A Comic Book That Never Was: SEVEN SOLDIERS OF VICTORY # 1

This is a new post, incorporating elements from a few previous posts.

In the midst of DC Comics' current (and welcome) series of facsimile editions reprinting individual classic comic books, here's a wish for a fauxsimile, a "reprint" of a comic book that never existed: Seven Soldiers Of Victory # 1.

In the mid 1970s, six consecutive issues of DC's Adventure Comics (# 438, dated March-April 1975, through # 443, January-February 1976) presented a previously untold tale of the 1940s team the Seven Soldiers of Victory. And I was stoked for it.

The Seven Soldiers (aka Law's Legionnaires) were DC's second-tier super-team in the 1940s, an attempt to replicate the success of the Justice Society Of America. Our valiant assembled Soldiers--the Green Arrow and Speedy, the Vigilante, the Shining Knight, the Star-Spangled Kid and Stripesy, and the Crimson Avenger, with the Crimson's Asian stereotype sidekick Wing an unofficial eighth Soldier--starred in the first fourteen issues of Leading Comics, 1941-1945, their victories vacated when the title switched to a funny animal format with Leading Comics # 15. 




I first heard of the group via a text page in a giant-sized issue of Justice League Of America published circa 1970 or so, and I was instantly fascinated by them. They were revived in 1972 for an epic three-part Justice League-Justice Society crossover in Justice League Of America # 100-102, and that arc remains my all-time favorite JLA story. And it was a popular story, so maybe it wasn't all that odd a notion for editor Joe Orlando to consider reviving the Seven Soldiers Of Victory a few years later as a backup in Adventure Comics.

But it was a little odd that it wasn't a new adventure; "Land Of Magic!" was an unused script from the '40s, written by Joe Samachson for (one presumes) an issue of Leading Comics and scuttled when the funny animals of King Oscar's Court kicked Law's Legionnaires outta Leading. The script was plucked from the vaults three decades later, and given to artists: Dick Dillin and Tex Blaisdell for the opening and closing team chapters, Howard Chaykin on Shining Knight, Lee Elias on Green Arrow and Speedy, Mike Grell on Crimson Avenger and Wing, Ernie Chua on Star-Spangled Kid and Stripesy, and Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez and Mike Royer on Vigilante. It was set to run as a serial backing the Spectre (and later Aquaman) in Adventure. Odd. But intriguing; I confess I was a little underwhelmed with the results at the time, but I had certainly been looking forward to it, and I still have some fondness for it looking back. Here are some sample pages from all of the serial's chapters.

The entire 1940s Seven Soldiers of Victory chronicles were eventually reprinted in a series of three DC Archives hardcovers. Of course I own them all. Victory at last!

But not complete victory. Script pages from "Land Of Magic!" were reproduced in the third and final volume of The Seven Soldiers Of Victory Archives, but the published story and its artwork have never been reprinted.

I concede this is an unlikely candidate for DC to ever put out as a fabricated facsimile edition, but...c'mon! Wouldn't it be cool? Until that happens, this would-be Seven Soldiers Of Victory # 1 will remain A COMIC BOOK THAT NEVER WAS.

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Carl's new book Gabba Gabba Hey! A Conversation With The Ramones is now available, courtesy of the good folks at Rare Bird Books. Gabba Gabba YAY!! https://rarebirdlit.com/gabba-gabba-hey-a-conversation-with-the-ramones-by-carl-cafarelli/

If it's true that one book leads to another, my next book will be The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1). Stay tuned. Your turn is coming.

This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl airs Sunday nights from 9 to Midnight Eastern, on the air in Syracuse at SPARK! WSPJ 103.3 and 93.7 FM, streaming at SPARK stream and on the Radio Garden app as WESTCOTT RADIO. Recent shows are archived at Westcott Radio. You can read about our history here.

I'm on Twitter @CafarelliCarl

POP-A-LOOZA: THE EVERLASTING FIRST! ABBA, Action Comics, Action Swingers, Adventure Comics, The Adverts, and Astonishing Tales

Each week, the pop culture website Pop-A-Looza shares some posts from my vast 'n' captivating Boppin' (Like The Hip Folks Do) archives. The latest shared post is a reprise of the very first edition of my series The Everlasting First, offering quick takes on my introductions to ABBA, Action Comics, Action Swingers, Adventure Comics, the Adverts, and Astonishing Tales.

This piece was a little bit longer when it was first posted back in August of 2016. My original intent for The Everlasting First was for each alphabetical entry to spotlight my introductions to a musical act and a superhero or other fictional entity, supplemented by the quick takes, consisting of an equal number of music and comics/pulp fiction subjects. As the series progressed, I realized that many comics fans didn't want to read about rock 'n' roll, and some pop music aficionados didn't care about the funnybook stuff.

So I started separating the music from the comics and pulp stuff, and retroactively split all the previously-posted Everlasting Firsts, as well. 

Over the course of nearly six years of The Everlasting First, I still haven't made it through the damned alphabet. I have gotten through the letter T, with T is for TARZAN, T is for THE TURTLES, and T's Quick Takes For Comics (Teen Titans, Thor, T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents, and The Twilight Zone) and Quick Takes For Music. (Television, the Temptations, Tommy Tutone and the Troggs). I haven't yet decided on the U entries--Uncle Scrooge? The Ugly Ducklings? U.N.C.L.E.? The Undertones? Uncle Sam? Tracey Ullman?--but I'll get to 'em eventually. When I finally do finish making my way through EF A-Z, I'll circle back to do others in no particular order, perhaps including the Animals and the Lone Ranger.

Two other dormant series are also due for a near-future comeback here: 5 Above (covering five songs from a specific artist or within a specific category) and Comic Book Retroview (covering short runs and/or single issues of comic book titles). Among the subjects potentially looming in one or t'other, we have the Romantics, Iron Man And Sub-Mariner, KISS, Daredevil Battles Hitler, the Hollies, Shazam!, Herman's Hermits, Detective Comics, Suzi Quatro, Captain Action, the Kinks in the '80s, the Spectre in the Silver Age, and comic book songs.

They say you never forget your first time; that may be true, but it's the subsequent visits--the second time, the fourth time, the twentieth time, the hundredth time--that define our relationships with the things we cherish. Ultimately, the first meeting is less important than what comes after that. But every love story still needs to begin with that first kiss. 

That's the boilerplate intro for The Everlasting First. And the origin of The Everlasting First serves as the latest Boppin' Pop-A-Looza.

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This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl airs Sunday nights from 9 to Midnight Eastern, on the air in Syracuse at SPARK! WSPJ 103.3 and 93.7 FM, and on the web at http://sparksyracuse.org/ You can read about our history here.

I'm on Twitter @CafarelliCarl

100-Page FAKES! presents: ADVENTURE COMICS # 452

100-Page FAKES! imagines mid-1970s DC 100-Page Super Spectaculars that never were...but should have been!

This was Aquaman's final appearance in Adventure Comics. And I've always hated it. SPOILERS follow below.

This issue would have hit the racks at Gold Star Pharmacy in North Syracuse in June of 1977. I was 17, soon to graduate from high school. I was still reading and loving my comic books, though my burgeoning interest in rock 'n' roll was beginning to outpace my ongoing 
passion for superheroes. I was about to discover punk rock, and I was about to get a girl (and then another girl, but that's a story for elsewhere). I didn't know it at the time, but I was about a year or so away from giving up on comics entirely. That's also a story for elsewhere.

Adventure Comics # 452 didn't really factor into my eventual estrangement from comics; I hated it on its own merit. This was the issue where Aquaman's infant son Arthur Curry, Jr.--Aquababy--perished at the hands of Aquaman's arch enemy Black Manta.

A baby dying in a freakin' escapist superhero comic book? Sorry. The hell with that.

Jim Aparo's artwork was gorgeous. Jim Aparo's artwork was always gorgeous. But I found the story's result so unpalatable, so wrong, that I could never embrace it on any level. I tried to address this make-believe tragedy in my own years-later sequel The Undersea World Of Mr. Freeze, but I couldn't undo it. I hated this story. I don't remember whether or not I followed Aquaman into his own solo title afterward--perhaps hoping that DC would erase this stupid plot decision--but if I did, I didn't stick around for long. 

Which makes me something of a hypocrite. About a year before this, I'd written an absolutely awful Batman story called "Nightmare Resurrection," which also included the death of a child, and concluded with The Batman standing by in cold observance as the killer met a painful and grisly end. Brrr. Edgy. I beat the mad parade of grim 'n' gritty comics by several years.

I disavow it now.

Because superheroes should be wish fulfillment. Win or lose, one would expect justice to triumph to some degree, one would expect the innocent to be saved, for innocence to be saved. There will be exceptions--Roger Stern's brilliant 1984 story "The Kid Who Collected Spider-Man" springs to mind as a particularly emotional and effective example--but c'mon...! In superhero stories, we're asked to believe a man can fly, that a guy in an orange and green costume can breath and even speak naturally under water, that the fantastic and the impossible are everyday occurrences, but it's a stretch to think these fairy tales could have a happily ever after? Bah. I'm aware of how the origins of many of our favorite heroes were rooted in tragedy--the destruction of Krypton and the subsequent deaths of Ma and Pa Kent, the murders of Thomas and Martha Wayne, et al.--but I still think a super-villain murdering an infant does not fall within my parameters for entertainment.

Yeah. I hated this issue.

Let's rearrange those Titanic deck chairs with the addition of some reprints starring various characters who appeared in Adventure Comics over the years: Supergirl, Bizarro, The Shining Knight (drawn by Frank Frazetta), and Superboy, who reclaims the top spot in Adventure Comics with the next issue. A Super-centric (Krypto-centric?) selection leaves no room for Green Arrow, Starman, Johnny Quick, Manhunter, The Spectre, Sandman and Sandy, The Vigilante, Hourman, Genius Jones, Black Canary, or any of the other stars of Adventure Comics, but I hope you enjoy it nonetheless. Roll credits:

Aquaman and Aqualad in "Dark Destiny, Deadly Dreams," Adventure Comics # 452 (July-August 1977)
Supergirl in "Now...Comes Zond," Adventure Comics # 397 (September 1970)
The Shining Knight in "The Flying Horse Swindle!," Adventure Comics # 161 (February 1951)
Bizarro in "Bizarro's Secret Identity!," Adventure Comics # 288 (September 1961)The Legion Of Super-Heroes in "The Stolen Super-Powers!," Adventure Comics # 304 (January 1963)Superboy in "The End Of The Kent Family," Adventure Comics # 229 (October 1956)

All characters copyright DC Comics Inc., and depicted here only in sample pages. I share the whole book with my subscribers. A tip of the Boppin' lid to Steven Thompson's fab Days Of Adventure blog as a resource for this edition's Supergirl, Shining Knight, Legion Of Super-Heroes stories. And as we leave Aquaman and Adventure Comics behind, 100-Page FAKES! will turn its spotlight back to Detective Comics, and one of the single greatest Batman stories ever published.

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Our new compilation CD This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, Volume 4 is now available from Kool Kat Musik! 29 tracks of irresistible rockin' pop, starring Pop Co-Op, Ray Paul, Circe Link & Christian Nesmith, Vegas With Randolph Featuring Lannie Flowers, The Slapbacks, P. Hux, Irene Peña, Michael Oliver & the Sacred Band Featuring Dave Merritt, The Rubinoos, Stepford Knives, The Grip Weeds, Popdudes, Ronnie Dark, The Flashcubes, Chris von Sneidern, The Bottle Kids, 1.4.5., The Smithereens, Paul Collins' Beat, The Hit Squad, The Rulers, The Legal Matters, Maura & the Bright Lights, Lisa Mychols, and Mr. Encrypto & the Cyphers. You gotta have it, so order it here. A digital download version (minus The Smithereens' track) is also available from Futureman Records.

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