Category: War Stories

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Black Max volume 3


By Frank S. Pepper, Ken Mennell, Alfonso Font & various (Rebellion Studios)
ISBN: 978-1-83786-102-6 (TPB/Digital edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Astoundingly Eerie Air Ace Action… 8/10

It’s time for another sortie down memory lane for us oldsters and, hopefully a frolic down a new, untrodden path for fans of the fantastic in search of a traditionally quirky British comics experience. This compelling compilation is another stunning nostalgia-punch from Rebellion’s superb, ever-expanding Treasury of British Comics, concluding the exotic, esoteric episodic exploits of seminal shocker Black Max: another darkly sparkling gem from our crown jewels of weird kids’ comics… and yes, there’s a strong argument that the readers were as wild and whacko as the strips we loved…

This sinister selection delivers the last gasps of the unsavoury war criminal of the skies, and includes rare-for-the-era crossover with another strip star. Black Max debuted in the first issue of Thunder and more than ran the distance: surviving cancelation and merger, soaring on into Lion & Thunder which finally gave up the ghost mid-decade. This third volume carries the last wave of those stories, covering 15th January to October 21st 1972 with the aviation excitement augmented by a brace of longer yarns taken from Thunder Annual 1974.

The series was typical of the manner in which weekly comics functioned back then: devised by screenwriter, veteran editor and prolific scripter Ken Mennell (Cursitor Doom, Steel Claw, The Spider and many more), with the first episode limned by the company’s star turn for mood and mystery, Eric Bradbury (Invasion, The Black Crow, Cursitor Doom, House of Dolman, Hookjaw and dozens more). The whole kit and kaboodle was then handed off to another team to sink or swim with, which they did until 1973: a pretty respectable run for any British comic feature…

In many ways, the attrition rate of British strips bore remarkable similarities to WWI casualty figures, but this serial was well-starred. The assigned follow-up writer was Frank S. Pepper. who began his legendary comics career in 1926. By 1970, he had clocked up many major successes including Dan Dare, Rockfist Rogan, Captain Condor, Jet-Ace Logan and Roy of the Rovers to name but a very, very few. Series illustrator Alfonso Font was a 10-year veteran – mostly for overseas publications – when he succeeded Bradbury. Based in Spain, Font had worked not just for Odhams/Fleetway but on strips for US outfits Warren and Skywald and continental classics such as Historias Negras (Dark Stories), Jon Rohner, Carmen Bond, Bri D’Alban, Tex Willer, Dylan Dog, Clark & Kubrick: Spiritualists Inc., Taxi, Héloise de Montfort and more…

Episodic by nature and generally delivered in sharp, spartan 3-page bursts, by the time of these trench warfare and skyborne tales, the premise and key characters were firmly established and Pepper & Font were growing bolder and more experimental…

In 1917, Germany and her allies were slowly losing the Great War. In the Bavarian schloss of Baron Maximilien von Klorr, the grotesque but brilliant scientist/fighter ace devised a horrific way to tip the scales back in favour of his homeland. His extremely ancient family had, for millennia, enjoyed an almost affinity with bats, and the current scion had bred giant predatory versions he controlled by various means – including magic amulets and telepathy. These flew beside him to terrify and slaughter the hated English. Initially, they had been a secret weapon used sparingly, but by this juncture allied soldiers and aviators knew well this other form of death from the skies…

His schemes were imperilled and countered on a weekly basis by young British pilot Tim Wilson. Originally a performer in a peacetime flying circus, the doughty lad was possibly the best acrobatic aviator on the Western Front and his constant clashes with von Klorr and the colossal chiropterans constantly frustrated the manic monster master…

Now, with Wilson’s superiors fully aware of the fearsome bioweapons, and thanks to the peasant’s constant interference, the Baron devotes an astonishing amount of time and effort to killing the English fighter ace… when not butchering Allied fliers and ground troops in vast numbers.

The odds seemed to shift once von Klorr began mass-producing his monsters, but Wilson eventually gained the upper hand: driving “Black Max” out of his castle HQ and into a hidden facility where the vile villain retrenched and made bigger, better terrors…

As lengthy, multi-part serials became the standard, the human fliers’ private duel expanded to include many veteran English Aces, infiltrating traitors into the Royal Flying Corps, brainwashing and torturing prisoners, steering zeppelins on civilian raids, and kidnapping British animal scientist Professor Dutton to improve the strength of his killer beasts…

Always, however, the Baron is foiled by his inability to ignore or avoid Wilson: a mistake that scuttles his grand schemes and costs him dearly…

Down but never out, the Baron returns to successful strategies and familiar killing fields, but suffers another reversal when Wilson discovers his current laboratory base. With only one giant bat left and his resources exhausted, Von Klorr relocates to a deserted aerodrome to consider his options and is shocked to receive a message from his grandfather. The terrifying patriarch of the “bat clan” has knowledge spanning millennia and reveals he has unearthed an ancient potion to recreate the “great Kingbat!”

Thanks to more timely interference from Tim, the killer beast attacks both German and British lines, necessitating an unprecedented alliance of the sworn enemies. Wilson is completely ready for von Klorr to betray him, but is still taken unawares when the moment comes as they kill the rampaging terror…

Here and now, it’s mere weeks after the crisis, and business as usual in the skies over Europe. As brave men shoot at each other, Von Klorr is almost court-martialled by his own leaders, but responds by secretly unleashing his last killer bat in defiance of the generals. It leads to a shocking meeting with another German freak and outcast every bit as nefarious and deranged as the Baron. Doktor Gratz is a towering intellect and supergenius in a warped, stunted body as proved by the mighty mole machine he travels under the earth in and the whirlwind weapon he uses to smash ships from the sky. He hates the British too and knows a fellow fiend when he sees one…

Soon they are attacking the allies and making a real dent, but Herr Doktor is keeping secrets from his partner. Sadly for them, Wilson is dogging their trail and prevents Gratz gaining his true objective, whilst exposing his perfidy to the furious Baron. The upshot is a sundered alliance, but Von Klorr does regain the trust of the generals which he uses – with his grandfather’s aid – to unleash more colossal Kingbats. His scheme is incredible in its audacity: employing the monsters to sink a British naval flotilla, capture an entire experimental battleship and imprison its crew…

Once again, it’s Wilson to the rescue, infiltrating a German internment camp to spring the sailors before leading the cruiser’s recovery in the face of the very worst the Kingbats can do. Von Klorr, meanwhile, has found even more uncanny allies in the form of an ancient race of subterranean bat-men dwelling unsuspected under the French countryside. These he controls with an amulet, but the sentient horrors are more than happy to kill humans…

Nearby, opportunistic Doktor Gratz reemerges and negotiates a truce with the Baron in anticipation of killing more enemy soldiers. Soon the macabre coalition is pushing back the Allied advance and all looks very bleak, but Wilson has a plan…

Defeated again and in retreat, Black Max and Gratz launch a new terror weapon – sinister “ghost planes” – but once more their subtle trickery is exposed, but not before the human devils unleash an assassination plot against French leaders and attack Paris in force with a legion of flying monsters. The build-up of months climaxes with relentless pursuit as the Germans abandon all schemes in a vengeful effort to kill the British flier, but as chaos mounts they reach too far…

In a rare event the series came to a fitting conclusion here and although the Baron was declared dead, Gratz did very well out of these walk-on appearances: he won his own spin-off series once Black Max ended. Uncomfortably entitled Secrets of the Demon Dwarf, it ran in Lion from October 28th 1972 to March 17th 1973 (plus annual and specials) as the mad scientist accidentally stranded himself in the 1970s and sought revenge for losing two World Wars and presumably just the one World Cup. Font did some of most expressive and inventive work on the feature, but I suspect Rebellion won’t be archiving this series any time soon…

As previously stated, this closing collection also includes two complete adventures from Thunder Annual 1974: one in prose and illustrated by an artist unknown and a final furious comics foray. The text tale saw Von Klorr visiting a Serbian castle to bolster failing Austrian forces only to fail due to Tim Wilson, whilst the final flight sees the true Brit following the Baron to Africa in search of ingredients to make a potion that might save his dying Kingbats from a dire disease…

These strip shockers are amongst the most memorable and enjoyable exploits in British comics: smart, scary and beautifully rendered. This a superb example of war horror that deserves to be revived and revered.
© 1972, 1973 & 2024 Rebellion Publishing IP Ltd. Black Max and all related characters, their distinctive likenesses and related elements are ™ Rebellion Publishing Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

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The Phantom – the complete newspaper dailies: volume Three 1939-1940


By Lee Falk, Ray Moore & Wilson McCoy: introduction by Mike Bullock (Hermes Press)
ISBN: 1-932563-61-X (HB/Digital edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Born Leon Harrison Gross, Lee Falk created the Ghost Who Walks at the request of his King Features Syndicate employers who were already making history, public headway and loads of money with his first strip sensation Mandrake the Magician. Although technically not the first ever costumed champion in comics, The Phantom became the prototype paladin to wear a skin-tight body-stocking and the first to have a mask with opaque eye-slits…

The generational champion debuted on February 17th 1936, in an extended sequence pitting him against an ancient global confederation of pirates. Falk wrote and drew the daily strip for the first two weeks before handing over illustration to artist Ray Moore. The spectacular and hugely influential Sunday feature began in May 1939.

For such a long-lived, influential series, in terms of compendia or graphic collections, “the Ghost Who Walks” was quite poorly served in the English language market (except in the Antipodes, where he has always been accorded the status of a pop culture god). Many companies have sought to collect strips from one of the longest continually running adventure serials in publishing history, but in no systematic or chronological order and never with any sustained success. That has been rectified recently by archival specialists Hermes Press who launched curated collections in 2010 which have made almost all the various canonical iterations accessible to the devoted.

This third landscape Dailies edition is currently only available digitally. Released in 2011, its pages are stuffed with sumptuous visual goodies like panel and logo close-ups, covers and lots of original art and opens with ‘Introduction: The Phantom and I’: a memories-rich text feature stuffed with sumptuous visual goodies from author/musician and uber-fan Mike Bullock before the vintage blood-&-thunder fun begins with exotic thriller ‘The Mysterious Girl’ (originally running Mondays to Saturdays, May 8th to September 2nd 1939).

Roaming Alexandria in plainclothes, the Ghost Who Walks interrupts a brutal abduction, but the jewel-bedecked victim doesn’t want his help or even to talk about it. Persistent and curious, The Phantom investigates further and learns she is currently amnesiac; terrified and being stalked by sleezy Count Pharos, who claims to be her guardian. When the rogue convinces “Miss Banks” to take a sea voyage with him, the Phantom and his faithful wolf Devil join the jaunt. Before long the heroes are apparently lost at sea, before the memory-afflicted maiden is also disappeared. Hard to kill, The Phantom trails the Count and finds a second abducted prisoner. Young Baron Marshall Dufresne is Pharos’ real ward and his imprisonment and wealth are what really concern the villain, particularly as the lad loves a girl named Merle and is prepared to sign a suicide note leaving everything to Pharos in return for her safety.

Of course, all those sneaky plans come unstuck once the Phantom decides to step in and stop the plot, but not before almost dying in many shocking ways as Pharos and his hulking henchman Red flee with the Phantom in spectacular hot pursuit, The chase ends in justice and Merle’s memories – and reputation – restored. Fast-paced, packed with peril and introducing a truly unique character in the bulky shape of Hannah – a fight-loving domestic servant who is The Phantom’s physical equal in fisticuffs – this epic exploit is sublimely frenetic fun, and segues seamlessly into ‘The Golden Circle’ (September 4th 1939 to January 20th 1940) as the hero’s true love resurfaces. Wealthy American adventurer Diane Palmer was made a nervous wreck by her time with The Phantom and has, for many months, believed him dead. Her doctors advised the masked man to go along with the sham for her sake…

The recuperating heiress has been unsuccessfully wooed by airman Lieutenant Byron, but when the Phantom checks in and finds her still pining for him, checks out again. The example inspires the pilot, who cables the hero to tell him Diana has agreed to become Mrs. Byron…

Enraged and jealous the hero returns to the hospital but finds her already gone. After dealing with Byron, The Phantom chases, catches and re-bonds with Diana. Sadly, that only generates a truly insurmountable problem as Diana’s snooty mother declares the masked peasant unworthy of her daughter. They can only wed if he gets a real job…

Chained to generations of duty and by his vow to oppose evil, the lovers are seemingly parted forever, and soon after in France the heartbroken hero is targeted by a mother/daughter con team and framed for murder. His frantic escape exposes another all-woman criminal gang plundering the world and The Phantom barely escapes the many traps and tribulations of the insidious organization The Golden Circle…

With war in Europe and the epic battle against the Circle ended, the subplot of Diana returns as Mama Palmer finally admits that all the men she’s pushed at her distraught daughter have not passed muster. Running from January 22nd to July 27th) ‘The Seahorse’ sees the dowager advertise for a suitable son-in-law with the result that Diana is feted, charmed, courted and ultimately kidnapped by scurrilous Count Danton. Naturally, The Phantom is not far away, but is he solely motivated by jealousy or does the fact that Danton is the foremost and deadliest enemy agent in the western hemisphere impact the hero’s incredible actions in winning her back?

Crucially, will clearing Diana of espionage charges and accusations of treason make The Phantom a more eligible suitor in Mama’s eyes?

This volume concludes with ‘The Game of Alvar’ (July 27th–
to December 14th 1940) as the reunited lovers enjoy a little downtime together… but only until they stumble onto a canny smuggling operation and Dian is targeted by a deadly assassin running a private murder-island. Naturally the Ghost Who Walks rushes to her aid, but the sinister Mr. Alvar has the entire police force and civil authorities on his payroll. Ultimately, this time it’s Diana who takes up arms, saves the day and restores honourable government to the oppressed, even if The Phantom does latterly land a blow or two…

The saga pauses for now with a few more images taken from The Phantom Big Little Books – another treat long overdue for resurrection.

Stuffed with chases, cruises, air and submarine clashes, assorted fights, torture, action antics, daredevil stunts and many a misapprehension – police and government authorities clearly having a hard time believing a pistol-packing masked man with a pet wolf might not be a bad egg – this is sheer gripping pulp-era excitement that still packs a punch and many sly laughs.
© 2011 King Features Syndicate, Inc.: ® Hearst Holdings, Inc.; reprinted with permission. All rights reserved.

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DC Horror – Sgt. Rock vs. the Army of the Dead


By Bruce Campbell & Eduardo Risso, coloured by Kristian Rossi & lettered by Rob Leigh (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-7795-20654 (HB/Digital edition)

This book includes some Discriminatory Content included for dramatic effect.

Sgt Rock and Easy Company are two of the great and enduring creations of the American comic book industry. The gritty meta-realism of Robert Kanigher’s ordinary guys in life-or-death situations has captured the imaginations of generations of readers, young and old.

Early this century the artist most closely associated with these characters – Joe Kubert – got together with acclaimed modern writer Brian Azzarello (Hellblazer, Wonder Woman, 100 Bullets) to produce a powerful, if simplistic, respectful morality play about the nature of killing. It’s a damn fine read.

Offering a completely different take on the characters is actor, producer, novelist and horror film legend Bruce Campbell (The Evil Dead franchise, Sundown: Vampires in Retreat, Bubba Hotep). His far too infrequent comics sallies include The Hire and Man with the Screaming Brain and here he crafts a truly gung-ho genre mash-up taking DC’s least exploited legend in a compellingly novel direction. His partner in crime is Eduardo Risso (assorted Batman tales, Boy Vampiro, Aliens, Logan, 100 Bullets) adding sleek, eerie style to the grimy, gritty proceeding.

It’s 1944 and War is still Hell, but of an utterly different kind, as the near-defeated German army plumbs abysmal depths in its quest to triumph over democracy and tolerance. With resources drained, every piece of materiel must be dedicated to saving the Fatherland, and, thanks to evil genius Dr. Morell, that now includes the reanimated, souped-up bodies of the glorious dead…

On the front lines surrounding Berlin, Sgt. Frank Rock and his battered veterans are catching up to the advance teams closing in on the dying Wehrmacht, when they are urgently seconded for a Level 9 Assignment. The brass have seen what early Nazi zombie units can do, and want their very best men on the job of stopping the rot before it’s too late…

Although this is a pretty commonplace plot for us Brits (brace yourself for a forthcoming Fiends of Eastern Front review!), here, sheer verve and darkly sardonic humour carry the tale across the battlefields and deep into the heart of Hitler’s crumbling Festung Europa, with plenty of action and twisty turns to feed the beast of a tale that just needed telling…

From sinister, portentous beginnings in ‘No Time like the Present’ and ‘What Could Go Wrong?’, through the ‘Belly of the Beast’ to ‘Where the Rubber Meets the Road’, and building to an epic confrontation as ‘Wanted: Hitler – Dead or Alive’ results in armageddon at ‘Target Zero’ this is a riotous, rip-roaring revenant rumble to breeze through and laugh loudly with… just like any well-made B-movie.

With covers and variants by Charlie Adlard, Chris Mooneyham, Pia Guerra, Frank Quitely, Kyle Hotz & Dan Brown, Christopher Mitten, Evan “Doc” Shaner, Ben Templesmith, Elizabeth Torque, Gary Frank, Brad Anderson & Francesco Francavilla, Sgt. Rock and the Army of the Dead is a grimly witty escapade that is certainly not your dad’s Easy Company, but certainly is a fabulously fun fear frolic.
© 2022, 2023 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

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Strange Suspense: The Steve Ditko Archives volume 1


By Steve Ditko, Joe Gill, and various (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-60669-289-0 (HB/Digital edition)

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: A Timely Tome of Terrors … 9/10

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Steve Ditko (November 2nd 1927 -c. June 29th 2018) was one of our industry’s greatest talents and probably America’s least lauded. His fervent desire was to just get on with his job telling stories the best way he could. Whilst the noblest of aspirations, that dream was always a minor consideration and frequently a stumbling block for the commercial interests which for so long controlled all comics production and still exert an overwhelming influence upon the mainstream bulk of Funnybook output.

Before his time at Marvel, the young Ditko mastered his craft creating short stories for a variety of companies, and it’s an undeniable joy to look at this work from such an innocent time. At this time he was just breaking into the industry: tirelessly honing his craft with genre tales for whichever publisher would have him, free from the interference of intrusive editors.

This first fantastic full-colour deluxe hardback – and potently punchy digital treasure trove – reprints his early works (all from the period 1953-1955), comprising stories produced before the draconian, self-inflicted Comics Code Authority sanitised the industry, and although most are wonderfully baroque and bizarre horror stories there are also examples of Romance, Westerns, Crime, Humour and of course his utterly unique Science Fiction tales, cunningly presented in the order he sold them and not the more logical, albeit far less instructive chronological release dates. Sadly, there’s no indication of how many (if any) were actually written by moody master Ditko either.  If guessing authors, I’d plump for editor Pat Masulli and/or the astoundingly prolific Joe Gill (who was churning out hundreds of stories per year) as the strongest suspects…

And, whilst we’re being technically accurate, it’s also important to note eventual publication dates of the stories in this collection don’t have a lot to do with when Ditko rendered these mini-masterpieces: Charlton paid so little, the cheap, anthologically astute outfit had no problem buying material it could leave on a shelf for months – if not years – until the right moment arrived to print. All tales and covers here are uniformly wonderfully baroque and bizarre fantasies, suspense and science fiction yarns, helpfully annotated with a purchase number to indicate approximately when they were actually drawn.

Ditko’s first strip sale was held for a few months and printed in Fantastic Fears #5 (an Ajax/Farrell publication cover-dated January/February 1954): a creepy, pithy tale entitled ‘Stretching Things’, followed here by ‘Paper Romance’ – an eye-catching if anodyne tale from Daring Love #1 (September 1953, Gilmor). A couple of captivating chillers from Simon and Kirby’s Prize Comics hot horror hit Black Magic come next. ‘A Hole in his Head’ (#27, November/December 1953) combines psycho-drama and time travel whilst more traditional tale ‘Buried Alive’ (#28 January-February 1954) is a self-explanatory gothic drama.

Stylish cowboy hero Utah Kid stopped a ‘Range War’ in Blazing Western #1 (January 1954, Timor Press), and Ditko’s long association with Charlton Comics properly began with the cover and vampire shocker ‘Cinderella’ from The Thing #12 (February 1954). The remainder of the work here was published by Charlton, a small company with few demands.

Their diffident attitude to work was ignore creative staff as long as they delivered on time: a huge bonus for Ditko, still studiously perfecting his craft and never happy to play office politics. They gave him all the work he could handle and let him do it his way…

After the cover for This Magazine is Haunted #16 (March 1954) comes ‘Killer on the Loose’: a cop story from Crime and Justice #18 (April 1954), and the same month saw him produce cover and three stories for The Thing #13: ‘Library of Horror’, ‘Die Laughing’ and ‘Avery and the Goblins’. Space Adventures #10 (Spring 1954) first framed the next cover and the witty cautionary tale ‘Homecoming’, followed by three yarns and a cover from the succeeding issue – ‘You are the Jury’, ‘Moment of Decision’ and the sublimely manic ‘Dead Reckoning’…

This Magazine is Haunted #17, (May 1954), featured a Ditko cover and three more moody missives: ‘3-D Disaster, Doom, Death’, ‘Triple Header’ and intriguingly experimental ‘The Night People.’ That same month he drew the cover and both ‘What was in Sam Dora’s Box?’ and ‘Dead Right’ for mystery title Strange Suspense Stories #18. He had another shot at gangsters in licensed title Racket Squad in Action (#11, May-June 1954), producing the cover and stylish caper thriller ‘Botticelli of the Bangtails’ and honed his scaring skills with the cover and four yarns for The Thing #14 (June 1954): ‘Rumpelstiltskin’, ‘The Evil Eye’, the utterly macabre ‘Doom in the Air’ and grisly shocker ‘Inheritance!’

He produced another incredible cover and five stories in the next issue, and, as always was clearly still searching for the ultimate in storytelling perfection. ‘The Worm Turns’, ‘Day of Reckoning’, ‘Come Back’, ‘If Looks could Kill’ and ‘Family Mix-up’ range from giant monster yarn to period ghost story to modern murder black comedies , but throughout, although all clearly by the same artist, no two tales are rendered the same way. Here is a true creator pushing himself to the limit.

Steve drew the cover and ‘Bridegroom, Come Back’ for This Magazine is Haunted #18, (July 1954), ‘A Nice Quiet Place’ and the cover of Strange Suspense Stories #19, plus the incredible covers of Space Adventures #12 and Racket Squad in Action #11, as well as cover and two stories in Strange Suspense Stories #20 (August 1954) – ‘The Payoff’ and ‘Von Mohl Vs. The Ants’ – but it was clear that his astonishing virtuosity was almost wasted on interior storytelling.

His incredible cover art was compelling and powerful and even the normally laissez-faire Charlton management must have exerted some pressure to keep him producing eye-catching visuals to sell their weakest titles. Presented next are mind-boggling covers for This Magazine is Haunted #19 (August 1954), Strange Suspense Stories #22 and The Thing #17 (both November 1954) as well as This Magazine is Haunted #21, (December1954).

The Comics Code Authority began judging comics material from October 26th 1954, by which time Ditko’s output had practically halted. He had contracted tuberculosis and was forced to return to his family in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, until the middle of 1955. From that return to work come the final Ditko Delights in this volume: the cover and a story which originally appeared in Charlton’s Mad Magazine knockoff From Here to Insanity (#10, June 1955). A trifle wordy by modern standards, ‘Car Show’ nevertheless displays the sharp, cynical wit and contained comedic energy that made so many Spider-Man/Jonah Jameson confrontations an unforgettable treat a decade later…

This is a cracking collection in its own right but as an examination of one of the art form’s greatest stylists it is also an invaluable insight into the very nature of comics. This is a book true fans would happily kill or die for.
This edition © 2009 Fantagraphics Books. All Rights Reserved

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Showcase Presents the Haunted Tank volume 1


By Robert Kanigher, Russ Heath, Irv Novick, Jerry Grandenetti, Joe Kubert, Jack Abel & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-0789-2 (TPB)

Robert Kanigher (1915-2002) was one of the most distinctive authorial voices in American comics, blending rugged realism with fantastic fantasy in his signature war comics, horror stories and superhero titles such as Wonder Woman, Teen Titans, Hawkman, Metal Men, Flash, Batman and even other genres too numerous to mention here. In 1956, he scripted ‘Mystery of the Human Thunderbolt’ – the first story of the Silver Age, introducing Barry Allen as a new Flash to the hero-hungry kids of the world.

Kanigher sold his first stories and poetry in 1932, wrote for the theatre, film and radio, and joined the Fox Features shop where he created The Bouncer, Steel Sterling and The Web, and provided scripts for Blue Beetle and the original Captain Marvel. In 1945 he settled at All-American Comics as writer and editor, staying on when the company amalgamated with National Comics to become the forerunner of today’s DC. Writing Flash and Hawkman, he also created Black Canary and, decades later, debuted another memorable female lead in Lady Cop, as well as so many memorable villainesses like Harlequin and Rose and the Thorn. That last torrid noir temptress he redesigned during the relevancy era of the early 1970s, launching a “schizophrenic” crime-busting super-heroine to haunt the back of Superman’s Girlfriend Lois Lane… which Kanigher also scripted.

When mystery-men faded out at the end of the 1940s, the ever-resourceful scribe  shifted over to westerns and war stories, becoming in 1952 writer/editor of the company’s combat titles: All-American War Stories, Star Spangled War Stories and Our Army at War.

He created Our Fighting Forces in 1954 and added G.I. Combat to his burgeoning battle-boutique when Quality Comics sold their titles to DC in 1956, all the while scripting Wonder Woman, Johnny Thunder, Rex the Wonder Dog, Silent Knight, Sea Devils, Viking Prince and a host of others.

Kanigher was a restlessly creative writer and used his uncanny but formulaic adventure arenas as a testing ground for future series concepts. Among many epochal war features he created were Sgt. Rock, Enemy Ace, The War that Time Forgot and The Losers… as well as the irresistibly compelling “combat ghost stories” collected in this stunning, economical monochrome war-journal. This terrific first tome re-presents the early blockbusting exploits of boyhood friends Jeb Stuart Smith, Arch Asher, Slim Stryker and Rick Rawlins, as depicted in G.I. Combat #87-119 (April/May 1961- August/September 1966), and also includes guest-star missions from The Brave and the Bold #52 (February/March 1964) and Our Army at War #155 (June 1965).

The eerie action opens with ‘Introducing – the Haunted Tank’, illustrated by the sublime Russ Heath. In this debut the now-adult pals are all assigned to the same M-3 Stuart Light Tank, named for a legendary Confederate Army General who was a strategic wizard of cavalry combat. During a patrol, the underdog neophytes somehow destroy an enemy Panzer even though they are all knocked unconscious in the process…

Narrated by Jeb as he mans the Commander’s spotter-position (head and torso sticking out of the top hatch and completely exposed to enemy fire whilst driver Slim, gunner Rick and loader Arch remain inside), the tanker recounts how a ghostly voice seems to offer advice and prescient, if veiled, warnings. These statements and their midget war machine soon draw the jibes of fellow soldiers who drive bigger, tougher war machines…

Eventually the little tank proves its worth and Jeb wonders if he imagined it all due to shock and his injuries, but in #88 ‘Haunted Tank vs. the Ghost Tank’, Jeb is actually seeing and conversing with his phantom namesake as he and the boys solve the utterly rational mystery of an enemy battle-wagon which seems to disappear at will. ‘Tank with Wings’ in G.I. Combat #89 was illustrated by Irv Novick, describing how old General Stuart’s impossible prophecy comes chillingly true after the M-3 shoots down a fighter plane whilst hanging from a parachute, after which Heath is back to limn a brutal clash against German ‘Tank Raiders’ who steal the Americans’ haunted home on treads.

Throughout the early days Jeb’s comrades continually argued about what to do with him. Nobody believed in the ghost and they all doubted his sanity, but ever since he began to see the spirit soldier, Stuart Smith has somehow become a tactical genius. His “gifts” are keeping them all alive against incredible, impossible odds…

G.I.C #91’s ‘The Tank and the Turtle’ sees a chance encounter with a plucky terrapin lead to clashes with strafing aircraft, hidden anti-tank guns and a booby-trapped village, whilst ‘The Tank of Doom’ (art by Jerry Grandenetti) sees the snowbound tank-jockeys witnessing true heroism and learning that flesh, not steel, wins wars. In #93 Heath depicted a ‘No-Return Mission’ which depletes American tank forces until the Ghostly General takes a spectral hand to guide his mortal protégés through a veritable barrage of traps and ambushes, after which ‘The Haunted Tank vs. the Killer Tank’ seeks to widen the General’s role as the phantom protector agonises over intel he is forbidden to share with his Earthly namesake during a combined Allied push to locate a Nazi terror-weapon. This time, the young sergeant must provide his own answers…

The rest of the crew are near breaking point and ready to hand Jeb over to the medics in #95’s ‘The Ghost of the Haunted Tank’, but when Slim assumes command he too starts seeing and hearing the General amidst the blistering heat of battle…

In ‘The Lonesome Tank’ Jeb is back in the hot-seat and scoffing at other tank commanders’ reliance on lucky talismans, until the General seemingly abandons him and he is pushed to the brink of desperation, after which G.I.C #97’s ‘The Decoy Tank’ proves that a brave man makes his own luck after a Nazi infiltrator takes the entire crew hostage. ‘Trap of Dragon’s Teeth’ allows the Ghostly Guardian to teach Jeb a useful lesson in trusting one’s own senses over weapons and machinery in combat, and issue #99 greets legendary Joe Kubert who starts a stint on the series in the book-length thriller ‘Battle of the Thirsty Tanks’, with the Stuart labouring under desert conditions which reduce both German and American forces to thirsty wrecks as they struggled to capture a tantalising oasis.

The crew reveal their fathers had all been tank jockeys in WWI and who disappeared in action when ‘Return of the Ghost Tank’ in #100 finds the lads back in Europe. Shock follows shock as they realise their sires had all been part of the same crew, with credibility further stretched when the M-3 begins to retrace and re-enact the last mission of their missing dads…

Any doubts about whether the General is real or imagined are laid to rest in #101’s ‘The Haunted Tank vs. Attila’s Battle Tiger’ (illustrated by Jack Abel), as the barbarian’s evil spirit becomes patron to a German Panzer, opening a campaign to destroy both living and dead Jeb Stuarts, after which Kubert returned for ‘Battle Window’: a moving tale of old soldiers wherein a broken-down, nonagenarian French warrior gets one final chance to serve his country, as the American tank blithely trundles into a perfect ambush…

A particularly arcane prognostication in #103 drives Jeb crazy until ‘Rabbit Punch for a Tiger’ shows him how improvisation can work like magic in a host of hostile situations, whilst ‘Blind Man’s Radar’ helps the crew complete a dead man’s mission after picking up the sightless sole survivor of an Axis attack.

In the mid-1960s before the Batman TV show led to rampant “Bat-mania”, The Brave and the Bold featured team-ups of assorted DC stars. Issue #52 (February/March 1964) grouped Tankman Stuart with Sgt. Rock and Lt. Cloud as the 3 Battle Stars in ‘Suicide Mission! Save Him or Kill Him!’ (by Kanigher & Kubert). In this superb thriller, the armoured cavalry, infantry and Air Force heroes unite to escort and safeguard a vital Allied agent… who had been sealed into a cruel and all-encompassing iron suit. Fast-paced, action-packed and utterly outrageous, the perilous chase across occupied France is one of the best battle blockbusters of the era.

Back in G.I. Combat #105 the ‘Time-Bomb Tank!’ starts seconds after the B&B yarn, as the Haunted Tank receives intel that Rock’s Easy Company are under attack. As they dash to the rescue, however, circumstances cause the M-3 to become a mobile Marie Celeste…

The ‘Two-Sided War’ finds Jeb promoted to Lieutenant and suffering apparent hallucinations when he and his crew are trapped in the Civil War, after which #107’s ‘The Ghost Pipers!’ details how the tankers aid the last survivor of a Scottish battalion in an attack that actually spans two wars, before again teaming up with Rock in ‘The Wounded Won’t Wait’. As Rick, Arch and Slim are injured, the Easy Co. topkick rides shotgun on the brutal return trip back to base…

Issue #109’s ‘Battle of the Tank Graveyard’ downplays supernatural overtones for a more straightforward clash deep within a deadly mountain pass, whilst ‘Choose Your War’ has the Confederate General chafing at his role assisting “Union” cavalry – until circumstances again seem to place the modern soldiers in a historical setting and the two Jebs work out their differences.

For #111’s ‘Death Trap’ the uncanny crew again work with Easy Company – in the desert this time since continuity was never a big concern for Kanigher. However, when the M-3 is captured, Jeb and the boys endure a bloody taste of infantry fighting before taking it back.

‘No Stripes for Me’ is actually a Rock tale from Our Army at War #155 (June 1965) with the Haunted Tank in close support as a battle-hungry General’s son continually refuses the commendations and promotions his valiant actions deserve, no matter what the cost to men or morale around him…

Rock and Jeb stayed together for G.I. Combat #112’s struggle against the Luftwaffe ‘Ghost Ace!’ who is Attila the Hun’s latest mortal avatar: a blistering supernatural shocker that once more forces the Phantom General to take a spectral hand in the battle against evil, after which ‘Tank Fight in Death Town!’ sees the war follow the M-3 crew back into a much-needed leave. Luckily Rock and Easy Co. are around to provide vigorous fire-support…

After nearly four years in the saddle, scripter Kanigher decided to revamp the backstory of the crew and issue #114 (October/November 1965) featured the Heath illustrated ‘Battle Origin of the Haunted Tank’, with the General revealing he had been assigned to watch over the M-3’s boys by Alexander the Great. In the afterlife, all great military commanders sponsor mortal combatants, but Stuart had refused to pick anybody and was stuck looking after “Damned Yankees”. Happily, the mettle and courage under fire of the boys changed many of his opinions after watching their first battle in the deserts of North Africa…

Heath also drew the team-up in #115 wherein Jeb is reunited with Navajo fighter-pilot Johnny Cloud as ‘Medal for Mayhem!’ pits both spiritually-sponsored warriors against overwhelming odds and forced to trade places in the air and on the ground. (Cloud regularly encountered a cirrus-mounted “Indian Brave” dubbed Big-Brother-in-the Sky galloping across the heavens during his fighter missions…) Novick then illustrated a sequel when Cloud and Stuart help proud Greek soldier Leonidas fulfil his final mission in the stirring ‘Battle Cry of a Dead Man!’

‘Tank in the Icebox’ in #117 is another Heath martial masterpiece wherein a baffling mystery is solved and a weapon that turns the desert into a frozen hell is destroyed, before Novick assumes the controls for the last two tales in this volume, beginning with ‘My Buddy – My Enemy!’ wherein bigoted Slim learns tragically too late that not all Japanese soldiers are monsters, and #119 again asks difficult questions when Jeb and the crew must escort an American deserter to his execution, with German forces attempting to kill them all before they get there in ‘Target for a Firing Squad!’ An added attraction for art fans and battle buffs are the breathtaking covers by Heath, Kubert & Grandenetti, many of them further enhanced through the stunning tonal values added by DC’s brilliant chief of production Jack Adler.

These spectacular tales cover The Haunted Tank through the blazing, gung-ho early years to a time when America began to question the very nature and necessity of war (Vietnam was just beginning to really hurt the home front in 1966), and combat comics started addressing the issues in a most impressive and sensitive manner.

The war fare here combines spooky chills with combat thrills but always offer a powerful human message that has never dated and may well rank amongst the very best war stories ever produced. This is a series long overdue for a modern archival and digital renaissance.
© 1961-1966, 2006 DC Comics, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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The Chronicles of Legion volume 1-4: Rise of the Vampires, The Spawn of Dracula, Blood Brothers & The Three Faces of Evil



By Fabien Nury, Mathieu Lauffray, Mario Alberti, Zhang Xiaoyu, Tirso, Eric Henninot & various, translated by Virgine Selavy (Titan Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-78276-093-1 (vol. 1), 978-1-78276-094-8 (vol. 2), 978-1-78276-095-5 (vol. 3), 978-1-78276-096-2 (vol. 4) – album HBs/Digital editions.

This book includes Discriminatory Content included for dramatic effect.

We’ve all been in love with vampires since the golden age of Victorian Gothic and it’s taken the undead in some extremely odd directions (I personally draw the line at sparkly immortal kissy-face boy-toys, but to each his own)…

Thankfully our European cousins have a more sanguine view of such matters and innate respect for tradition even when they reinterpret the old classics. Prolific scribe Fabien Nury (Stalin’s Death: A Real Soviet History, Once Upon a Time in France, The Master of Benson Gate, Necromancy as well as the epic Je Suis Légion with John Cassaday) began in 2011: a generational saga putting a fresh creepy spin on the legend whilst keeping a steady eye on the tone of what has gone before…

Les Chroniques de Legion was illustrated by round-robin art-team Mathieu (Star Wars, Long John Silver) Lauffray, Mario (Nathan Never, Morgana, assorted DC covers) Alberti, the enigmatic Zhang Xiaoyu (Crusades, Savage Highway) & Tirso Cons (Eye of the Devil, Le Manoir murmurs), reflecting the tale’s beguiling skirmishes occurring across a number of evocative eras.

First volume Rise of the Vampires found its English-language voice in 2014, opening in 1476 as barbaric warlord Vlad Tepes finally falls before the overwhelming armies of the invading Moslem horde. His stubborn Transylvania a crushed and broken province, the infamous leader had been dragged from the arms of his favourite concubine and beheaded by exultant general Selim Bey. Working for the invaders, Vlad’s despised and treacherous brother Radu knew that the story was not over yet…

As the victorious Turk ravishes his despised enemy’s beloved, Dracula’s implacable sibling rival is just too late to stop his brother’s malign blood invading the Moslem’s body and eating his devout mind. In an instant, Selim Bey’s is gone, overwritten by the undying Impaler…

Nor can Radu stop the sanguine horror escaping, and after “Selim” murders the Sultan and vanishes, the Transylvanian turncoat endures all the anger and hatred of the Ottomans. Of course, since his blood is just as accursed as Vlad’s, Radu’s story doesn’t end with his body’s destruction either…

In 1521, Vlad is on the move once more, inhabiting the body of Gabriella Del La Fuente. This recent orphan voyages to the New World; contracted to marry audacious conquistador Hernan Torres. A flower of the aristocracy, her perfect beauty is only marred by a strange scarlet mark on the back of her neck… a blemish shared with her recently-departed father Victor and a long-dead Turk named Selim Bey…

She has no idea Radu reached the Americas long ago, and transformed them to a hell of his own devising. The other brother has sustained his own arcane life by equally esoteric means, only in his case the intellect was scattered and diminished by the swarm of rats who consumed him and passed on his essence for the longest time…

Russia in 1812, and an undying warrior spirit wears French Hussar Armand Malachie. As Napoleon’s broken armies flee vengeful Cossacks after the battle of Berezina, he convinces his faithful subordinates Kholya, Stern, Hartmann and Feraud to desert with him. Detouring to the Wallachian Mountains, they hunt for valuable loot Armand had heard about: the “Lost Treasure of Vlad Dracula Tepes”…

It’s all a lie. The true reason for the diversion is that Dracula sensed far-distant Radu had allowed an unprecedented atrocity to be created and the time has come to end their infinitely extended vendetta forever…

London, 1887: elderly lawyer Morris Webster contacts friendless, antisocial clerk and gambling addict Victor Douglas Thorpe with an offer that will forever liberate the morose wastrel and ne’er-do-well from the drudgery of his impoverished Whitechapel life. For reasons inexplicable, Thorpe has been selected by immensely rich aristocratic recluse Lord Byron Cavendish to inherit all his lands and properties… upon successful conclusion of a personal interview, of course…

To Be Continued…

 

The Chronicles of Legion volume 2: The Spawn of Dracula

The epic war between immortal blood-drenched brothers continues in the second translated volume with a reiteration of the gory facts: Vlad Tepes Dracula and his younger brother Radu possess the power to extend their lives beyond what anyone else would think of as death. Their consciousnesses are carried in their blood, and by transferring the potent ichor to other living beings they can possess and dominate any number of victims infinitely. Both have lived for centuries and for all that time they have hated each other…

Here the story expands across three theatres of war with their unceasing attempts to destroy each other centred in very different eras. However,  rather than disparate clashes over time and space, these duels comprise glimpses of an extended, ceaseless campaign of terror with mere mortals callously disposable tools, weapons and cannon fodder…

The opening act occurs in 1885 as gambling addict and utter swine Victor Douglas Thorpe enters the palatial home of reclusive Lord Byron Cavendish. Should the upcoming interview go well, the impoverished cad will soon be heir to the largest fortune in the Empire…

The conference goes exactly as the unseen benefactor intends. When the successful applicant returns to London, he bears a strange red mark and is no longer quite himself.

Centuries earlier in 1521, Gabriella Del La Fuente bears the same scarlet sigil as she is escorted through the green hell of the New World to a meeting with her powerfully placed future husband. Guided by the conquistador’s enticingly masculine mulatto bastard Martin, the Doña’s party – rough soldier, cloying Spanish priests, avaricious self-important dignitaries and her fanatically loyal bodyguard Carlos – slowly make their way through the jungles until an uncanny sense warns of danger ahead…

Seconds later they are attacked by a horde of screaming barbarian warriors seemingly immune to pain and mortal harm, fighting on after being holed by musket fire or even beheaded.

Moments before her body’s imminent demise, Gabriella recognises her brother’s bloodmark on an attacker’s neck and, even as faithful, steadfast Carlos comes to her rescue, Vlad realises Radu has beaten her to this new continent and made himself at completely home.

Miles away, seeing through the dying eyes of his puppets, the other undying scion of Transylvania screams in fear and fury…

With daylight the much-diminished party struggles on towards Torres’ citadel and half-constructed cathedral, with the bride-to-be increasingly succumbing to lust as she cares for her wounded and septic future son-in-law. Once inside the Mission, she is forced back into the role of diffident contract-bride, but Hernan is no easy man to love. His thoughts are solely of preserving a legacy and creating a legitimate dynasty, and her bringing more grasping priests and fanatical Inquisitors to plague him has not endeared her to the Great Man…

Reduced to the status of closeted brood-mare, Gabriella has Carlos capture a huge eagle and, by allowing it to bite her, gains a mighty avian frame from which to view the world and survey her own inexorable rise to power. As he slowly recovers, Martin too falls under her spell, but this bewitching has nothing to do with her blood…

In late 19th century England an aristocrat’s estate burns in a vast and deliberate conflagration, but the new Lord has no regrets and looks only forward, never back.

In 1812 a band of deserters from Napoleon’s army have reached Targovishte. Armand Malachie has led faithful surviving subordinates Kholya, Stern, Hartmann and Feraud to the Wallachian Mountains in search of the treasure of Dracula, but the long-suffering peasants there, rapidly recognise who the dashing French Hussar is carrying inside him…

When an innkeeper passes on a message from Radu, arrogant Vlad disregards it, but later engages in a pointless clash with a band of Cossacks leading to the death of his mortal host…

As his men abandon his corpse to the snows, the embarrassed immortal marshals his fading strength to reanimate the cadaver and follow in search of a new meat-home…

And in 1887, Victor Douglas Thorpe attends the funeral of his so-suddenly and suspiciously deceased benefactor and is accosted by the woman who carries his unborn child. Her entreaties go unacknowledged and, as he is driven away in his livered carriage, she bitterly damns him…

To Be Continued…

 

The Chronicles of Legion volume 3: Blood Brothers

The unstinting war of immortal sanguinite siblings flows into a third translated volume as here some hint of what caused their enhanced states of being and eternal enmity is at last revealed. Still unfolding, across varied theatres of war, very different aspects of their inhumanity, our saga resumes in 1812 where Transylvanian snows conceal so many creatures which are Radu, collectively awaiting the next move of the Napoleonic deserters lured to this frozen wasteland by dreams of finding Dracula’s gold.

The teller of those tales was Captain Armand Malachi who led his battle-hardened comrades to Wallachia Mountains before dying in battle. At least that’s the way they all saw it. Vlad, riding Malachi, found it expedient to fall down when “killed” but now, with his host form actually ceasing to function in the crippling cold, the eternal warrior is forced to transfer his accommodations to something more welcoming and sustaining. When he catches up to his former friends, however, their understandable reaction leads to more violence and in the end only poor Kholya remains of any real use…

Half a world away and back in 1521, Gabriella, bearing a sign marking all the blood-ridden, stoically endures the vigorous dynastic intentions of future husband Hernan. She had endured the New World to be his comfortable, church-sanctioned brood-mare but is now far more interested in the Conquistador’s bastard son.

Her empire-building is not only imperilled by her treacherous body’s needs, but also by the impossibly powerful, indefatigably hostile natives bearing the taint and preternatural vitality of brother Radu.

When the “Indios” mount a full attack on the half-built compound, the Europeans barely repel the assault, and then only at the cost of the Doña’s steadfast and mystically augmented Carlos, whom she impetuously sacrifices to preserve Martin. In the gory aftermath, Hernan’s son realises what she is and what she’s done, but when they foolishly consummate their overwhelming passion, the constantly spying priests of the Inquisition make their own move. They are of course, no match for the powers of a Dracula…

Soon Hernan is gone too and Gabriella turns her attentions to making the New World her own. All that remains to bar her progress is firmly embedded Radu…

London in 1887 is the centre of the universe and formerly impoverished scoundrel Victor relishes his return to it, even as the latest embodiment of a monster. The new Lord Cavendish takes his place amongst the aristocracy of the Athenaeum Club but cannot escape their haughty disapproval and even outright hostility. No one knows why the immensely wealthy old oligarch settled his title and the largest fortune in the Empire upon such a blatant parvenu blackguard, but they all have suspicions…

When Chief Superintendent Warren of Scotland Yard and solicitor Mr. Morris Webster attempt to extort the new Peer with a fabrication of supposition and innuendo, they are unaware that they are challenging a sadistic absolute monarch carrying centuries of experience in removing threats to his security, but his summary treatment of them is as nothing to the way the next chancer is dealt with…

Soon afterwards the holder of Thorpe’s old gambling debts attempts to reassert his old hold on the former addict and foolishly uses Esther Harrington as leverage. When he was human, Thorpe had left her pregnant and penniless without a second thought, but as new Lord Cavendish is more concerned about making a statement than any sum of money. Before long Whitechapel’s grimy streets first run red with his all-encompassing vengeance and then explosively burn in a furious storm of purging flame.

Afterwards Cavendish cannot really explain why he lets Esther live or why he sets her up with a fortune and a new life… in distant India…

And in the cold snows of a dark night, Roma gypsies gather around a campfire where an old man tells the story of two brothers who were held hostage by the Ottoman Sultan to keep their lordly father compliant. The boys dealt with enforced captivity in different ways. Tough, rebellious Vlad bided his time and nursed his hatred whilst softer, weaker sibling Radu quickly capitulated, becoming a favourite plaything of the Sultan.

One day an aged pilgrim came to court carrying a box with two scorpions in it and Vlad discovered the means to fulfil all his dreams, but at such an incredible cost…

To Be Concluded…

 

The Chronicles of Legion volume 4: The Three Faces of Evil

Bleak, thrilling and sumptuously sinister, this last instalment feels a little rushed as the wetware war of brothers escalates across separate eras. With the Carpathian brothers clashing continually, and taking everyone in their proximities to hell with them, the fate of the unborn abomination is undisclosed…

However, as Vlad and Radu exploit their specific advantages and specialities, the physical clashes enter the terrifying realm of 20th century global conflicts and espionage endeavours, with corpses piling high everywhere. However, and as always, throughout their entwined existences, no one gets out alive and at last the bloody chess game and extended proxy wars can only be settled up close and personally: face to face and ichor to ichor…

Ultimately there a victor of sorts, but it doesn’t feel like it…

With illustrator Eric Henninot (Little Jones, Carthago, XIII Mystery) stepping in to limn a portion of the cataclysmic conclusion, the winner appears to be attrition and weariness, but is there one last bite in one of these beasts?

Physically unfolding as a quartet of luxurious oversized (211 x 282mm) full-colour hardbacks, as well as in digital editions, this superbly illustrated and beguiling told serial saga presents an intoxicatingly absorbing jigsaw of terror and tragedy that is a stunning and ambitious treat for all fans of fang and fear…
The Chronicles of Legion and all contents © Editions Glénat 2011-2012. Translated editions © Titan Comics, 2014 & 2015.

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Showcase Presents Sgt. Rock volume 4


By Robert Kanigher, Bob Haney, Joe Kubert, Russ Heath, & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012- (TPB)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

In America after the demise of EC Comics in the mid-1950’s and prior to game-changing Blazing Combat magazine, the only certain place to find controversial, challenging and entertaining US war comics was at DC. In fact, even whilst Archie Goodwin’s stunning but tragically mis-marketed quartet of classics were waking up a generation, the home of Flash, Green Arrow and the Justice League of America was a veritable cornucopia of gritty, intriguing and beautifully illustrated battle tales presenting combat on a variety of fronts and from differing points of view.

Whilst the Vietnam War escalated, 1960s America increasingly endured a Home Front death-struggle pitting deeply-ingrained Establishment social attitudes against a youth-&-freedom oriented generation with a radical new sensibility. In response DC’s (or rather National Periodical Publishing, as it then was) military-themed comic books became even more bold and innovative…

For what seemed like forever at the time, the “combat-happy Joes” of Easy Company and their indomitable invincible “top-kick” Sgt Rock were one of the great and enduring creations of American comics. The gritty meta-realism of Robert Kanigher’s ordinary guys in a constant welter of life-or-death situations captured the imaginations of generations of readers, young and old. So pervasive is this icon of pictorial combat that it’s hard to grasp that Rock is not an immortal industry prototype like Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman – with us since the earliest moments of the industry – but was in fact a late addition to and child of the Silver Age of Comics: debuting as just another Kanigher & Joe Kubert tale in war anthology G.I. Combat (#68, January 1959). Happy 65th Anniversary you G.I. guys!

The archetypal and idealised “common man” sergeant was an anonymous boxer who wasn’t especially skilled or gifted but simply refused to be beaten: absorbing all punishment dealt out to him. When ‘The Rock!’ enlisted, that same Horatian quality soon attained mythic proportions as he held back an overwhelming Nazi attack by sheer grit and determination, remaining bloody but unbowed on a field littered with dead and broken men. The tale inspired an instant sequel or two before – in Our Army at War #83 (June 1959) – the mythmaking truly began…

This fourth monumental military milestone collects in chronological publishing order and stark, stunning monochrome, more of the groundbreaking classics which made Sgt. Rock a legend. These grimly gritty, epically poetic war stories are taken from still-anthological Our Army at War #181-216 (bracketing cover-dates June 1967 – February 1967): a period when American comics underwent a spectacular renaissance in style, theme and quality, even as the Vietnam war took over the nation’s consciousness and conscience.

They are also still criminally unavailable in modern editions – colour and/or digital – but hope and profit motives still cling on…

Scripted throughout by Writer/Editor Kanigher and illustrated primarily by Russ Heath and/or Joe Kubert, the terse episodes herein begin with #181 as the taciturn topkick meets ‘Monday’s Coward – Tuesday’s Hero’ with Heath depicting how the sarge helps three deserters find their fates whilst Easy escort them to a firing squad, after which a change of venue – to North Africa – sees ‘The Desert Rats of Easy!’ (#182, Kanigher & Heath) avenge their comrades of Baker Company by destroying a cunningly concealed munitions dump…

A general industry shift towards mystery and supernatural themes was impacting all sectors of DC’s output and OAaW #183’s ‘Sergeants Don’t Stay Dead!’ tipped into symbolism and metaphysics as a dying soldier’s drawing and an exploding tank seemingly send the titanic topkick back into earlier manifestations as a key combatant in the Revolutionary, Civil and First World wars, prior to Kubert illustrating a terse ethical psycho-drama in #184 as Rock and his comrades risk their lives saving a ‘Candidate for a Firing Squad!’ who is happy to see them all die if he can save his own skin…

Unsafely ensconced in Europe again, ‘Battle Flag for a G.I.’ finds the weary warriors endangered by a starry-eyed young patriot whose battle banner imperils and – ultimately – inspires them all before #186 reprinted the Kanigher/Kubert classic from OAaW #90 as ‘3 Stripes Hill!’ revealing how Rock won his stripes, after which Heath returns for #187’s ‘Shadow of a Sergeant!’ as a hero-worshipping replacement dogs Rock’s heels and gets too close to the action…

Kubert & Jack Abel limn ‘Death Comes for Easy!’ as Easy are knocked off-kilter by fortune-telling replacement “Gypsy” after which #189 tackles the unsettling topic of child-soldiers in Kanigher, Kubert & Abel’s ‘The Mission was Murder!’ When French resistance fighters are killed, their kids regroup as Unit 3 to assist Rock and Easy in eradicating a hidden Nazi radar station, after which Our Army at War #190 (an 80-page Giant reprint issue) offers another chance to read Kubert’s ‘What Makes a Sergeant Run?’ as Rock shares his hard-earned war wisdom with the young and the hapless, as first seen in OAaW #97.

Air Ace and proud Navajo flier Johnny Cloud co-stars in 191’s ‘Death Flies High!’ as the soldiers and airman complete a downed bomber’s mission against a lethal windmill(!) after which Kubert & Abel illustrate another Unit 3 thriller as Rock is captured and faces ‘A Firing Squad for a Sergeant!’, before Kubert flies solo in #193in a flashback to Easy’s African campaign. ‘Blood in the Desert’ sees the tough top kick playing bodyguard to a farmer obsessed with making the sands bloom, even if he must irrigate it with his own blood…

Kubert writes and draws the next Unit 3 yarn in #194 as a mission goes sour and Rock is caught by sadistic Colonel Koldbludt. The gleeful torturer really wants the kid guerillas and in ‘A Time for Vengeance’ regrets getting his wish…

Kanigher & Kubert reunite for #195 as Rock and the kids hit a ‘Dead Town!’ dripping with recent blood and ancient history to liberate slave labourers before another Kubert all-alone tale foresightedly explores PTSD before we even had the term when Rock reaches his limit in ‘Stop the War… I Want to Get Off’ and a mysterious figure helps him out with a perspective-altering voyage through history…

In OAaW #197, Kanigher & Heath place Rock’s guys and Unit 3 between the German army and a doomed French village in ‘Last Exit for Easy’ (if you are precious about chronology the inexplicable placement of this yarn just after Dunkirk will drive you bonkers, but just remind yourself it’s only comics and you’ll survive), after which Kanigher & Kubert return to basics for # 198’s ‘Plugged Nickel!’ as the sarge proves the true value of good luck keepsakes in combat and tackles an alpine fortress and its ‘Nazi Ghost-Wolf’ in #199…

As much to celebrate the era as the anniversary, Our Army at War #200 inducted proto-hippie ‘The Troubadour’ in a bizarre tale of frontline pacifism and protest (delivered in rhyme and sans word balloons, too!). It’s supplemented by a classy ‘Special Battle Pin-up’ by Kubert and precedes a subtle shift in narrative emphasis beginning with #201’s ‘The Graffiti Writer!’ as Easy company slog across battlefield and devastated villages only to discover that “Kilroy was here!” first…

The ”combat happy Joes” take centre stage in #202 after learning (erroneously) that ‘The Sarge is Dead!’ but their battles briefly pause for an 80-Page Giant in #203 which offers similarly-themed reprint ‘Easy’s Had It!’ (by Bob Haney & Kubert from #103), exploring what happens when Rock is wounded and the company must fight without their guiding light and lucky talisman…

OAaW #204 & 205 were also reprint issues, represented here by their superb Kubert covers, but #206 resumes abnormal military service with ‘There’s a War On!’ as a Nazi psy-ops expert targets Rock with drugs, women and real food, but still fails to break his resolve, after which ‘A Sparrow’s Prayer’ harks back to North Africa where a tough spot seemed to need a devout recruit’s ardent orisons to save his companions’ bodies and souls…

Heath returned as regular artist with # 208 as ‘A Piece of Rag… a Hank of Hair!’ found Easy in a French village and reluctant babysitters to a little girl used a decoy by SS killers, before ‘I’m Still Alive!’ focussed on a replacement who was convinced his days were numbered…

Our Army at War #210 delivered a much-demanded sequel when Easy infiltrated an Italian fishing village and found their cheeky bugbear was still there first in ‘I’m Kilroy!’

A spiritual tone pervades #211’s Alpine adventure ‘The Treasure of St. Daniel!’ as the liberation of a small village reveals the location of a long lost treasure and the fact that the greedy occupiers didn’t really leave, after which a bombing raid renders the sarge deaf in in the middle of a joint US/UK commando raid in ‘The Quiet War!’

A small tale with big impact comes in #213’s ‘A Letter for Bulldozer!’ as the company strongman is torn apart by an envelope he dares not open, prior to the arrival of disruptive loner PFC Willy Hogan who leans too late how to be Easy in 214 ‘Easy Co… Where Are You?’ before the new material concludes with ‘The Pied Piper of Peril!’ in #215, wherein French kids appear to prefer their retreating Nazi overlords to the liberating Americans. Of course, there’s a simple nasty explanation if only Rock can find it…

Designated Sgt. Rock’s Prize Battle Tales, 80-Page Giant OAaW #216 ends this combat catalogue with Kanigher & Kubert’s classic yarn ‘Doom over Easy!’ – as seen originally in #107 – with the usually savvy soldiers afflicted by crippling superstition until the sergeant steps in…

Robert Kanigher at his worst was a declarative, heavy-handed and formulaic writer, but when writing his best stuff – as here – his stories are imaginative, evocative, iconoclastic and heart-rending. He was a unique reporter and observer of the warrior’s way and the unchanging condition of the dedicated and so very human ordinary foot-slogging G.I. He was also a strident and early advocate of equality and integration.

With superb combat covers from Kubert or Heath fronting each sortie, this battle-book is a visually vital compendium and certified delight for any jaded comics fan seeking something more than flash and dazzle. A perfect example of true Shock and Awe; these are stories every comics fan and combat collector should see, and one day we’ll have them in the full archival dress and trimmings they deserve…
© 1967, 1968, 1969, 1970, 2013 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

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The Dynamite Art of John Cassaday


ISBN: 978-1-52410-936-3 (HB/Digital edition)

It’s only Wednesday and already a grim week for lost heroes. On the back of hearing of the death of wonderful James Earl Jones and undeservedly forgotten Zoot Money comes news from closer to home as we learn that John Cassaday has gone far, far too early…

Born Texan in 1971, Oklahoma-raised John Cassaday was a multi-award-winning comics artist, actor and TV director, legendary for his depictions of Ghost, Captain America, The Astonishing X-Men, Planetary, Desperadoes, I Am Legion and Star Wars as well as his unforgettable procession of covers for many companies and characters. His particularly iconic, stridently symbolist use of imagery made his work globally known, admired and sought after whilst his imagination and imagery featured in numerous animated films and poster books.

Cassaday was self-taught with a superb eye for landscape and location. It underpinned a primal understanding of the body language of evil and heroism and deep affection for the classic landmarks and groundbreakers of our somewhat simplistic genre: combining to inform the astounding visuals in this mammoth hardback (234 x 307 mm) or digital catalogue of comic and fantasy masterpieces.

In 2006 Cassaday began a long and wonderfully fruitful association with Dynamite Entertainment, generating covers for a vast pantheon of stars comprising generational household names and the best of new concepts, and many are gathered here for you to ogle…

Following context and potted history from Dynamite Publisher Nick Barrucci’s Introduction and a Foreword by comics everyman Scott Dunbier, the Gallery of Graphic Wonders opens with 100+ pages of ‘The Lone Ranger’ and includes commentary by scripters Brett Matthews and Mark Russell and editor Joe Rybandt, augmenting pencil roughs, sketches and those astounding covers (including colour variants).
Throughout, Cassaday’s own colour work is bolstered by contributions from Dean White, Laura Martin, Francesco Francavilla, Marcelo Pinto, Ivan Nunes, José Villarrubia, June Chung & Tony A?ina
Garth Ennis’ war anthology ‘Battlefields’ boasted some of Cassaday’s most engaging images, and those paintings are here supplemented by designs, working sketches and colour variants as is Project Superpowers spinoff ‘The Death-Defying ‘Devil”’, and vintage stars ‘Buck Rogers’ and ‘Sherlock Holmes’.

‘The Complete Dracula’ boasts iconoclastic covers and commentary from co-writer Leah Moore before a return to pulp fictioneers offers additional character studies and designs for a staggering swathe of bombastic eyecatchers gracing the many series and crossover team-ups featuring ‘The Green Hornet’, ‘The Shadow’, ‘The Spider’ and ‘Doc Savage’.

Then ‘Grand Passion’ and ‘Ian Fleming’s James Bond’ artworks bring us to a selection of ‘Other Covers’ including ‘Red Sonja’, ‘The Boys’, ‘Zorro’, ‘Blackbeard: Legend of the Pyrate King’, ‘The Complete Alice in Wonderland’, ‘Project Superpowers Chapter 2’, ‘Peter Cannon: Thunderbolt’, ‘Will Eisner’s The Spirit’, ‘Kiss’, ‘John Wick’ and ‘Battlestar Galactica vs Battlestar Galactica’, and they are all simply beautiful and unmissable.

There are many books – both academic and/or instructional – designed to inculcate a love of comics whilst offering tips, secrets and an education in how to make your own sequential narratives.

There are far more intended to foster and further the apparently innate and universal desire to simply make art and do so proficiently and well, but here the emphasis is on promoting the artist’s sheer unassailable visual excitement and his treatment of a lexicon of legends. This book will delight everyone who wants to see a master in his element; showing that nobody does it better…
All properties © 2020 their respective rights holders. All rights reserved.

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Speed Racer Classics


By Tatsuo Yoshida, translated by Nat Gertler (Now Comics)
ISBN: 0-70989-331-34 (TPB)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

During the 1960s when Japanese anime was first starting to appear in the West, one of the most surprising small screen hits in America was a classy little cartoon series entitled Speed Racer. It first aired on Japan’s Fuji Television from April 1967 to March 1968;  52 high velocity episodes that steered into US homes mere months after. Back then nobody knew the show was based on and adapted from a wonderful action/science fiction/sports comic strip created in 1966 by manga pioneer Tatsuo Yoshida for Shueisha’s Shōnen Book periodical.

The comic series was itself a recycled version of Yoshida’s earlier racing hit Pilot Ace.

The original title Mach GoGoGo was a torturously multi-layered pun, playing on the fact that boy-racer Gō Mifune – more correctly Mifune Gō – drove the supercar “Mach 5”.

“Go” is the Japanese word for five and a suffix applied to ship names whilst the phrase Gogogo is the usual graphic sound effect for “rumble”. All in all, the title means “Mach-go, Gō Mifune, Go!” which was adapted for US screens as and its assumed simpleton viewers Go, Speed Racer, Go!, initially running from 1967 and for decades in syndicated reruns…

In 1985 Chicago-based Now Comics took advantage of the explosion in comics creativity to release a bevy of full-colour licensed titles based on popular nostalgic icons such as Astro Boy, Green Hornet, Fright Night and the TV cartoon version of Ghostbusters, but started the ball rolling with new adventures of Speed Racer. Gosh, I wonder who owns the rights to all those great comics and if we’ll ever see them revived in modern collections?

The series was a palpable hit and in 1990 the company released this stunning selection of Yoshida’s original stories in a smart monochrome edition graced with a glorious wraparound cover by Mitch O’Connell. It was probably one of the first manga books ever seen in US comic stores. Although the art was reformatted for standard comic book pages the stories are relatively untouched with the large cast (family, girlfriend, pet monkey and all) called by their American TV nomenclature/identities, but if you need to know the original Japanese designations and have the puns, in-jokes and references explained, there are many Speed Racer websites to consult and there have been many more translated collections in familiar tankōbon style editions…

Pops Racer is an independent entrepreneur and car-building genius estranged from his eldest son Rex, a professional sports-car driver. Second son Speed also has a driving ambition to be a pro driver (we can do puns too, just so’s you know) and the episodes here follow the family concern in its rise to success, peppered with high drama, political intrigue, criminal overtones and high octane excitement (whoops!: there I go again)…

The action begins with ‘The Return of the Malanga’ as – whilst competing in the incredible Mach 5 – Speed recognises an equally unique vehicle believed long destroyed when running this same gruelling road-race. The plucky lad becomes hopelessly embroiled in a sinister plot of remote-controlled murder and vengeance after learning that the driver of the resurrected supercar crashed and died under mysterious circumstances years ago. Now, the survivors of that tragic incident are perishing in a series of fantastic “accidents”; are these events the vengeance of a restless spirit or is an even more sinister force at work?

In ‘Deadly Desert Race’ the Mach 5 is competing in a trans-Saharan rally when Speed is drawn into a personal driving duel with spoiled Arab prince Kimbe of Wilm. When a bomb goes off, second son Racer is accused of attempting to assassinate his rival and must clear his name and catch the real killer by traversing the greatest natural hazard on the planet whilst navigating through an ongoing civil war: a spectacular competition climaxing in a blistering military engagement…

After qualifying for the prestigious Eastern Alps Competition, our youthful road ace meets enigmatic Racer X: a masked driver with countless victories, a shady past and a hidden connection to the Racer clan before ‘This is the Racer’s Soul!’ reveals the true story of Pops’ conflict with Rex Racer when criminal elements threaten to destroy everything the inventor stands for.

After the riveting race action and blockbusting outcome, this volume concludes with a compelling mystery yarn as – in ‘The Secret of the Classic Car’ – Speed foils the theft of a vintage vehicle by organised crime before being sucked into a nefarious scheme to obtain at any cost a lost secret of automotive manufacture hidden by Henry Ford. When the ruthless thugs kidnap Speed, Pops catapults into action just as the gang turns on itself with the saga culminating in a devastating and insanely destructive duel between rival super-vehicles…

These are delightfully magical episodes of grand, old-fashioned adventure, realised by a master craftsman, well worthy of any action fan’s eager attention, so even if this particular volume is hard to find, other editions and successive collections from WildStorm, DC and Digital Manga Publishing are still readily available.

Go, Fan-boy reader! Go! Go! Go!…
Speed Racer ™ & © 1988 Colour Systems Technology. All rights reserved. Original manga © Tatsuo Yoshida, reprinted by permission of Books Nippan, Inc.

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Night of The Devil – War Picture Library volume 3


By Hugo Pratt, Tom Tully, Gordon Sowman & various (Rebellion Studios/Treasury of British Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-78108-903-3 (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) wandered the world in early life, whilst becoming one of its paramount comics creators. His enthralling graphic inventions since 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 own exotic formative years – is mercurial soldier (perhaps sailor is more accurate) 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 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 others – Pratt returned to and 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 star, he created pirate feature Capitan Cormorand, detective feature Lucky Star O’Hara, and a moody South Seas saga called Una Ballata del Mare Salato (A Ballad of the Salty Sea). When it folded 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 rich thematic pickings in the ubiquitous mini-books like 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 yarns were regularly recycled and reformatted, but the supernaturally-tinged stories gathered here – from Battle Picture Library #62 (June 1962) and War Picture Library #91 (March 1961) – have only appeared once… until now…

Resurrected and repackaged by Rebellion Studios for their Treasury of British Comics imprint, Night of the Devil is a brooding blend of mystery, revenge and supernatural doom scripted by astoundingly prolific long-serving Glasgow-born Tom Tully. His canon of classic delights include Roy of the Rovers, Heros the Spartan, Dan Dare, The Leopard from Lime Street, Adam Eterno, Janus Stark, Mytek the Mighty, Master of the Marsh, The Wild Wonders, Nipper, The Mind of Wolfie Smith, Johnny Red, Harlem Heroes, Mean Arena, Inferno, Football Family Robinson, Buster’s Ghost and countless more.

He’s supported here by co-writer/unsung company stalwart Gordon Sowman who toiled during the 1950s & 1960s on Picture Library publications and weekly features as well as writing numerous Sexton Blake Library novels under the nom du crime Desmond Reid. He might even have written the sadly uncredited second jungle combat tale here…

A fulsome and informative Foreword from Chloe Maveal shares some more astounding real life adventures of Pratt and traces his celebrated career before we step into creepy comics combat mode with ‘Night of the Devil’ (BPL #62)…

Deep in Burma’s jungles a seven-man British Army platoon races to blow up the bridge at Taigu and slow the inexorable advance of Japanese forces. However ‘The Lieutenant’ in command is untested, arrogant and vainglorious, only seeing the task as a means to secure promotion and praise.

Ignoring the advice of tested veterans such as Lance Corporal Paddy Price and Sergeant Matt Brind, smugly superior Lieutenant Robert Salter pushes his team mercilessly and makes one costly mistake after another. When his recklessness causes his scout’s death and makes them a pinpoint target of the enemy, the remaining squad snatch a few hours’ sleep before pressing on and taking refuge in an ancient edifice far from their planned route home. ‘The Temple’ is pre-Buddhist, eerily magnificent and occupied by a single native priest dedicated to the worship of ancient Phya Yomaraj. That doesn’t save him when Salter panics and opens fire with a machine gun…

As the cleric dies vowing doom to all, the gunfire alerts the enemy outside and triggers ‘The Siege’ which gradually but spectacularly winnows the team down. Tensions aren’t eased any when Private Don Evans finds a tourist guide and mordantly reads out the history of the arcane temple and its god who is “king of the devils” and ruthless with all transgressors…

Salter is descending into madness but still hopeful of escape, triumph and glory. Despatching the Sarge and Price to complete the mission and blow up ‘The Bridge’ simply to distract encroaching waves of Japanese soldiers, he then betrays them to save his own skin. As his end approaches, Salter experiences ‘The Awakening’, but as he shakes sleep from his head and readies his team to resume the mission to Taigu something occurs and he realises it was no dream but a horrific prophecy…

A powerful psychological thriller breaking the rules of kids’ combat comics, Night of the Devil is subtly subversive, straightforwardly told and startlingly compelling, far from the bread & butter war stories that sustained British readers for decades.

Pure horror overtones are dialled down in follow-up ‘The Bayonet Jungle’. Far less overtly spooky in delivery, this catalogue of jungle warfare originated in War Picture Library #91 (March 1961) with Pratt limning a more traditional episode, albeit one similarly steeped in psychological angst. It begins as a hard-pressed, cut-off British unit in Burma is disturbed and conflicted by new replacement Jack Green. Although a capable soldier, many of his new comrades believe him a jinx because twice he has been the ‘Sole Survivor’ of in-country patrols. Minor events seem to constantly confirm those fears and superstitious squaddie Jenkins can’t stop speculating aloud despite every effort of solid soldiers Sergeant Freeman and Major Webb…

With mail drops and supply runs failing, snipers, air raids and ‘Jungle Ambush’ bedevilling the embattled survivors, the last thing they need is demoralising accidents too, but only after a Burman native working for the Japanese infiltrates the unit and leads them into an ambush at the ‘Village of Treachery’ is rationality is restored with the ‘Test of Courage’ in fighting their way out inspiring the spooked warriors to battle towards reinforcements, turn the tables on the enemy and score an explosive victory…

What happens next is powerful, exhilarating and exactly what you’d expect from a kids’ comic crafted to sell in the heyday of UK war films commemorating the conflict their parents lived through.

At the end are the original full-colour painted covers by superb Pino Dell’Orco as first seen on Battle Picture Library #62 (June 1962 ‘Night of the Devil’) and War Picture Library #91 (March 1961 ‘The Bayonet Jungle’).

Potent, powerful, genre-blending and oddly cathartic, these are brilliant examples of the British Comics experience – and if you’re a connoisseur of graphic thrills and dramatic tension – utterly unmissable.
© 1961, 1962, 2021 Rebellion Publishing IP Ltd. All rights reserved.