The final title in my overview of DC's Big 5 War Comics did not originate with DC but was a Quality Comic Publication that DC continued to publish after purchasing the company. DC also continued to publish Quality's Blackhawk but chose not to hand Blackhawk to Editor Bob Kanigher as they did with G I Combat. Quality launched G I Combat in 1952 hot on the heels of DC's Our Army at War, Star-Spangled War Stories and All-American Men of War.
Quality ceased publishing their entire line with comics cover dated December 1956. DC purchased their assets and integrated characters such as Plastic Man, Doll Man, Phantom Lady, Kid Eternity and Miss America into their continuity. DC took the decision to keep publishing Blackhawk and G I Combat and these titles retained their numbering and publishing schedule. Quality's last issue of G I Combat was #43 (December 1956) and DC's first was #44 (January 1957).
Bob Kanigher kept the cover copy "War Front Fury, Battlefield Adventures", bullet logo and title logo but assigned the interior to his own established artists, Grandenetti and Kubert in the first issue. Kanigher himself wrote the stories with contributions from Bob Haney, Bill Finger and others. Quality's cover artists Dick Dillin and Chuck Cuidera continued to work on DC's continuation of Blackhawk with Dillin eventually becoming a long time Justice League of America penciller from 1968 until his death in 1980.
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| G I Combat #1 (October 1952) Art by Reed Crandall |
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| G I Combat #6 (May 1953) Pencil art by Dick Dillin, inks: Chuck Cuidera |
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| G I Combat #33 (February 1956) Pencil art by Dick Dillin, inks: Chuck Cuidera |
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| G I Combat #43 (December 1956) Pencil art by Dick Dillin, inks: Chuck Cuidera |
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| G I Combat #44 (January 1957) Art by Jerry Grandenetti |
A Sgt. Rock prototype appeared in #68 (January 1959) in a story by Bob Kanigher and Joe Kubert.
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| G I Combat #68 (January 1959) Art by Joe Kubert |
G I Combat was the last of DC's Big 5 to gain a recurring star feature but when it did the feature was one of the longest running and most successful of all the war series.
Haunted Tank first appeared in #87 (April/May 1961) in a story by Bob Kanigher and Russ Heath. The concept of a World War II Stuart tank commanded by Lieutenant Jeb Stuart and haunted by the ghost of Confederate Civil War General J. E. B. Stuart was a stroke of genius.
Haunted Tank first appeared in #87 (April/May 1961) in a story by Bob Kanigher and Russ Heath. The concept of a World War II Stuart tank commanded by Lieutenant Jeb Stuart and haunted by the ghost of Confederate Civil War General J. E. B. Stuart was a stroke of genius.
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| G I Combat #87 (April/May 1961) Pencil art by Russ Heath, inks: Jack Adler |
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| G I Combat #91 (December 1961/January 1962) Pencil art by Russ Heath, inks: Jack Adler |
Johnny Cloud made a guest appearance in #115 (December 1965/January 1966) in a story by Kanigher and Heath which also featured Sgt. Rock.
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| G I Combat #115 (December 1965/January 1966) Art by Russ Heath |
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| G I Combat #138 (October/November 1969) Art by Joe Kubert |
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| G I Combat #195 (October 1976) Art by Joe Kubert |
Kanigher and Glanzman brought in Sgt. Rock, the Losers and Mademoiselle Marie for the Gala 200th Issue (March 1977).
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| G I Combat #200 (March 1977) Art by Joe Kubert |
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| G I Combat #246 (October 1982) Art by Joe Kubert |
G I Combat continued through to #288 (March 1987), finally becoming a casualty to Crisis on Infinite Earths. Bob Kanigher was still writing the stories thirty years after taking over the title as both writer and editor.
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| G I Combat #288 (March 1987) Art by Joe Kubert |
The G I Combat title had lasted longer than all of the other DC Big 5 titles. All-American Men of War was cancelled in 1966, Star-Spangled War Stories switched titles to Unknown Soldier in 1977 and was cancelled in 1982 and Our Fighting Forces was cancelled in 1978. Our Army at War did last until 1988 but it had switched titles to Sgt. Rock in 1977. A great war comic and a lasting legacy to the great artists who worked on it and the master of war comic writing, the great Bob Kanigher.
Evidently, the super hero genre was in a slump in the 1950's. The two Quality titles that DC chose to continue uninterrupted were G.I. Combat and Blackhawk. The former was obviously a war comic and the latter was at least paramilitary. I would assume they looked at sales figures and saw that war comics were what sold at the time. AFAIR, DC never really did much with Quality super heroes, but they tried a few revivals from time to time. They published Plastic Man for ten issues in 1966-67, and then tried again for another ten in the 1970s, but it never caught on. (There were also a few guest-star appearances in Brave&Bold, and a back-up strip in Adventure Comics.) I remember a few reprints of Kid Eternity, the Ray, and Black Condor in 100-Page Super Spectacular issues in the 1970s, as well as teaming them up in Freedom Fighters. Kid Eternity also appeared in the Shazam strip in World's Finest. Blackhawk sort of phased in and back out in the 1970s and again in the early 1980s. Oddly, even with the decline in war comics, it was G.I. Combat that seemed to have the longest uninterrupted run of the comics that DC took over from Quality.
ReplyDeleteG I Combat was certainly the most successful title DC had from the Quality stable. Plastic Man never reached the heights of the Golden Age and his best stories were probably in Grant Morrison's JLA.
DeleteIn a way, I would have expected Plastic Man (and Inferior Five) to fit in with the camp comedy/pop art fad in 1966. But the subteen kids (then the main audience for comics) still wanted their super heroes played straight. And the adults who watched the campy Batman TV show (and the Man from U.N.C.L.E. and Wild wild West) did not read comics.
DeleteDC had a tough time in the late 60s dealing with losing their market share to Marvel, it is possible that they focussed on their core characters and did not have capacity for the minor characters. Weisinger retired and Kanigher stepped down from editing, how many top quality editors did they have? Schwartz and Boltinoff split the super titles and Boltinoff was not a great innovator, where was the vision coming from?
DeleteWhat I like about War comics, and to a point, books like Challengers of the Unknown, House of Mystery etc..is that the stories were more realistic and believable. If you look at Batman and Superman during those years, they were fighting goofy looking aliens, evil doubles of themselves, giant hands, dumb imaginary tales, or Lois Lane dreaming of marrying Superman for the 415th time. I'm loving reading about these and seeing the old covers.
ReplyDeleteKanigher's war books had great art and sometimes were more realistic....Haunted Tank stretched things further than most but it was more realistic than the Wonder Woman stories Kanigher was writing at the time. Batman was quite dumb in the fifties although some of the stories had their charm. I really enjoy Weisinger's Superman, he used great writers including Jerry Seigel himself and Otto Binder along with great artists like Curt Swan. Batman didn't improve until Julius Schwartz took over with the new look in my opinion.
DeleteChallengers was a great series when Kirby was drawing it but I am only familiar with House of Mystery from the 70s which was great!