The DC War Comics 1959-1976
by Corporals Enfantino and Seabrook
by Corporals Enfantino and Seabrook
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| Jerry Grandenetti |
"The Fighting Angel!"
Story by Bob Haney
Art by Jerry Grandenetti
"The Star Jockey!"
Story by Robert Kanigher
Art by Irv Novick
"Aces Wild!"
Story by Hank Chapman
Art by Russ Heath
Peter: During World War I, a German zeppelin harasses a French village until an American pilot (dubbed "The Flying Angel" by the French) concocts a dangerous plan to knock the blimp from the sky. Hands down, the best Jerry Grandenetti art I've ever seen (and I've seen way too much, believe me!), so good I didn't know it was Jerry until I read the credits on GCD. In spots, there's a definite Alex Toth-ian vibe to the visuals. An exciting story to boot, although I could have stood for a few more pages of backstory. Unique in the fact that, aside from the craft, we never see the enemy. It's rumored that Keith Moon read this story just before attending that party with Jimmy Page. One thing that bugs me: is Haney giving us a wink when he has a white cloud shaped like an angel on a horse (perhaps the earliest incarnation of Big-Brother-In-The-Sky?) or is the man just getting lazy with his metaphors?
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| Seriously? Jerry Grandenetti? |
Jack: I thought it looked like circa 1962 Grandenetti, especially the mustachioed French guy. While I'm happy for a break from one WWII story after another, this is too short to get any traction. And the white cloud in the sky makes me worry that this is going to be a concept issue. I do like the cover, though. Note that this is one of the very rare occasions when Bob Haney writes the lead story, probably because they put the stories in chronological order with WWI first.
Peter: After a grueling mission, Johnny Cloud's men are bored and the only thing, it seems, that will placate them is a story about Johnny's youth. The tale that keeps all ears on Johnny Cloud this day is one about the ace's first visit with the "maker of smoke pictures," an ancient medicine man who can show the future to the one brave enough to look into the smoke. When Johnny looks deep into the smoke, he sees himself as a jet fighter caught in a blazing battle with Nazis. The men seem satisfied with the flashback and just in time, as they are called to duty shortly after. In a special meeting with his CO, Johnny Cloud is told their next mission will be a Terror-Rocket launching platform hidden under a camouflaged lake. When the squadron gets there, though, Cloud has bad vibes about the target. Sure enough, it's a phony and when they find the real launch pad it's guarded by flak guns. The squad manages to destroy the target but not before they get into a nasty dogfight with enemy fighters. Johnny Cloud realizes this is the same scenario he saw years before in the smoke. Only his quick wits and some sharp maneuvers save his hide. "The Star Jockey," Johnny Cloud's 8th adventure (all of them written by Kanigher and drawn by Novick), is an exciting enough chapter with some espionage (a la the then-recently discovered James Bond novels by Ian Fleming) to liven the narrative. For the first (but not the last) time, our Native American hero loses his opening spot.
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| "Cloud, Johnny Cloud" |
Jack: I was all set to make a smart remark about the "maker of smoke pictures" being Cheech or Chong but this is actually one of the better Johnny Cloud stories we've read so far. There is a sprinkling of Indian background but Kanigher resists overdoing it with the references to braves and arrows. The cloud in the sky appears in the second story in a row. We'll see if the third story in this issue completes the concept.
Peter: The Sabrecats of Squadron 11 get the good news that they are "Aces Wild!" when the air force informs them that they are the first All-Ace squadron in history. At that moment, in walks a green pilot and the men become sour. Our new hero knows he's on the hot seat and must get his five kills as soon as possible so as not to tip the apple cart. His first few missions end badly; he scores four hits but finds out that every one of them was assisted, thus he's only credited with half of each kill. Are the others helping him just so they can maintain their stellar record? On the next mission, our rookie ends all speculation when he takes on a whole sky full of Migs. I love the air battle stories when they're visualized by Russ Heath but I'm beginning to wonder if the enemy trained their pilots for battle. We always seem to be the better of the two sides, but it would be a nice change of pace to read a story where our guys don't wipe out the entire enemy air force without Allied casualties. A quick note about that cover, a "snapshot" of each of the issue's stories, which is the first of many such montage covers, eschewing the usual action shot from the lead story. I prefer the one-shot, traditional covers over these tidbit wrappers but they'll be around for a while.
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| "Aces Wild!" |
Jack: What happened to the concept? Where's the white cloud in the sky? The cover promises us tales of three wars, but is this one supposed to be in Korea? I guess someone who knows jets better than I do could identify the war by the planes, but there are no human enemy fighters pictured and no one mentions Korea. Oh well, there goes my 1962 early concept comic.
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| Jerry Grandenetti |
"Rock's Battle Family!"
Story by Robert Kanigher
Art by Joe Kubert
"No Glory for George!"
Story by Hank Chapman
Art by Jack Abel
"Kindergarten Fighter!"
Story by Bob Haney
Art by Jack Abel
Jack: When Sgt. Rock overhears some of his men comment that he has no family, he recalls a few past events that prove them wrong. After landing at Anzio, Rock met an old Italian couple who refused to leave their home despite a Nazi tank assault. Rock destroyed the tank and they called him their son. Later, after invading the French coast, Rock helped destroy a Nazi radar station in a windmill. For his trouble, a pretty French woman asked him to be godfather to her baby. Back in the present, Rock laments that he will never have a girlfriend. That changes when he rescues a beautiful French freedom fighter from a Nazi gunboat attack. The woman tells him that she's now his girlfriend and, with a kiss from Mlle. Marie, "Rock's Battle Family" is complete.
First of all, though the GCD credits the cover to Kubert, it's clearly by Grandenetti. The GCD bases many of their credits on Julie Schwartz's notes, but we've seen them be wrong before. The Men of War cover pictured above is a well-known influence on a Roy Lichtenstein painting, but I think the girl's face in this Army at War cover could also translate well into something by the pop art king.As for the story, I think it's great. Is this the first time we've heard that Rock was an orphan? Kanigher has been trying more and more in recent months to develop a cast of recurring characters in Easy Co., and giving Rock a piecemeal battle family is a great idea. The action scenes are stirring and the quiet scenes show a tenderness that is rare for this series. The concluding surprise of having Rock meet Mlle. Marie is perfect! What better girlfriend could he have? I hope we see her again. Kubert handles the final kiss much more subtly than Grandenetti handles similar moments in the Gunner and Sarge series.
Peter: A rare misfire (pun intended) in the Sgt. Rock pantheon, this one didn't do a thing for me. It was long and, save for the surprise finale starring Jack Seabrook's favorite Frenchie, uneventful. If nothing else, we learn a very important fact about Rock's past: he was an orphan. I do think it's cool that Kanigher hit on adding a superhero trope to the narrative, that of the shared universe. Who'd a thunk Mademoiselle Marie would share a night of cuddling and Nazi-killing in a tree with the curmudgeonly Sgt. Rock (I love the very subtle tease on the cover)? Next up: Pooch is stranded in the Pacific, cornered by a stegosaurus.
Jack: George is the name of a helicopter that wants to get in on the fighting in Korea but instead is assigned to be a courier. When the action heats up, George comes through and rescues a downed pilot who then manages to gun down an enemy jet while hanging from a ladder below the helicopter. I kind of liked George and was rooting for him. As Peter says, he can even fly upside down!Peter: I admit I had to Google whether a helicopter could actually fly belly up. It's possible but not recommended, so there goes my rant about how idiotic that trick is. Well, no, I'll leave my rant in. At the very least, Chapman could have written in a scene where George decapitates a squad of buck-toothed commies. The rest of the story is just as fantastical. Seriously, wouldn't the military issue a Section 8 to a guy who talks to his chopper? Hands up. Who didn't see, from the get-go, that George would come through and save the day, stealing thunder from his super-sonic cousins?
Jack: Dog Co. has the tough job of checking out a French town that has not been scouted. They are aided by chalk drawings that give away Nazis' hidden positions. The art is by a "Kindergarten Fighter," a French boy who speaks no English. When the Nazis capture the lad, it's up the the G.I.s to save him. I was surprised that the boy could not speak English! I thought all French folk in these comics spoke our language in heavily accented fashion.
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| Jerry Grandenetti |
"Trail of the Ghost Bomber!"
Story by Robert Kanigher
Art by Jerry Grandenetti
"Ski-Trooper in a Frying Pan!"
Story by Hank Chapman
Art by Jack Abel
"The Secret Battle Eye!"
Story by Hank Chapman
Art by Joe Kubert
Jack: After being attacked on the beach by a kamikaze battalion, Gunner, Sarge and Pooch bring the captured enemy fighters back to base and learn that they will soon be menaced by a ghost with wings of thunder! When a ghostly bomber plane flies overhead, the trio follow the "Trail of the Ghost Bomber," flushing out a camouflaged tank and falling through a hollow tree trunk into a hidden river. They locate the ghost bomber's hidden hanger and blow it up before riding a log down the river to home and safety. It's nice to read a solid, straightforward action story with these fighters and have no sign of any gal photographer. Still, the seeds of Grandenetti's later stylistic downfall have been planted and we can see them in some random scratchy panels.
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| The ghost of Grandenetti yet to come |
Jack: When a ski trooper on his way from the desert to the Alps falls out of the plane during a surprise attack, he becomes a "Ski-Trooper in a Frying Pan!" with just his skis and his wits available to escape Nazi tanks in the middle of the desert. A captured enemy camel comes in handy as our hero manages to blow up a couple of tanks before ditching his skis and riding his newfound pal out of the barren wasteland. This story led me to Google once again to see if one can really ski on sand dunes. Apparently, you can--and it's a sport!
Peter: Talk about non-stop action! Well, you have to concentrate on the thrills and spills because if you stop long enough to think about all the absurdities in this story, it'll ruin the fun. As goofy as the rest of the story is, with its Nazi camels and desert slaloms, the intro involves you in the sheer terror of being sucked out of a damaged plane at night.Jack: A camera inadvertently traded back and forth between U.S. and Nazi soldiers becomes "The Secret Battle Eye!" when it records action from the viewpoints of each side. Christopher Isherwood's 1939 novel, Goodbye to Berlin, includes on its first page the famous line, "I am a camera." Isherwood's story went through several adaptations and finally ended up as the movie Cabaret; fitting, then, that this story narrated by a camera should show events in the fight between the U.S. and Germany.
Peter: Dismissing the silly narration by the camera, this was the best story of the month hands-down. The gimmick of the camera passing from hand to hand seems familiar (perhaps it was done in a previous entry with the object being a handgun?) but is, nonetheless, very effective. No surprise that Kubert's art was what made the strip vault from pretty good to outstanding. Circulation figures reveal that subscriptions for Our Fighting Forces were at 205,000 in 1961, 25,000 higher than Our Army at War. Quite a surprising figure since I assumed Our Army (starring the popular Sgt. Rock) outsold Our Fighting at the time.
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| IN OUR NEXT HORRIFYING ISSUE! |
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| It had to happen! |
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| The CCA reference is probably a dig at Dell, whose comics were not code-approved. Dell was DC's biggest competitor until later in 1962 when Dell and Western split up and Gold Key was born. |
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