FYI tells you why tales of action on a battlefield and a charming space detective make for a great graphic novel
FYIu00a0tells you why tales of action on a battlefield and a charming space detective make for a great graphic novel
It is an intriguing task, this review of a popular series of war comics. Intriguing, when one realises the subject in question has occupied a shockingly large amount of our time on earth.
This critic believed the best way to begin was by keeping the American writer Barbara Kingsolver in mind. She once wrote: "There's a graveyard in northern France where all the dead boys from D-Day are buried. The white crosses reach from one horizon to the other.
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I remember looking it over and thinking it was a forest of graves. But the rows were like this, dizzying, diagonal, perfectly straight, so after all it wasn't a forest but an orchard of graves.
Nothing to do with nature, unless you count human nature."
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The publishers may have known, instinctively, that action on any battlefield made for a great sales pitch.
In his introduction to Commando: The Dirty Dozen: The best 12 Commando comic books ever!, editor George Low describes the series as "a comic drawn for boys with enough text added to make it a good read".
The stories stick to a now-standard 68-page format, covering the usual themes of patriotism, courage and cowardice.
What stands out more largely, one supposes, to the wisdom that comes with age are stereotypes that schoolboys tend to be ignorant of when they first pick up a copy of Commando at their local libraries.
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The only plausible reason to pick them up now is the heavy dose of nostalgia they come packaged with.
A far more interesting anthology to own is the one devoted to Rick Random, Space Detective.
A character as old as the fighters in Commando, Rick Random made his first appearance in the 1950s, accompanied by female sidekick Detective Superintendent Andi Andrews.
They were both gainfully employed by the Interplanetary Bureau of Investigation, and captured the attention of readers excited by the launch of satellite Sputnik in 1957.
The stories may be quaint by today's standards, but what makes the series shine is the black-and-white composition of artist Ron Turner.
Apparently, his work was inspired by writers HG Wells and Jules Verne.
Considering the original comics are now highly prized collectors' items, series editor Steve Holland rightly points out that many readers could be reading these tales for the first time, "having heard whispers about them from other fans."
For those who consider Alan Moore's Watchmen a genre-defying piece of work, it may be interesting to think about what he may have read as a child. Keep that in mind when you next go comic-book hunting.
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