of tragedy which implacably dogs them in the city slowly recovering from nuclear conflagration.

Here the indomitable idealistic individualist, having finally found a way to express his anger and effectively fight back against the idiocies and injustices of a world which lets Atom bombs fall but is seemingly incapable of learning from its mistakes, at last strikes back at the demagogues and monsters who still keep the bad old ways alive… even after their people suffered the most hideous of consequences…

Barefoot Gen: Never Give Up begins following an inspirational ‘Gen’s Message: A Plea for Nuclear Abolition’ by the Translators & Editors and – as previously – the other end of this monochrome paperback balances the essay with a biography of the author and invaluable data ‘About Project Gen’…

The graphic manifesto resumes in March 1953 as Gen prepares for his school graduation ceremony, despite seldom attending that hidebound institution over the past few years. Fellow bomb orphans Ryuta and quietly stolid Musubi – who have shared Gen’s shabby shack for years – are also in high spirits. They have been constantly selling dresses made by radiation-scarred outcast Katsuko on Hiroshima’s rebuilt street corners, diligently saving the proceeds until she has enough money to open a shop. Now the manager of one of the big stores wants to buy all the clothes they can manufacture to sell in his fashionable venues…

At the Graduation Ceremony Gen once again loses his temper when the faculty begin memorialising the past and celebrating the failed regime of the empire. Later, his savage confrontation with teachers and visiting dignitaries sparks a minor student revolution. For many of the juvenile delinquents it’s also an opportunity to inflict some long-delayed retribution on the educational bullies who have oppressed and beaten them for years…

Encouragingly, however, not all parents and attending adults take the teachers’ side, and a potentially murderous confrontation is (rather violently) defused by Gen. The boy’s life then changes forever when he bumps into a young woman and is instantly smitten. His pursuit of Mitsuko will bring him into conflict with her brutal father, former employer and unrepentant war-lover Nakao who is now a highly successful businessman going places in the reconstructed city…

Gen has been studying with elderly artist Seiga Amano, learning the skills his own father would have passed on had he not died in 1945. The mentor/father-figure encourages his protégé to pursue Mitsuko… and it costs them both their jobs. However, the seeming setback is in fact liberating and before long the star-crossed youngsters are in a fevered euphoria of first love. So engaged is Gen that he is not there when stolid Musubi is targeted by a cruel Yakuza honeytrap who addicts him to drugs before fleecing him of all Katsuko’s hard-earned savings…

With a happy ending so close he can touch it, Gen is dragged back down to earth by a trio of tragedies which leave him near-broken and all alone. The legacies of the bombing have again cost him almost everything…

After a horrendous bout of death and vengeance-taking, Gen seems to have nothing to live for, but the despondent young man is saved by aged Amano who rekindles his spirit and wisely advises him to get out of Hiroshima and start his real life in the world beyond it…

Keiji Nakazawa’s broad cartoon art style has often been subject of heated discussion; his simplified Disney-esque rendering felt by some to be at odds with the subject matter, and perhaps diluting the impact of the message. I’d like to categorically refute that.

The style springs from his earliest influence, Osamu Tezuka, Father of Anime & God of Manga who began his career in 1946 and whose works – Shin Takarajima/New Treasure Island, Tetsuwan Atomu/Astro Boy and so many more – assuaged some of the grim realities of being hibakusha, providing escape, hope and even a career path to the young illustrator. Even at its most bleak and traumatic the epic never forgets to shade horror with humour and counterpoint crushing loss with fiery idealism and enthusiasm.

As such the clear line, solid black forms and abstracted visual motifs act as tolerable symbols for much of the horror in this parable. The art defuses but never dilutes the horror of the tragedy and its aftermath. The reader has to be brought through the tale to receive the message and for that purpose drawings are accurate, simplified and effective. The intent is not to repel (and to be honest, even as they are they’re still pretty hard to take) but to inform, to warn.

Shocking. Momentous. Bleak and violent but ultimately astoundingly uplifting, Nakazawa’s Barefoot Gen is without peer and its legacy will be pervasive and long-lasting. So now you’ve been warned, buy this old book. Buy the entire series. Buy the new editions as they come out. Tell everyone you know about it. Barefoot Gen is an indisputable classic and should be available to absolutely everyone.
© 2009 Keiji Nakazawa. All rights reserved.

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They Called Us Enemy (Expanded edition)


By George Takei, Justin Eisinger, Steve Scott & Harmony Becker (Top Shelf Productions/IDW)
ISBN: 978-1-603094-70-2 (Expanded HB) eISBN 978-1-684068-82-1-
TPB ISBN: 978-1-603094-50-4

This book contains Discriminatory Content from less enlightened times included for historical and dramatic veracity.

Graphic biographies are still a relatively new form for English-language comics, but the wealth and variety of material already available is truly breathtaking and laudable. This so timely exemplary example is a subtly understated yet deeply moving chronicle exploring the events and repercussions of a truly shameful moment in US history, as recalled and relived by a global icon of popular culture. He also happens to be one of that embattled democracy’s most ardent advocates of diversity, justice and equality and top-level activist in the arenas of LGBTQ and Asian-American rights.

George Takei initially celebrated and commemorated his life in prose autobiography To the Stars, but here, in collaboration with writers Justin Eisinger & Steven Scott and illustrator Harmony Becker, the Hollywood star deftly shifted focus to explore in painful and revelatory detail the early years of his life: a formative period spent as a non-person confined without cause behind barbed wire in his own country.

Recounted as non-linear, non-chronological episodes, the history and self-serving actions of American leaders – like Lt. General John L. DeWitt or Los Angeles Mayor Fletcher Bowron, who systematically stripped all people of Japanese ethnicity of their rights, livelihoods, possessions and autonomy – are seen through the eyes of a small child. Those observations inevitably shaped the actor into a crusading defender of democratic principles of later life.

I’d love to say that’s simply a thing of the past, but kids are still being locked in cages and families split up. It’s apparently something we humans just can’t stop doing…

Following the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7th 1941, on February 19th 1942, US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, dividing the country into military zones and effectively declaring all American citizens of Japanese origins enemy aliens. This led to their internment for the duration of the war across 10 isolated camps between the West Coast and Mississippi river.

In surprisingly fond recollections of camp life, we share the notions of baffled children – George, brother Henry, sister Nancy Reiko and many new pals – and the lasting, post-war consequences of divisively authoritarian stunts such as legally-binding loyalty pledges de-fanged and counterpointed by modern day discussions and triumphant moments of past injustices finally addressed.

As well as exposing the true price of dog-whistle politics and human cost of bowing to baying demagogues we see here a shameful period of state-sanctioned, opportunistic profiteering and proud racism in a tale that is a testament to human endurance, perseverance and innate dignity. Amidst the stomach churning, mostly bloodless horror are moments of delightful warmth and genuine humour, bolstered by actions of unsung humanitarian heroes like Takei’s own parents and pioneering civil rights lawyer Wayne M. Collins. Their tireless fortitude and resistance to state-sanctioned oppression, along with the efforts of countless others, offers inspiration and hope for all suffering similar restraint and abuse while sadly proving that some battles may never end. Just look at any headline with the word seeker, refugee or asylum in it and the sheer cost of protecting migrants anywhere on Earth today…

Also offering touching afterword ‘Making History’ by Takei, Eisinger, Scott & Becker; a Takei family photo album; reproduced Civilian Exclusion orders, street maps of the internment camp and chilling “Final accountability rosters” for Camp Rohwer & Camp Tule Lake, this book includes a detailed look at the process of creating it, with candid team photos, script pages, roughs and layouts, as well as press and convention shots of George collecting the numerous awards for his efforts. At the close, there’s a feature on how the book has transitioned to becoming an educational standby, acknowledgements and the always welcome creator biographies.

They Called Us Enemy is a compelling, beguiling and harshly informative account of injustice and unchecked ignorance endured with plenty of points as pertinent now as they ever were.

In 2020 this expanded edition was released with 16 pages of extra material in both physical hardback and digital volume.
They Called Us Enemy Expanded Edition © 2020 George Takei. All Rights Reserved.

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Showcase Presents Our Army At War


By Dave Wood, Robert Kanigher, David Khan, Hal Kantor, John Reed, France “Ed” Herron, William Woolfolk, John Reed, Art Wallace, Nat Barnett, Irv Novick, Carmine Infantino, Gene Colan, Bernie Krigstein, Frank Giacoia, Joe Giella, Bernard Sachs, Irwin Hasen, Bob Lander, Gil Kane, Ross Andru & Mike Esposito, Jerry Grandenetti, Bob Oksner, Mort Drucker, Sy Barry, Fred Ray, Eugene Hughes, Ray Burnley, Ray Schott & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1401229429 (TPB)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

In America following the demise of EC Comics in the mid-1950’s – and prior to Warren Publishing’s astounding Blazing Combat – the only certain place to find challenging, entertaining and often controversial American war comics was at DC. In fact, even as Archie Goodwin’s stunning yet tragically mis-marketed quartet of classics were waking up a generation, the home of Superman, Batman & Wonder Woman was also a cornucopia of gritty, intriguing, beautifully illustrated battle tales presenting combat on a variety of fronts and from many differing points of view. As the very public Vietnam War escalated, and secret wars in central America festered unseen, 1960s America increasingly endured a Home Front death-struggle pitting deeply-ingrained Establishment social attitudes against a youthful freedom-from-old-values-oriented generation with a radical new sensibility. In response, the military-themed comic books of DC (or rather National Periodical Publishing, as it then was) became ever bolder and more innovative…

That stellar and challenging creative period came to an end as all strip trends do, but some of the more impressive and popular features (Sgt. Rock, Haunted Tank, Unknown Soldier, The War That Time Forgot, The Losers, Enemy Ace) survived well into the second – post horror-boom – superhero revival as character not genre vehicles. Currently, English-language fans of war stories are grievously underserved in both print and digital formats, but this magnificent monochrome reprint compendium is still readily available. It collects Our Army At War #1-20, from August 1952 – March 1954. With war comics resurgent, it was a new anthology title that was on sale from June 11th 1952 which ran for 301 issues until March 1977, whereupon it was redesignated Sgt. Rock and soldiered on (sorry, couldn’t stop myself!) until #422 cover dated June 1988. The appeal of that style and genre has largely vanished from comic books but once, these were hugely popular casual entertainments for kids and others.

Pure anthology Our Army At War very much followed Harvey Kurtzman’s EC model for Two-Fisted Tales & Frontline Combat, primarily featuring the proud American fighting man on a variety of historical battlefronts including the Revolutionary War, War of 1812, Civil War, Spanish-American War, WWI and Korean War even whilst concentrating the majority of its creative firepower on WWII – in which the target readership’s fathers and older relatives had just fought.

Sans ado or preamble, OAAW #1 opens with ‘Last Performance!’ as Dave Wood, Frank Giacoia & Joe Giella reveal how former acrobats Eddie March & Bert Brown escape a deadly German ambush thanks to their old act and a little common sense, after which Kanigher, Irv Novick & Bernard Sachs take us to the Pacific theatre of war and explain – without dialogue – how an entrenched marine patrol only survive Japanese scare tactics by when they ‘Dig Your Foxhole Deep!’

Fanciful – if not outright whimsical – notions proliferated in this era and David Khan, Irwin Hasen & Bob Lander gleefully kick off the practise as a Kentucky mountain man (and a dog!) unused to combat boots provides invaluable pedal intel at the Kasserine Pass thanks to ‘Radar Feet!’ prior to Dave Wood, Gil Kane & Giella ending the issue with inter service rivalry in the Pacific as ‘SOS Seabees!’ sees US troops and navy engineers forced to cooperate to survive…

In issue #2, Kanigher returned his much-loved boxing-as-combat metaphor in ‘Champ!’ with Carmine Infantino & Giella limning a yarn of sporting rivals meeting again over gunsights and in foxholes, before Dave Wood, Bob Oksner & Sachs depicted a tense moment as a sentry spots what might be Germans disguised as GIs in ‘Second Best!’, after which a soldiers takes drastic action to ensure a little peace and quiet to finish ‘A Letter from Joe!’ (by Hal Kantor, Mort Drucker & Lander). The issue ends on Khan, Novick & Lander’s ‘Survival for Shorty!’ as a sensitive short-tempered pee-wee powerhouse strives to proves he’s as big a man as any of his team as they raid a Japanese stronghold…

Kanigher, Novick & Sachs open #3 with the war deep inside a US Marine’s head as he endures the pressure of another ‘Patrol!’ even as Wood, Kane & Lander offer ‘No Exit!’ for former stunt-bikers Skeets & Wally when the former’s combat-trauma traps them behind enemy lines with crucial knowledge of a forthcoming surprise attack…

Kantor & Eugene Hughes then prove superstitious Roy has no need of his lost ‘Lucky Charm!’, before Kantor, Drucker & Lander complete the issue with the tale of ‘Frightened Hero!’ Perry Walters whose tardiness made him a lifelong mouse… until he hit the D-Day beaches…

The contemporaneous Korean conflict led in OAAW #4 where Kanigher, Novick & Sachs reveal the lonely response – and fate – of the ‘Last Man!’ in a unit wiped out by the pitiless enemy after which Kantor & Bernie Krigstein introduce a soldier hoping to take it easy until his ‘Replacement!’ shows up, before Kantor, Ray Schott & Lander, explore the job similarities of a peacetime mailman once more carrying a ‘Special Delivery!’ through the mud and weather of the 38th Parallel. Kantor, Jerry Grandenetti & Giella then finish the forays with an ironically barbed close look at the ‘Soft Job!’ tank men face every day in modern warfare…

Staying in Korea, #5 opens with Kanigher, Novick & Sachs wryly exploring the perennial problem of keepsakes in ‘Battle Souvenir!’, whilst Kantor, Oksner & Lander cover the other regular misdemeanour of illicit underage enlistment as a seasoned officer must act quickly after finding out the age of new unit replacement ‘Baby Face!’. Combat engineers then get a moment in the spotlight – and mud – blowing a crucial bridge in ‘T.N.T. Bouquet!’  courtesy of John Reed, Gene Colan & Sy Barry, after which Khan & Hughes detail the rocky ride of an elite ‘Ranger!’ in a unit of ordinary dogface… until the shooting starts…

Variety overrules contemporaneity in #6 as Kanigher, Novick & Sachs head back to the American Civil War for ‘Battle Flag!’: the lyrical tale of a grandfather recalling what carrying that bloody banner as boy-soldier cost, and followed by a highly experimental yarn from Kantor, Grandenetti & Ray Burnley that’s tantamount to science fiction, wherein a ‘Killer Sub!’ meets its fate. Robert Bernstein & Hughes take us to Korea next as a GI foils a cunning booby trap and makes a mortal enemy determined to have the ‘Last Laugh!’ at any cost before Kahn, Colan & Giella close the issue with the charming tale of a US soldier and a music (and democracy!) loving Korean boy happy to help out as ‘Kid Private!’…

Cover-dated February 1953 and on sale from December 10th 1952, OAAW #7 closed the first year with a mixed bag of yarns beginning with ‘Dive Bomber!’ by Kanigher, Grandenetti & Giella, wherein the novice team piloting a Curtiss Helldiver in a mass attack against the Japanese Navy are shot down and must survive all perils…

Kahn, Drucker, Lander then upgrade to Korea and trace the perilously peripatetic path of a US service pistol as narrated by ‘I, The Gun!’, prior to Reed, Colan & Lander detailing how lost puppy Tugger saves a doughboy patrol from murderous ‘Counterattack!’ before we close on alpine WWII combat as Wood, Colan & Giella’s ‘Mountain Trooper!’ learns a lesson about glamour jobs before returning to the good old infantry…

In #8, Kanigher & Novick’s ‘One Man Army!’ cogitates on being a cog in a massive war machine before single handedly conquering a communist Korean citadel, whilst Wood & Krigstein spectacularly play with the form in ‘Toy Soldier!’ – the short saga of an amazing inventor in the US trenches of the Great War. Reed & Colan then present ‘Rearguard!’ action as a lonely man holds off an unseen army and ponders his life before a brief cessation of hostilities as Wood, Grandenetti & Giella test argumentative sibling soldiers with roaring rapids, crucial supply deliveries and many, many murderous “commies” chasing then through the ‘Pusan Pocket!’…

Opening #9, uncanny coincidence and the powers of a jinx concern the crew of US submarine Flying Fish after picking up a message in a bottle written by members of their WWI namesake. The eerie tale of the ‘Undersea Raider!’ (by Kahn, Colan & Giella) ends badly and portentously for all before segueing into Wood, Grandenetti & Sachs’ generational saga of US pilots whose glorious deaths in combat overwhelm the latest scion and compel Joey Rickard to become a ‘Runaway Hero’ by joining the infantry in Korea. However, destiny is a harsh mistress…

Bernstein & Hughes test out motor pool instruction theory when novice corporal Jim Terris goes off book to deliver crucial supplies by making a ‘Fatal Choice!’ after which Kahn & Krigstein imaginatively refocus the ‘Eyes of the Artillery’ when a fighter pilot is forced to become a specialist bomber in primitive crate to destroy a deadly North Korean supergun…

Kanigher & Krigstein lead in #10, with Signal Corps veterans Don & Steve adding to their already lethal workload as ‘Soldiers of the High Wire’ when their commanding officer sanctions a broadcast for the folks back home and they have to keep the civilians alive and recording despite attacks from jets, tanks and even Korean guerillas…

‘Deadlock!’ by Wood, Colan & Giella then details how a downed American pilot and his Nazi counterpart are trapped in a standoff on a sinking submarine, each anticipating rescue by their side as time runs out. Next, Kantor, Grandenetti & Giella reveal how ‘Chessmen of War’ decide the course of a battle when captured Red Chinese Major Tao plays a fateful game with his US interrogator, after which we close on Kahn & Krigstein depict the ultimate triumph of a ‘Fighting Mess Sergeant’ taken prisoner by North Koreans…

Our Army At War #11 opens in the sky where Kanigher, Novick & Sachs compare the attitudes of Kamikaze pilots and US swabbies shooting them down in ‘Scratch One Meatball!’, whilst Kahn, Colan & Giella stick with the last days of WWII – specifically Luzon island – for ‘Guerilla Fighters’, where a grizzled yank sergeant and a young Filipino recruit make things hot for the embattled occupiers. Kantor & Hughes stick to same war but head to Europe for a ‘Combat Report’ as embedded war correspondent (albeit for a company newspaper) Davey Brown gets fed up with evasions from GIs and makes his own news before Wood & Krigstein return to Korea and depict how an embarrassing present from home can change a ‘Soldier’s Luck!’

William Woolfolk, Grandenetti & Giella secure pole position in #12 as ‘Flying Blind’ sees a cynical solitary US Navy pilot learn to trust when he is injured in mid-air even as Kahn, Colan & Giella oversee the reuniting of a team of track & field sportsmen on a Pacific island infested with Japanese killers and forced to endure a ‘Death Relay’ to survive, before Reed, Colan & Sachs define the ‘End of the Line!’ for a publicity-seeking fool who always had to be first in peacetime and paid the price for it in battle-shattered Belgium. Kanigher & Novick pause the fighting for the moment in a tale of performance anxiety as a paratrooper frets over ‘The Big Drop!’ on the night before D-Day…

Woolfolk, Grandenetti & Giella again lead in OAAW #13 as the torch of mentor/guardian passes from one pilot to another above bomb-shattered Japan in moody yarn ‘Ghost Ace!’, after which Wood, Novick & Sachs describe how ‘Combat Fever!’ chills one hypochondriac GI as his unit establish a beachhead on the ferociously occupied Solomon Islands. Human frailty and pomposity are punctured in Kahn, Colan & Giella’s ‘Phantom Frogman’ as a Navy hero describes the mysterious undersea guardian angel actually responsible for all his feats and medals before the issues closes on ‘Minuteman of Saratoga!’ by Nat Barnett & Krigstein wherein cocky young Roger Holcomb eventually proves his worth to his elders in the proud militia…

The concentration on American servicemen ended in #14 as Woolfolk & Krigstein share the militarily profound and uplifting tale of a boy more steadfast than Napolean himself and known forever after as the ‘Drummer of Waterloo’, before Kahn, Colan & Giella return to quarrelsome GIs in a foxhole inadvertently capture Nazi bigwigs in ‘Double or Nothing!’ Woolfolk, Ross Andru & Mike Esposito then detail the casual heroism of a military doctor who goes all out to save his patients as a ‘Soldier Without Armor’, in advance of the same author – with Grandenetti & Giella – exposing one soldier’s phobia over heavy ordnance… and how he was cured by a ‘Killer Tank’…

Kanigher, Novick & Sy Barry claimed the lead spot in #15 as ‘Thunder in the Skies’ exposed the pressures of night bombing raids over Germany as experienced by the waist gunner of a Flying Fortress, before Art Wallace, Colan & Sachs visit Italy as a history loving GI – one of the US divisions trying to kick out the Nazis – becomes an unwilling ‘Tourist with T.N.T.’ Reed, Colan & Giella then embrace 1918 and the Battle of Chateau Thierry as members of the 4th Marine Brigade take ‘A Sunday Walk’, into utter carnage before a ceasefire of sorts closes the issue with Reed, Grandenetti & Sachs’ ‘The Fifteen-Minute War’ – a brutal, barbaric fug-enshrouded 1942-set battle for Massacre Ridge on Attu in the Aleutians…

Obsessive hunger for vengeance grips hard in OAAW #16’s opener, ‘A Million-to-One Shot!’ as Kanigher, Novick & Giella detail how the lone survivor of a Japanese strafing attack on shipwrecked sailors turns into a quest spanning the entire Pacific war. Nat Barnett, Andru & Esposito cover a typically gung-ho ‘Battle of the Bugles!’ during the Spanish-American War’s attack on San Juan Hill, before Reed, Colan & Giella channel cyclic history for a 1940 ‘Last Stand!’ in the mountains of Greece with eerie echoes of 300 Spartans at Thermopylae. Ending on a lighter note, France “Ed” Herron, Andru & Esposito share the story of a street corner in liberated French city Metz that suddenly comes under Nazi attack with only a ‘Traffic Cop Soldier!’ to save the day…

Kanigher & Novick detail combat on skis to start #17, as ‘The White Death!’ follows an elite snow-skimming team ordered to take a key mountain pass untouchable by bomber raids, whilst Barnett, Colan & Giella draw the ‘Sword for a Statue’: revealing the strangest exploit of the War of 1812 and West Point’s mythology. Then, Wallace, Hughes & Giella recount an aspiring author’s ‘Battle Without Bullets!’ and unbelievable victory over his German captors, prior to Herron, Grandenetti & Sachs showing how a ‘Washed-Out Cadet!’ failure to make pilot officer is the Japanese’s loss after he finds his true killing calling…

Kahn, Colan & Giella open #18 in WWII as a Navy rescue helicopter pilot continually causes trouble in ‘The Duel’ by picking fights with Nazi infantry and even shipping and U-Boats, after which we head back to 1775 where ‘Frontier Fighter’ Mr. Wade casually and most effectively tramples all over the old-fashioned rules of combat held dear by his British employers and their French opponents in a frighteningly belligerent tale of early American exceptionalism from Barnett, Grandenetti & Sy Barry. Reed, Andru & Esposito then wittily address a fluke of combat as a simple corporal is rotated out before ever even seeing a Germen. Happily for him his ‘Delayed Action’ getting back to his lines more than makes up for his previous lack of stories to tell his kids. The issue closes with a more serious yarn from Woolfolk, Colan & Sachs as a sleep-deprived Pacific based Marine is constantly told to ‘Wake Up – And Fight!’

Penultimate inclusion OAAW #19 commences with Kanigher & Novick’s ‘The Big Ditch’ as a fighter pilot shot down by a Focke is picked by a Nazi crash boat and interrogated at a hidden rocket base before escaping and destroying it all. That remarkably low concept yarn is made up for by Woolfolk, Grandenetti & Giella’s ‘No Rank’ as damaged, isolated lone wolf Jack Randall learns the value and responsibilities of leadership, after which historical specialist/veteran Superman and Tomahawk illustrator Fred Ray delivers a potent paean to the Civil War with his Gettysburg-set ‘Stand-In Soldier’, after which Kahn, Colan & Giella play games as ‘G.I. Tarzan’ sees a former ape-man actor employ what he learned on set to flush out Japanese soldiers hiding in lush island jungles…

Closing this vintage veteran-fest, Our Army At War #20 (cover dated March 1954 and on sale from January 4th) sees Kanigher, Grandenetti & Sachs launch proceedings with the life story of USS Lion from the mustering of its crew to the Captain’s command to ‘Abandon Ship!’, whilst Joseph Daffron, Andru & Esposito more light-heartedly trace the fall and rise of a seemingly cursed B-25 bomber in ‘The Flying Crackerbox’. Herron & Frank Giacoia address the hostility and acrimony of defeated southern soldiers in ‘The Blue and the Gray’, and the epic war stories conclude for now with ‘T.N.T. Mail!’ by Woolfolk, Grandenetti & Giella wherein contented loner and voluntary outsider Charlet West at long last learns the value of comradeship during a colossal tank engagement…

With covers by Novick, Infantino, Giella, Giacoia, Kane, Colan, Krigstein & Grandenetti this compilation is technically excellent but suffers from many flaws caused by changing tastes and expanded consciousness. Bombastic, triumphalist and frequently overbearingly jingoistic, this mighty black-&-white treasure trove of combat classics also holds thoughtful, clever and even funny yarns of relatively ordinary guys in the worst times of their lives, making it a monument to a type and style (if not ideology) of storytelling we’re all the poorer without. Hopefully the publishers will wise up soon and begin restoring their like to the wide variety of genre sagas currently available in graphic collections…
© 1977, 1978, 1979, 1980, 2014 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

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Darkie’s Mob: The Secret War of Joe Darkie


By John Wagner & Mike Weston (Titan Books)
ISBN: 978-1-84856-442-8 (HB)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Britain has always had a solid tradition for top-notch comic strips about the Second World War, but the material produced by one radically different publication in the 1970s & 1980s surpassed all previous efforts and has been acknowledged as having transformed the entire art form. Some of the best bits and most memorable moments have been gathered over the intervening decades and current Fleetway license holder Rebellion are doing a sterling job revisiting past glories via their Treasury of British Comics imprint. So too are the equivalent efforts of DC Thomson’s modern combat archives…

Here however is a still-controversial yet sublime series that’s been “At Ease” since Titan Books released this edition way back in 2011. As we again commemorate the end of WWII and Victory over Japan’s loathsome militarist regime, surely this saga is ripe for release again?

Battle was one of the last great British weekly anthologies: a combat-themed anthology comic. It began as Battle Picture Weekly on 8th March 1975 and, through absorption, merger and re-branding became Battle Picture Weekly & Valiant, Battle Action, Battle, Battle Action Force and ultimately Battle Storm Force before itself being combined with the too-prestigious-to-cancel Eagle on January 23rd 1988. Over 673 gore-soaked, politically incorrect, epithet-stuffed, adrenaline-drenched issues, the contents of the blistering periodical gouged its way into the bloodthirsty hearts of a generation. It was consequently responsible for producing some of the best and most influential war stories ever.

These include Major Eazy, D-Day Dawson, The Bootneck Boy, Johnny Red, HMS Nightshade, Rat Pack, Fighter from the Sky, Hold Hill 109, Fighting Mann, Death Squad!, Panzer G-Man, Joe Two Beans, The Sarge please link to 8th May 2025 (star-artist Mike Western’s other best work ever), Hellman of Hammer Force and the stunning and iconic Charley’s War among many others.

The roster of contributors was equally impressive: writers Pat Mills, John Wagner, Steve McManus, Mark Andrew, Gerry Finley-Day, Tom Tully, Eric & Alan Hebden, with art from Colin Page, Pat Wright, Giralt, Carlos Ezquerra, Geoff Campion, Jim Watson, Mike Western, Joe Colquhoun, Carlos Pino, John Cooper, Mike Dorey, Cam Kennedy and more…

One of the most harrowing and memorable series during that reign of blood & honour was an innovative saga of obsession and personal vengeance set in the green hell of Burma in the months following the Japanese invasion and rapid rout of the entrenched British Empire in Spring 1942.

As crafted by John Wagner & Mike Western, Darkie’s Mob is a phenomenally and deservedly well-regarded classic of the genre, disclosing how a mysterious maniac adopts and gradually subverts a lost, broken, demoralised and so very doomed squad of British soldiers. The sinister Svengali’s intent is to on use them to punish Japanese soldiers in ways no normal man could imagine…

This gloriously oversized hardback compilation collects the complete uncompromising saga – which originally ran from 14th August 1976 to 18th June 1977 – in a deluxe monochrome edition which also contains a comprehensive cover gallery and ‘Dead Men Walking’: an effusive introduction by unabashed fan and occasional war-writer Garth Ennis.

After such preliminaries the drama opens: a frenetically fast-paced mystery-thriller beginning in 1946 when Allied troops discover the blood-soaked combat journal of Private Richard Shortland, reported missing along with the rest of his platoon during the frantic retreat from the all-conquering Japanese. The first entry – and the opening initial episode – are dated May 30th 1942, describing a slow descent into the very heart of darkness…

Defeated, despondent, and ready to die, the rag-tag remnants of the mighty British Army are rescued from certain death by uncompromising, unconventional and terrifyingly pitiless Captain Joe Darkie, who strides out of the hostile Burmese verdure and instantly asserts an almost preternatural command over the weary warriors. The men are appalled by Darkie’s physical and emotional abuse of them, and his terrifying treatment of an enemy patrol he encounters whilst leading them out of their predicament. They’re even more shocked when they discover that he’s not heading for the safety of their lines, but guiding them deeper into Japanese-held territory…

Thus begins a guerrilla war like no other, as Darkie moulds the soldiers – through brutal bullying and all manner of psychological ploys – into fanatics with only one purpose: hunting and killing the enemy.

In rapid snatches of events culled from Shortland’s log, we discover Darkie is a near-mythical night-terror to the invaders: a Kukri-wielding, poison-spitting demon happy to betray, exploit and expend his own men if it means slaughtering his hated foes. The monster is equally well-known to enslaved natives and ruthlessly at home in the alien world of the Burmese jungles and swamps. What kind of experiences could transform a British Officer into such a ravening horror?

An answer of sorts quickly comes after Shortland intercepts a radio communication and discovers that the British Army has no record of any soldier named Joe Darkie, but the dutiful diarist has no explanation of his own behaviour or reasons for keeping the psycho-killer’s secret to himself…

For over a year the hellish crusade continued with the Mob striking everywhere like bloody ghosts: liberating prisoners, sabotaging Japanese bases, destroying engineering works and always, always killing in the most spectacular manner possible. Eventually, after murdering generals, blowing up bridges and casually invading the most secure cities in the country, the Mob become the Empire of Japan’s most wanted men, but in truth both Britain and the enemy hunt the rogue unit with equal vehemence and ferocity.

Darkie wants to kill and not even Allied orders will stop him…

Gradually whittled away by death, attrition, insanity and fatigue as Darkie infects them with his hatred and nihilistic madness, The Mob are nothing more than Jap-hating killing machines ready and willing to die just as long as they can take another son of Nippon down to hell with them…

The descent culminates but doesn’t end with the shocking revelations of Darkie’s origins and secret in Shortland’s incredible entry for October 30th 1943, after which the inevitable end inexorably drew near…

This complete chronicle also includes a heavily illustrated prose tale from the 1990 Battle Holiday Special and I’m spoiling nobody’s fun by advising you all to read this bonus feature long before you arrive at the staggering conclusion…

A mention should be made of the language used here. Although a children’s comic – or perhaps because it was designated as one – the speech and interactions of characters contains a strongly disparaging and uncomfortably colourful racial element. Some of these terms are liable to cause offence to modern readers – but hopefully not nearly as much as any post-watershed TV show or your average school playground – so please try and remember the vintage, authorial directives and cultural temperature of those times (the 1980s not WWII) when these stories were first released.

Battle exploded forever the cosy, safely nostalgic “we’ll all be alright in the end” tradition of British comics; ushering in an ultra-realistic, class-savvy, gritty awareness of the true horror of military service and conflict, pounding home the message War is Hell. With Darkie’s Mob Wagner & Western successfully and so horrifyingly showed us its truly ugly face and inescapable consequences. It should read with caution but also demands to be a permanent fixture on graphic novel shelves.
Darkie’s Mob © 2011 Egmont UK Ltd. All Rights Reserved. Dead Men Walking © 2011 Garth Ennis.

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War Picture Library: The Crimson Sea


By Hugo Pratt, Fred Baker, Donne Avenell, Alf Wallace, E. Evans, W. Howard Baker, with Allan Harvey & various (Rebellion Studios/Treasury of British Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-83786-199-6 (HB/Digital Edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Born in Rimini, Ugo Eugenio Prat, AKA Hugo Pratt (June 15th 1927 – August 20th 1995) spent his early life wandering the world, in the process becoming one of its paramount comics creators. From the start his enthralling graphic inventions like initial hit Ace of Spades (in 1945, whilst still studying at the Venice Academy of Fine Arts) were many and varied. His signature character – based in large part on his exotic formative years – is mercurial soldier/sailor) of fortune Corto Maltese.

Pratt was a consummate storyteller with a unique voice and a stark expressionistic graphic style that should not work, but so wonderfully does: combining pared-down, relentlessly modernistic narrative style with memorable characters, always complex whilst bordering on the archetypical. After working in Argentinean and – from 1959 – English comics like UK top gun Battler Briton, and on combat stories for extremely popular digest novels in assorted series such as War Picture Library, Battle Picture Library, War at Sea Picture Library and more – Pratt settled in Italy, and later France. In 1967, with Florenzo Ivaldi, he produced a number of series for monthly comic Sgt. Kirk.

In addition to the Western lead feature, he also created pirate feature Capitan Cormorand, detective feature Lucky Star O’Hara, and moody South Seas saga Una Ballata del Mare Salato (A Ballad of the Salty Sea). When that gig ended in 1970, Pratt remodelled one of Una Ballata’s characters for French weekly Pif Gadget before eventually settling in with the new guy at legendary Belgian periodical Le Journal de Tintin. Corto Maltese proved as much a Wild Rover in reality as in his historic and eventful career…

In Britain, Pratt found richly adventurous pickings in our ubiquitous mini-comic books such as Super Picture Library, Air Ace Picture Library, Action Picture Library and Thriller Picture Library: half-sized, 64-page monochrome booklets with glossy soft paper covers containing lengthy complete stories of 1-3 panels per page. These were regularly recycled and reformatted, but the stories gathered here – from War Picture Library #50, 40, 58 & 92 – have only appeared once… until now…

Whilst we’re being all factual and ethical, it’s only fair and honest to state here that all these lost graphic classics have been restored by our own Allan Harvey, so if you can find him feel free to gift him with a cup of tea and a ship’s biscuit or two…

Resurrected & repackaged by Rebellion Studios for their Treasury of British Comics imprint, the quartet of gritty, no-nonsense war dramas of men against the enemy and their own flawed natures begins with eponymous oceanic saga The Crimson Sea, published in May 1960 in WPL #50. Scripted by editorial assistant Fred Baker to match tone & timbre of contemporary war films – back when he still freelanced on the side before becoming manager of Fleetway’s romance comics division – this terse taut odyssey of error and redemption is a drama-drenched family tale of brothers serving aboard the same convoy escort ship.

Baker’s writing credits include Martin’s Marvellous Mini, Skid Solo, Tommy’s Troubles, His Sporting Lordship, Skid Kids, Hot-Shot Hamish and much more for weekly titles including Lion, Tiger, Buster, Hurricane, Thunder, Valiant, New Eagle, Scorcher, Chips, Radio Fun, Film Fun, Valentine and Roy of the Rovers). Fred Baker died on 4th June 2008.

When HMS Grapnel is holed in 1942, younger sibling and junior ship’s telegrapher & W/T officer Peter Wayman is severely traumatised after being ordered – and expected – to remain at his post deep in the Destroyer’s bowels as it slowly sinks.

Lieutenant Dave Wayman is with him, secretly carrying out his panic-stricken younger brother’s duties until the end. After both are miraculously rescued, Peter descends into a spiral of guilt-fuelled self-loathing. Even though Dave does everything to help, all the younger son sees is shame and disgusting pity: forces that dog him over the following months whilst he retrains as a Landing Craft pilot, and exacerbated by big brother solicitously transferring along with him to “look after him”. Inevitably the war forces Peter to relive his worst moment, but it also gives him a chance to redeem himself in his own eyes… and he takes it…

Grittily authentic, the spectacle and scale of sea battles and harbour raids is perfectly balanced with dark passion and human frailty, and even though the yarn provides a plot twist happy ending (this is for kids, remember?) The Crimson Sea is a worthy match for any 1960s movie – especially with Hugo Pratt “art directing” at his peak…

Air war grips us for the next tale in this bumper compilation as E. Evans & Alf Wallace co-write the exploits of a displaced Australian bush pilot in ‘Pathfinder’: a tale of frustration, prejudice, battle fatigue and ultimate triumph first seen in February 1960’s WPL #40.

During the 1960s Alfred “Alf” Wallace was Managing Editor of Odhams and part of the triumvirate – with Bob “Bart” Bartholemew & Albert “Cos” Cosser – who brought Marvel Comics to Britain in the Short-lived Power Comics imprint. He apparently didn’t write much, but when he did, the results (like immortal classic The Missing Link/Johnny Future) were unmissable. Sadly, I can offer even less about his collaborator Evans here. Perhaps one day…

Commercial pilot Henri le Jeune despised Japan’s sneaky tactics at Pearl Harbor and Manila and swiftly enlisted in the Royal Australian Air Force to make them pay. Sadly, his gifts were too valuable to a global war effort and he was posted to Britain, firstly as a fighter pilot and – after much unpleasantness – to Bomber Command. Boisterous, ill-disciplined and arrogant, this squarest of pegs in a succession of extremely round holes was also ridiculously unlucky, caught up in friendly fire incidents and constant squabbles with superior officers. This led to frequent Boards of Enquiry, where he was generally vindicated but somehow always remained shunned and popularly vilified…

It eventually led to Le Jeune flying Lancasters, but also into conflict with a CO who had flown too many missions and was falling apart on the job, ending in vindication of a sort following a calamitous night raid on the factories of Essen…

Author and journalist Arthur Atwill William “Bill” Baker was born in Cork on October 3rd 1925, not long after the partition and foundation of the nation of Ireland. He fought for Great Britain in WWII and, after becoming a globetrotting freelance foreign correspondent in the immediate aftermath, eventually settled in London. He became an editor for Panther Books, and wrote many Sexton Blake novels before becoming the franchise editor in 1955. As the Controlling Group Editor at Fleetway, he launched the Air Ace Picture Library line whilst continuing to write content and full stories for War Picture Library.

In 1963, when Fleetway axed Sexton Blake, Baker acquired all rights and continued the series as independent publisher Howard Baker Books until 1969, and whilst writing genre novels under many pen names, also embarked on the massive task of reprinting the entire run of classic boys story-paper The Magnet (home of Billy Bunter). He died just short of his goal in 1991, having published 1520 of the 1683 issues in hardback collections.

His script for WPL #58 (July 1960) provides rollicking, relatively uncomplicated action as ‘Up the Marines!’ follows Royal Marine Commandos on various lethal and perilous missions, employing kayaking skills and deadly combat training to harry German shipping and shore-bases behind enemy lines, and concentrates on veteran RMC Sergeant Alan Swift, who loses a comrade – and subsequently his nerve and initiative – on a raid. Highly decorated but plagued by what we now know as PTSD, Swift’s career is saved when the fallen hero’s younger brother Teddy joins his unit just in time to play a crucial role in the D-Day landings…

Final mission ‘Dark Judgment’ premiered in War Picture Library #92 (April 1961), written by Donne Avenell, who began his strips career in Amalgamated Press’ editorial department, long before it evolved into Fleetway and ultimately IPC. Avenell’s first tales were for household name Radio Fun but briefly paused whilst he participated in WWII. Born in Croydon in 1925, Avenell served with the Royal Navy, before resuming publishing: editing an AP architectural magazine whilst pursuing writing for radio dramas and romances under many pseudonyms. By the 1950s, he was back in comics on top titles including War Picture Library and Lion; scribing sagas of The Spider, Adam Eterno, Phantom Viking, Oddball Oates and more. Avenell co-wrote major international features like Buffalo Bill, Helgonet (The Saint) and Lee Falk’s The Phantom for Swedish publisher Semic and devised the Django and Angel strip, whilst toiling on assorted licensed Disney strips. In 1975, with Norman Worker, he co-wrote Nigeria’s Powerman comic which helped launch the careers of Brian Bolland and Dave Gibbons. Avenell was equally at home on newspaper strips such as Axa (1978-1986, drawn by Enrique Romero); Tiffany Jones and John M. Burns’ Eartha whilst also working in television, on shows like The Saint plus their subsequent novelisations. He died in 1996.

Here, the setting is Nazi-occupied Greece in 1942 where ancient themes of suspicion and mistrust grip members of the Special Boat Section after they pick up two escaped POWs who have swum away from a prison camp on Rhodes. Able Seaman Sam Turner is stolidly ordinary and dependable, but his fellow fugitive – Richard Hasler, Lieutenant, R.N.V.R. – is decidedly odd. Some of the rescue crew have even heard him speaking German…

As the SBS officers probe the escapees for useful intel on the camp or other potential high value targets, Lieutenant Tod Fielding and his superior Major Adam Perry form diametrically opposed views on Hasler and everything he has told them. Despite fear of espionage and betrayal rife the war must go on and dramatic proof – one way or the other – can only come after the roving unit commits to a large and risky operation on Rhodes, with both Hasler and Turner employed as guides…

Dramatic and searingly tense if a little predictable, this yarn allows Pratt to make magic with his mastery of shadows and negative space with breathtaking effect.

Packed with powerful, exhilarating action and adventure and exactly what you’d expect from a kids’ comic crafted to sell in the heyday of UK war films commemorating a conflict their parents and relatives lived through, this is another bombastic artistic triumph equipped at the end with the original eye-catching painted covers: two by Giorgio De Gaspari (War Picture Library #40 and 58); one by Septimus E. Scott (WPL #50); plus War Picture Library #92’s team effort from “Creazioni D’Ami” as well the standard ads for other publications and creator biographies.

Potent, powerful, genre-blending and irresistibly cathartic, these are brilliant examples of the British Comics experience. If you are a connoisseur of graphic thrills and dramatic tension – utterly unmissable.
© 1960, 1961, 2024 Rebellion Publishing IP Ltd. All rights reserved.

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The 10,000 Disasters of Dort


By Mike Butterworth, Luis Bermejo, José Ortiz Moya & various (Rebellion)
ISBN: 978-1-78618-949-3 (TPB/Digital Edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

It’s time for another sortie down memory lane for us rapidly diminishing oldsters, but hopefully opening a fresh, untrodden path for new fans of the fantastic seeking a typically quirky British comics experience.

British comics have always enjoyed an extended love affair with what can only be described as “unconventional” (for which feel free to substitute “bizarre” or “creepy”) stars. So many notional role models in our strips have been outrageous or just plain “off”: self-righteous voyeur/vigilantes like Jason Hyde, sinister masterminds in the manner of The Dwarf or Black Max, arrogant ex-criminals like The Spider or outright racist overmen such as fearsome white ideologue Captain Hurricane…

At first glance, prior to the advent of game changers Action and 2000AD, British comics seemingly fell into fairly ironclad categories. Back then, you had genial and/or fantastic preschool fantasy; a large selection of licensed entertainment properties; action; adventure; war; school dramas, sports and straight comedy strands. Closer examination would confirm that there was always a subversive merging, mixing undertone, especially anarchic antiheroes like Dennis the Menace or our rather strained interpretation of costumed crime-busters. Just check out Phantom Viking, Kelly’s Eye or early Steel Claw stories…

Following post-war austerity, the 1950s ushered in a comics revolution. With British printing and paper restrictions gone, a steady stream of titles emerged from companies new and old, aimed at the many different levels of childish attainment from pre-school to young adult. When Hulton Press launched Eagle in April 1950, the very concept of what weeklies could be changed forever. That oversized prestige package with photogravure colour was expensive, however, and when London-based publishing powerhouse Amalgamated Press retaliated, it was a far more economical affair. I’m assuming AP only waited so long before the first issue of Lion launched (cover-dated February 23rd 1952) to see if their flashy rival was going to last. Lion – just like Eagle – was a mix of prose stories, features and comic strips and even offered its own cover-featured space-farer in Captain Condor – Space Ship Pilot. Initially edited by Reg Eves, Lion’s 1156 weekly issues ran until 18th May 1974, when it merged with sister-title Valiant. Along the way, in the tradition of British publishing which had always subsumed weaker-selling titles to keep popular strips going, Lion absorbed Sun (1959) and Champion (1966) before going on to swallow Eagle itself in April 1969, with the result soon thereafter merging with Thunder (1971).

In its capacity as one of the country’s most popular and enduring adventure comics, the last vestiges of Lion only vanished in 1976 during Valiant’s amalgamation with Battle Picture Weekly. Despite that demise, there were 30 Lion Annuals between 1953 – 1982, benefitting from our lucrative Christmas market, and combining original strips with historical prose adventures; sports, science/general interest features; short humour strips and – increasingly from the 1970s – reformatted reprints from IPC/Fleetway’s back catalogue.

Of course, our pictorial kids’ stuff was always unlike any other kind: always enjoying -especially when “homaging” such uniquely American fare as masked superheroes – a touch of insouciant rebelliousness. Until the 1980s, UK comics employed an anthological model, offering variety of genre, theme and character. Humour vehicles like The Beano and Dandy were leavened by action-heroes such as Billy the Cat or General Jumbo whilst adventure papers like Smash, Hotspur or Valiant offered palate-cleansing gagsters including The Cloak, Grimly Feendish, Mowser and sundry other titter-treats. Originally presenting a cosy façade of genial comedic antics or school follies, cheery cowboys, staunch soldiery and moonlighting light entertainment stars, before long there increasingly lurked behind and below the surface dark and occasionally utterly deranged fantasy fare. These included marauding monsters and uncanny events upsetting a comfy status quo. Perhaps it was all just a national shared psychosis triggered by war, rationing, nightly bombing BUT NO SUCCESSFUL INVASION SINCE 1066, DAMMIT!…

Over and over British oddness seemingly combined with or reacted to our long-standing familiarity with soft oppression, leading to stories of overwhelming, imminent conquest and worse. With our benighted shores existentially threatened, the response from entertainment sources was a procession of doughty resistors facing down doom from the deepest depths of perfidy and menace… especially from the stars. Moreover, thanks to an economic downturn and spiralling costs in publishing, the mid 1960s and 1970s were particularly wild and desperate for UK comics: inspiring a wave of innovation most fondly remembered for darkly off-kilter heroes, beguiling monsters and charismatic villains. The 10,000 Disasters of Dort pretty much ticks all those boxes.

A trained artist, Mike Butterworth wrote for many comics titles: historical strips such as Buffalo Bill, Max Bravo, the Happy Hussar, Battler Britton and Billy the Kid as well as the epic Rise and Fall of the Trigan Empire. He simultaneously and latterly became a Crime and Gothic Romance novelist with more than 20 books to his assorted pen names. The 10,000 Disasters of Dort was simply another bread-&-butter B-feature assignment; albeit an extremely popular one that probably took off thanks not just to his terse, imaginative scripts and the tone of the times but also the astounding visual vivacity of its illustrators, Luis Bermejo and José Ortiz…

The astoundingly gifted Luis Bermejo Rojo was a star of Spanish comics forced to seek work abroad after their domestic market imploded in 1956. He became a prolific contributor to British strips, working on a succession of moody masterpieces across many genres. These included The Human Guinea Pig, Mann of Battle, Pike Mason, Phantom Force Five and Heros the Spartan, in Girls Crystal, Tina, Tarzan Weekly, Battle Picture Library, Thriller Picture Library, Eagle, Buster, Boys World, Tell Me Why, Look and Learn and many more. Bermejo finally achieved a modicum of his long-deserved acclaim in the 1970s, after joining fellow studio mates José Ortiz, Esteban Maroto & Leopoldo Sanchez who all worked on adult horror stories for US magazines Creepy, Eerie and Vampirella and their Spanish spin-offs.

José Ortiz Moya’s 60 plus year career began after he won a contest in Spanish magazine Chicos. In the 1950s, he worked on digest strips for Editorial Maga, including Capitan Don Nadie, Pantera Negra and Jungla, and agency work saw him produce several strips for foreign publishers, particularly Britain. Here he memorably illustrated Caroline Barker, Barrister at Law for The Daily Express; Smokeman and UFO Agent in Eagle magazine and The Phantom Viking in top seller Lion. Over the 1970s & 1980s Ortiz worked on several popular British strips including The Tower King and House of Daemon for the new Eagle, Rogue Trooper, The Helltrekkers and Judge Dredd for 2000 AD and The Thirteenth Floor for Scream! This last was another stunning horror-show Ortiz co-created with John Wagner & Alan Grant. Whilst doing all of this work on UK kid’s comics, in the US Ortiz was also working on – and is arguably best known for – stories for Warren’s Eerie and Vampirella.

Here the meat of the matter is enthralling episodes delivering a stunning nostalgia-punch via Rebellion’s superb Treasury of British Comics imprint, collecting a seminal sci fi shocker unleashed on the “Juvenile Boys’ periodical” as the print equivalent of Saturday night at the movies…

This slim tall tome gathers the original saga as played out in Lion from 18th May to 23rd November 1968, and also includes the altered ending added when the saga was rerun eight years later. Rebellion have spared readers from redundancy by only adding the episodes from Lion for 11th & 18th May 1974, but have also kindly included pertinent items from Lion Annuals for 1970 & 1971; ta very much…

The premise is simple and effective, as decades from “now” on March 18th of super-advanced year 2000 AD, the last great Atlantic liner HMS Royalty approaches New York City, only to see the mega metropolis crumble to ruin before succumbing to disaster herself. Scientists around the world rally to investigate and Cambridge Professor Mike Dauntless discovers that all the steel for 50 miles around the city had become like rubber…

His rash deduction that Earth was under attack from space is confirmed 24 hours later as a colossal crystal cylinder materialises outside Moscow and a giant extraterrestrial calling itself Ratta, Dictator of Dort serves notice to humanity. With its own world doomed to expire in 50 years, Ratta intends to move his subjects to Earth. The resident population can move or endure 10,000 manufactured super-science generated trials and terrors that will sufficiently depopulate the region and thin the herd…

Responding to the sadistic ultimatum, Dauntless determines to foil or counter each “disaster”, and is soon called to Paris to destroy rampaging giant vines erupting from the sewers, consequently gaining a teen sidekick in newly orphaned Gaston…

… And that how the drama proceeded with Mike & Gaston plus occasional local co-stars countering or at least stalling each of smugly gloating Ratta’s doom ploys, and facing the best and worst of human behaviours as society crumbles. The star assaults include enlarging beasts and birds in Melbourne, drenching Britain with waves of hatred turning the population into marauding murderers by tainting the nations favourite tipple and dropping irresistible superweapons into the greedy hands of desert bandits in Central Arabia. In every instance Dauntless manufactures solutions at the risk of his life, never having time enough to stop, think, anticipate or plan a counter attack…

As Mike leads a spirited ground defence of Cairo, Ratta ups the stakes with a global attack that neutralizes electricity and follows up with a new ice age before teleporting to Earth and walking amongst embattled humanity to enjoy the agonies of his victims. The Dictator of Dort also infiltrates Mike Dauntless’ team with a view to ending the world’s resistance in one stroke, but shoots himself in the scaly foot after playing chess to decide humanity’s fate… and losing…

Temporarily stalled but undeterred, Ratta resumes his attacks by unleashing a billion bugs on Bavaria and going on to inundate Earth in ants, after which the alien turns the unchecked power of the sun upon the world. This Ninth Disaster necessitates Mike & Gaston seeking a solution in orbit and when they are posted as lost in space, newly-appointed alien attack tsar Tom Burley is quickly overwhelmed when men and women begin devolving into brutes and beasts…

Convinced of victory, Ratta declares the war over and orders all Dort to be evacuated and sets forth for the newly conquered territory, but the Dictator has made a grievous error…

With Earth ultimately saved, the feature ended, but under approved kids’ comics protocols was rerun after five years. Editorial policy dictated the entire readership would change approximately every 4 to 5 years as they grew older and sought other entertainments. Deemed still of interest despite the time required for a complete turnover of readership the Disaster unfolded again but with a new more relevant conclusion. Included here are the two new episodes commissioned and tacked on to the run which spanned 22nd December 1973 to May 4th 1974.

Sadly we don’t know wrote or drew the instalments for 11th & 18th May, and can only assume who was responsible for complete yarn ‘Plague of Locusts’: a comics sidebar story set in the same continuity as the main story included Lion Annual 1970, which would have been published in autumn 1969.

Here, Dauntless & Gaston aid London’s war against massive marauding monster locusts and learn that not all threats to humanity originated on Dort, before Lion Annual 1971 provides a tantalising text feature by artist and writers unknown asking ‘Do You Believe in Flying Saucers? and gathering in evidence a number of documented close encounters.

Also on view is s stirring Cover Gallery, Creator biographies and an always-welcome excerpt from Siegel & Bunn’s The Spider’s Syndicate of Crime vs. The Crook from Space.

An exciting, engaging, done-in-one delight that’s undemanding and rewarding is a rare treat these days. If that appeals, this is what you want. What you really, really want…
© 1968, 1970, 1971, 1974 & 2023 Rebellion Publishing IP Ltd. All Rights reserved.