“You're Catching On, Buster!" COMICS! Sometimes I Don’t Want To Ruffle Any Feathers But I Do Have To Say That Nazis Seem Like Really Quite The Most Awful People!

I read a 1960s DC war comic. It was pretty neat. Don’t worry, it’s inevitable that we’ll hit some real shockers soon, but not this week.

OUR ARMY AT WAR by Joe Kubert & Robert Kanigher

Anyway, this…
OUR ARMY AT WAR #160
“What Is The Color Of Your Blood?”
Art by Joe Kubert
Written by Robert Kanigher
Sgt Rock created by Joe Kubert & Robert Kanigher
DC Comics, $0.12 (1965)

This yellowing and elderly comic clutched in my yellowing and elderly hands is remarkable for a number of reasons. The most amusing of those reasons is Robert Kanigher’s lovably hyperbolic reaction to a letter criticising his work on WONDER WOMAN: “What is one more scar to a walking battlefield?” This being OUR ARMY AT WAR and not WONDER WOMAN the precise criticism is irrelevant so Kanigher doesn’t print it. Kanigher’s steely indifference in the face of such criticism is, however, important so he does share that with us. “What is one more scar to a walking battlefield?” Fantastic stuff. Due to its relevance Kanigher is however able to share with us the rest of the letter which, fortuitously, is praise, this time for the Enemy Ace strip. Yes, as you’ve probably gathered from previous entries in the appallingly persistent “Old Man! Old Comics!” things I do, one of the very special pleasures of reading an old comic is the dip into the psyche of the Comics Scene Past it allows via the letters page. Usually, because I err towards old war comics, this is an exciting peek into the minds of readers who were inclined to address their excitable letters to fictional characters (“Hi, Sgt Rock! Remember when you shot that Jerry in the face? How did his brains taste?”) and correct mistakes regarding weaponry (“…the Koch-Wobbler sub-machine gun was in fact useless in prolonged firefights due to its tendency to overheat and loudly question why everyone couldn’t just get along.” ) The thrilling fusion of imagination and pedantry on display is an entertainment in itself, and an important indicator of how seriously the audience took this stuff. Well, some of the audience. Admittedly most of the audience neglected to write in and probably forgot these books as soon as they finished them, but, still, someone out there was listening. In recognition of this DC’s war comics would occasionally try to say something worth listening to. OUR ARMY AT WAR #160 is one such issue.

OUR ARMY AT WAR by Joe Kubert & Robert Kanigher

OUR ARMY AT WAR#160 is a Message Issue and, no, the message isn’t that you can’t hurt Robert Kanigher’s feelings with your WONDER WOMAN criticisms but rather that everyone should knock that racist shit off. From my privileged view point (white, male, one cat, no hair) it’s easy to think such a message is like telling everyone not to wash their hair in lava ,or not to keep tigers under the bed, and yet rumour has it that racism persists. Sure there’s a black President in The Americas but there was also all that pretty racist stuff about him being a Hawaiian muslim or something. (Those damn Hawaiians! Always causing a fuss! I don’t want to sound anti-Hawaiian here but…etc.) Things are by no means sorted on the racial equality front in 2015 and terrible, terrible things still happen to remind us of that. But things are… better (said the complacent middle aged white man) in 2015 so the clumsy but heartfelt sentiments on show here might seem a tad toothless. But not all times are these times. And this comic didn’t come out in 2015; it came out in 1965. That may well have been ten years after Rosa Parks changed everything by not going to the back of a bus but those ten years of Civil rights progress had been filled with tear gas, violence and death. In 1965 there may well have been the Voting Rights Act but there were also the Watts Riots (Aug 11-17, 1965) and the assassination of Malcolm X (21 Feb 1965). Offering up a plea for racial equality in a comical periodical might not exactly have been literary gunpowder, but in 1965 it was still far from empty gum flapping.

OUR ARMY AT WAR by Joe Kubert & Robert Kanigher

Throughout I’m treating this comic as a Kubert & Kanigher collaboration because comics are (ideally) a collaborative art form and Kubert & Kanigher worked closely together on the Rock comics. The storytelling with its in media res opening, repetitive reinforcement of key points, flash-backs, direct to the point of bluntness dialogue, use of quotes to highlight simple metaphors and the general ability to impart something quite rickety with the illusion of solidity is Kanigher at the top of his “get it done” game. Kubert’s art has an extra level of commitment here, with that lively looseness of line bolstered by the blunt impact of his blacks to smooth the eye through.

OUR ARMY AT WAR by Joe Kubert & Robert Kanigher

As I’ve said in the past I think Joe Kubert was quite keen on his comics being edifying so I can quite see the whole message thing originating from him, Kanigher giving the thing shape, and then the two batting it back and forth until time ran out and they just had to go with what they’d got. The result is not exactly buffed to a high gloss, but for all the slips into silliness and end runs past realism “What is The Color of Your Blood?” works well as a four colour punchy polemic.

OUR ARMY AT WAR by Joe Kubert & Robert Kanigher

As is traditional Sgt Rock headlines OUR ARMY AT WAR but for much of this blockbuster battle yarn Jackie Johnson takes centre stage. Because you aren’t old and daft you probably don’t read a lot of DC war comics so it’s maybe worth pointing out that Jackie Johnson is the black member of Easy Co. From my intensive researches (i.e. reading Codename: Gravedigger in MEN OF WAR) I can tell you that this is unrealistic as blacks and whites were segregated during WW2, with black soldiers relegated to menial and unpleasant tasks while the white soldiers did the fighting. However, due to further research (i.e. reading SGT ROCK comics) I can assure you that Sgt Rock stories are not supposed to be documentaries so, yes, there’s a black soldier in Easy Co. In 1965 America was still firmly impaled on the Punji sticks of the Vietnam War and soldiers (back before they were allowed porn vids) were notorious for reading comics. Sometimes people wonder how DC’s war comics lasted as long as they did and, simplistically, I think it’s because even though they were (mostly) about WW2 they allowed America to acknowledge and deal with the wars that came after. Anyway, racial segregation in the US Army had ended in 1948 so by 1965 black soldiers could die with white soldiers, which just goes to show equality isn’t all pony rides and ice cream. It also shows why Easy Co. anachronistically included a black soldier - it was an attempt to reflect the diversity of the armed forces audience of the time.

OUR ARMY AT WAR by Joe Kubert & Robert Kanigher

The exact individuals whom Jackie Johnson is supposed to be an amalgamation of varies according to who you ask, as this story revolves around boxing I’m going to stick with Jackie Johnson being a combination of Jack Johnson & Joe Louis, who were both boxers. They also both play directly into the ideas and themes Kubert & Kanigher are utilising. Man, that’s a chalk and elbow patches sentence right there. Before we get to that dusty stuff I have to tell you about the dust up it’s attached to. In essence then, Rock, Wild Man (he of the eerily prescient hipster beard) and Jackie Johnson are captured by Nazis, amongst whose number a familiar face is found. Fate (as if working against a really tight deadline with little room for such niceties as plausibility) has conspired to bring Jackie face to face with, one Uhlan who is not only a German boxer, but the very same German boxer to whom Jackie had memorably lost the heavyweight boxing championship prior to WW2 (!) Memorably for Jackie that is, not you because it didn’t really happen so how would you remember it? Turns out Jackie remembers it enough for everyone as we see in a series of flashbacks in which Jackie saves Easy Co. via a succession of typically Kanigher-esque acts awesomely entertaining in their unfeasibility, but then looks all sad and Sgt Rock stands near him and does one of his little monologues which explain Jackie’s sadness in a manly way. Basically, Jackie has really taken his Stateside loss at the hands of a Nazi, and the later use of his defeat as Propaganda, really badly. He needs to toughen up a bit; what if someone did something really awful like criticise his work on WONDER WOMAN?

OUR ARMY AT WAR by Joe Kubert & Robert Kanigher

Having won once the Nazi reckons twice can’t hurt and so elects to do so in an impromptu rematch. The idea here is to have a bit of fun during a rare spot of down time to demonstrate to his cackling pals the racial superiority of the white race. (Why, I do the same myself when running long macros at work!) Of course it’s implicit that once Jackie even starts to look as though he’s winning the Nazis will kill Rock, Wildman & Jackie because, well, Nazis are big jerks. So, at this point of suspense I naturally change the subject and start going on about Jack Johnson: Jack Johnson (1878-1946) was the first African-American world heavyweight boxing champion. His landmark 1908 win followed several years of doggedly pursuing the chance to fight for the title, and then fourteen rounds of hitting the Canadian Tommy Burns in the face. What’s important here isn’t his title but the fact that his victory was seen as a bit of an affront to believers in the self-same superiority of the white race which the Nazi in this story is so keen to prove. Unfortunately for Jack Johnson that was quite a lot of people in his own country at that point in history. Mind you, in their defence none of them were Nazis. This led to a string of white opponents being thrown at Johnson and the creation of the horrible term “Great White Hope”, because the hope was that the white man would put this uppity, um, fellow in his place. The white man repeatedly failed to do so until April 5 1915 when Johnson lost his title to Jess Willard. It’s this “Great White Hope” thing which is informing Kubert & Kanigher’s work here. The reference to the whole ugly deal of a white guy knocking a black guy down and thus proving the superiority of an entire race in one victorious act of thuggish brutality is inescapable. In Jack Johnson’s day apparently it all seemed pretty reasonable, but by 1965, thankfully, it’s a view presented as the childishly delusional nonsense it clearly is.

OUR ARMY AT WAR by Joe Kubert & Robert Kanigher

Joe Louis (1914-1981) has an even more direct connection to the narrative at hand. Joe Louis was also black and also a boxer, but following wise advice had played it safe and played it quiet in direct contrast to Jack Johnson whose flamboyance had really upset certain folk (white folks, I’m talking about whites folks there). Canny management had built Joe Louis up as a respectable and honourable sporting figure in the public eye. People were okay supporting Joe Louis. Which was good because Joe Louis would take on a symbolic aspect he probably could have done without. Jackie Johnson’s first loss to Uhlan echoes Joe Louis’ 1936 defeat at the gloves of Max Schmeling (1905-2005), a white German boxer. The state of things in Germany were frankly distressing at that time and so this victory was seized upon as proof positive of the Aryan superiority preached by the kind of people who think putting skulls on uniforms is an adult fashion decision. In 1938 a rematch occurred, and things with the Nazis were getting so bad so quickly the world was having trouble ignoring it. War was coming. The rematch was no longer only about black vs white, but also about Fascism vs Democracy. And so two men hitting each other for money took on a ridiculously potent symbolism. Records show that on the night of June 22, 1938 the myth of Aryan supremacy got in the ring with an athletic black man and lasted two minutes and four seconds. No, Joe Louis did not fall that night.   Despite his failure Schmeling, surprisingly, wasn’t stuck in an oven or shot but served his country as a paratrooper in WW2. The boxer Jackie faces is also a paratrooper. So, no, see, all these connections aren’t simply in my head. Now, I would like to tell you that following the fight Nazi Germany admitted it was wrong, apologised to everyone, rethought its philosophy and became a socialist utopia where men and women of all colours joyfully worked together to achieve the goal of peaceful space colonisation, but I would be lying. In fact Nazi Germany carried on merrily turning the world to fiery dung as though nothing had happened. Because apparently settling the whole racial superiority in the ring thing only counts if the white guy wins.

OUR ARMY AT WAR by Joe Kubert & Robert Kanigher

Where there’s boxing there’s blood, and that together with its colour is crucial in the racial power play on these pages. The Nazis were big on blood and not just the spilling of that of others, but the (supposed) purity of their own. While he’s being smacked about Jackie is constantly taunted as to the colour of his blood by the Nazi. Now, the Nazi obviously doesn’t believe Jackie’s blood is black, that would be ridiculous, it’s just the whole bending another to your will thing beloved of bullies everywhere. Because he believes the others’ lives are at stake Jackie won’t fight back, but equally he won’t give the Nazi the satisfaction of saying what he wants to hear. Luckily (cough) Rock and Wild Man break free and are beaten to the ground which allows the narrative to fudge the next bit nicely. Rock tells Jackie to take the guy’s face off and maybe Jackie hears him or maybe Jackie doesn’t, either way Jackie starts swinging and Jackie starts winning.

OUR ARMY AT WAR by Joe Kubert & Robert Kanigher

Seeing Uhlan guy in trouble the Nazis immediately fire on both of them to erase the mistake they have made, which is less than sporting of them. Wild Man and Rock now take out the Nazis without any trouble because (cough) Easy Company jump out of a bush and because it’s time for the big finish. Jackie and NAME are wounded but a transfusion could just save the Nazi’s life..! Sorry, no prize today for guessing what happens next.

Look, as inelegantly arrived at as it may be there is still a power in the final scenes where Jackie’s blood saves the Nazi’s life and the dude immediately recants his vicious idiocy. Yeah, turns out that there are actually two messages in this book - one is to knock that racist shit off, and the other is that people can change. As bumpy a narrative ride as it may be OUR ARMY AT WAR#160 turns out to be both right thinking and remarkably generous of spirit, and you know that can’t ever be less than VERY GOOD!

OUR ARMY AT WAR by Joe Kubert & Robert Kanigher

What's the only kind of dynamite that can stop a war? COMICS!!!! They are "Top-Special"!

"Pop...EVERYTHIN' I Want Costs MONEY!" COMICS! Sometimes I Slap Leather!

Sorry, that garage clearing was a beast. Still, look what I found:

Hawk, Son of Tomahawk by Thorne & Kanigher Anyway, this... TOMAHAWK# 135 Art by Frank Thorne, John Severin Written by Robert Kanigher, Jerry DeFuccio DC Comics, $0.15 (1971) Tomahawk created by Fred Ray & Ed Frances Herron Hawk, Son of Tomahawk created by Mr & Mrs Tomahawk

Here's a DC Western book I'd never heard of and didn't realise I owned. It's got a Joe Kubert cover that looks like an “Egg-timer Special” but still has time for a sweet charcoal effect background, and slips its lack of detail past by walloping you with a fistful of impact. Yeah, Joe Kubert could do you a cover like no other. Joe Kubert was also the Editor here, which explains the presence of Robert Kanigher on typewriter hammerin'. Back then Editors had a favoured stable (Western wordplay, cheers.) of talent whose most valued attributes were timeliness and dependability rather than flash, pizzaz or having performing hair. Kanigher was a sturdy workhouse who Kubert was always happy to employ because he knew that he could ask Kanigher for a 12 page oater by lunchtime tomorrow and Kanigher would deliver - like it was his job or something. Basically, books edited by Joe Kubert tend to have a lot of Robert Kanigher in them because Robert Kanigher got it done. And I tend to have a lot of Joe Kubert edited books because I like the weird genres they put him in charge of (War, Westerns, Apemen and Tor (always Tor)). Just in case you were thinking I was engaged on some stealth rehabilitation of Robert Kanigher or something.

Hawk, Son of Tomahawk by Thorne & Kanigher

The book is called SON OF TOMAHAWK but the indicia reveals it is actually TOMAHAWK, this discrepancy is due to the recent replacement of Tomahawk in the main strip by his son Hawk, Son of Tomahawk. The repercussions of this are documented in the letters page where the level of bewilderment, guarded optimism and plain dislike show comic fans' embrace of change is timeless in its consistency. Unfortunately, I lack any kind of context for this comic so I had to look up Tomahawk and it turns out his adventures were originally set during in the Revolutionary War where he fought on the wrong side (I'm British, natch). In this book he wanders about in his vest puffing on a corncob pipe while his son has all the fun. His son, Hawk, Son of Tomahawk, is a design classic in the same way as a Plymouth Fury. A Plymouth Fury that some crackjob's driven into a wall. Because Frank “Every Rose Has Its” Thorne's art here is characteristically light on detail it's hard to pin down Hawk, son of Tomahawk's look too specifically, as Thorne's work becomes more nebulous the harder you look at it. Basically though Hawk, son of Tomahawk, with his skunk streaked DA, tasselled jacket with tribal decals, and drainpipe jeans would make even Vegas Elvis do a double take. But then this is a new kind of Western hero.

Hawk, Son of Tomahawk by Thorne & Kanigher

Or at least I think it is; this is the only issue I own so it might just be an outlier in what is otherwise a run as salty and plain ornery as SCALPHUNTER or JONAH HEX. Here though it looks like every effort is being made to avoid offence, even to the extent of having a pacifist hero. Hawk, Son of Tomahawk's mum is a Native American and he has a toddler brother decked out in tribal duds. Which is nice, but they are pretty generic and later when some other Native Americans show up they are all stoic and dignified. Which is fine, very respectful and that but it's hardly the stuff of high drama. Luckily, there's always the White Man. I don't know why the White Man gets such a raw deal (reads a history book; cries. Okay, **** the White Man.) The story starts by some bad white guys harassing a peddlar who gives Hawk, Son of Tomahawk a catalogue as a reward. Now, remember the Old West was like a giant open air lunatic asylum where the only recreational activities were murder, rutting, trains and drinking until blindness set in. So a catalogue in the Old West would have been like the Internet but with less naked people involved in wallpaper paste accidents and less pictures of cats hating us. Seriously, Hawk is enraptured and decides immediately to set out to gain enough riches to buy some scented candles, Sea-Bison or a life-size cardboard glow-in-the-dark Abe Lincoln. Whatever; I don't know what they had in those things; vittals and gingham or something. Anyway, he bumps into his big pal who is just setting out with a treasure map. That's quite a coincidence to you, but if you had 12 pages you'd tend to think of it as expedient. There's a nice bit where they find the Ghost Mountain inside another mountain, but the gold turns out to be in a Native American burial ground. (Joke about America being one big Native American burial ground removed on grounds of taste.)

Hawk, Son of Tomahawk by Thorne & Kanigher Up until exhaustion and gold fever set in Hawk, son of Hawk's pal is pretty okay but then he gets all racist and violent like a Farcry game on legs. That's not because he's white though, let's be clear here; gold turns the guy's head, at which point he becomes a big murderous racist. This is good because if someone had more time they could “read” this story about the corrupting effect of the capitalist system and how its emphasis on reward sets people against one another. Or something. Mind you, I don't know if Kanigher accidentally stumbles on this, I've just had a brain fart, or it's actually built-in. It's not every comic that has the brass balls to declare that even The White Man isn't the villain, it's the system of exploitation in which he exists which is the true villain! Socialist Pacifist Western Comics for The Win! Anyway, the whole trapped underground with a violent racist thing is pretty unfortunate for Hawk, Son of Tomahawk, what with his Mum being a Native American. Even worse, he's in a 1970s comic where it seems they are actively trying to get away from the usual Western thing of plugging varmints and owlhoots at the drop of a stetson. Luckily, he's in a 1970s comic where it's still entirely okay for the greed addled white dude to get speared by a toppling corpse because this makes it both no one's fault and karmically just.

Hawk, Son of Tomahawk by Thorne & Kanigher

Basically, and admirably, Kanigher attempts to deliver a message via a tale without villains, heroes or excessive violence. Since all those things are the reasons comics are entertaining its no surprise their lack makes the result a little dull. But I do have to admire how Kanigher leaps out of his own trap built of good intentions. I was entertained after all, just in a different way than usual. It's efficiently and pleasantly drawn by Frank Thorne, whose art has a fluid grace not entirely unlike that of Joe Kubert. Thorne would later become famous for drawing Red Sonja and spend many happy years producing his own comics featuring ladies in a state of undress, and judging Red Sonja-a-like contests while dressed as a wizard. In many ways, I think we can all agree, Frank Thorne won.

AMERICA: "A Glance at Yesterday" by Sam Glanzman

After the lead feature Sam Glanzman gets roped in to do one of his typically informative double page spreads. I’m used to seeing these pop up in war comics so it’s interesting to note he was versatile enough to do The Old West too. Here kids get to thrill to a picture of a wagon train being burned, which is surrounded by informative illustrations of weapons the native Americans would have used to slaughter the same kids' ancestors and some of the headdresses they might have sported to do so. It's nice, dusty looking stuff and it's even nicer to be reminded that space fillers could be quality gear.

"SPOILERS" by Severin & DeFuccio The final 8 pages are a (probably reprinted) story called “Spoilers” by Jerry DeFuccio and illustrated by John Severin. This is a really dense tale with an attention to detail in the text which suggests it is an attempt to adapt a true story into comics. Maybe not though, because during a quick spin around the Internet I found no mention of “Kirby's Raiders” circa 1865. I did, however, find some really interesting pictures of naked people who had been involved in wallpaper paste accidents, and also of cats hating us. It's a nice yarn about a Confederate who goes back home to one of those mansions apparently everybody in the South seems to have lived in (well, everybody white). You know the ones with the big pillars and a big pile of fixings for them thar mint juleps out back. Unfortunately those Northern bastards have been at it and left it not unlike when a burglar breaks in and dumps one out on your bed (apparently it’s from the adrenalin; it makes you loose). As revenge Kirby forms his Rangers and they go around stealing gold from that darned gubbermint. Kirby takes a break, disperse his gang, hides the cash and takes up on a farm where he helps out with his honest toil until a bunch of locusts turn up. Basically, Kirby sees he has become a spoiler like the darn Yankees and the locusts. It ends with a hilariously underplayed final panel where he muses on the lesson he has learned and we are informed that the money he hid earlier had also fallen victim to the locusts. It’s left unsaid, but if I know my westerns then that guy’s life was short and punctuated by violent inquiries as to the location of the loot from his former colleagues. John Severin draws the holy Hell out of it all in his characteristic style - sharp as a craft knife and loaded with detail. Two decent strips and an informative space filler makes TOMAHAWK #135 a comic which is GOOD!

In 1971 for fifteen slim cents you could get Joe Kubert, Frank Thorne, Sam Glanzman and John Severin. Now that's – COMICS!!!

"WHO'S Stubborn?" COMICS! Sometimes Only The Sea Sees!

No, no, no! Oh, Sgt Rock, the optimum method of seagull attracting is to be a small child stood in St Ives holding a rapidly collapsing ’99, as my still somewhat traumatised son will attest. Naturally I realise it isn’t the fault of the seagull but rather that of the idiots who persist in feeding them in flagrant contravention of the many signs prohibiting this precise behaviour. (I am particularly proud of how middle-aged that sentence sounds; it’s the written equivalent of rolling up my jacket sleeves and nodding fiercely along to a shitty Phil Collins “number”. At a wedding.) SGT ROCK by Heath & Kanigher

Anyway, this... OUR ARMY AT WAR #258 Art by Russ Heath, Sam Glanzman Written by Robert Kanigher, Sam Glanzman DC Comics, $0.20 (1973) Sgt Rock created by Joe Kubert, Robert Kanigher & Bob Haney

This comic came out in 1973 and is set during a war which ended in 1945. As I peck these words out it’s 2015 and while you’ve probably heard of that war (The Second World War) you’ve probably never heard of this comic. There’s no real reason for you to have done so. I only found it because I’ve had to start clearing out the garage because someone had the crazy notion that we should put a car in there. Sheer madness, I trust you’ll agree. Obviously then, I’ve been sorting through my comics, and I read this one and thought I’d write about it precisely because it is a good example of the kind of comic that’s rarely mentioned; a 1970s DC war comic. 1970s DC war comics get the high hat because they aren’t as good as 1950s EC war comics and also, everybody probably (and rightly) feels a bit hinky about war as entertainment. This sensitivity to tastelessness can be seen right there in this issue's letter column:

Allan Asherman there, making sure everyone's on the same pag viz a viz reality and war. Besides Sgt Rock the book is also bulked out by other strips, most notably one of Sam Glanzman's unaffected and clear eyed depictions of serving aboard the USS Stevens. It's a particularly bleak tale drawn in Glanzman's Kuberty and roughly blunt signature style. Basically, Sam Glanzman is pretty great, you know?

USS STEVENS by Sam Glanzman

Anyway, this isn’t the old Comics Were Better Back Then! or the rarer Hey, Look a Lost Masterpiece! it’s just a look at one of hundreds of thousands of comics produced in the past before it slips into the obscurity it was intended for. Well, slips back into my garage, because this one’s a keeper.

SGT ROCK by Heath & Kanigher

Keeping it as basic as basic training then, the cover is by Joe Kubert but that’s not all of Joe Kubert’s contribution. If you squint at the print below the opening splash page it’s possible to see that the Editor was also Joe Kubert. Joe Kubert (1926-2012) was a titanic comics talent whose staggeringly voluminous output consisted largely (but not solely) of war comics. And Tor comics. In his later years he would attempt to connect more directly with the world by addressing the Bosnian conflict (Fax From Sarajevo ( 1990)) and by dealing with a chunk of personal issues in a series of OGNs addressing the Holocaust (Yossel, April 19, 1943 (2003)), parental expectations (Jew Gangster (2005)) and the reality of war (Dong Xoai, Vietnam, 1965 (2010)). All of them were visually striking if slightly over earnest comics which, disarmingly, sought to impart the importance of decency, respect and empathy. An admirable aim he pursued right up to the end of his life, and which saturates his final comics series (Joe Kubert Presents (2013)) And, yes, even his Tor comics. Here though, with OAaW#258, the mighty Joe Kubert’s visual contribution is a typically arresting cover featuring Sgt Rock wrestling a very yellow fellow indeed. Sgt Rock’s foe is a Japanese soldier and his icteric aspect may be down to a touch of malaria and an attendant pinch of jaundice, but let’s face it it’s probably down to the heavy handed colouring of the day. But wait, weren’t Sgt Rock and Easy Company active in the European Theatre which was kind of light on Japanese soldiers and, it should be noted, a really poor choice for a night out as theatres go? Every so often Robert Kanigher would find a reason to shift Sgt. Rock to the Pacific. This was largely for reasons of variety, I expect. While Bob Haney actually wrote the prototype Rock’s first appearance in OAaW#81 (1959), Kanigher created him (Rock, not Haney) in an editorial capacity and he and Joe Kubert further refined the character into his iconic state. Kanigher wrote the vast majority of Rock’s antics so it was probably primarily for the sake of his own sanity that he changed things up intermittently.

SGT ROCK by Heath & Kanigher

Of course the audience of the time (children, soldiers, degenerates, reprobates) couldn’t be counted on to have seen the previous issue so a quick catch up was always appreciated. The first page of this issue is one such catch-up. Today you might get a page of poorly proof read text, the tone of which can vary from the functional to the humorous. Here we get a Russ Heath splash page, which may very well just be an exercise in visual exposition, but it’s one done with such design flair and general artistic excellence I’d certainly hang that bad boy on my wall. Check it out. Check it out again. Still rocking, right? All the information a reader needs is represented visually right there. Rock’s haunted face has pride of place in a position suggesting the elements surrounding him are thoughts/memories, and the smoke trail of the falling plane carries the eye down while it gluts itself on the surrounding detail. You’d have to be trying very hard indeed not to interpret the visuals here correctly. Admittedly, yes, all the information a reader needs is repeated in the text box. But while this image-text repetition results in a certain level of redundancy intrinsic to the form at this time (i.e. 1973, not 2015) this occurs less frequently than you might expect in the following pages, but it does occur. I hold that this repetitiveness is entirely intentional and a natural result of the bifurcation of the workload, rather than bad writing per se. Say an editor asks a writer to write a script and assigns it to an artist, where’s the guarantee that they’ll get back a seamless piece of entertainment? It’s over there having tea with Lord Lucan is where that is. So, you make sure the writer writes it all down and you make sure the artist draws it all too; belt and braces, basically. Comics was different back then; it was better. No, of course it wasn’t. The rewards back then were pitiful. I’ve read this comic a couple of times and I can’t actually find the names “Robert Kanigher” or “Russ Heath” credited as writer or artist respectively. These dudes expected nothing. These dudes weren’t going on chat shows anytime soon, or getting their snout in the TV cash-trough, or snorting uncut Hollywood; they were making a comic and doing it as well as they could. Which in Russ Heath’s instance was phenomenally, in case I don’t make that clear later. Heath’s the star of this strip but Kanigher’s no slouch.

SGT ROCK by Heath & Kanigher Robert Kanigher (1915-2002) was, reportedly, not well loved by his peers but as far as posterity is concerned that carries as much weight as a politician’s promise. You pick up this book and you'll just find Robert Kanigher’s a decent writer. This sucker just chugs along. It’s 14 pages long but it feels like three times that, and in a good way. In another way he’s a very bad writer because the strip is just a succession of events that aren’t actually thematically connected or any of that fancy stuff; but it entertains. Since that was his job - he’s a good writer here. For the bulk of the issue Rock is alone and adrift yet Kanigher singularly fails to let us into Rock’s head except via his terse and basic narration of events.

SGT ROCK by Heath & Kanigher

Most writers wouldn’t exercise such restraint. There are no revelations about Rock’s past; it’s all about his present. This is good because Rock is a pretty basic character. Whatever you throw at him, he doesn’t fall. He endures. He’s a rock. That’s it. (It works, don’t knock it.) Having flashbacks to Rock’s first sweetheart, harvesting waving fields of corn, labouring in the steel mill and being dandled on Pappy’s knee etc. would dilute him. Sure, such after the fact encumbrances would appear in other Rock comics and be so poorly policed that at one point if you totted them up he’d got three Dads, like some shitty sit-com or something. In this comic there’s none of that; just a man existing moment to moment. Because that's how you survive a situation this horrific. Well, in this comic anyway. However, Kanigher’s nerve buckles when it comes to having faith that this stoic castaway stuff will keep the audience attentive. So we have a flashback with Easy Co. storming a pill box so that the kids get their customary action scene, complete with Kanigher’s signature move – the "TNT-whatsit" phrase ("Looks like that flyin' swastika is goin' to put us in the ice-box --with a TNT ICE-BERG!"). In his defence Kanigher does use the scene to establish the particular quality of Rock the issue will pivot around; his stubbornness. And, let's face it, editorial may have required certain “Sgt Rock” elements to appear in every issue; I think that’s pretty likely. A more organic outburst of action occurs when Rock lands on one of those tiny islands the Pacific hosts which are as numerous as my grudges, and he encounters some Japanese soldiers. A sequence of violence is then depicted by Russ Heath who, with ink, brush and genius, manages to communicate all the desperate tension and explosive movement of such an encounter. Being the shy type I’ve never been attacked by Japanese soldiers on a beach but for a few seconds Russ Heath sure made me feel like I had. Just Rock and the Japanese officer are left and, sensibly enough, they decide to pool their resources until they get back to the war.

SGT ROCK by Heath & Kanigher

I know, I know, you’re ahead of me here and are already thinking of John Boorman’s 1968 movie HELL IN THE PACIFIC. This movie starred Lee Marvin and Tosihro Mifune as WW2 enemies stranded on a Pacific island who first fight then unite, before the War inevitably returns and with it, duty. And this bit in the comic is, indeed, like that fine movie, but it isn’t 103 minutes long it’s 14 pages long. Kanigher & Heath don’t have the room to do more than nod in the movie’s direction but it’s a firm nod. So, I guess there’s a bit of pop culture referencing going on there; some homaging, yeah? You didn’t realise they did that before Community did you! This basic premise was also, uh, homaged somewhat more extensively in an episode of Battlestar Galactica, but that hadn’t happened in 1973 and I doubt Robert Kanigher had seen it unless he was prone to prophetic visons of crap culture. Depends how hard he was hitting the sauce, I guess. I know I’ve seen a few sights that way (badgers on mopeds!) One of the interesting things about the movie is that Marvin and Mifune never stray from their native languages so the audience shares their frustrations and breakthroughs, this is a great idea but probably not one the public warmed to as the movie was a huge financial loss. Kanigher & Heath don’t have time for all that smart malarkey so it turns out the Japanese officer can speak English.

SGT ROCK by Heath & Kanigher

In a pithy masterclass on exposition, Kanigher establishes how that is ("My mother taught it in school." BANG! Job done.) Kanigher cannily uses the officer to have Rock fill us in on the story so far, which is one time too many really. As though sensing this Russ Heath wades in and draws the balls off of what is basically several panels of two men sitting and talking. The standout here is the bit where Russ Heath takes us under the surface of the sea to show a shark shadowing the raft and its oblivious passengers. A certain kind of easily excited blogger might start telling you that this shark represents the war which exists independently of the two men’s attention and could explode into their lives without warning. Me, I think Russ heath is keeping both himself and his readers awake and just really drawing that shark the way sharks should be drawn - really well. Look at that panel. Damn, the song Russ Heath’s art sang in 1973 is so strong in this comic I can hear it all the way in th efuture year of 2015.

As I’ve said the strip is only 14 pages long (did you catch that?) and yet Rock’s journey takes days, weeks even. Kanigher acquits himself well, but it’s Russ Heath’s art which leaves you feeling you’ve shared Rock’s journey and appreciating its span while he generously spares you the actual tedium of it. Heath’s opening splash is a majestic thing but the double pager that follows it up is equally strong. Having established Rock is adrift on the previous page Heath uses the top panels on the next page to punch home how long Rock’s been floating and the cost it’s had on him. Alternating (and enlarging) Day-Night-Day panels punctuated by repetitious babble take the eye across to the seagulls which become in Rock’s sun-fried mind, and before our eyes, planes swooping down from the top right with their bullet trails diagonally strafing the combat happy joes of Easy Co., who push across to the right against the bullets and take us to the page turn. That’s some pretty sweet visual storytelling right there.

SGT ROCK by Heath & Kanigher

In a later sequence similar to the one at the top of page two Heath manages to make it send a different message; this time the panels again indicate an indeterminate but large amount of time has passed but Rock seems barely to have moved. The maddeningly slow pace of drifting depicted there, because unless some weather is happening the sea isn’t really rushing anywhere.

SGT ROCK by Heath & Kanigher

Again and again, on every page it’s Heath’s eye for detail which convinces. Heath pays everything the same level of interest and doesn’t play favourites. As a result his people are convincing in posture and expression within a world that seems concrete. He actually draws the sea for a start, then there’s the stances in the tussle on the raft, the body blown back by bullets, the predatory grace of a shark, everything, all the way down to the scabs on Rock’s head.

Just another comic; just another day at work for Russ Heath & Robert Kanigher. Our Army at War #258 is just VERY GOOD!

SGT ROCK by Heath & Kanigher

In the end all rocks must crumble but some things endure. Yeah, I'm talking about COMICS!!!

"In This Issue: EVERYONE DIES!" Sometimes It's Not Just The G.I. Who is Immortal!

Being a gallery of comics covers featuring The Unknown Soldier, drawn mostly by Joe Kubert (1926-2012). Yes, okay, a cursory bit of staid analysis and a little tearful nostalgia too, but mostly some timelessly exciting imagery. I hope you enjoy them as much as I did (and continue to). Art by Gerry Talaoc

Anyway, this... It will be readily apparent to even the most bleary of eyes that the majority of the covers below are by Joe Kubert. The rare exceptions are by Ernie Chua (Ernie Chan) and Al Milgrom. The difference is striking. Noting that difference is certainly no slur on either man as Joe Kubert had few equals when it came to cover art and design, and even fewer equals when it came to war comic cover design.

Because Kubert provide covers for the majority of the Faceless G.I.'s escapades this gallery, incomplete as it may be, highlights several aspects of Kubert's cover art. There's no escaping Kubert's fondness for the cover delivering the chilly thrill equvalent to the "He's Behind You!" of children's pantomimes. (e.g. #166,#174, #181 etc) Joe Kubert would never get tired of this device and because Joe Kubert was an amazing talent it never got old. So amazingly talented was Joe Kubert that he could produce covers which could still capture the eye despite teetering dangerously close to the generic. (e.g. #185, #192,#193 etc) Back then it was not uncommon for covers to be held on file for use in the event of a deadline chrunch, so this explains the lack of specificity here rather than any disinterest on Kubert's part. Those are the least of these covers, and they are also the fewest. (They are still good though.) Outnumbering them by far are images so pulpily explosive I want to go and find out what's going on inside that comic right now. And I already know!

And just as I can recall the exact page of Gullivar Jones: Warrior of Mars where I fell in love with Gil Kane's work, so I can remember exactly which comic cover sold me on Joe Kubert for life. It's #195. An American relative visited us when I was under 10 and brought with them a pile of comics. Yes, even then everyone knew no good would come of me. I can't remember any of the other comics but I remember that one. I remember that one because the charge of violent menace coming off it was almost palpable. I recall that for several months I kept it beneath my bed and, when feeling brave, would lean over and inch it out with my finger until I could take its horrid promise no more and scoot it hurriedly back into the darkness. Brrrr!

Sometimes I think The Unknown Soldier is in danger of being forgotten by Comics, but I shouldn't worry because Comics will never forget Joe Kubert and their legends are entwined. He co-created him after all.

Enjoy!

The Unknown Soldier was created by Joe Kubert & Robert Kanigher

So, no, I don't have the final issue. Humph!

You know what those were right? COMICS!!!

"...Sweet Innocence Defiled By The Breath Of Foulness..." COMICS! Sometimes The Undead Are Impeccably Dressed!

"Four hundred years ago my vampiric kiss transformed the woman I loved into a soulless thing called Mary, Queen of Blood! Today an unholy order follows her evil designs, and the blood they spill is on my hands!..." But enough about me. What about Andrew Bennett? What about "I...Vampire!"

Anyway, this... I…VAMPIRE! Art by Tom Sutton, Ernie Colon, Adrian Gonzales, Paris Cullins, Dan Day and Jim Aparo Written by J M De Matteis, Bruce jones, Dan Mishkin, Gary Cohn and Mike W Barr Lettered by John Constanza, Gaspar, A Kawecki, Andrews, Ben Oda, Todd Klein, Jun Roy Talactac Coloured by Adrienne Roy I...Vampire! created by Tom Sutton & J M De Matteis (Contents Originally appeared in House of Mystery #290, 291, 292, 293, 295, 297, 299, 302, 304-319 & The Brave And The Bold #195 (1981-1983)) DC Comics, $29.99 (2011)

The younger, far more agreeable, me used to buy House of Mystery off the spinner rack in the UK so I didn’t always get to see every issue. The issues I did see I usually bought because they had such damn fine covers. It’s a truism that the covers of DC’s “mystery” line of anthologies were usually the best bit, mostly because it’s true. Oh, they had nice art inside but the stories were mostly pointless things that stopped rather than ended and banked on the fact that some supernatural trappings would distract you from all the other failings. They looked like Twist-In-The-Tale tales but the Twist was usually that there was barely a Tale. I still bought ‘em because they looked good and had werewolves and skeletons in. Look, here’s the big thing about kids and entertainment; they aren’t that picky. Anyway, things picked up content wise for HoM when, in 1981, it started running "I…Vampire!” This was a, rare for these books, continuing series which lasted until 1983.  Of course the downside to continuing episodic serial fiction for filthy foreigners  such as my self was, as I said, that the younger, far more agreeable, me used to buy House of Mystery off the spinner rack in the UK so I didn’t always get to see every issue. But that’s okay because here, in this volume, there is every one of the 24 original chapters of "I…Vampire!” And also, an issue of Brave And The Bold in which "I…Vampire!" teams up with Smilin' Batman! Remember when Batman smiled? Good times.

Upholding the “mystery” line tradition the covers are the best bit here, but in a welcome break from tradition the actual comics are pretty neat too. It’s just that the covers are by Joe Kubert and Michael William Kaluta. I mean, come on now. Mind the carpet; I believe your cup just did runneth over! Both artists provide fantastically atmospheric and alluring covers despite their conspicuously different styles. Kubert’s usual superficially wild lashings of ink retain their timeless impulsive energy and his signature imprecision creates a sense of instability, of flux; one wholly apt for the gaudy transformative horror of the strip. Kaluta, naturally, is far more precise with a far lighter line producing a far more ethereal and desiccated effect which, unlike Kubert, serves to underscore the melodramatic pathos at the heart of the lead character. Because "I…Vampire!" one Andrew Bennett by name, is a right whining  mimsy and no mistake.

Mind you, he’s every reason to be moody what with his wedding preparations being interrupted by his sudden initiation into vampirism via a passing manky monk. Even in 1591 I imagine weddings were fraught enough affairs, as the mobile disco had yet to be invented, without being turned into an undead leech on humanity. A vampire I’m talking about there, not a lobbyist. Somewhat rashly Bennett shares his curse with his betrothed, Mary, only to find that she takes to it with somewhat more alacrity. Rebranding herself as Mary, Queen of Blood she organises her fellow nosferatu into The Blood Red Moon and embarks on a crusade to enslave humanity. When we first join him in 1981 Bennett is busy trying to kill the woman he loves and foil her evil schemes. Hobbies are important to men, after all. Luckily he isn’t alone. There’s Dmitri Mishkin who throughout the series will provide creepy oedipal fun aplenty as he tries to kill his vampiric mother. Sadly Dmitri probably isn’t related to Dan Mishkin one of the series’ later writers as that would be really weird and suggest a serious reappraisal of all our realities. Now as alluring as matricidal elderly Russian men are DeMatteis chooses to provide Bennett with a more traditional love interest in the form of Deborah Dancer. Yes, her name was Deborah. Deborah. But whether she had woodchip on the wall or, indeed, her house was very small remains unrecorded. That’s the basic set up then for the series with a bit of an alcoholism subtext as Andrew struggles to survive without taking a human life. This setup takes a whole ten pages, and stands De Matteis in good stead freeing him up to dash off in a number of unfeasible but entertaining directions. After five issues he runs out of puff and passes the baton to Bruce Jones.

Jones barges right on in and starts marking his territory in no uncertain times. Initially he resets the series to the TV Hulk template. Now Bennett will be meandering down the lonely road to intersect episodically with different people with terrible consequences. Mostly for them. There’s an absolute cracker of an episode where Bennett takes up with the wife and child of a man whose death he has caused. Now, obviously lessons will be learned, closure achieved and there’ll be a sad departure leaving everyone wiser and richer. I don’t want to spoil anything but let’s just say that Bruce Jones sets about your expectations with a ball peen hammer and doesn’t let up until they are unrecognisable. Bruce Jones’ is really good at undercutting expectations is what I’m saying there.  This is aided and abetted by this disdain for logic, but I’m guessing entertainment is  a greater consideration for Bruce Jones than sense. I say that with some confidence because quicker than Threshold got cancelled he remembers he likes time travel and things get entertainingly insane fast as the series becomes a chronally unstable race between Bennett and Mary to save/kill the ancestors of the inventor of the cancer cure which is, in the 1980s, killing all the vampires. You hardly need the gift of Second Sight to know that Jack The Ripper turns up, Gaw Blimey! He’s near sawed ‘er head clean orf!

In comparison to Jones' satisfyingly eventful irrationality Mishkin and Cohn serve up altogether more sedate fare which favours the adventure elements largely to the detriment of the horror and occasionally steps straight into the puddle of preachiness. Don't mistake me, they aren't terrible, but it just takes them time to fling off their inhibitions and skinny dip in the straight faced silliness the strip requires.  Also, in "By The Time We Got To Woodstock..." a vampiric threat is destroyed by a combination of Jimi Hendrix playing live and the combined Love emanating from a field full of self obsessed drug addled Hippies. Which is terrible on an almost cellular level. But it is still amazing; I’ll give them that much. By the time the strip climaxes they have, fair’s fair, rallied their talents enough to provide Andrew Bennett with a finale as fittingly inventive, daft, moving, horrific and optimistic as he deserves. And then there's Tom Sutton. Tom Sutton who provides the bulk of the art on these pages and proves himself a showstopper and no mistake.

TOM SUTTON (d.2002)! If this book is worth a place on anyone's shelf (and it is. Mine!) it is because of Tom Sutton. Tom Sutton makes this series work. It’s difficult to believe that Sutton's art ever found a more suitable vehicle than "I...Vampire!" Maybe it did, let me know. I assure you, I'm all ears. Look, Tom Sutton is a maniac on these pages. Forever throwing in one nifty bit of business after another; if it's not innovatively having the contents of a panel bleed across the gutters into another, it's a series of panels showing motion or physical transformation in a manner reminiscent of psychedelic wig out movies. Tom Sutton is clearly enjoying himself here and his enthusiasm is as infectious as the vampirism he’s called upon to illustrate.

Sutton's stuff isn't pretty, elegant or, in panel to panel continuity terms, particularly consistent but it doesn't need to be. In fact I'd say it spits on such stuff. Because while energy isn't unusual (although it could do with being more usual) in comic art, Sutton's energy has a definite edge of anger to it. Fitting the strip to a tee there's a sense of dissolution permeating every one of Sutton's panels. An unsettlingly organic feel, as of fruit past its best and sliding into sweet rot. Sutton's work lifts the series out of melodrama into debauched melodrama, spectacularly flamboyantly debauched melodrama at that. Sutton's art looks like it actually has an odour. And it looks like you should thank your luck stars you can't smell it, as it would be a rank and vinegary one I'm guessing. It’s not all bug eyed hell for leather ostentation though.  Sutton’s smart enough to vary the intensity of his art so that although the whole thing looks like you're viewing it through eyes hot and misted with fever, at times it goes beyond even that; Sutton’s images become deliriously inflamed and pass seamlessly into the realm of the rawly hallucinatory.

I single Tom Sutton out because while everyone else here does good work they all did better work elsewhere, but I'm not Sure Tom Sutton did. His garish, visually mushy sensibility lines up with "I...Vampire!" so well he effectively makes it what it is. And thanks, primarily, to Tom Sutton "I...Vampire!" is like Liberace wrote Interview With A Vampire but in COMICS!!!!

Now, how can that not be GOOD!

"..Towards A Life Of Peace And Justice For All Mankind." PEOPLE! A Brief Farewell To Joe Kubert.

On August 12th 2012 Joe Kubert died. I wrote what follows as a kind of farewell to Joe Kubert. Then I realised it isn't really a farewell, because his work remains and I'll be reading it until I'm no longer around either. So, I guess it's a kind of thank you instead. The kind he'll never read but the kind I need to say. The selfish kind then but it's also the genuine kind so I guess it balances out?

On August 12th 2012 Joe Kubert died.

Don't worry, this isn't going to be  a long one.  Nor is it going to be bombastic like my Kirby stuff, because bombast doesn't strike me as being very Joe Kubert. I didn't know the man but he seems to have been  pretty grounded. The kind who'd look after his own and himself, and if there was anything left he'd hold out a hand to you and yours too. Luckily for a lot of people there was a lot of Joe Kubert left to go around, enough that he even opened a school. You want to talk about giving something back to comics? You want to talk about building a future for comics? You want to be talking about Joe Kubert. As I say though, he looked after himself too. Which means that there's no depressing story concerning his treatment by the Industry. In fact it means that there are a whole bunch of books with this delightful stamp on them:

Joe Kubert seems to have been one of the few to have met the Industry on its own terms and not just survived but prospered. Mind you he got in there early and he seems to have set his feet and tucked in his chin right from the start. The fact Joe Kubert's example is such a lonely one suggests you have to be Joe Kubert to do that, but things are changing and maybe Joe Kubert's exception will become the rule.

My primary consumption of Kubert's art was through his covers. These things were wonders to me in my youth. Over here in the UK distribution of US comics was spotty at best so I imagine there were more than a few of my generation who grew up spinning their own lurid nonsense and attaching it mentally to tiny reproductions of imagination snagging covers. For me Joe Kubert's covers were  so striking that many embedded themselves in my brain only to detonate years later. When the Dark Horse TARZAN collections were announced in 2005 I pounced on them, driven by the suppressed need to discover the contents behind those incredible '70s covers that had taunted my childish eyes decades before. Kubert drew and edited those books and I had no idea, as much as I loved his art, how incredible that stuff was. If you like Joe Kubert you need those books. I read that Kubert himself went all out on them, so, you know, there can't be many higher recommendations for such unjustly neglected work.

Because, yeah, Joe Kubert edited as well as drew and wrote comics. He was a tough editor by all accounts, I know he gave Russ Heath a larruping for lateness and then there was that time he riled Alex Toth, although I believe Alex Toth was hardly the most unrileable of men. He took it all seriously and as a result his books were seriously good. He'll probably be best remembered for the war books he produced with Kanigher and while these are usually mocked as gung-ho and compared unfavourably to Kurtzman's (incredible) EC books, it's good to remember that DC wasn't EC. Fact is that when Kubert took over the editing he immediately stuck "Make War No More" at the end of every yarn. Given the corporate constrictions he was working under Joe Kubert always tried to do the best, most wholesome and educational work he could. I have deliberately used two hokey terms there, two terms practically guaranteed to have you waving your hands before your rolling eyes, and I have done so on purpose. Because, yes, Joe Kubert's work can appear a bit stolid, a bit too Dad. The fact that this constant undercurrent of morality remained right to the end of his work is worth celebrating even if at times it is a little heavy handed for modern minds. He meant well and it rarely got in the way of his two-fisted tales. Because the primary attraction was his art and his art was powerful enough to blast apart any other reservations.

Because his art is glorious. Given time enough Kubert would bring you back perfection. But artists of Kubert's generation rarely had time enough. One of the (maybe even the)  prime defining aspects of their art is this very lack of time. The need for speed was possibly the most influential factor in the art of Kubert's generation. And Kubert was quick. Kubert was also gifted enough to be quick and good. Most of the time he was great but he was rarely less than good. Look at Kubert's art at DC when he was at his most prolific and people today can have a real good time picking it apart. But you have to look at it for a fair bit before you can do that. Kubert was so good that he could approximate reality so convincingly he didn't need to make it look real. Every line was a kind of trick he convinced the reader to play on themselves, and the audience was always willing to go along because every line promised it would be worth it. And it was. That's not faint praise either, his work was belted out at a rate of knots and its true excellence is in how excellent it is at merely suggesting excellence. But he had to be excellent in the first place to even approach that. Like I say given time enough not even these caveats are necessary. See the art in DONG XAOI, TEX and his TOR series of 1993 and 2008  to see what Joe Kubert could do when he could lay it down at his own sweet pace. And TARZAN of course. Truly Joe Kubert's art was a gift to us all.

So, just some brief words there about Joe Kubert. Not comprehensive in the slightest, little more than perfunctory in fact given the scope of his career. But the words were meant in sincere tribute. Joe Kubert enriched my life and th elives of thousands of others with his art. Joe Kubert was an artist, a husband, a father and a teacher. His work encompassed a multitude of genres: war, western, superhero, barbarians, and on and on to versatility's end. He wrote, he edited and he drew comics.  Man, he really drew those comics. Boy, those comics.

Joe Kubert.

He made ink sing.

Goodnight and thank you, Joe Kubert.

Joe Kubert (1926 - 2012).

All scans taken from TOR Volumes 1,2 and 3 published by DC Comics/The Joe Kubert Library. Tor was created by Joe Kubert.

If you wish to talk about Joe Kubert in the comments do feel free to do so. Otherwise, i wish you all good health and plenty of fine, fine COMICS!!!

Better than never: Hibbs on 6/27

As far as I am concerned, this isn't "last week's comics" until I open the front door of the store on Wednesday!

BATMAN INCORPORATED #2:  This one is kind of a master class in communication using comics, as Morrison and Burnham basically tell you Everything You Ever Needed To Know About Talia Al'Ghul (But Forgot To Ask) in an incredibly economical, yet massively packed, 20 pages. Some pages have as many as five different scenes on the page! An absolutely EXCELLENT tour-de-force on this one.

  FUCK ALAN MOORE BEFORE WATCHMEN NITE OWL #1: Uh, wow. You know, I expected some of these would be bad, but I really never expected them to be almost a parody of the very idea of prequelling WATCHMEN.

This is just staggeringly bad: from the bizarre rapey childhood home, to the changing the original text (the worst sin of all in a project like this), to the scenes of Rorschach using-'hurm'-as-a-catchphrase ("DY-NO-MITE!"), to the cringeworthy "destiny of love" bullshit, I almost get the feeling that Staczynski thinks he is trying to make WATCHMEN "better". This comic, sadly, just reeks of hubris and shame.

I'd hoped to at least appreciate the art, but I found Joe Kubert's inks to be kind of overpowering on son Andy.

Either way, the writing just kills it here: this is everything you possibly feared a "Before WATCHMEN" comic might be.  Full-on CRAP.

FATIMA THE BLOOD SPINNERS #1: Beto is just insanely prolific, isn't he? Terrifically gory, this is a kind of perfect 70s-ish exploitation B-movie, but totally of the moment as well somehow. Gore! Horror! Large Breasts! I'm glad I live in a world where I'm going to sell more copies of this than of THOR and HULK combined, y'know? GOOD HYPERNATURALS #1 : I think this is kind of a perfect comic for you if you have a sympathy for the basic concept of Legion of Super-Heroes (Future, many heroes from many worlds), but not necessarily liked any specific execution of that concept. Or if you like the Marvel Cosmic stuff that DnA did, it's similar tonally. Extremely sturdy construction of ideas here, if not exactly brimming with truly compelling characters. I thought it was solidly GOOD. LOEG III CENTURY #3 2009:  It may be because I simply "got" more of the references and cameos, but this was vastly my favorite of the three parts of Century, and it brings everything together in a deeply satisfying way. I also find the idea of the universe being saved by **** ******* to also being oddly perfect and correct. Kevin O'Neill's art, as always, veers between the grotesque and perfectly captured. I thought this issue was pretty damn EXCELLENT.

(You can also get v1 & v2 on the Digital Store, if you wanted) PROPHET #26: With all of the people telling me they can't buy this book in their LCS, I'm more and more convinced that Image erred in renumbering from the 90s series. Without a doubt, this is the best science-fiction series being published today. And a great series got better with Brandon Graham himself drawing this issue, and kicking the concept a door open further. I admire (and get frustrated, I admit) by how this book doesn't try and spoon feed you its concepts. Really VERY GOOD stuff. OK, that's really all I have time for today, time to open to the teeming hordes (ha!) I am, seriously, going to try to get to THIS week's books before Friday and be "caught up" again. Wish me luck!

What did YOU think?

-B

"I'm A MAN, And I'll LOVE You As A Man Loves A ..." Comics! Sometimes There's A Film Out As Well! (John Carter!)

So, yeah, there's a John Carter film out on Friday. Not that I ever get to the pictures anymore but, hey, you might! In the meantime you could read this about some comics featuring the same character. It's a thought isn't it. Probably one more than went into the writing of this. Hey, can CGI do this?:

No, no it can not. You lose CGI!

I guess I should start with a disclaimer: I'm not really an Edgar Rice Burroughs fan; indeed I don't even know if I have read the source novels for these comics. So if you're looking for an informed Burroughsian monograph you might want to jump off right here. What follows is just some old gimp prattling about some comics, because what he really likes is comics. And prattling.

EDGAR RICE BURROUGHS’ JOHN CARTER OF MARS: THE JESSE MARSH YEARS Drawn by Jesse Marsh. Scripted by Paul S. Newman. Foreword by Mario Henandez. Collects Four Color Comics #375, #437 and #488, originally published in 1952 and 1953 by Dell Publishing Co., inc. (Dark Horse Books, 2010, $29.99)

I bought this book because once I'd seen the cover it refused to entirely leave my mind and was constantly hovering there urgently pressing me to purchase it at some point. I think it was the really solid no-nonsense blacks that fixed the image to the page and into my mind. At the time I had been admiring Don Heck's solid blacks and this seemed to play off and feed into that brief flare of interest. Also, there was something very Gilbert Hernandez about it what with the intentionally(?) stilted poses , the harsh crease lines and the occasional smattering of dots for texture. So I bought the book with some Christmas money and prepared to be disappointed. Obviously the cover was just a lucky image that Dark Horse were using to lure credulous punters like myself into buying reprints of justly forgotten chaff as the Hollywood version of the material slowly hove into view.

I was wrong.

Mars circa 1952.

This book was fantastic. Jesse Marsh is fantastic. This isn't actually news to anyone except me it seems. He's actually on the list of possible inductees into the 2012 Eisner's Hall of Fame. Casting my mind back I recall interviews with Alex Toth and Howard Victor Chaykin (who is also on the 2012 Hall of Fame list. What a dilemma!) in which both mention Jesse Marsh. Still, it's one thing hearing about a comic artist's work and seeing it.

Actually looking at it Marsh's work looks totally ahead of its time. Wait, let's back up. I'm not saying anyone could mistake these comics for modern comics. The very nature of the material works against Marsh in this regard. For a start each of the three reprinted comics are tasked with adapting an entire Edgar Rice Burroughs' novel in 32 pages. There's no time for shilly-shallying, no room for indulgences like splash pages, very little chance for a panel's art to be unadorned by narration or dialogue. No, Marsh has to fit it all in to a series of pages consisting of (roughly) 6x6 grids where his greatest indulgence is to let two such panels bleed together either vertically or horizontally. And he doesn't get to do that all that often. Cramped and constricted as he is by the format Marsh has the technique to deliver the equivalent of putting on a musical in an elevator. That's where the 'ahead of its time' bit comes in; in the actual art.

The Incomporable Dejah Thoris - Circa 1952.

There's a colossally impressive understanding of design on show. Because Marsh is working in the highly strictured world of '50s comics (and Gold Key were particularly inflexible in format) Marsh is unable to do anything about the actual page design but the design of the panels themselves are beautifully chosen to balance the elements within them. And (get this) the actual elements within the panels are further forays into design by an artist who was clearly just so incredibly good at what he did he could do the incredible just to keep himself amused. What other reason can there be for the pictures/sculptures/scenery with which Marsh surrounds his characters? His sculptures and pictures are so good I have the suspicion that they are actual object d'art that only my lack of breeding and education prevent me from identifying. The fact they change from panel to panel (even when the scene has not changed!) suggest Marsh was just larking about. But, what larks!

Martian Action! Circa 1952.

But, no, you aren't going to mistake these comics for the cutting edge of Now. Marsh's work does have its failings but although the characters may be stiff  it must be said they are distinctive. The "incomparable" Dejah Thoris seems to have been modelled on the actor Emily Watson which can't be right? John Carter isn't terribly expressive but he does look like himself in every scene and doesn't look like anyone else and you can't always say that about even modern comics. Although the big thing everyone gets sweaty about with Burrough's Mars novels is that everyone is nudey rude except for weapons and jewelry everyone here is fully dressed.  So, I guess purist might balk but all the incident, adventure and momentum of good pulp entertainment remain intact. Given the task of illustrating the functional script of Paul S. Newman Marsh manages to not only provide work which does so but at the same time carves out room to indulge his own idiosyncrasies and interests in a way which actually serves to enhance the work rather than distract or undermine its primary purpose: to entertain.

John Carter circa 1952.

One for the folks interested in form rather than content, or the talent rather than the character if you like.  VERY GOOD!

EDGAR RICE BURROUGHS’ JOHN CARTER OF MARS: WEIRD WORLDS Art by Sal Amendola, Murphy Anderson, Gray Morrow and Joe Orlando. Written by Marv Wolfman. Introduction by Marv Wolfman. Collects stories from Tarzan #207-209 and Weird Worlds #1-#7, originally published in 1972 and 1973 by DC Comics. (Dark Horse Books, 2011, $14.99)

In 1971 as a hedge against the possibility that super-heroes had outstayed their welcome DC comics cast about for properties to replace them. Tarzan and the other ERB properties, including John Carter, caught DC's fancy since they were still adventure themed but more sober in appearance than super-heroes. This tells us that people are always predicting the end of super-hero comics and sobriety is pretty subjective. Good news for drunks, then! Great news for The Incomparable Joe Kubert who took the lead on the project. While his creative talents were focused on Tarzan he took on editorial duties for the other ERB character, such as John Carter. According to Bill Schelly's Man of Rock: A Biography of Joe Kubert (which I am filleting facts from in an attempt to look knowledgeable) Murphy Anderson and Marv Wolfman got the John Carter assignment because they were big John Carter fans. Apparently Michael William Kaluta wanted the gig but Murphy Anderson got it, mostly because he shared an office with Pappy Joe Kubert and was asked first. Not exactly high drama but that's what happened.  (You could have guessed Granite Joe Kubert had edited these stories because he can't help sticking his inky fingers in the Gray Morrow chapter on on pg17-22.) Anyway, the comics that resulted are collected in this book.

Mars circa 1972.

Given the fact that fully two decades separate the work in this volume and that contained in the Marsh volume discussed earlier it's interesting to see how the comic art approach has changed. There's a lot more variety in page design in 1971 with panels inset into double page splashes, flashback panels with wobbly edges, decorative chapter headings a la old timey newspaper strips and on and on. What's clear is that the artist has far more freedom to control the visual presentation of the material. In between Marsh and Anderson's work something new has appeared: pacing. There is no pacing in the Marsh book; there's no opportunity for it. But in this volume it's evident that the writer/artist are able to actually pace their material. The material may have set limits as to length but these limits are far more generous than those Marsh was labouring under.

The Incomparable Dejah Thoris circa 1972.

There's also a lot more freedom with regards to sex'n'violence. In the '50s material the incomparable Dejah Thoris was wrapped up like a shoolmarm but by the '70s she's certainly giving herself a good airing. Don't worry though because in the '50s John Carter was decked out like a Hussar but by the '70s he's all raggedy loincloth and musky muscles so noone's playing favourites here. Poor old Jesse Marsh had at best a couple of panels to depict savage action on worlds unknown but Anderson et al fare better with plenty of room to swing a Thark.

Martian Action! Circa 1972.

The ERB books didn't really sell very well and after a while moves were made to bring in cheaper foreign artists which probably explains why Murphy Anderson's contributions stop on pg. 68 and Sal Amendola finishes off the rest of the book. I'm not saying Sal Amendola was foreign (to American shores) but I am betting he was cheaper.  After the somewhat traditional art preceding it the book suddenly explodes into a Barbarellatastic mindmelt of groovy layouts and gear designs, man. Well, it tries to. Alas, Sal Amedola is hampered by a lack of talent but the surfeit of ambition he possesses almost overcomes this. I said "almost". It isn't very pretty but I admire the energy; that's about as good as it gets with the Sal Amendola stuff. He does, however, chuck in some nudey rudery for the hardcore Burroughs' fans which is amusingly cheeky of him.

John Carter circa 1972.

As a complete TPB this one disappoints in that it starts off with some strong and solid work by industry vets but is compromised halfway through by market considerations to ultimatley produce a collection that I can only call OKAY!

EDGAR RICE BURROUGHS’ JOHN CARTER OF MARS: WARLORD OF MARS Art by Ross Andru, Bob Budiansky, Sal Buscema, Ernie Chan, Dave Cockrum, Ernie Colon, Frank Giacoia, Larry Hama, Carmine Infantino, Gil Kane, Bob McLeod, Frank Miller, George Perez, Walt Simonson, Mike Vosburg and Alan Weiss. Words by Chris Claremont, Peter Gillis, Bill Mantlo, Alan Weiss and Marv Wolfman Foreword by Michael Chabon Collects John Carter, Warlord of Mars #1-#28 and Annuals #1-#3 originally published in 1977-79 by Marvel Comics. (Dark Horse Books, 2011, $29.99)

Pulp got Gil Kane early and pulp got Gil Kane but good. Although he was often opining that Comics needed to mature itself in terms of subject matter, he, himself, was never able to escape the grip pulp held on his imagination. Gil Kane was a great, great man but his tastes could tend to the unsophisticated. Luckily since that was the very problem he berated comics for he may have been held back creatively but it didn't hurt him commercially. Particularly in the '70s when pulp's stock was strong in the comics market and he had plenty of juice himself.

Mars circa 1977.

In the '70s Kane spent a lot of time working up books he'd be interested in doing, starting them, realising he couldn't produce pages fast enough to pay him enough, leave the book, work up a book he's be interested in doing...and rinse, repeat. He was like the goddamn Littlest Hobo of comics or something ("There’s a voice that keeps on calling me. Down the road is where I’ll always be").  I'm being 'exasperated' because that behaviour makes it really hard to get good long runs of his stuff in collections. Obviously I know that's really not any concern of Gil Kane but  equally obviously it does mean I'm glad to have this volume.

The Incomparable Dejah Thoris circa 1977.

So, yeah, my primary interest in this volume is the Gil Kane stuff. That's a good 190 pages. After that my attention started to wander a bit but I can assure you that the Gil Kane on these pages is some good Gil. As usual his natural glory is clothed by inks by someone else which isn't ideal but hardly a deal breaker. Most of the time the inks are by Rudy Nebres or other Filipino artists of the period. Which is fine as this  lends everything an ornate quality appropriate to the pulp material. It helps make up for Kane's shortcomings. Oh, I love old Gil I do, I do but he did suffer from visual generalisation quite a bit. C'mon, we speak freely here; his future buildings and his ancient buildings are only distinguishable because the latter have some cracks in and a tree growing out of a window while the former doesn't. So, while it's usual to bemoan the fact it isn't Kane on Kane action for this volume it works out okay; the ripe inking lends everything a distinctive character Kane would probably have omitted if left to his own devices.

Martian Action! Circa 1977.

Where Kane doesn't need any help is in portraying the supple violence of well honed bodies in motion, communicating the lusty allure of his sexy ladies and his even more alluring men and basically creating such an atmosphere of raw physicality that it practically removes the readers glasses and tells them they are beautiful. Or something. I like Gil Kane's art, it sends me. Of course like any good bad boy he's gone when he's had his fill and Kane's departure makes the book stumble a little but the continued use of Rudy Nebres gives it enough visual continuity to keep it upright and interesting. For a while anyway. Storywise it's just the usual pulp stuff. In that it's more important that things happen than that the things that happen actually make sense. In fact the more outlandish and sense defying the better. The Headmen of Mars by Bill Mantlo and Ernie Chan is a particularly proud erection to the joys of sheer momentum and excess over intellect. It's pulp and it's written as such so the words don't treally bear close examination. Ah, but that's what they want you to think. If, however, you do pay attention to the words you find that EDGAR RICE BURROUGHS’ JOHN CARTER OF MARS: WARLORD OF MARS is in fact lubricated with sly innuendo and at times this reaches such steamy excess that it wouldn't be too great a surprise if the pages dilated at the touch of your enquiring fingers or let loose a soft sigh at the insistent pressure of your questing gaze.

I'm not joking. Not only are John Carter and the Incomparable Dejah Thoris continually on their way to/from the boudoir but you get the impression that if it weren't for all these Master Assassins of Mars, zombie hordes, air-pirates of Mars etc. they would be quite happy just letting John Carter make good on all his multiple breathy promises to "love her as only a husband can love a wife", "kiss her as she has never been kissed before" and "get right in there and root around like a monkey looking for nuts".  This reaches delirious heights on p. 306 when the text reads:

"With a SKILL that still occasionally SURPRISES me--I MATCHED course and speed with Dejah's flier and DOCKED the two craft together. A moment later I was at her ENTRY HATCH--With a cry torn from her SOUL, she sprang into my arms --I will not DWELL on what happened next."

Oh, do dwell, Chris Claremont, dwell!

John Carter circa 1977.

And you know what? That's great! The John Carter and The Incomparable Dejah Thoris actually resemble a couple with a working sexual attraction. Okay, it might be somewhat exaggerated in a pulp stylee but maybe if my muscles were three times as powerful as any other males I imagine I'd be a lot more popular too.

I really liked this book but I think I've made it clear that that that's primarily because of the presence of Gil Kane, a tendency for my own interests to run to the unsophisticated and an appreciation for healthy smut. If you do not share these pleasures you probably won't find this to be GOOD!

(Apparently Marvel have released the same comics in a colour over-sized Omnibus. They are probably even better in colour. Sighhhhhhh.)

Mars. The Incomparable Dejah Thoris. John Carter. ('Mars Action' about to occur) circa 1977.

Have a good weekend and remember to read some COMICS!!!

"I Want To Be That Man!" Comics! Sometimes A Little Melodrama Doesn't Hurt!

Happy New Year and I do so hope you all had a very Merry Season of Cheer! Sadly I read some more DC war comics from the '70s and then wrote about 'em!

I think you'll find I can and, worse, I did!

SHOWCASE PRESENTS: THE UNKNOWN SOLDIER By Joe Kubert, Irv Novick, Doug Wildey, Dan Spiegle, Jack Sparling, Gerry Talaoc (Art) with  Joe Kubert, Bob Haney, Robert Kanigher, Archie Goodwin, Frank Robbins and David Michelinie (Words) (DC Comics, $16.99, 2006)

Art by Joe Kubert

(N.B. All images are taken from original copies of the comics on loan from the Kane Archive. The book under discussion itself is B&W. However the guy who wrote this was unable to satisfactorily wrestle his SHOWCASE onto the scanner and achieve pleasing results. The images in the book are excellent but THEY ARE IN BLACK AND WHITE!)

1. The Twice Born Man: Origin(s) of A Living Legend

It sounds like something Steve Allen might drone as he extended a limp arm in welcome to his next guest; “And now…the man no one knows yet is known by everyone…!” but it isn't rather it’s the tag line for the Immortal G.I. himself  - The Unknown Soldier. This SHOWCASE PRESENTS volume collects his first 38 issues in the form a big B&W brick of crisply reproduced pages. The Soldier (as I shall for brevity’s sake refer to him hereafter) was created by Robert Kanigher and Joe Kubert in OUR ARMY AT WAR #168 (June 1966). In 1970 The Soldier took over the lead in STAR SPANGLED WAR STORIES with #151. Judging by the letter columns (not reproduced) it seems the then lead Enemy Ace feature while popular wasn't popular enough, so The Soldier’s appearance was intended to find a lead feature which would engage with enough readers to prevent cancellation. The concept seems to have been an attempt to create a super-hero for WW2 but one with at least some realistic grounding.

In his first appearance The Soldier is presented as the latest in a family in which the males are bred to serve the US in times of war as troubleshooting masters of disguise. They have been doing this since The Revolutionary War. Don’t worry if this is news to you because someone clearly had an attack of sense and this silliness was redacted in #154 with a second origin. According to the second, more popular, and better, origin The Immortal G.I. was originally a (never named) grunt who lost both his brother (Harry) and his face in a Japanese attack.  Just before death and disfigurement visit the pair Harry tells the Legend-to-be that “one guy can affect the outcome of a whole war! One guy in the right place…at the right...time…”  It’s lucky for comics that Harry didn't choose to that moment regale his sibling with tales of which cheerleaders he wished he’d banged back home or how he was shipping machine gun parts back piece by piece to settle scores when he got Stateside; lucky because it’s these words that lead the defaced survivor to dedicate his life to being that “one guy in the right place…” and in being such a man to become a Legend. The Legend of The Unknown Soldier.

Art by Gerry Talaoc

Following his training the Soldier is a dab hand at creating an accurate mask of a person, impeccable at intuiting their body language and mannerisms and very convincing when it comes to replicating vocal inflections. And he can usually do all that from just a photograph. Look, it’s a ‘70s WW2 war comic dreamt up on the fly about a guy with a bandaged face who can impersonate anyone; a comic largely intended to entertain; a series that ends with The Soldier making Hitler die like a dog in his bunker while on a mission to stop vampiric octopi being unleashed (note: not in this volume as it is a couple of decades later).  It’s just one of those series where the dumb and the excessive combine to create a flavour of awesome only some palates will savour. Most of the time.

Sometimes the comic goes off-mission and starts to stray into more realistic areas.  And it’s when the realism starts to chafe at the entertainment that I find the series at its most interesting. So, those are the aspects I’ll be concentrating on as I drivel on about a select few issues of STAR SPANGLED WAR STORIES Featuring: THE UNKNOWN SOLDIER.

2. Unrealistic Realism: Joe Kubert

The first phase of The Soldier’s adventures in this book are dominated by Joe Kubert. Kubert’s tales typically place The Soldier in a real event (The Doolittle raid on Tokyo, the July 20^th bomb plot against Hitler) or make broad points about heroism and sacrifice in at least marginally realistic scenarios. On the whole the comic booky nature of the hero and Kubert’s obvious brief to entertain work against his more serious intentions and so I've picked an issue which demonstrates this tension between the real and the fantastic more than most:

The Unknown Soldier in TOTENTANZ By Joe Kubert (a) and Bob Haney (w) Originally appeared in STAR SPANGLED WAR STORIES #158 (DC Comics, $0.25, 1971) Reprinted in black & white in SHOWCASE PRESENTS: THE UNKNOWN SOLDIER (DC Comics, $16.99, 2006)

 Totentanz is German for “dance of death” and it is used here as the name of the concentration camp setting for the latest mission for The Soldier. Unlike most concentration camp stories it starts with a joke:

Art by Joe Kubert

Threatening the inmates of a Concentration Camp with death may very well be the very definition of black humour. Beyond black even; anthracitic humour. It’s not a nice joke, but it is a joke. Beyond the gallows humour it’s pretty much the usual Joe Kubert war comic cover (which is to say it is a piece of excellence in and of itself, never mind the pages it is stapled to) in form at least. But in content it’s far from usual. There are children staring out from behind the wire. If you think that’s funny, congratulations, you’re really transgressive.

Art by Joe Kubert

Joe Kubert edited and drew this story so I’m going to assume he was the driving force behind the result.  Now, given his decades of excellence in and influence upon comics I doubt I have to tell anyone that Joe Kubert is Jewish. He also appears to be quite serious about this Jewishness. ( If the dryly amusing introduction to THE ADVENTURES OF YAAKOV AND JOSEF (2004) is to be believed Kubert only did the series of faith based stories after being browbeaten by a Rabbi.) Also, Kubert hasn't been one to shirk from documenting man’s inhumanity to man as the OGN FAX FROM SARAJEVO (1996) attests. Then there’s the OGN YOSSEL:APRIL 19, 1943 (2003). Basically if you read a decent proportion of Joe Kubert’ work you will soon start to see recurring themes and interests; Jewishness, The Holocaust, man's inhumanity to man and Tor. (Christ, Joe Kubert will never give up on Tor.) There’s all that stuff and more but essentially there’s this:  Joe Kubert’s family fled Poland to America to escape the Nazis. At least those of Joe Kubert’s family who survived the Nazis did so.

Art by Joe Kubert

I’ll not lie; Totentanz is as silly a story as most Unknown Soldier tales. The actual plot doesn't even make much sense. It’s very Bob Haney (1926 – 2004); which is to say his brio and level of craft manage to keep you reading despite all the increasing inconsistencies and illogicalities. That’s okay because Joe Kubert just wants a story set in a concentration camp and Bob Haney gives him that. And Joe Kubert wants a story set in a concentration camp so that he can at least suggest some of the inhuman foulness of such a place. And Joe Kubert gives us that. He gives us that right from the off with an opening splash that looks like this:

Art by Joe Kubert

And the whole story is basically an excused to present a series of terrible images of terrible things, a succession of suffering. Sadly for Joe Kubert this comic was made in 1971 and I don’t believe there was a writer working in comics then who could provide a text able to completely vanquish any qualms concerning tastelessness or, perhaps worse to today's audience, obviousness. Haney has a good go though with stuff like “testifying to the awful “fuel” within!” but he’s still effectively hamstrung by the fact that he’s writing what is essentially a children’s comic and his own limitations as a writer. Which is to say; he’s a fine ‘70s comic book writer but this tale’s a bit out of his reach. By their very nature Comics have always lagged in the writing department (and they still do despite what the writers say) but the Kubert's horrifically arresting art here is sufficient to achieve his purpose but it has to do it bluntly; so bluntly it might repel modern sensibilities. Also, maybe a subject like The Holocaust can’t be finessed. Once you get behind the wire things get primitive real fast and maybe intellectualizing this stuff just serves to dilute the impact. If a comic about Concentration camps doesn't leave you feeling sick that’s probably a worse comic about concentration camps than one that’s got a silly plot but does, at least, leave you feeling like someone’s hit you in the face with a shovel a few times. So yeah, like most of these stories in the Kubert part of the book Totentanz is hampered by the limits of mainstream genre comics of its time but is still pretty entertaining due to the strengths such comics had (compression, momentum, clarity of purpose). Unlike the other Kubert tales it aims a bit higher and, alas, fails a bit more but it gets its point across alright which isn't too shabby an achievement.

Art by Joe Kubert

3. Ruddy Good Fun And Race Hate: Archie Goodwin & Frank Robbins

Phew! Industrialised genocide sure puts a damper on things doesn't it? Let’s try and fill that uncomfortable silence and get the party mood going again with some race hate! It’s surprising to find such a subject in the next section of the book which I have designated as being The Goodwin/Robbins Bit. Archie Goodwin (1937-1998) was, of course, possibly the greatest Editor in comics. He’s certainly one of my favourites (along with Andrew Helfer in case anyone gave a toss) and back when Editors did Editing Stuff rather than whatever they do now he was The Best. I suppose you want some kind of supporting evidence because you have mistaken this for some kind of disciplined text instead of the rambling nonsense it so clearly is. Well, do you know how Archie Goodwin edited STARSTRUCK? By doing nothing to it. Clearly Archie Goodwin knew when to hold ‘em and when to fold ‘em. He was also a pretty good writer but his work in the BLAZING COMBAT collection is better evidence of that than anything here. Here Goodwin has clearly been asked to provide espionage capers and he does so. They are okay, they are entertaining but they aren't as good as Frank Robbins’ (1917 – 1994) stories. Or at least one of Frank Robbins’ stories. This one:

The Unknown Soldier in A TOWN CALLED HATE! By Jack Sparling(a) and Frank Robbins(w) Originally appeared in STAR SPANGLED WAR STORIES #179 (DC Comics, $0.20, 1974) Reprinted in black & white in SHOWCASE PRESENTS: THE UNKNOWN SOLDIER (DC Comics, $16.99, 2006)

Art by Joe Kubert

Unlike Totentanz this tale succeeds on the strength of the writing rather than the art. Jack Sparling was, I’m sure, a lovely man and a joy to all he met but his art here is functional; this being no small praise in the days when they had to chuck this stuff out at a rate of knots. But it’s the writing that makes this one worthy of attention. Which is a bit of a shocker I can tell you. Prior to this issue Frank Robbins has seemed content to provide capers in the style of Goodwin bur with the pulp ridiculousness turned up to Purple. Entertainment is the name of the game with these and as a result they haven’t aged too well although I’m sure any 7 year olds were thrilled to bits which, let’s be fair, was pretty much the point of this stuff. Following tales in which shaven headed Nazis torture young Belgian girls while leering over the contents of their straining sweaters and flicking fag ash in their desperate eyes to have Robbins suddenly get all serious is certainly arresting. It’s just not what you expect from someone who has committed “What—What does an apprentice cheese-maker know of…DEATH DEVICES?” to posterity. I mean I’m glad he did because I like a laugh too but I’m more grateful for A Town Called Hate.

Art by Jack Sparling

In “a small French town near the Malmedy area” (which probably isn't really called "Hate") an all-black engineers corps are greeted by a white soldier with some racist banter. That night several of them are machine gunned in their bunks. The survivors immediately blame “Those dirty, muther-lovin’ WHITE TRASH...!” and toss a grenade into a bunkhouse of their sleeping Caucasian comrades. The town is now a battleground with sides divided on racial grounds. Enter The Soldier. Except...The Soldier is unavailable so the task falls to his comrade Chat Noir. As is explained by the man himself “..it means “Black Cat!” I AM black …and PROUD of it!” Robbins’ does a nice job in the conversation between Chat and a General of showing how racism exists in less overt forms than the violence we have seen. Chat picks him up on the use of “your people” and seethes over being addressed as “boy”. If the current conflict can be ceased that isn't going to mean the end of racism and the beginning of a bold new dawn but first things first and off Chat trots.

Luckily The Soldier ends up in the same town (it’s a comic!) but he’s posing as a German and then joins some Germans disguised as Americans which makes him an American posing as a German who is posing as an American. This is confusing but accurate what with the Germans actually using such tactics during the Battle of The Bulge. So there are German wandering around disguised as G.I.s and…oh, you've figured it out! Clearly the black soldiers were killed by a German posing as a Yank!  And, yes, so the evidence indicates and the plucky G.I.s team back up and start fighting the right war again. How neat and quaint except…it isn't. Robbins has The Soldier and Chat realize that in fact the violence was sparked by a racist G.I. but the obvious, yet wrong, solution was used to get the guys back together and pointing their guns in the right direction. I like that a lot. I like the fact Robbins doesn't take the easy way out, in fact I like it so much I brought it to your attention. Robbins takes a pretty big subject dresses it in genre trappings without losing sight of the fact the subject is bigger than the tale he’s telling. He does a good job. There’s not a lot of nuance, y’know. But again, how much nuance do you really need? Racism isn't right. It’s not open to debate. That’s it. End of.

Art by Jack Sparling

4. Subterfuge And (Sub)Text: Michelenie & Talaoc

I am a great fan of the Michelinie/Talaoc stories. This may be because this is where I came in when I was a kid but it may also be because they are very good. For me Michelinie seems to be the first writer to really nail the concept. Given the evidence in this book his stories take the form of morality plays spliced with espionage thrillers. There’s always a more personal, more human conflict being addressed within the wider conflict of WW2 in which the stories take place. Again, they aren't big on nuance (today's word is: nuance!); there is never any doubt what the stories are supposed to be demonstrating but they are big on characterisation and entertainment. They never forget that they are pulp and this together with a pretty dark sense of humour saves them from becoming preachy. No one likes preachiness! Except preachers, I guess.

The Unknown Soldier in 8,000 To One By Gerry Talaoc(a) and David Michelinie(w) Originally appeared in STAR SPANGLED WAR STORIES #183 (DC Comics, $0.20, 1974) Reprinted in black & white in SHOWCASE PRESENTS: THE UNKNOWN SOLDIER (DC Comics, $16.99, 2006)

Art by Joe Kubert

Did you know that Hitler had a “hands off” policy regarding Jews in Denmark? Well in 1943 it appeared Der Fuhrer regretted his largesse and changed his nasty mind. In this tale plans have been made to ship 8,000 Jews to safety , but this plan has been compromised – enter The Soldier! Posing as a Kommando The Soldier hits an early roadblock when upon reporting to his superior the Colonel orders his men to “Kill Him!” Naturally The Soldier goes Mortal Kombat on them and it turns out that this was only “a test!”. This is awesome pulpness but Michelinie slips in the caption, “…no time to think of the lives hanging in the balance. I had only time to – REACT!” A caption which appears redundant but is important later. Shortly thereafter The Soldier meets Inger.

Art by Gerry Talaoc

Inger’s a real piece of work. Inger is a Jew working with the Nazis who will do “anything” to stay alive. That’s what Inger’s about – staying alive. Like The Bee Gees. She knows what the Nazis are all about when it comes to The Jews (what the Nazis are all about with The Jews is bad). A failed attempt is made on Inger’s life and she recognises the dead assassin as her brother. She weeps but doesn't recant. This is pretty good stuff. I mean, I don’t want to die and I also don’t want to help Nazis and I know I’d like to make the right choice but…hey, you never know do you? I don’t like Inger but I understand Inger. A couple of pages later in fine pulp tradition Inger has outlived her usefulness and become “expendable!” As a final test of loyalty (the Germans still have suspicions what with The Soldier getting up to all kinds of stuff I haven’t told you about) The Soldier is ordered to shoot her.

Does he:

a) Shoot her. b) Turn his weapon on the Germans, escape with her and sail off with The 8,000 Jews. c) Disarm everyone with laughter by doing an impression of a drunk monkey.

The correct answer is:

Art by Gerry Talaoc

I mean he isn't happy about it or anything. In fact he even has a caption: “Like the trembling girl before me the War left me no choice…”Remember Soldier, one slip-up…and 8,000 innocent people…will die!”” Hey, maybe this can usefully be juxtaposed with the earlier caption where he didn't have time to think. Here he has time to think, but in the end he still has to do the same thing: kill. One more time in case anyone missed it: “Like the trembling girl before me the war left me no choice…” Because isn't that the point of the whole story? Inger made a choice but in the end she might as well not have done: she still ended up dead. She just betrayed 8,000 people for a couple more weeks of life. It’s pretty sad really. What? Oh, The 8,000 Jews get away but it wasn't really about them it was about one Jew who should have been hateful but ended up being tragic. As ever there’s not a lot of nuance (!) but there is a lot of excitement, action and heart. And I guess that’s why, despite the formidable talent preceding them Michelinie and Talaoc’s Unknown Soldier stories are the best in this book. Or maybe it’s just because I read them when I was a kid. This stuff really did a number on your head as a kid, y’know?

5. Gerry’s Vase

Alright! Stop shuffling about in your seats this is the last bit. I just wanted to draw attention to the work of Gerry Talaoc in this book. Gerry Talaoc was never better than here. Which is a stupid thing to say since I haven’t seen everything Gerry Talaoc’s ever done. But since the stuff here is so freaking awesome it’s hard to believe he did better stuff and everyone’s just keeping quiet about it when I enter the room. People aren't exactly shouting about this stuff after all are they? Talaoc’s art on these Unknown Soldier stories is fantastic. Everything has a really grubby look to it. Absolutely no one looks like a movie star, everyone looks human and by “human” I mean a bit weird, a bit like life’s had a good go at them. He does have a tendency to make his figures gangly but that just works out really well too because when he cracks out the action it has a unique flailing look. Have you ever been in a fight? It isn't like a Bourne film (I’m assuming you’re a normal person not a professional cage fighter or something) it’s like a Gerry Talaoc comic. Lots of flailing, gnarled face pulling, shabby desperation, yeah, Gerry Talaoc’s fighting is pretty convincing. Best of all though is what I’m calling, in an attempt to get in The Comics Journal, Gerry’s Vase. In 8,000 To One there’s this bit of business with a vase. It’s totally inconsequential to the action but its beautiful. Look:

Art by Gerry Talaoc

I bet that vase wasn’t in the script he just did it. Physical objects in the drawn environment reacting to the actions within that environment. Should be standard stuff but it isn’t. After all when was the last time you saw Gerry’s Vase?

Hopefully I’ve managed to give some indication of why SHOWCASE PRESENTS: THE UNKNOWN SOLDIER is VERY GOOD! If I haven’t, well, that’s on me because it is. That’s it. Well done, thanks for coming. Don’t forget to collect your coats.

Have a good weekend everyone!

"They Gave Their Lives...Just For THAT?" Comics! Sometimes They "Dare To Be Different"!

Old war comics written about by old man - pictures at Eleven! Here's a thing: In MAN OF ROCK by Bill Schelly, a book which is all about Joe Kubert and the things he has spent his time doing, there is no mention of BLITZKRIEG. (Other than that Bill Schelly's book is, however, VERY GOOD!)

It's okay, Bill Schelly, I think I've mentioned BLITZKRIEG enough for everyone!

And now our Feature Presentation:

It was 1976 and it was time to see WW2 “through the eyes of the enemy”. This was hardly unprecedented. Joe Kubert (b. 1929)and Robert Kanigher (1915 – 2002)had previously worked up and on Enemy Ace in Star Spangled War Stories. Said series was an innovative look at WW1 (1914-18) through the character of a German air ace modelled upon The Red Baron (Manfred Von Richthofen not Snoopy). These stories are collected in their entirety in SHOWCASE PRESENTS: ENEMY ACE which is a plump lump of B/W brilliance (VERY GOOD!). Giving in to the temptation to gorge on the contents, however, results in an unavoidable recognition of the repetition in their structure. If read in the short bursts as it was initially published it becomes clear that this repetition was entirely intentional. Read any individual Enemy Ace story and you get a complete story with all the information required to understand the context and point of what was on the pages.

Modern readers may also finds some of the contents a bit broad at best and belief defying at worst. That’s understandable but tends to underestimate the fact that these are primarily stories and their intention is principally to entertain and then, typically, to make a point. To get the most out of them it’s probably best to view them as a form or parable rather than an attempt to accurately reflect reality. You probably remember The Parable Of The Killer Skies from Sunday School. The contents of Showcase: Enemy Ace will always be of interest thanks to the astonishing performance of all the artists involved; Joe Kubert, Neal Adams, Frank Thorne, Howard Victor Chaykin and John Severin. There were indeed giants in those days but it’s worth stressing that of these lofty talents Joe Kubert’s scalp was the most sky scraping. I’m a like me some Joe Kubert, I do. But the fact that these stories are still readable is evidence of the rock solid craft brought to the task by Robert Kanigher.

A lot of people liked Enemy Ace but not enough people, sales on the book kept falling and, as Editor, Kubert was forced to drop the series and replace it with The Unknown Soldier. (Don’t worry if I’m going to talk about The Unknown Soldier it will be a time other than this one.) The point here is that the success of Enemy Ace is due to the fact that the techniques involved were as taut as Cher’s face. So Enemy Ace wasn't a total success but it was very popular which is more than can be said for The War To End All Wars (which is a case of false advertising if ever I saw one). Of course after the world got its breath back it decided to produce the more popular sequel WW2. And it was in this setting that Kubert and Kanigher attempted to replicate the success of their “through the eyes of the enemy” approach.

But because you are paying attention you are now thinking why do that? If Enemy Ace couldn't pull in the punters why launch a whole new series with a similar premise? The DC Explosion is why. It’s aptly named because it was about as controlled and disciplined as an explosion. The fact it was almost immediately followed by the DC Implosion should tell you just how successful cramming as much stuff onto the spinner racks turned out to be.Given the urgent need for fresh recruits to be rushed to the Retailing Front many comics were sacrificed on the spinner racks. BLITZKRIEG was amongst the cannon fodder.

BLITZKRIEG #1 - 5 By Ric Estrada, Sam Glanzman and Lee Elias(a), Joe Kubert & Robert Kanigher(w) (DC Comics, $0.30 ea, 1976)

Sadly the big thing about BLITZKRIEG is how half-baked it seems. There's an interesting premise ("Yeah, but how was WW2 for The Bad Guys?") but it just doesn't get any traction. The stories themselves are solid enough to start with but as the series progresses they start to become more hazy, lacking a point around which Kanigher can cohere his scripts.  It's a good framework though; following three German soldiers through the war and having them reflect the mindset of "The Enemy" (who unsurprisingly will be surprisingly like "Us"). The first problem is that Kanigher has too many protagonists. Sgt. Rock and Enemy Ace have a strong central figure around which events can orbit and whose experiences provide the Reader with an "in". BLITZKRIEG has Franz, Ludwig and Hugo. Franz is blond and handsome representing The Intellectual, Ludwig is a meathead always thinking of ladies and Hugo is a speccy bald weasel always thinking about food. It's fairly clear that they are three separate aspects of Man and their very separation is that which blinds them to the fact that if all three were united in one individual more perspective would be available, possibly even enough to grant them the wit to realise that what they are involved in is both inhuman and insane.

And, to be fair, BLITZKRIEG doesn't stint on the depiction of the horrors perpetrated by these ordinary guys. Throughout the course of this series the "heroes" kill women and children, both armed and unarmed, massacre P.O.W.s and are active in the horror of the pacification of The Warsaw Ghetto. It's unpleasant stuff and there lies BLITZKRIEG's second main difficulty. By focusing on this barbaric string of events it's hard to root for our Three Stooges. The series focuses so hard on these atrocities that there is barely even room for our three chums to pop up and offer their character revealing insights ("I like bread!", "I like ladies!", "I like Butterflies"! Jesus, these guys make Brick Tamland look nuanced.) The Reader never gets to know them because they are hardly present in the narrative and when they are they are always saying the same things. They never change and they never learn no matter how bad things get, no matter how stained their hands.

But then maybe that's the point. Maybe that's how these things happen. Franz, Ludwig and Hugo appear totally at the mercy of events, pulled under by the current of History only to resurface briefly to state to themselves (and to us) the only things that keep them functioning; their appetites and their belief that this is necessary, or at least unavoidable. They are trapped in a narrative not of their making and they cling to sanity only by reducing themselves to their most basic, unthinking needs. That would be good, I think. But I only think that, I don't know that. And I think I only think that because that is how I am naturally inclined to think. I don't believe there is much on the actual pages to convince me that the authors (writers and artists; comics is a gestalt thing remember) are moving me by design to these thoughts. But then inspiring thought in a reader isn't such a bad thing. Even if the particular colour of that thinking is an unintended by product. Because, maybe, WW2 is the kind of thing that happens when people stop thinking and let other people do that for them, particularly when those people doing the thinking are the kind of people who should be heavily medicated and monitored for their own safety.

BLITZKRIEG has other problems too. The premise is a deceptively complex one and the truncated nature of the episodes (roughly 11 pages) doesn't allow enough room for the authors to really start working. What a comic like BLITZKRIEG needs to succeed, amongst other things, is room to breathe. In the '70s comics authors were rarely allowed this luxury. Sure, modern comics do get this break but if comics from 2000 to 2011 have shown us anything it's that if you give comics creators room to breathe often that's all they do; breathe. Then there's the nature of the conflict BLITZKRIEG depicts. Enemy Ace not only has a single protagonist but also benefits from being set in a conflict where "Good" and "Bad" are entirely more nebulous labels, and the meaning of these is further diffused by the concepts of honour, duty and tradition. These concepts had pretty much worn out their welcome by the time WW2 rolled around, sure, they lingered and were important but by no means to the same extent and the longer the war rolled on the more denuded of meaning these concepts became. In a War in which people are putting other people in ovens, reduced to cannibalism, arming their children and dropping nukes on civilian targets honour, duty and tradition aren't really going to be able to cut it. Hell, even "Good" is going to have its work cut out for it. Presenting WW2 "through enemy eyes" would require rather more serious thought than BLITZKRIEG can muster.

Given the moral morass of its setting, its uncharismatic leads, fuzzy storytelling and general lack of polish BLITZKRIEG fails to achieve its lofty ambitions but...but...even at its worst BLITZKRIEG is wholly innocent of the most objectionable charge that could be raised at such an endeavour. At no point are the actions of the Germans glamorised or presented as attractive. That would be the worst thing and BLITZKRIEG doesn't do that thing.

Authenticity is usually a concern with war books. Personally I’m rubbish at authenticity as long as Hitler isn't a space-stoat and the Yanks aren't riding gorillas into battle I’m generally okay. Luckily though back when smoking was good for you readers used to send letters in to comics and in issue #4 we have a letter which addresses the accuracy of BLITZKRIEG #1 thus saving me the bother:

"...mistakes are prevalent in this issue. Uniform insignias and ranks were inaccurate.The main characters were portrayed as privates. However, their weapons sub-machine guns were not issued to privates, who were armed withWW1 bolt action rifles throughout the entire war...German panzer represented was not built until 1941. The Molotov Cocktail was not named until 1941...In the Polish campaign Rommel was a Colonel attached to Hitler's bodyguard..." (text edited from Cadet Captain Rudy S. Nelson's letter from BLITZKRIEG#4)

So, not so accurate then but accurate enough if accuracy isn’t too much of a concern. And I don’t want it come across like special pleading but back when steak was a breakfast cereal research was proper work. You had to leave the house and visit these buildings called "libraries" which had "books" in them with "pages" and, yeah, I know it sounds like a madman's dream or something. Luckily, the ever reliable Sam Glanzman leaps into the trench of doubt and picks up the authenticity potato masher and chucks it back in your face with some pics'n'facts spreads about tanks and planes (The Panther Tank, Dornier DO-335A and the F-40 Corsair) before supplying a "3-D table-top diorama" where kids could paste the pictures to cereal boxes and through the judicious use of scissors and imagination recreate their own hellish scene of human suffering to treasure forever ("U.S.S. Buckley Rams The U-66"). Or at least 'til the cat got hold of it.

The intentions of all involved are, I’d say, honourable and good but we all know where the road paved with those leads. Except Ernest Hemingway who said that the road to Hell was paved with stuffed donkeys, but that guy liked his pop a bit too much. Obviously this comic isn't Hell on paper but the good intentions of all involved don’t stop it being more interesting than successful. Way more interesting than successful in fact but since I like interesting things I’d ultimately call BLITZKRIEG GOOD!, although as entertainment it’s probably EH! Having said that though there is the odd panel like this one below which brings BLITZKRIEG back up to GOOD!

And like moral certainty - I'm GONE!

Have a nice weekend, everybody!

"Watch Yer Noggin!" Comics! Sometimes They Are About Losers!

I read an old ‘70s DC war comic and I liked what I saw. Because what I saw was drawn by Joe Kubert, Alex Toth, Sam Glanzman and John Severin. I am good to my eyes. It cost 25 cents. Well, in 1971 it did.

OUR FIGHTING FORCES # 134 By John Severin, Alex Toth, Joe Kubert & Sam Glanzman (a) with Robert Kanigher (w), lettering (probably) by the artists and colours by U.N. Known. The colourist no one knows but is known to everyone! Ho! DC Comics, Nov-Dec 1971, 25 cents (7½ pence)

"Joe Kubert edited this so if he wants Japanese soldiers on the cover when there are none inside, By God, there will be Japanese soldiers on the cover!"

It’s probably untrue to say that OUR FIGHTING FORCES (OFF) isn't anyone’s favourite comic but you could probably fit all the people who’d choose OFF before all other comics into the snug of a small pub. Personally I chanced upon this issue due to a weakness I have for smelly, yellowing non-tights’n’fights ‘70s mainstream genre comics. Sure, some men have a weakness for dangerous women or the thrill of the hunt but that’s their loss. I wasn't expecting much is what I’m saying. But what I got was Toth, Kubert, Glanzman and Severin. And I also learned some exciting facts about dogs.

"An awesome pause and then  - mad shit busts loose - it's SEVERIN!"

Robert Kanigher writes all the tales between these two tatty covers and if any one man personified DC’s war comics it is Joe Kubert. But after Joe Kubert it is definitely Robert Kanigher. Now while on a purely human level it seems Kanigher was certainly “difficult” on a professional level he was certainly, well, professional. Unlikely to be critically lauded anytime soon Kanigher could not only fill pages but, even better, he could fill lots of pages and better still he could do it without surcease. Robert Kanigher was a writer when a comic writer’s job was to write and no one can deny the fact he did that. When Joe Kubert replaced Kanigher as DC’s war books editor Kubert kept Kanigher on as writer. Whatever ill feeling there was Kubert did what it took to deal with it in order to keep the man he felt was best suited to the job. That’s a pretty solid tribute to the man’s talents. Either man. Anyway, Kanigher could churn this stuff out and like anyone who ends up as a churner the results were mostly mediocre with the odd brush with greatness and far more belly-flops into incoherence. Given the rate at which he pumped this stuff out it’s also easy to spot his style so although the last story here (“Number One”) is not credited to a writer I’m pretty sure it’s Robert Kanigher.

"Wait 'til he sees her teeth. (British people's teeth - comedy GOLD!)"

If it isn't Robert Kanigher my gast will be flabbered because the story is very, very Robert Kanigher. It’s a variation on his old standby of someone repeating a phrase embodying something they want to do while the events of the story conspire to prevent them and usually leading up to an ironic ending. Where “ironic” usually means “coincidental” rather than “ironic". It also has another signature Kanigher move – the lone soldier who pretty much unfeasibly kills his way to the end while the threats ascend in scale and danger; here our plucky dogface bests a plane, a gunboat, a U-boat and finally a pill box with three ’88 guns. That’s not bad for one grunt. I’d guess this one isn't writer-credited because it’s a reprint (the page filling banner across the top clues you in) but Joe Kubert has stuck his name on the art. This is lucky because it looks a bit like he was in a rush and so it resembles the work of someone who has just left The Kubert School rather than someone who will soon open the Kubert School. It’s OKAY!

"There's practically nothing there but everything essential is there - it's TOTH!"

Preceding Number One there is “Soldier’s Grave” by Robert Kanigher and Alex Toth. Yeah. Alex Toth. Not much to say really as it’s Alex Toth so the page designs and layouts are wonderful, the brevity with which he visually communicates the necessary information is borne of skill rather than sloth and, look, it’s Alex Toth. Kanigher’s tale tells of an aged Egyptian who joins the Pharaoh's armies so that the pay he will receive on fighting will take care of his family. Now, I’m a Dad and a Partner while also having, shall we say, a certain Autumnal mental aspect so that kind of stuff gets in me and hurts. The poor sucker can’t make it into the fight (so his family won’t get any moolah) but luckily he lucks into holding up the Persians while his forces retreat. This costs him his life but the Eygptian leader promises to see his family right by giving them the valuable dagger that slew their paterfamilias. Again, I think Kanigher is reaching for irony here but ends up kind of edging more into the area where the dagger is a symbol for a kind of old timey Death In Service payment. It’s not a terribly convincing ending but there is an effective playing up of the disgusting waste of the Pharaoh and the parlous state in which his subjects live. It’s kind of clever really. With the exception of one panel the story shows just desert, pyramids, rocks and soldiers; it’s barren and harsh and then there’s the single panel showing the Pharaoh's tomb filled with food and loot. It would of course be cleverer without the big word balloon spelling it out for us but back then over-egging the pudding was par for the course. So, Kanigher’s script is okay but Toth’s art lifts it up to VERY GOOD!

"It's okay all that'll end up in a British museum - because we are stealers!"

Sam Glanzman’s U.S.S. Stevens’ tale “In Tsingtao” takes us almost to the front of the book and, like all it’s author’s work, it has a lot of heart that makes up for most of the rough edges. Glanzman actually served aboard the U.S.S. Stevens during 1941 – 45 and I believe (although you may correct me) that these stories certainly draw upon his experiences if not actually document said experiences. It’s knowing this that lends a certain generosity to my reception of the strip. While I might otherwise be unimpressed by what appears a muddled attempt to contrast the comic book mythology of Superman’s invulnerability with the very real vulnerability of four sailors slain on shore leave; knowing it is probably based on a real event means that I can be more impressed by it as an attempt to embody the sadness and waste of such an event and that reading more into the panel where the sailors watch a Superman serial than the fact that sailors used to watch Superman serials is entirely my fault. Which is a long and tedious way of saying In Tsingtao is short and affecting and GOOD!

"Man, I bet the guys who created Superman died rich!"

Luckily any reader will have been prepared for Glanzman’s depressing tale by the feel-good fun facts of “Canine Corner”! This is two pages of dog facts and pictures which are linked to the military theme of the book by the fact that some dogs were used by the Army as they could “giving warning of enemy infiltration at night”. i.e. they barked.

"For Mr. Graeme 'The Dog Botherer' McMillan"

Which brings us to the tale at the front of the book - “The Real Losers!” I have worked my way backwards because like the immortal Vanessa Williams song I like to leave the best ‘til last. This isn't the best story because of Robert Kanigher’s script but because of John Severin’s art. The script is basically an excuse to build to a scene where Gunner (the young blonde Loser) rediscovers his will to fight the good fight. Like all Kanigher’s war scripts the plot has little to do with reality but for it to work it has to at least appear to be grounded in reality. Given Kanigher’s shortcomings as a writer this is a task the art has to shoulder. John Severin’s performance on these pages is more than suited to the task. I like to group Severin amongst my personal roster of Quiet Giants of Comic Art. He rarely appears on anyone’s best of list but he certainly deserves to. It’s probable that working with the inestimable Harvey Kurtzman on EC’s war stories cemented in Severin a certainty that research and authenticity were essential to successful verisimilitude. See this panel from pg.8:

Now I've read a lot of war comics so I've probably seen more bullet riddled German soldiers fall out of trees than is strictly healthy but what strikes me about that panel is the level of detail. The insignia on the helmet is clearly visible, attention has been paid to the studs on the soles of the boots and, best of all, Severin has drawn the lining in the helmet. Now I’m not a WW2 obsessive so I can’t vouch for the veracity of these elements but the wealth of them convinces me of the reality of the image and makes me shake my head in admiration at the effort that could have been so easily avoided but wasn't. Later (pg.13) Severin draws a bunch of howling Wehrmacht bursting from a landing craft. According to a WW2 obsessive and pedant (how often the two are paired!) I once worked with it seems holding a Schmeisser by the ammo clip wouldn't work due to its instability when firing. So, I’m not unaware that Severin gets things wrong but the things he gets wrong are the things everyone gets wrong and the things he gets right are things most artists wouldn't even bother about.

But Severin isn't just about the detail, which in isolation would make his work err towards the clinical, but also about body language and expressions and it’s these that give his work heart. By pg.11 Gunner and Sarge are on a beach with a bunch of walking wounded when they are made aware of an impending German attack. At this point Gunner still won’t pick up his gun to fight but at the OIC’s command of “Walking wounded!—Grab your weapons and form a line at the water’s edge!” Kanigher steps back and lets Severin’s lines speak with dignity and sureness:

Of course Kanigher has to spoil it on the next page with some customarily hilarious over-egging (“Who needs FEET to SQUEEZE a TRIGGER!”) but look at that last horizontal panel. Look at Sarge’s face; his expression. That’s a complex piece of “acting” right there. It’s class and John Severin is a class act all the way. It’s a sad thing that such excellent work has to be stumbled upon in back issue bins by accident. But it’s a good thing I did because I got to tell you about it. Assuming you’re still here. John Severin’s excellent work lifts The Real Losers! up to VERY GOOD!

So there’s an old DC war comic I wasn't expecting anything from but got a Hell of a blast out of. And me? Like The Pharoahs I'm history!

Have a nice weekend all a youse stumblebums!

"Okay, Let's Go." Comics! Sometimes They Contain Cowboys!

I hear tell there's no call for Western comics no more. I reckon folks don't know diddly squat. One's I read made me more than partial to 'em.

Hunker down a spell why doncha and hear me jaw about a couple of Western comics. WESTERN By Grzegorz Rosiński (a) and Jean Van Hamme (w) Cinebook, 2011, $15.95/£7.99

In the year 1868 Ambrosius Van Deer’s reunion with his long lost nephew goes badly wrong. Blood is spilled, secrets are revealed and Destiny sets a course for tragedy that will be years in the shaping.

WESTERN is a tale of love, revenge, identity and destiny that spans the period of 1868-1922 over its 64 pages of densely packed story. It is the product of the w/a team behind the Belgian comic series THORGAL which is a series I have not read but is apparently one of the most popular French language comics there is. Look, I can’t read everything and since I am mono-lingual (if that) I’ll just have to take Wikipedia’s word. Also, if WESTERN is any indication then the popularity of THORGAL is understandable; for this is a very good comic indeed.

To my uneducated eyes European comics seem primarily artist driven (Rosinski is credited first on the book cover) as opposed to the current state of American affairs where the writer is king (or if not king then architect). Certainly this book is noteworthy primarily for the art. As is no doubt obvious this book is my first exposure to Rosinski’s work but I have to say that Rosinski work is pretty stellar. Characters are easily identifiable, settings are convincing, staging is clear, actions are active and all these things are to be applauded rather than taken for granted. Rosinski knows what he is doing and he does it very well indeed. Over the top of all this understated excellence Rosinski applies a lovely faded wash of colour, sometimes even dropping lines out entirely leaving only the soft hues to carry the image. Rosinski is obviously talented with colour and that’s most in evidence in the full-colour paintings that punctuate the episodic narrative. These are things of greatness. If I could scan one in I would but I can’t so take my word if you do pick the book up it’s worth the cover price for these evocative and enduring images alone.

Of course if you do buy it you’ll probably read it so it’s fortunate that Van Hamme doesn't let the side down on writing duties. Given the chronological scope, episodic nature and the limited page count Van Hamme has it all on to keep his narrative successful. Wisely Van Hamme maximises the information provided to the reader by tripling up on the dialogue (effective but blunt as is common with translations) and visual information (gorgeous and invaluable) with the third device of narration. Clearly at home with words beyond dialogue (it’s called writing) Van Hamme doesn't use his narrative voice to merely utilitarian ends. In fact Van Hamme bookends the tale with two nice pieces of misdirection. The first is clever but the second and final occasion is cleverer as it defies expectations in a way which is truly surprising and emotionally affecting. That’s real writing and, yes, it is hard. The actual story doesn't lack for incident, excitement or drama provided you can stand a healthy dose of coincidence and the accept the fact that a one-armed man can be such a crack shot. But coincidence is ever melodrama’s companion and a Western without a crack-shot protagonist would be a very short comic indeed. The melodramatic momentum together with the eventful occurrences keep the thing moving towards its fateful end quite smoothly and the artful efficiency of the storytelling combined with the sepia washed beauty of the art results in WESTERN being VERY GOOD!

TEX: The Lonesome Rider By Joe Kubert (a) and Claudio Nizzi (w) SAF Comics, 2005, $15.95/£9.50

Tex visits some old friends only to find them slaughtered by a gang of “rascals”. Saddling up and heading out Tex vows to bring them to justice Texas Marshal style!

 TEX: The Lonesome Rider is an attempt to introduce the long running (since 1948!) Italian comics series to the nation in which it is set; that’s you, America. To do so they chose the immaculate Joe Kubert to do the art chores. This process together with the history of Tex is detailed in introductory front matter in the volume. The best part of this is an interview with Joe Kubert in which he gives new dimensions to the word “concise”. A man of few words our Joe Kubert is, prefers to speak with his brush, I guess. A bit like old timey cowboy heroes who were tight lipped and let action speak louder than words. (Yes, my segues do require more work, thanks for noticing). And TEX is certainly nothing if not old-timey.

While WESTERN is clearly, and convincingly, set in a realistic approximation of the Old West the action in TEX is set in a kind of shared popular memory of the West. It’s a world of white hats and black hats (literally), bad men, good men and weak men that find the strength to be good, the hidden nobility of the savage, saloon brawls and stage coach hijacks. Rather than some clever post modern device I’d imagine this is merely the result of basing a series on popular culture and the changeover from Tex’s “papa” Giovanni Luigi Bonelli to other hands. It’s probable that since TEX worked there seemed little reason to change it so the revisionism of the Western since The Searchers (maybe? The Wild Bunch? you choose.) has had little impact on this book. Which isn't to say it is bad but is to warn you that it is all quite familiar and not terribly concerned with realism. It’s a yarn really and it does what yarns are supposed to do; it entertains. Actually it does more than entertain it delights but it only delights because of the presence of Joe Kubert.

Joe Kubert. There’s a name to conjure with and with TEX that name conjures up 240 pages of Black & White magic. Seriously, 240 B&W pages of Joe Kubert art and you aren't already haranguing your LCS to get you a copy? I have to say more? Okay then. Joe Kubert’s work on these pages elevates the whole thing not just one level, but maybe two or three. Which is fortunate as the dialogue is bland (it’s translated) and the plot is solid but perfunctory. There are just so many Joe Kubert joys on these pages it’s almost indecent.

The big thing about Joe Kubert is he’s a pen and ink prestidigitator par excellence. He fools your eye into thinking you are witnessing perfection; into thinking that line is in the only place it could be. Whereas a Toth would fuss and worry over actually finding the right line Joe Kubert can approximate that line with such confidence that he doesn't have to actually find that line. That’s not a back handed compliment there’s more art and skill in such suggestion than I can verbalise. He does practically nothing with the landscapes in this book but he does everything needed to make them practically a character unto themselves. The best panels in this book are the panels where Joe Kubert’s art is free of words and there are many such panels in this book.  Comics may be a marriage of words and images but the greatest artists can make those images speak with words finer than the finest writer. Joe Kubert is one such artist and his presence makes TEX VERY GOOD!

Both these books are worth your eye-time, both these books are Westerns I’d suggest you don’t let the latter blind you to the former. But that’s just me. And me? I’m gone like the American West.

In which I fall in love with a brushstroke: Graeme in a tree with Kubert, Hawkman.

So last night, I had a dream that proved that my subconscious was frantically grabbing what little pieces of pop culture that I'd exposed myself to over the last couple of days - My life was being narrated by This American Life's Ira Glass, and illustrated by Joe Kubert. Needless to say, everything was much funnier than it is in real life, and looked beautiful. Kubert's art was pretty much the main reason that I picked up SHOWCASE PRESENTS HAWKMAN VOLUME 1, the phone-book-sized collection of the first Silver Age stories about the man with the feather fetish. I've never been a major fan of the character or the concept, but the idea of getting lots of prime Kubert art in black and white for relatively cheap was a very easy way to get me to part with my money. Having read the book, it's easily the best thing about it - As much as many artists of the Silver Age had an ability and strength (to say nothing of work ethic) that many of today's Young Guns and Ten Terrific could learn from, Kubert is one of only a handful who matches that to a style that's breathtaking even today. Even though he only handles a few stories at the start of the book (The series obviously had a rocky start, running three issues in Brave and Bold before disappearing for awhile, before another three issue run, then another disappearance, then a run in Mystery In Space before finally graduating to its own title; Kubert was only on the strip for the Brave and Bold issues), it's Kubert who you'll remember when you're finished with the 500+ pages: His lush brushwork, his mastery of the balance of black and white on the page, the care and attention he takes on things that other artists would've just hacked out without a second thought... It's impossible to read this book and not be convinced each and every page that he worked on, that he's one of the greatest comic book artists of all time. Completely amazing, beautiful work that makes the normally-competent Murphy Anderson (who handles the remainder of the series in this book) look stiff and lifeless by comparison.

What you may be missing in the afterglow of that love, though, is the lowkey charm of Gardner Fox's stories. Yeah, it's definitely one of the lesser of DC's Silver Age books but, just like his Justice League stories, you can't help but be swept along with the old-fashioned "adventure with a lesson built in" nature of the whole thing - Look at Hawkman use that old-fashioned weapon from his museum and learn the name of said weapon and as much of its history as can fit in a caption! The science-fiction aspects are enjoyably campy in retrospect (We don't celebrate "Independence Day," but "Impossible Day"! We Thanagarians don't use wedding rings - We use wedding earrings! But only for women! We have our own words for "hour" and "week," but like using "day," if that's okay with you!), which kind of sums up a lot of what makes the stories as enjoyable as they are - it's not that they're good, per se, but they're funny and charming for maybe the wrong reasons. It doesn't stop them being entirely readable, of course, even when Murphy Anderson is drawing. For the first third of the book, though, you'll barely notice that there are any words; your eyes will be fixed on the shot of the talking bird in the beautiful pen-and-ink tree. Or the staircase rendered in loose, thin brushstrokes. Or the profile shot of Carter with his helmet, where the shadow falls perfectly to draw your eye across the panel. Or... Well, you get what I'm saying. It's enjoyably Okay overall, but worth it for the opening stories alone.