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[The Australian Panther]

Noir and Hard-boiled Detective Fiction are genres dear to my heart.

Here we have Kerry Drake, Buck Ryan and Dick Tracy.

These books have only one story each, reprinted from Newspaper strips. In two of them we have continued stories but edited to be fairly complete in the comic book.
There are other things they have in common, which is why I have selected them.
For now, that's enough from me. Happy reading.     

Kerry Drake Detective Cases 2
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=65055

Super Detective Library 159 - Buck Ryan and The Phantom Prowler
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=84957

Four Color (1942 Series)
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=38364

Elvis Costello - Watching The Detectives
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snPDoXl9ZPs

If you have been reading the 'Watcha Watching' posts you will recognize quite a few faces in this clip.

Cheers!

[Quirky Quokka]

Some interesting selections there, Panther. I like noir and detective stories. We have a reasonable collection of classic noir and detective DVDs from 1930s to 1950s--lots of Humphrey Bogart and Alfred Hitchcock, plus things like Double Indemnity, Laura, The Third Man, and more obscure ones. I'll look forward to reading these.

I'd seen those Buck Ryan ones, and thought they'd be worth a look, but hadn't gotten around to reading them yet. Also, I didn't think there were Dick Tracy comics here, because they've edited them out of some of the other compilations, so that will be interesting. As a kid, I wasn't crazy about the cartoon show because of the way it was drawn (Flintstones and Jetsons were much more my style), so it will be interesting to actually read the comic.

And I remember the Elvis Costello song, but not the film clip,  Good one.

Cheers

QQ

[Robb_K]

That Elvis Costello video shows clips of some of my favourite noir films and actors.  Noir and detective films are dear to my heart, as well.  I like Buck Ryan and Dick Tracy.  I've only flipped through a Kerry Drake comic and strip or two.  I like longer, book-length stories.  So, I should enjoy these books.

[K1ngcat]

Looking forward to reading these, Panther, all three tecs are confirmed favourites of mine. 

[K1ngcat]

Okay, I know I'm kinda cheating here but I decided to go for the last one first. I think Dick Tracy was probably the best-known comic strip detective in the world and to some extent the blueprint for many of those who came after him. I certainly learned of his existence long before I met Buck Ryan and Kerry Drake, and both of those characters have traits that remind me of Tracy.

Funny enough the first story in this Dell reprint-compilation is one of the first Tracy tales I ever read, in another reprint collection from Harvey, probably when I was around twelve-thirteen. I didn't notice the reversed names at the time, ie, the scientist whose name was Drab Color,  the publisher whose name is Patriot, or the Black Pearl whose surname is Dare. I could see that the art was unusually stylised, almost unrealistic, (I understand Gould had learned some of his craft from a mail order correspondence course) but the most important thing was that his art was truly sequential. Every panel provided the information the reader needed to advance the story. And that's probably one of the things that kept Tracy in popularity for so long. So far he's still the only comic strip Dick I know who's had his adventures read out over the radio by a New York Mayor, or inspired a movie featuring Warren Beatty, Al Pacino, Dustin Hoffman and Madonna.

This one-off comic manages to retain some cohesiveness, even though it starts part-way into a story line. Roloc Bard nearly meets his maker, Yogee Yamma goes to a rather grisly end, and Junior gets badly messed up in his adventure with Deafy, but the level of violence and tragedy only mimics real life, perhaps another reason that Tracy managed to achieve such longevity. Though, seriously, would you go on holiday while your adopted kid continued his lessons at school and developed a business in bicycles on the side?   

All in all, no matter how cartoony the art is, no matter how ridiculous some of the plots are, I still have a genuine fondness for Dick Tracy which I can't let go. I'm very pleased that something in the system screwed up enough for us to have a little trace of Tracy on CB+.

Thanks for posting it, Panther.
Sorry for reviewing it our of order 
All the best
K1ngcat

[The Australian Panther]

Kingcat, there's no rule that says you have to read the posted books in order.

I could see that the art was unusually stylized, almost unrealistic, (I understand Gould had learned some of his craft from a mail order correspondence course) but the most important thing was that his art was truly sequential.

I wouldn't call the art unrealistic, but its cartoony, not realistic in the sense that Alex Raymond or Neal Adams was. But it's clear and to the point and illustrates clearly what the narrative needs it to show.  And if you compare Gould's work during his early years, and this work is relatively early, he definitely matured and grew. Never changed his basic style tho.  If you look at Jack Kirby's work in the 50's [Bullseye and Boys town and Sky Masters in particular]. it's clear that Jack could draw as realistically as the best of them, but as time went on - particularly from the time he left Marvel and started on the Forth World, it's clear that he had got to the point where the narrative took precedent over detail in the art. But he could still take your breath away. I have had a professional artist friend hate Dick Tracy because of Gould's art.  If you look at many of Kirby's later covers closely and try to copy them, you will soon see that the anatomy is often out of 'real' proportion. But you see, that's very deliberate exaggeration, to help the cover image grab your attention.
I don't know what they teach artists in comic book schools now, but I am damn sure they don't look at KIrby's work, or Gould's or probably Alex Toth's. There is certainly not much evidence of it in most current comics.

Every panel provided the information the reader needed to advance the story. And that's probably one of the things that kept Tracy in popularity for so long.

Exactly! And no waste.             

[Quirky Quokka]

Kerry Drake #2

Ah, the days when you could smoke a pipe in your hospital bed without anyone blinking. I know from Panther's description that this is taken from a comic strip, but the narration box tells us that Drake is having 'a life of pleasant ease' after suffering acid burns. Where were his burns? Probably not the most pleasant thing to be recovering from.

I've never heard of Kerry Drake, so this was all new to me. I liked the way the one story took up most of the comic book, giving more time for development. But I had trouble with the concept of someone not having a face. According to Sandy, 'No Face' has 'two burning eyes, a slit of a mouth and nothing else'. How can there be nothing else? Is there just no skin and he has bones and tissue sticking out? If his facial injuries were so severe, wouldn't he have needed medical treatment to survive the accident? Once his head is wrapped in bandages, he is very reminiscent of The Invisible Man, who also went nuts.

Best line comes from Sandy - 'I'm as limp as an empty nightie' (p. 6). And no wonder she slipped on the ice (p. 5). Who wears high heels on ice?

I also wondered why 'No Face' went to the trouble of finding a method of killing that wouldn't leave a trace (i.e., the dry ice), but then left a threatening note to tip everyone off.

It was interesting how they included a couple of explanations of detecting techniques, such as the nature of handwriting analysis, though I think it's a leap to say that someone who starts writing bigger must have had a terrible shock. Maybe their eyesight's failing.

Do laundries really stamp items with fluid that is visible only to ultra-violet rays?

Interesting comment about men with wounded faces at the end. I imagine a lot of men would have come home from the war disfigured in some way. But would they have been comforted by this one comment after reading a whole comic about a vengeful disfigured man? They also have to get a moral in right at the end so that kids know crime doesn't pay, though I was glad the old landlady saw justice for the killing of her lovebirds. That was plain mean, given she was the only one who'd been nice to him.

The art was good enough to draw the eye, but not brilliant. The lettering for the narration bits wasn't the best.

Overall, I enjoyed this one. Always good to read something new.

Burma Bridge Busters

I hadn't heard of the Burma Bridge Busters, and looked them up to see if they were real. Turns out they were. I've seen the Dambusters movie over and over on TV repeats, but had never heard of this one. The war would have been over by the time this comic came out in December 1945, so I guess they were able to talk about actual missions. I also learned that 'duck soup' is not just the name of a Marx Brothers movie, but means 'easy to overcome'. I don't think it's an expression here in Australia. Our equivalent would probably be something like 'a piece of cake' or the more modern 'easy peasy'.

Dotty Dripple

These two one-pagers didn't grab me. A bit like a poor man's Dagwood and Blondie, without the heart.

Thanks for the selection Panther. Now onto the next one.

Cheers

QQ

[K1ngcat]

Kerry Drake always strikes me as a Dick Tracy clone. And not so surprising since it was designed to fill a place previously occupied by one of Tracy's major competitors, Nick Marsh's Dan Dunn. An argument between Marsh and his publishers resulted in house editor Allen Saunders taking over the scripting chores while the art job was given to Alfred Andriola, and voila, Kerry Drake was born. He shares the same collection of villains known for their bizarre personalities and/or physical or facial disfigurements as Tracy had with his Flat Top, The Brow, Pruneface. etc., and as late-comer Batman had with The Joker, The Penguin, Clayface, and many others.  Andriola, although he took all the credit, did farm out his work to assistants, including (no surprise) Jerry Robinson, assistant Bat-artist to Bob Kane. And so the torch is passed on...

This comic is well chosen (thanks Panther!) because it does allow a story to begin and end in the same issue - we have many Kerry Drake comics in the Harvey series, which catches the rolling feel of a continued series. But at the same time the stories overlap from one issue to another meaning not all of them are completed in one comic. No-Face obviously suffered hideous facial disfigurements, and however unlikely the final effects may have been, I think describing them in too much detail would destroy the horror. Most of the truly horrifying moments in the old b/w horror movies were left to the imagination, now we have no imaginations we have to suffer movies like Saw.

Anyway, there's lots of hard-boiled detective clichés like the secretary who carries a torch for her boss, and the kid side-kick like Junior Tracy (or Robin) but generally I consider Drake to be pretty much Dick Tracy with slightly classier artwork. I enjoy the strips, and recommend anyone else who does to check out the Harvey collection elsewhere on CB+. It's all good.

More later
K1ngcat

[Robb_K]

Kerry Drake #2

Kerry Drake - No-Face Apollo
Finally an almost book-long self-contained story, with room to develop the characters to a decent extent, and provide a decent pacing, revealing more and more about the villain's plot while building up suspense.  Being a private detective, I think Drake is more like a clone of Sherlock Holmes, rather than police detective, Dick Tracy, despite his having a large stable of visually unusual, quirky villains, like Tracy had.  I don't really like, or see the need for "Firetop", seemingly a late teenager "sidekick".  He wasn't really used for anything in this story.  It was just the comic book convention for young boy readers to imagine themselves participating in dangerous, adventures, in which they could perform heroic feats, and help bring criminals to justice.  But, to me, it just provides an unnatural situation, which makes it difficult for me to "Live in the story", constantly reminded of how impossible the situation is.   
The artwork is adequate, but not memorable.  I like the  contrast of light and dark panel colouring. 

Like QQ, I don't believe that having suffered enough from acid burns to have an extended hospital stay, that it would provide him "a life of pleasant ease".  I also agree that the description of the horrendous face should have made more sense than nothing but one eye and a slit for a mouth.  They might have described it as  something like: "Only his eyes and mouth slit were recognisable between what remained of his tortured skin."

I also never did like the comic book convention of having the characters think to themselves things that could be shown through other means (especially when it is NOT the point of discovery for them, or the time of coming to that conclusion (e.g. they had been doing things for quite a while, that would only have been done had they come to that conclusion long before).  And that is especially grievous in the cases in which the character is saying this out loud, to himself or herself in a speech balloon, rather than a thinking balloon. I agree that laundries stamping job numbers in invisible ink into the fabric of clothing items is a bit far-fetched (although, it WOULD get rid of the unclaimed items problem.

Burma Bridge Busters
A nice information piece on the Burmese Theatre of WWII.  Interesting that A US comic book included this about a British Theatre, rather than an American one.  I would have guessed this would have been handled by Britain's RAF.  But, maybe The RAF was too tied up in guarding The English Channel, North Sea, Atlantic convoy routes, Mediterranean and North African Theatres, and needed the American Army Air Corps to help them for air support in Burma?  I Don't remember The Australians providing much help in terms of air support.  Did they even have an Air Force?

Dotty Dripple 1- Page Gags
These were dull, obvious gags, and all too often used by many different publishers using their own domestic comedy characters.  Yes, Dotty and Horace were invented as clones to successful, Blondie and Dagwood.  And for quite a while, Harvey Comics had both of them, and, if I remember correctly, and King Features had both, as well.  I don't get the point of that duplication.  I understand why rival publishers would want to make a clone of a rival's successful strip.  But why would a publisher want to add a clone of its own series (even if it WAS successful)?  Why not use your young creative talent to make a new and different series with the same level of cleverness and ingenuity, or pick up an already somewhat successful strip, or a promising-looking new strip idea from a new creator?

[The Australian Panther]

a British Theatre, rather than an American one.  I would have guessed this would have been handled by Britain's RAF.

Don't forget  that Burma bordered India, both were part of the British Empire, and Britain already had a considerable military presence in India, and was fearful that, having overrun Burma the Japanese might extend their operations to India.
The US interest in Burma was the possibility of opening a back-door into China across the eastern flank of the Himalayas, which they eventually did. The Burma theater featured strongly in the imagination at the time, so much so that there were a number of movies made about the Burma theater and with A level stars and directors.
Australians in Burma?
My hackles just rose!
Burma and India 1941-1945
https://anzacportal.dva.gov.au/resources/burma-and-india-1941-1945

Probably fewer than 10,000 of those who played a part in the Burma campaign were Australians. Nonetheless, the campaign was noteworthy for Australians. By contributing men to this 'forgotten war', Australia could boast that it had met the enemy on every front of the Japanese southward advances. Australians who served South-East Asia Command (SEAC) and earned the Burma Star campaign medal (or a Burma clasp if they had previously earned the Pacific Star) were to wear this medal with pride.

Burma 'It was a gigantic Via Dolorosa of the halt, the lame and the blind ...'

[Rohan D. Rivett, Behind Bamboo, (first published 1946), Ringwood, Penguin, 1991, 244.]
https://anzacportal.dva.gov.au/wars-and-missions/burma-thailand-railway-and-hellfire-pass-1942-1943/locations/australian-prisoners-asia-pacific/burma

No Australians were taken prisoner of war in Burma (now Myanmar) during World War II. However, more than 4800 Australians were sent to southern Burma by the Japanese between September 1942 and July 1944. During this period around 800 Australians died.

I have seen photos of the survivors of the railway builders when liberated. You couldn't tell the difference between them and newly liberated concentration camp survivors.
Today millennials know nothing about WWII and care even less but my generation of Australians had those images burned into our retinas.     

[Quirky Quokka]

Burma Bridge Busters
A nice information piece on the Burmese Theatre of WWII.  Interesting that A US comic book included this about a British Theatre, rather than an American one.  I would have guessed this would have been handled by Britain's RAF.  But, maybe The RAF was too tied up in guarding The English Channel, North Sea, Atlantic convoy routes, Mediterranean and North African Theatres, and needed the American Army Air Corps to help them for air support in Burma?  I Don't remember The Australians providing much help in terms of air support.  Did they even have an Air Force?

Robb, I see Panther has already addressed this, but here's another interesting article from that site that looks more generally at the Aussie air force in WWII. But truth be told, I know very little of this either.

https://anzacportal.dva.gov.au/resources/royal-australian-air-force-1941-1945

I guess each country tends to report more on what its own armed forces are doing, and they're the stories we hear more about in our own history books--except of course for the major events like D-Day, Pearl Harbor, and Hiroshima; and events depicted in movies and TV shows. When I was in primary school, I remember learning about the 'fuzzy wuzzies' (native people of New Guinea) who helped the Australians fight the Japanese in Papua New Guinea. I'm guessing that probably wasn't taught much (or at all) in British or American schools.

Cheers

QQ

[Quirky Quokka]

No-Face obviously suffered hideous facial disfigurements, and however unlikely the final effects may have been, I think describing them in too much detail would destroy the horror. Most of the truly horrifying moments in the old b/w horror movies were left to the imagination, now we have no imaginations we have to suffer movies like Saw.

Yes, I agree K1ngcat, that we wouldn't want a really gory pic and descriptions, though maybe the writer could have explained it a bit better as per Robb's suggestion. Some of the horror comics of course had those gory pics, but if I'd bought a detective one like this, I wouldn't have expected to come across anything too horrifying. I love suspense and thriller, but not horror and gore.

Cheers

QQ

[Robb_K]

Dick Tracy - Dell 4 Color Comics 96
Lots of panels (averaging 11+ per page) make for nice-sized stories in this 52-page book.  Of course, Gould's art is "cartoony" and very stylised, but I'm used to that. 

Yogee Yamma & The Underground Prisoner
Unfortunately, the first story in this book starts in its middle, and CB+ doesn't seem to have a book with the first 2/3 of this story.  The previous Dell 4 Color Dick Tracy book (#56) ends with a different story.  The story about a chemist being captured by a villain, and forced to work on developing his nerve gas that temporarily keeps people unable to resist commands from others, so the villain can sell it to enemy nations for fantastic amounts of money, is very interesting and entertaining. 

Black Pearl & The Flying Submarine/Tank
This story is typical of wartime stories about weapons plans stolen by foreign agents, who sell them to the highest-bidding heads of foreign military organisations (almost always enemies of the comic publishing nation.  And the theme of a new, secret armoured combat machined vehicle, that flies in the air like an airplane, rides on the surface of water like a boat, navigates under water like a submarine, and moves quickly over land like a highly-mobile, heavily-armed tank.  It's an interesting concept, having the protagonists (plainclothed detectives) kidnapped by the villainess, to be used as "testers" of an experimental vehicle in life-threatening situations, so that lives of her gang members aren't put at risk.  I do think that the ending is a bit weak and disappointing, having the foreign potential buyer be a US secret service agent in disguise, and capturing the main gang members all at once, just by pulling out his gun and pointing it at The Boss (Black Pearl).  And the main hero, Dick Tracy, just finding them already captured.  Not much action at the optimum (should-be) climax point.  The author using the novel idea of having Tracy take the submarine back deep under the water and pound on a mostly underground water main to send a morse code SOS message to the pumping station to send police to his rescue is an unexpected clever addition to the story.

Junior Tracy & The Great Bicycle Racket
This is a very entertaining story with a very inventive plot.  The only slight problem is that it is difficult to believe that a criminal gang with such a well-organised plan for building a business, would set up a young boy in a business, to sell stolen items, on a plot of land that was owned by someone else, with both of those situations bound to be found out by the city's authorities, ESPECIALLY because a young minor operating a business (without a license - which he likely couldn't receive in any case), would attract a LOT of attention.  A related problem is the fact that the amount money the crooks would be garnering was way too small in relation to the amount of physical work they needed to do (fixing bicycles and assembling new bikes using the stolen parts), and the high risk of getting caught.  Doing the work they were doing, they'd have been much better off to "go straight", and open a legitimate bicycle sales and repair shop.  And it also seemed like a bad idea to smash a lot of students' bicycles one time only, and need to move their mobile operations to a new town after each child businessman recruiting and bicycle parking lot smashing event.  They would be continually moving, and would need to spend more money on gasoline, flophouse rent, and eating all meals from restaurants and grocery stores, than they probably could earn from selling new bicycles from $3-5.  They couldn't all sleep in their truck, as it would need to be filled with stolen bicycles and parts, as well as tools to assemble and fix them.  The ironic thing about it is that the plot is just not well thought out.  I would think there is a way to change the plot elements to get rid of the illogical and unrealistic elements, and still have the desired entertaining results of a criminal gang taking advantage of kids' entrapeneurial instincts, and also have bicycle stealing be the source of the revenue.  I'm not sure if I'd end up using repairing the bikes as a remedy.  Perhaps just having a different gang member, posing as a civic-minded, used bicycle dealer, providing the stolen "replacement bicycles" at a "fair" price to help the families of the kids whose bikes were stolen.  The bicycles stolen in their previous town of operation could be sold in the next town, to avoid having the school children whose bikes were stolen, recognising bikes sold to them as belonging to their schoolmates.  This just points out that even some newspaper strip stories weren't well thought out because of the severe time pressure to continue day-after-day, week-after-week to come up with the daily line strip or weekly Sunday page.

All in all, this was a very enjoyable read.  I wish I could read the opening story from its beginning.  I don't remember reading it during the early '50s.  I did read some of the Dick Tracy stories in Sunday Newspapers during the 1950s and early 1960s.  But this story was from 1940, and my cousins didn't save old newspaper comics sections.

[Robb_K]

a British Theatre, rather than an American one. I would have guessed this would have been handled by Britain's RAF.

Don't forget  that Burma bordered India, both were part of the British Empire, and Britain already had a considerable military presence in India, and was fearful that, having overrun Burma the Japanese might extend their operations to India.
The US interest in Burma was the possibility of opening a back-door into China across the eastern flank of the Himalayas, which they eventually did. The Burma theater featured strongly in the imagination at the time, so much so that there were a number of movies made about the Burma theater and with A level stars and directors.
Australians in Burma?
My hackles just rose!
Burma and India 1941-1945
https://anzacportal.dva.gov.au/resources/burma-and-india-1941-1945

Probably fewer than 10,000 of those who played a part in the Burma campaign were Australians. Nonetheless, the campaign was noteworthy for Australians. By contributing men to this 'forgotten war', Australia could boast that it had met the enemy on every front of the Japanese southward advances. Australians who served South-East Asia Command (SEAC) and earned the Burma Star campaign medal (or a Burma clasp if they had previously earned the Pacific Star) were to wear this medal with pride.

Burma 'It was a gigantic Via Dolorosa of the halt, the lame and the blind ...'

[Rohan D. Rivett, Behind Bamboo, (first published 1946), Ringwood, Penguin, 1991, 244.]
https://anzacportal.dva.gov.au/wars-and-missions/burma-thailand-railway-and-hellfire-pass-1942-1943/locations/australian-prisoners-asia-pacific/burma

No Australians were taken prisoner of war in Burma (now Myanmar) during World War II. However, more than 4800 Australians were sent to southern Burma by the Japanese between September 1942 and July 1944. During this period around 800 Australians died.

I have seen photos of the survivors of the railway builders when liberated. You couldn't tell the difference between them and newly liberated concentration camp survivors.
Today millennials know nothing about WWII and care even less but my generation of Australians had those images burned into our retinas.   

I knew that Burma had been a British colony/protectorate, which had been taken over by The Japanese Army.  I also knew that The US Army Air Corps, or US Volunteers helped bomb Japanese contingents along The Burma Road in support of supply caravans.  I suspected that due to The RAAF's small size, they probably wouldn't have made up much of the Allied Air Forces used in that campaign, as compared with RAF and US.  I knew that The RAAF operated in Indonesia, Malaya, Singapore, and supporting the US re-invasion of The Philippines (especially Mindinao) in 1944.  I did know that The Australian Army sent infantry troops to fight in Burma.

I also knew that Canadian Navy and land troops participated in The Battle of Hong Kong in 1941, and in support of The US in the re-invasion of The Phillipines in 1944, and Canadian Special Forces' Navy Divers spearheaded assaults across rivers in The Burma campaign.  But most of The Canadian combat participation took place in Europe and The Mediterranean theatres.  My father and uncle were in The Royal Winnipeg Rifles, who landed in Normandy at Juno Beach, losing almost half their regiment to death or injury.  My father was wounded, later, farther into France.

[Robb_K]

Burma Bridge Busters
A nice information piece on the Burmese Theatre of WWII.  Interesting that A US comic book included this about a British Theatre, rather than an American one.  I would have guessed this would have been handled by Britain's RAF.  But, maybe The RAF was too tied up in guarding The English Channel, North Sea, Atlantic convoy routes, Mediterranean and North African Theatres, and needed the American Army Air Corps to help them for air support in Burma?  I Don't remember The Australians providing much help in terms of air support.  Did they even have an Air Force?

Robb, I see Panther has already addressed this, but here's another interesting article from that site that looks more generally at the Aussie air force in WWII. But truth be told, I know very little of this either.

https://anzacportal.dva.gov.au/resources/royal-australian-air-force-1941-1945

I guess each country tends to report more on what its own armed forces are doing, and they're the stories we hear more about in our own history books--except of course for the major events like D-Day, Pearl Harbor, and Hiroshima; and events depicted in movies and TV shows. When I was in primary school, I remember learning about the 'fuzzy wuzzies' (native people of New Guinea) who helped the Australians fight the Japanese in Papua New Guinea. I'm guessing that probably wasn't taught much (or at all) in British or American schools.
Cheers
QQ

We learned in Canadian schools (at least in my school) that indigenous Papuans helped The Australians fight The Japanese in New Guinea.  But, we didn't know they were called "Fuzzy Wuzzies".  I guess that was a reference to their high natural (kinky) hair-dos.  I hope it was an effectionate term, rather than a derogatory
term.  I'd bet that was taught in UK schools.  I doubt that that was taught in American Schools.

[The Australian Panther]

Robb,

I hope it was an affectionate term, rather than a derogatory term.

Correct, it was affectionate.
A variation was, 'Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels' because they saved many lives through being to navigate jungle and bring the wounded to safety.

cheers!

[The Australian Panther]

To get an idea of what Allied POW's went through in WWII - take a look at Sam Glanzman's depiction of the BATAAN forced March in the Philippines.
Combat 03
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=38720

And for the record, if you were wondering, I am not in any way anti-Japanese. That was then, this is now.

[gregjh]

Can't beat some hardboiled detective action! I'll get to reading these, soon.

[Robb_K]

Funny enough the first story in this Dell reprint-compilation is one of the first Tracy tales I ever read, in another reprint collection from Harvey, probably when I was around twelve-thirteen. I didn't notice the reversed names at the time, ie, the scientist whose name was Drab Color,  the publisher whose name is Patriot, or the Black Pearl whose surname is Dare. I could see that the art was unusually stylised, almost unrealistic, (I understand Gould had learned some of his craft from a mail order correspondence course) but the most important thing was that his art was truly sequential. Every panel provided the information the reader needed to advance the story. And that's probably one of the things that kept Tracy in popularity for so long.

Thanks for posting it, Panther.
K1ngcat

Kingcat, do you know which number of The Harvey series that book was?  I'd like to read the beginning of that first story with "Roloc Bard".  And for some unknown reason, there's no Dell Four Color Dick Tracy issue between #56 and #96 to contain the beginning of that story.  It makes no sense to me that Dell started a book in the middle of that story (unless they started it in an earlier issue of a different Dell series).  And why would the do that when they already were issuing "Dick Tracy" newspaper strip reprints in Four Color Comics #34 and #56, and also in their previous 1939 Four Color Comics (Series 1).  That story should have been printed in complete form in Dell's "Dick Tracy Monthly" series of 24 issues starting in 1948.  But I don't know the title of that story to look it up in GCD.

[K1ngcat]

Kingcat, do you know which number of The Harvey series that book was?  I'd like to read the beginning of that first story with "Roloc Bard".  And fore some unknown reason, there's no Dell Four Color Dick Tracy issue between #56 and #96 to contain the beginning of that story.  It makes no sense to me that Dell started a book in the middle of that story (unless they started it in an earlier issue of a different Dell series).  And why would the do that when they already were issuing "Dick Tracy" newspaper strip reprints in Four Color Comics #34 and #56, and also in their previous 1939 Four Color Comics (Series 1).  That story should have been printed in complete form in Dell's "Dick Tracy Monthly" series of 24 issues starting in 1948.  But I don't know the title of that story to look it up in GCD.

Oh, Robb, I wish I could tell you. I know it's still in my comics collection upstairs, but I haven't been upstairs for about two years on account of my mobility problems so I can't even check it out for you. Sixty years has passed since I first read it, and my mind's a bit fuzzy on the details now.  All I remember is it was a Harvey "giant size" compilation with a predominantly yellow cover. It was only the fact that I remember the Roloc Bard story that made me realise I'd seen it before. But it's always possible that they'd started that reprint half way into the story too, and seeing the original might not help you any.

All the best anyway
K1ngcat

[crashryan]

K1ngcat: After a bit of detective work of my own I found what I believe is the comic you're remembering. It isn't one of the 25-cent giants, but the last ten-cent issue before the 25-centers began. Harvey's reprinting of the Yogee Yama story begins in Dick Tracy #139 (Apr 1960) and ends in #140. Roloc Bard introduces himself in #140. This was the last 10-cent Harvey issue. Neither of these issues has a yellow cover, but a later 25-cent issue does, so you might be mixing the two up. Memory does that to one! Here are links to the covers for #139, #140, and #143, the 25-center with the yellow cover. I'm sorry but I can't get the usual image imbed to work. You'll have to click the links. The files are from the GCD.

https://files1.comics.org//img/gcd/covers_by_id/183/w400/183046.jpg?9168731489884749029

https://files1.comics.org//img/gcd/covers_by_id/183/w400/183047.jpg?-1228916844784029388

https://files1.comics.org//img/gcd/covers_by_id/183/w400/183050.jpg?-3172010493588697436

Robb: I have scans of all of Dell's Dick Tracy books, including Four Color and monthlies, except for #6 in the first Four Color series. It looks like Dell did indeed start F.C. #96's story in the middle without having run its beginning in another comic. Usually in their strip reprints they'd at least add a brief opening caption sketching out how we got here. Not this time.

[SuperScrounge]

Kerry Drake Detective Cases 2

Kerry Drake Trails the Faceless Horror
"That'll hold the little morons for another day!" - Isn't that line based on a real life comment by a children's show host who thought the microphone was off? 

Kind of simplistic, but okay.

Burma Bridge Busters
Interesting, but short.

Dotty Dripple
Okay.

[crashryan]

SuperScrounge, that quote references an urban legend which became attached to "Uncle Don" Carney, the host of a kiddie show broadcast from 1928 to 1947 on New York's WOR. Usually the story claims Carney said "That ought to hold the little bastards" and the station was immediately swamped with telegrams fom outraged parents. The story goes on to say that Uncle Don was fired, blackballed from radio, and ended up a drunken derelict. All this never happened. In fact Carney was on the show til it ended, after which he continued with childrens' programming until his death in 1954.

Snopes has a thorough, fascinating look at the legend's history, which starts before Uncle Don, and how it became attached to Carney. Much of the blame goes to Kermit Schaefer, who in the mid-1950s produced a series of "blooper" records purporting to be recordings of outrageous broadcast slip-ups. They were in fact re-creations, and many of the "bloopers" probably never ocurred. I remember hearing some of these records as a kid. They were popular "party records."

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/uncle-don-rumor/

[The Australian Panther]

"That'll hold the little morons for another day!" - Isn't that line based on a real life comment by a children's show host who thought the microphone was off? 

Apparently that is an urban legend dating  back to Radio days. Must have been a powerful one because I remember hearing it in Australia  - told of an American children's host - and until now I didn't doubt its veracity, It is quite believable!
Did Uncle Don Call Kids 'Little Bastards' on the Air?
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/uncle-don-rumor/
Clearly, the line in the comic references this story!

Cheers!

[Robb_K]

K1ngcat: After a bit of detective work of my own I found what I believe is the comic you're remembering. It isn't one of the 25-cent giants, but the last ten-cent issue before the 25-centers began. Harvey's reprinting of the Yogee Yama story begins in Dick Tracy #139 (Apr 1960) and ends in #140. Roloc Bard introduces himself in #140. This was the last 10-cent Harvey issue. Neither of these issues has a yellow cover, but a later 25-cent issue does, so you might be mixing the two up. Memory does that to one! Here are links to the covers for #139, #140, and #143, the 25-center with the yellow cover. I'm sorry but I can't get the usual image imbed to work. You'll have to click the links. The files are from the GCD.

https://files1.comics.org//img/gcd/covers_by_id/183/w400/183046.jpg?9168731489884749029

https://files1.comics.org//img/gcd/covers_by_id/183/w400/183047.jpg?-1228916844784029388

https://files1.comics.org//img/gcd/covers_by_id/183/w400/183050.jpg?-3172010493588697436

Robb: I have scans of all of Dell's Dick Tracy books, including Four Color and monthlies, except for #6 in the first Four Color series. It looks like Dell did indeed start F.C. #96's story in the middle without having run its beginning in another comic. Usually in their strip reprints they'd at least add a brief opening caption sketching out how we got here. Not this time.

Thanks, Crash!  Now knowing what comic book contained the story, I could find a copy to read it.  A Danish friend of mine had a copy of that book and sent scans of that story to me.  I've now read the entire story.  And it is a good one, set up well in the earlier two segments.  It's downright unsatisfying to only be able to read one or two episodes of a 2 or 3-episode story.  That takes me back to my early days of comic book collecting, when I had only 1 or 2 issues of mid-to-late 1940s Walt Disney's Comics & Story's inherited from my older cousins, or bought at the used comics shelves, and was missing 1 or 2 episodes of a 3-episode Floyd Gottfredson Mickey Mouse long story.  Sometimes, I had to wait years to finally get the missing issue.  That was back before collectors' book stores and weekly auctions, and when it was hit or miss that I would find them for 5 cents, Canadian, at the used book shops used comics rack, because some older kid decided to sell his old comics because he'd "grown up"!