As I’ve mentioned before in this Silver Age reread, I’ve never been a war comics fan, and I was barely reading any comics from the start of ’69 until 1972. It’s no surprise, therefore, that I missed the birth of The Losers in 1969’s G.I. Combat #138.
I became aware of them after I resumed buying comics but didn’t think much about them. I certainly didn’t know they were a collection of heroes who’d originally had their own strips in various DC war books. All I knew of war books came from house ads and the only names I remembered were Sgt. Rock and Mademoiselle Marie — “the resistance fighter with TNT in her lipstick!” was a memorable tag line.
If I had known their history, I might have assumed that Robert Kanigher and Russ Heath (Joe Kubert did the cover) introduced them as a way to save space. Just as having Superman and Batman join forces in World’s Finest years earlier saves space as comic downsized, or Atom and Hawkman stayed in print for an extra year by turning Atom into Atom & Hawkman. That one bit the dust earlier in 1969, with a final Joe Kubert Cover.
It was closer to Roy Thomas resurrecting obscure heroes for All-Star Squadron. PT boat commander Captain Storm had last appeared two years ago; Navajo flying ace Johnny Cloud had made one appearance in the previous two years; Marines Gunner and Sarge had been gone for three years. Colonel Stuart of the Haunted Tank was the only one who still had a steady gig. Did Kanigher think of this as a way to revive a bunch of his characters? Was it a Hail Mary play to keep the Haunted Tank going? If so, it worked, as the Losers kept appearing all the way to the end of the 1970s. Possibly Jeff, whom I know is a bigger comics fan than I am, knows the logic behind it, or one of our other readers.
The set-up is very Kanigher. Gunner and Sarge, Captain Storm and Johnny Cloud are the sole survivors of various missions, hence their declaration they’re the Losers. That’s a similar premise to the original Suicide Squad, a team of sole survivors dedicated to carrying on the fight for those they left behind. While the Losers is best remembered for Jack Kirby’s 1974-5 run, obviously enough fans liked it outside that era to keep it going.
The Metal Men had considerably less success with their reboot, which started in 1968 and kept them in print until … 1969. It’s never gotten the infamy that the Blackhawks’ transformation into conventional superheroes did, though it looks just as disastrous. Then again, I’ve never read more than a single issue so for all I know it’s an unsung masterpiece. I doubt that will change: they only have a couple of issues in the second Showcase collection of Metal Men and I’ve no urge to find them on eBay. I like the classic Metal Men too much.
In #33’s “Recipe to Kill a Robot” Robert Kanigher (the team’s creator) and Mike Sekowsky (who does all the covers here) launch the kind of radical reboot that we’ve seen over and over again in the years since. Doc goes into a coma, the Metal Men become hunted fugitives after their powers run wild, Col. David Magnus (the brother we never knew Doc Magnus had) takes a hand and in the middle of all that the team has to defeat an alien invasion.
The next couple of issues (by the same creators) were more of the same. The Metal Men save lives, the public distrusts them, the authorities debate whether to melt them down. Wow, phrased like that it sounds a lot like another attempt to imitate Marvel, doesn’t it?
Their next attempt to win over the public pits them against evil alien clowns, making it four issues of aliens in a row. The previous era sometimes got flak for having the Metal Men battle robot after robot; was Kanigher trying to change gears? If so, they’d change a lot more the next issue when Sekowsky became the writer/artist on this book in addition to his work on Wonder Woman. I imagine Sekowsky was happy to go it alone, given he later caricatured Kanigher as a creepy, cross-dressing shoplifter in Wonder Woman (I don’t have the link, sorry).
In Sekowsky’s first issue, a billionaire named Conan — no, not that Conan — saves them from the public’s wrath by faking their death and giving them secret identities as everyday humans. It sounds similar enough to Kanigher’s Teen Titans reboot I wonder if Sekowsky was following through on Kanigher’s idea.
After a couple more adventures dipping into the horror genre, we get another new direction: Doc’s been kidnapped and taken to a foreign country where he’s out of his coma, brainwashed, and building a robot army. The team try to stop Doc but he’s hopelessly mad and evil and guns Tina down when she can’t bring herself to shoot him.
In the final issue Doc attempts nuclear blackmail, the guys try to stop him (Tina’s recovering) and succeed — but it’s only a Magnus-bogt. Doc’s still out there, scheming to sew more havoc. I imagine he would have if the book hadn’t ended. As it was, it would be 1976 before the robots finally restored their creator to sanity.
To end on a fun note, Amazing Spider-Man #82, “And Then Came Electro,” (Stan Lee and Jim Mooney with Marie Severin providind the cover) shows Stan Lee is getting the hang of Marvel’s new rule stories must be done in one issue. The story has Peter, desperate to raise money, put in an appearance on a TV talk show. Unfortunately Max Dillon, AKA Electro, sees this as an opportunity: he pitches J. Jonah Jameson on paying him to defeat Spider-Man and unmask him on national television. Jonah, of course, jumps at the chance.
The action is competent but as so often happens, Peter’s personal struggles steal the show.
While Spider-Man never does collect on his fee, Lee has the sense not to make it yet another issue where everything possible goes wrong. Pete at one point tells Gwen she’d be better off without him; Gwen makes it clear she loves him and she’s in it for the long haul, despite Peter’s secrets and erratic behavior. Having something go right for Peter adds to the issue.
On a final note, I’m puzzled how seriously Marvel took Goodman’s dictat to have single issues stories only. That Spidey issue is one-and-done but Avengers the following month (cover by John Buscema) is part one of two —
—as is Thor (cover by Marie Severin)
Did Goodman just not check or what?
