Mission Ten: Two Mission to Doom

We meet Johnny Cloud’s freckle-faced crew chief, Shamrock, at the start. He’s earnest and takes pride in keeping Cloud’s Mustang in tip-top shape from tail to prop. But war is brutal, so he attaches a four-leafed clover badge on the cowling for good luck.

Shamrock confides that he worries about Cloud’s safety, and so he asks him: “What’s it really like up there?” Cloud pauses and says nothing. He cannot find the words to describe the horrors of combat, so he looks away. 

But the question lingers.

On the next mission, the Happy Braves intercept a wave of German bombers; the fighting is fierce and two P-51s are lost along with their pilots, Stevens and Phil. The bombers are turned back, but Cloud feels demoralized. 

When Cloud returns to base, Shamrock asks his question again. And, like before, Cloud is unable to answer.

When Cloud takes off the next day, Shamrock notices that the good luck emblem has fallen off. He waves his arms, but Cloud is gone. What little protection he could proffer is moot. 

Shamrock panics!

The Happy Braves Flight pass over a trio of German tanks, but they press on to their target: a radar station. As they approach the target, flak gunners open fire, and with hot metal exploding all around them, the P-51s fail to destroy the station. 

Before they can mount a second run at the radar station, a gaggle of Fw-190s emerge from the sun and force the Braves to retreat. 

When the flight returns to base, they discover that the three tanks had attacked the airfield. Shamrock was taken. Cloud worries. Is Shamrock still alive? 

Image Credit:

AAMOW#91 (June 1962): Splash Page Art: J. Grandenetti; Writer: R. Kanigher.

Johnny Cloud TM DC Comics

DC War Comics -- Part Four

It has been a month since I posted last. So, this week, I give you a double-posting.

Last month, I explored the start of the Sgt. Rock era. This was the first war series in the Big Five DC War Comics. Plus, the stories were longer (about 13 pages on average).

Close on the heels of Sgt. Rock, a second serial hit the Big Five in May 1959 with the introduction of Gunner and Sarge in OFF. This duo fought in the jungles against the Japanese and was joined by a combat dog named Pooch several months later. The series continued until August 1965 – a run of 50 issues.

Another short series was begun in SSWS with the August 1959 issue featuring the French resistance fighter, Mademoiselle Marie. She grabbed the cover spot without so much as an audition; no surprise there, as she was leggy with a sassy pixie cut and a submachine gun on her shoulder. Marie’s lead story was aptly named Battle Doll. She rappelled down ropes, scaled walls, and planted bombs, all while wearing above-the-knee-skirts. Her series was short with only eight appearances after which she was replaced by tank-eating dinosaurs – poor gal.

Johnny Cloud reported for duty in December 1960, behind Rock, Gunner and Sarge, and Marie. But before we get to him, let’s look at one other series that roared into battle just a few months later – here, I am referring to Jeb Stuart and the Haunted Tank.

The Haunted Tank series began in GIC with the May 1961 issue, and within a few months, gained its own subtitle that lasted until 1977. It was quite popular, and one of my favorites too. The theme borrowed a spiritual punch from Johnny Cloud with cavalry general JEB Stuart (of the CSA) ghosting the M3 tank commanded by Sgt. Jeb Stuart, and at times, providing information and wisdom to help the crew prevail in battle.

Let’s pause to compare these two: Cloud and Stewart. Both of them have spiritual connections. Yet, there are crucial differences.

Cloud routinely shared his travails with his Big Brother, as did Stuart with his Ghost. And both of them felt empowered by their spirits. But here, the similarities end. The Great Warrior Spirit provided Cloud with supernatural advantages when needed. Cloud was an avatar. He was destined to shine brighter than the storm clouds: He was invincible! In contrast, the JEB Stuart, the Ghost, did not intervene directly. Instead, he provided Stuart with insights and warnings, often in the form of riddles – this was helpful, but Stuart was left mostly on his own. He was not invincible!

Consequently, we can appreciate how Cloud stands apart from the other Big Five warriors. Take the most indomitable example: Sgt. Rock had no less courage or resolve than Cloud, but he was limited by his muscular strength and combat skills. Sgt. Rock was amazing, extraordinary even, but we see him as the ground-pounder that he was.

As this cast of characters shows, the period between 1959 and 1961 marked the start of several series across the Big Five. All of them were distinctly different. All of them displayed a unique fighting spirit of a sort. Here’s a parting glance: Sgt. Rock appeared in April to June 1959; Gunner and Sarge in May 1959; Mademoiselle Marie in August 1959; Johnny Cloud in December 1960, and Jeb Stuart in May 1961.

Other series came and went but only Sgt. Rock and Jeb Stuart lasted beyond 50 issues. Gunner and Sarge ended at 50, and Johnny Cloud lasted for 32 ending when AAMOW folded – note that Gunner and Sarge and Cloud made a few guest appearances in other titles before joining The Losers in 1970. 

In case you’re wondering, some of the other serials included OFF’s Fighting Devil Dog – Sgt. Rock’s jarhead brother – for eight issues, followed by Lt. Hunter and his Hellcats for 22 issues. In SSWS, the dinosaurs took over for 12 issues, followed by a few appearances of the Suicide Squad; then, the very popular Enemy Ace and Unknown Soldier serials took the title well into the Bronze Age. A few other heroes deserve recognition including Lt. Steve Savage the WW1 Balloon Buster who edged out Cloud in AAMOW in four issues, and Capt. Storm who grabbed his own title in June 1964, commanding a PT Boat in the Pacific for 18 issues.

Ironically, The Losers reincarnated Gunner and Sarge, Johnny Cloud, and Capt. Storm, joining them into a demoralized squad that always prevailed against overwhelming odds. The Losers were introduced in GIC in November 1969 and continued in OFF from 1970 to 1978. But I submit that Cloud was maligned in this dreadful series. He’s not the same man we see in AAMOW.

            Image Credit:

GIC#116 (March 1966): Story Art: I. Novick; Writer: R. Kanigher.

The Haunted Tank TM DC Comics

DC War Comics -- Part Three

Last time, I introduced the Big Five DC War Comics: Our Army at War, Star Spangled War Stories, All American Men of War, Our Fighting Forces, and G.I. Combat.

The Big Five started off with collections of short stories, usually six to eight pages long, but this began change in the late 1950s. Longer stories (13 pages by 1958) and returning characters began to appear, thus setting the stage for Johnny Cloud.

Serial warriors started with Sgt. Rock and Easy Company, and no one has traced his genealogy like Chris Pedrin in his Big Five Information Guide. Hints of an unyielding soldier, brave and protective of his men, nicknamed “Rock” first surfaced in AAMOW in December 1955 – the seed was planted, and over a dozen developments took shape in OAAW, SSWS, and GIC during the next three years. 

By 1959 the mold was set, and Rock rose to prominence in a series of stories: The Rock in GIC (January); The Rock of Easy Company in OAAW (April); Hold up for Easy Company in OAAW (May); and finally, The Rock and The Wall in OAAW (June 1959).

Sgt. Rock and Easy Company went on to dominate OAAW from that point on, earning him a bold, red-white-and-blue title spot in OAAW in September 1965. The members of Easy Company were profiled over time with several standouts like Bulldozer, Ice Cream, and Wee Willie, to name but a few. This cast of personalities provided friendly banter within grueling plotlines that gave cohesion to Easy Company while capturing the loyalty of fans. 

The formula worked spectacularly just as it did for comic book superheroes like Batman and Robin, the Justice League, and later, Marvel’s Fantastic Four. Rock owned OAAW until it folded in February 1977 – he was, and is, the most popular comic book war hero.

In his wake, other war heroes emerged, and the serial war comic book became the norm. It was only a matter of time before a fighter pilot like Johnny Cloud would get his own book.

... and we will finish our thumbnail review of DC War Comics next week!

Image Credit:

OAAW#191 (March 1968); Cover Art: J. Kubert; Writer of lead story: R. Kanigher.

Sgt. Rock & Johnny Cloud TM DC Comics

DC War Comics -- Part Two

This week I continue with a brief history of DC War Comics ...

Despite the shift away from superheroes and soldiers in the late 1940s, the fervor for war comics did not die; rather, it was shuffled to the back burner – overlooked actually – but not for long. War stories were selling. 

The Entertaining Comics group (or just EC) introduced two titles in 1950 and 1951 with enough success to ring the bell. Two-Fisted Tales began in December 1950, spinning off from the horror title Haunt of Fear (which itself replaced a western titled Gunfighter) – clearly EC was searching for an audience. Frontline Combat was introduced in August 1951 as a totally new book. These war comics were gruesome with high body counts. They tended to focus on the Korean War but included adventures from earlier conflicts including WW2. They enjoyed short runs (24 and 15 issues respectively) ending in the mid-1950s.

Intent on catching this wave, the DC Comics war machine started rolling (and flying) in late 1952 with their most prolific writer/editor, Robert Kanigher, calling the shots. Our Army at War (OAAW) hit the newsstands in August 1952, followed by a retitled Star Spangled War Stories (SSWS) in the same month – the latter was formerly an adventure book named Star Spangled Comics featuring Batman and Robin (mostly Robin) among others.

Next in the lineup was Johnny Cloud’s book. The revamped All American Western was retitled to All American Men of War (AAMOW) in August 1952. All told, DC had three new war titles (OAAW, SSWS, and AAMOW) by the end of the year, all with a primary focus on WW2.

In October 1954, Our Fighting Forces (OFF) was added to the fray. And two years later, DC acquired GI Combat (GIC) – a Quality Comics publication that began in October 1952. With these two additions, the Big Five as the war comic group is affectionately known was complete – quite a turnaround as DC did not have a single book devoted to war (and titled as such) before 1952.

Next up ... The Big Five and the resurgence of the Serial Warrior ...

Image Credit:

AAMOW#8 (December-January 1953-54); Cover Art: I.Novick (P) & Giella (I); Writer: D.Kahn.

Sgt. Storm Cloud TM DC Comics.

A short history of DC War Comics -- Part One

For the last two weeks, we explored the pulp fiction of G-8 and His Battle Aces. Today, we move on to the DC War Comics ... our goal is to see wherein Johnny Cloud, the Navajo Ace, fits into the timeline. As we shall see, Cloud arrived late, and his tenure was short at just over six years (not counting the Losers series).

Unlike the pulp fiction of the 1930s, comic books began as compilations of newspaper strips with non-descript titles such as New Fun and More Fun. One of the first themed books was Detective Comics, launched in March 1937 and featuring longer stories of up to 13 pages.

Comic books went big-time after the June 1938 publication of Action Comics featuring Superman – this issue marked the beginning of the Golden Age that lasted until the mid-1950s. The Silver Age followed and lasted until about 1968. Bronze was next. The metallic monikers reflect age, value, and collector popularity.

The transition from pulps to comics shows how the power of images captured the imaginations of readers in new ways. They say a picture is worth a thousand words. How about sixty of them linked together to tell a story!

With comics, the art took center stage, and although a thousand words per panel might be an exaggeration, the images were potent in ways that words fail: You have to see Superman lifting a car over his head to believe it! Same with Cloud: You have to see him cling to tail of a Stuka to get how amazing he is!

Superheroes ruled comic book pages at first. Certainly, their bright costumes were fashioned for comics. Fighting crime was the mission with Superman and Batman beating-up gangsters and thugs month after month. But with the rise of Nazi Germany, coupled with Japanese aggression in Asia, the superheroes joined the hunt for spies and terrorists in America. Once the war was in full swing, soldiers and fighter pilots joined the fray.

The stage was set for war comics. All American Comics (AAC) introduced flying ace Hop Harrigan in its first issue dated April 1939 – he was a daring flyer who with Tank Tinker, the world’s best mechanic, and Prop Wash, his mentor and friend, banded together to fight crime. During the war, they joined the Air Force to fight in the Pacific. In 1941, Hop donned a costume and became a superhero called the Guardian Angel. After the war, Hop and his crew went back to chasing bad guys.

Another hero of the skies was Blackhawk introduced in Military Comics in August 1941. Blackhawk was a Polish-American pilot with a squadron of crack-shot fighters, operating from an island off the coast of France. Blackhawk looked the part: broad shoulders filling a double-breasted uniform befit with menacing hawk figures. During the war, Blackhawk battled the evil, yet inept, Baron von Tepp who was emblematic of Nazi Germany. After the war, Blackhawk fought against an endless parade of costumed villains such as Grin the Grabber, Killer Shark, Firebug, and Hoopster – I dare say that Blackhawk had a rogue’s gallery larger than Batman’s!

All this mayhem brings us well into the postwar period when superheroes along with their wartime compatriots like Hop and Blackhawk faded in popularity – Hop Harrigan last appeared in 1948 whereas Blackhawk soldiered on with his own title until the late 1960s. Either way, it appeared that war comics were out and domestic genres were in, and what’s more domestic than romance for the tenderhearted and westerns for the six-gun crowd?

Still, superheroes in tights chased bank robbers, mainly Superman and Batman (and yes, Blackhawk too), but their aura had dimmed. With AAC as the gasping canary, Green Lantern lost his cover spot in August 1948 to the gun-slinging cowboy Johnny Thunder. Three months later AAC was retitled as All-American Western (AAW).

Were the war stories over? No. They were about to explode! Sgt. Rock and Easy Company were just over the horizon.

For the next few weeks I take some blog breaks ... see you in the New Year!

Image Credit:

OAAW#141 (April 1962): Cover Art: J. Kubert; Writer: R. Kanigher.

Sgt. Rock TM DC Comics

Pulp Fiction: G-8 and His Battle Aces -- Part Two.

Last week I described how my Dad started off reading G-8 and His Battle Aces -- a pulp fiction series that predated the War Comic boom. And so, I purchased a G-8 reprint: Patrol of the Cloud Crusher (June 1936) -- my hope being that this was one of the issues he read. The timing was right on, as Dad would have been nine or ten ... or later, since he relied on hand-me-downs from other kids who (unlike him) had a dime to spare.

The saga starts with a mysterious mechanic visiting airfields and rubbing grease on Allied aircraft. Weird. G-8 thought so too. As it turned out, the grease was an attractant, a pheromone. But for what end? The answer flashed over the radio: A flight of British SE5s … decimated! 

A giant hand sprung out from a cloud and grabbed one, then two, and finally three of the biplanes, and crushed them into splinters. There were no survivors. What on earth?

G-8 and his comrades – Nippy Weston and Bull Martin – got to work, facing death, not only from the barbaric hands, but also from the machinations of Herr Doktor Kreuger. It was he who developed the ointment of death that attracted the giant hands and made them grab. And his plan was devious: “I have many giant arms, “he boasted, “… that will pluck planes out of the air and crush them.” 

G-8 was beginning to realize that the grease was, by some odd chemistry, a source of nutrients, a food. These so-called hands were not hands at all. They were mussels – huge, primeval mollusks that survived in a cave once occupied by Neanderthals. Kreuger had found that they morph into a shape resembling a hand whenever food was nearby. In this case, the food was mixed with grease. So how do you stop them?

It was discovered that alum (a sulfate of aluminum) smothers the mussels much like insecticide kills flies. And so, the Allied pilots filled their guns with alum-coated bullets and attacked. The cave was bombed, and the few remaining hands were shot and killed as they frantically grabbed at the air. The story ended with G-8, Nippy, and Bull eating scallops for breakfast (a type of mussel) – “a fitting dish” Nippy quipped.

 And so, I was Dad for a few days, late fall, early twilight, huddled in my easy chair, reading G-8 – a communion of sorts. 

I guess what is so intriguing, is how I followed his path without knowing there was a path. I had my own airplane period in the mid-1960s, and it was filled with Monogram P-51s, Johnny Cloud adventures, and WW2 books. I didn’t become a pilot, but Dad did, and that’s enough for a lifetime of stories. And now we have this one: G-8’s tangle with the airplane-crushing hands!

Next time ... The War Comics!

A Brief History of War Comics ... but first, some Pulp Fiction: G-8 and His Battle Aces!

For the next few weeks, I will provide a thumbnail history of DC War Comics. This will help us appreciate wherein Johnny Cloud falls (no pun intended, as he did jump out of his burning P-51 many times).

First off, I will start with slight detour. Part tribute to my Dad (who passed away a few weeks ago -- I am totally crushed) and part set-up for the Golden Age of DC War Comics that began with flying aces such as Hop Harrigan who began his adventures in April 1939.

Here is Dad.

It was 1936, late fall, early twilight. With his chores done, the evening found Dad curled up behind the stove, atop the coal box, reading pulp fiction lit by a kerosene lamp. He was nine. And like me, he was engrossed with a fighter pilot. Dad’s hero was known only as G-8 – his true identity was never revealed!

G-8 and His Battle Aces flew from October 1933 through June 1944. In all, Robert Hogan penned over a hundred stories. G-8 was a master spy who commanded a small squadron of biplanes in the Great War, but he was up against more than just German aces. That would be too easy. Instead, G-8 faced fantastical creations from the Kaiser’s mad scientists – for example, Dr. Gurnig produced a remote-controlled flying head with a single eye that shot lethal X-rays at Allied fighters.

And if that wasn’t enough, G-8 battled supernatural beings, including Martians, a giant plane-eating spider, even a huge skeleton. Science fiction. And airplanes. Dad was captivated, but it was the cover-art that drew him in. This was when he started drawing airplanes, building wings out of balsa, and dreaming about soaring through the skies. His friends called him “airplane crazy.” 

This is Dad’s origin story – every superhero has one.

Dad liked to remind me that he was born in the year that Charles Lindberg crossed the Atlantic – 1927. So, it was only natural for him to be airplane crazy. Just as G-8’s cover art grabbed his eye, Johnny Cloud grabbed mine. So, I decided to probe his history, so I purchased a G-8 reprint: Patrol of the Cloud Crusher (June 1936). Maybe he read this one – I took a chance.

I'll tell you the story next time ... very strange, and very 1930s!