Panelology

By Sean McQuaid

This week: Comics go to war!

As Remembrance Day draws near, the spectre of war looms ever la media; however, one oft-§ for war stories is comics. * comics genre virtually s comic books.

When the comics s industry b flower in the late 1930’s, America (the primi comic book publisher) wasn in World War II-- but likes cans, comics were itchi r advent of aggressive dictaters“in“Ger Japan and Italy gave comics endiieciale bad guystoexploit-- similarto television and film’s swipes at foreign leaders like Saddam Hussein today. Moreover, many comics readers and writers were genuinely patriotic individuals who felt America would, sooner or later, have to confront the aggressors attacking America’s allies in Asia and Europe.

Asa result, nazis, fascists, ‘“Japs,’’ and sinister Orientals of all kinds began turning up in comics, either as figures of ridicule (the Chaplin-esque Hitler was often played for laughs) or as fearsome forces of evil, or both. A lurid example of this trend was the wildly successful Daredevil vs. Hitler-- comic book one-shot, wherein the red-and-black clad, boo-

merang-tossing Daredevil (not to be confused with the modern-day Marvel hero of the same name) joined forces with a few other heroes to give Hitler and his gang a good thrashing (the strangely comical cover has Daredevil and friends lashing out at a larger-than-life, photo- graphically doctored, fearfully cringing Hit- ler). And this before the Americans even went to war!

elas, decibels patriotic comics heroes: the Shield, Captain Flag, Yankee Eagle, USA (the Spirit of Old Glory), Miss America, Mister America, Minute Man, Uncle Sam, The Pa- triot, The Star-Spangled Kid and Stripesy, and near-countless others. i

War came to the Americans (literally) with the late 1941 Japanese sneak attack on Pearl Harbor, and comics joined the fight with gusto. Virtually every super-hero enlisted, or fought the Axis powers in their costumed identities, or both (Superman tried to enlist, but was rejected during his physical exam: while reading the eye chart, he accidentally read a different chart in the next room with his x-ray vision).

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A prime example of the super-heroic war effort was DC Comics’ Justice Society of America, comics’ first super-team (and un- questionably the greatest of their era). After Pearl Harbor, the JSA all enlisted (with the exception of the Spectre, who was, after all, a ghost), but were asked to leave the armed forces in the same issue: the army felt superhuman or extraordinary soldiers such as the JSA —e

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(If you haven’t the resources to dig up the ultra-rare, monstrously expensive back is- sues of the JSA’s 1940’s All-Star Comics, you can get a more sophisticated and somewhat expanded version of the JSA’s wartime ex- ploits in various issues of the 1980’s series All- Star Squadron. This series also explained lots of nagging continuity points, like why the more powerful DC heroes didn’t plough straight into the Axis powers’ home countries-- Hitler and Tojo had dug up some mystic artifacts whose combined magical field kept the more power- ful, magic-susceptible heroes out of Japan and occupied Europe. For a more condensed but comprehensive account of the JSA’s history, see the essential America vs. The Justice Soci- ety mini-series. Another option would be the All-Star Comics Archives, an expensive but gorgeous series of hardcover books reprinting the JSA's original All-Star Comics series.)

If anything, the comic book war effort went a bit overboard. Enemy peoples were given disturbingly racist and often ruthless treatment, notably in Marvel Comics (then called Timely Comics). Marvel cover artist Alex Schomburg once said Timely would buy any cover he drew so long as “‘the japs showed their ugly teeth and glasses and the nazis looked like bums.’’ One especially lurid Mar- vel cover showed the Human Torch burning off a Japanese soldier’s arm while a wholesome, all-american girl looked on in delighted admi- ration.

When the war ended, comics almost ended with it. The comics lost their best bad guys, patriotic heroes went out of style, super- heroes in general began to lose their following as idealism waned in post-war America, and Americans would soon be seduced away from comics by a more pervasive, influential form of cheap mass entertainment: television. Re- gardless, there would be war comics-- both then and in the following decades. Many, like EC’s war comics and some of DC’s (i.e. Sgt. Rock), would attempt to convey the horrors of war; others, like Marvel’s Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos, and the more recent G.I. Joe, would glamorize and glorify it. But the subject has always been there, though not very popular or widespread in current comics- - perhaps because North America has never

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been as involved in war as it was in the 40’s, or perhaps because we have lost faith in the wisdom of war-- and rightly so.

Regardless, some fascination persists. Apart from the many comics about civilian soldiers, there have also been many recent super-hero stories set during wartime. Marvel Comics, who never hada major wartime super- ie team, rectified that in the 1970’s with the

artime super-team Avis Powers. Its cast ica, Namor the Sub- fan Torch, and a HC] Vs new characters k is series lasted bats d Bistned a spin-off group: i eon she ony eh ont super-team of wich el heroes like the Patriot, Jack Pramondked Raven, and the Thin Man. Morerecently, the Invaders and the Liberty Legion returned (with minimal suc- cess) in a new Invaders mini-series.

Other wartime Marvel teams introduced through the Jnvaders series included the Kid Kommandos (Cap’s sidekick Bucky and the Human Torch’s sidekick Toro teamed with kid crimefighters Golden Girl and the Human Top), the Crusaders (a primarily British rival super-group to the Invaders who disbanded on learning their organizer was an enemy agent), and Freedom’s Five (a World War I super- team whose members included France’s Crim- son Cavalier, America’s Phantom Eagle, and Britain’s Union Jack, Sir Steel and the Silver Squire).

Meanwhile, DC has been much busier with modern-day wartime series: the Wonder Woman series was set in the 1940’s for a time during the 1970’s, and DC has devoted several now-cancelled ongoing series to wartime teams. These include the A//-Star Squadron (anexcel- lent 1980’s series about a presidentially cre- ated,. wartime alliance of all of DC’s 1940’s wartime super-heroes, including the JSA, the Law’s Legionnaires and the Freedom Fight- ers), The Young All-Stars (a sequel to All-Star Squadron focusing on some of the team’s | younger members), and the Freedom Fighters (golden-age characters originally published by Quality Comics and later purchased by DC, including Uncle Sam, the Ray, Phantom Lady, the Human Bomb, Black Condor, Firebrand, the Jester, Max Mercury, the Spider, Miss America, Red Bee, Neon, the Invisible Hood, Magno, Red Torpedo, Manhunter, and many others. The Freedom Fighters first appeared in 1970’s DC Comics as heroes from an alternate Earth where the Nazis won the war, but they were later reintegrated into DC continuity as 4 splinter group of the All-Stars).

While no major wartime super-hero adventures are in publication at present, wat remains a popular genre, and the characters produced in the World War II era persist (in one form or another) as the foundation of the two major comics companies-- and of the industry in general. War, however obsolete 0' unpopular a subject it may seem, played 4 major role in the making of the comic book industry.

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November 8, 199