[The Australian Panther]

It's still 5:37 pm in New York and 04:09:52pm in London. Here in NSW its 7:40 am on Monday.
I am posting early because I will probably be out most of the day.
No comments on the book from me just yet. Enjoy!
   
Army War Heroes 22 [Introducing The Iron Corporal]
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=72297

Voyage to the Deep 1
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=33693

Marco Polo 1
https://comicbookplus.com/?dlid=40424

[Quirky Quokka]

Army War Heroes 21

I must admit, I'm not a huge fan of war comics. I appreciate the service that all of our military personnel do and have done, but I'm not really the target audience of these kinds of comics. But I was intrigued by the cover that promised 'a Yank in the Aussie army', so that had me reading on. It's also interesting that the stories are from WWII, though published in 1967. Not uncommon, of course, but I wondered if any Vietnam sensibilities would find their way into the stories.

Bushwhack Pass

I guess this was the sort of scenario that would happen between enemy forces, though there wasn't much of a story arc as such. Still, it showed how different strategies could play out when the odds are seemingly stacked against one side. The sudden arrival of the air force was convenient, but okay overall.

The Loner

Interesting premise of whether it's best to fight alone or with a platoon that you don't think is doing the job. As it says in the conclusion, most loners would have either been court martialled or given medals. I imagine there would have been more court martials. Although set in WWII, I wondered if this story was affected by growing sentiments since the Korean and Vietnam wars, regarding whether you should always follow the orders of commanding officers if you feel they are unjust. Though in this particular story, it seems that the loner thought the commanding officer was not up to the job.

Climb a Cliff - short story

I was trying to work out when this one was set. It mentions that the narrator was in Her Majesty's constabulary for 20 years in one of the small colonies. Even though it mentions 'colonies', it can't be Queen Victoria because it also mentions the Iron Curtain. If it's talking about Queen Elizabeth II, that would take the story into the 1970s. It's understandable that they don't mention an actual colony, but I had trouble placing the timeline. I'm also not sure about the politics. It's easy to look back on things with 21st century eyes and think that a story is politically incorrect, but there are still instances today of certain governments and organisations who weaponise different groups of local people for their own aims. Also, I think that's meant to be humour at the end, but it wasn't that funny.

The Iron Corporal

It was interesting to see something set in New Guinea, as it was one of Australia's main arenas of the war against Japan. However, I wasn't familiar with the American role. A quick google search just showed me that there were hundreds of thousands of Americans involved as well. Had the Japanese not been stopped in New Guinea, their next stop would have been Australia. In fact, the Japanese had already bombed Darwin in Feb 1942. But back to the comic! Apart from some 'good' old-fashioned Aussie fat shaming, it's a fairly interesting tale that shows the cost of war on the individual soldier and their families.

Overall

I wasn't crazy about the art, though it did the job. The lettering was quite poor and hard to read in places, especially in some of the narration boxes. The stories were okay, but not brilliant. Always good to read something different that you wouldn't usually read though.

Thanks Panther, for finding something with an Aussie connection.

Cheers

QQ

[SuperScrounge]

Army War Heroes #22

Bushwack Pass
Basically an okay average-style war story, probably would have been better longer fleshing out the problems of fighting in that kind of situation.

The Loner
Interesting. Seems to be a bit lucky for Bideau (he didn't even get hit by the enemy) but it kind of works as a character study.

Climb A Cliff
Okay.

Introducing the Iron Corporal
Except no one calls him that and the reason isn't given till the next issue. Okayyyyyyy... Otherwise okay war story.

Promo
"Exciting war stories of frontline combat action!"
Well, how many exciting war stories do you hear about soldiers based at HQ? 

[Quirky Quokka]

Army War Heroes #22

Promo
"Exciting war stories of frontline combat action!"
Well, how many exciting war stories do you hear about soldiers based at HQ? 

Exciting if someone bombs the HQ 

[SuperScrounge]

True, QQ. But how often would that happen?

Mainly I was thinking of some stories from the staff of the Stars & Stripes in WWI (I've been indexing cartoons from the American Legions where some of these stories were retold) and while there were some amusing stories not much fell in the 'death-defying' vein. 

[SuperScrounge]

Voyage to the Deep #1

Parts of this story remind me of Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea, an admiral in charge of an experimental submarine. Which came first?

The admiral thinks they will see feathered fish, furry fish, fish made of metal, and of flames.
Yeahhhhhhhhh... I don't think anything like those have ever been discovered.

A lot of telling rather than showing.

The enemy has tilted the Earth.
So the enemy is... God? I wonder if the writer is going to explain this or just handwave it away?
Handwave it is. *Jedi handwave* You will accept the nonsense about the enemy magically shifting the liquid core.

Yee gods and little fishies do they drone on about the destruction of New York. Was it the writer's wishful thinking? 

Divers in diver suits, at the base of Marianas Trench, leave the sub and aren't squished flatter than pancakes???
Funny how many science fiction writers lack any understanding of real science.

Of course, no explanation why the enemy were planning to destroy the Earth. Maybe if they'd been explained as aliens that would explain why they didn't care about the planet's fate.

What an awful story. The artist clearly went overboard to make it visually interesting, but you can only do so much.

[SuperScrounge]

Thinking further about Voyage To The Deep I wondered if it was a post-divorce issue. (The Divorce is how Western Printing referred to the split between them and Dell.)

The time's about right, I think it happened in mid-1962, the writing not being up to Western's usual stuff indicates that as well.

If so it was an interesting time. Sorry if I ramble a bit here.

For those unaware, up till mid-62, Dell Publishing hired Western Printing to produce a comic book line for them. Western signed most of the licensing contracts, hired the writers/artists/etc. and printed the books. Dell put up the money, told them how many issues they should print of each book and put their brand on the books.

When Dell split with Western, they lost most of their comic content since Western held the licenses, and they had to hire their own writers/artists/etc. to produce new books.

Kind of funny since Dell had been the number one comic book company up till that point. (Western just created the Gold Key brand and kept going.)

So the similarity between Voyage To The Deep and Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea probably is not a surprise, the movie came out in 1961, the show wouldn't arrive till 1964, so it probably seemed a safe bet to "borrow" some ideas from.

[Quirky Quokka]

Voyage to the Deep

Well, in spite of a ridiculous premise, an unknown enemy that is never explained, and a purely fictitious understanding of science, I enjoyed this one more than the war comic. As SuperScrounge says, there is a lot of telling rather than showing in the writing, but I didn't mind some parts of it. I liked the stream of consciousness as Leigh imagined what was happening in New York. Some really interesting illustrations accompanied those sections, like the image of Leigh holding New York in his palm, and the view from his mind's eye.

Even though the science is ridiculous, at least it sounds sciencey. I have no idea what purpose Judith Hill, private secretary, served other than to hug people and look concerned. If they're going to include a token woman, they could at least have the token woman doing something. I wondered how all those scientists came up with theories and solutions so quickly. And who knew that skin divers could pop out of a submarine in the Mariana Trench with no ill effects?

I did learn something though. I'd never heard of a lampray before and had to look it up. Now I know what those ugly suckers look like.

I did like the art on the whole. There were some interesting images (as noted above), some great full-page pieces with interesting caption balloons (one like a ribbon), and some interesting panel placement on occasion.

It was interesting that it was bookended with a bit about Noah's Ark. I was confused by the opening page, as there's no mention in the Biblical account of two stars of Pleiades being removed temporary so the waters could gush from the heavens.  On the last page, I had to look up the Angel Razel, as I'd never heard of him either, and it turns out he's an angel linked with Jewish mysticism. So maybe the mention of Pleiades also comes from there. In any case, it was an interesting parallel between the earth being destroyed by a flood in Noah's day, and now (1962) the possibility of nuclear annihilation.

For all its gaping plot holes, I actually enjoyed this one.

Cheers

QQ

[Morgus]

You know, I could have SWORN we did a discussion on Ol’ Sam a while ago. Maybe because it just seems like a good, obvious choice. Glanzman did a lot work for Charlton, and Dell...But if we did, I couldn’t find it.

Gotta say that MARCO POLO was my fave and the mini bio of Yoko Tani helped a lot. (It has been posted earlier and then removed.) One of those faces you KNOW you’ve seen but you just can’t figure out WHERE. The architecture (I guess you’d call it) of editing down a two hour movie to a comic book format has always impressed me.

Q.Q. I know you don’t like war comics, but if you have to check them out, Sam’s work is considered some of the best in the genre. He actually served in the war and his experiences made it into his work.  In softcover, U.S.S. STEVENS collects his D.C. stuff from OUR ARMY AT WAR. 
Now, of course, people are going to tell you that if you want to read a REAL well made war comic you HAVE TO go with the EC ones, TWO FISTED TALES, and FRONTLINE COMBAT. Harvey Kurtzman ran them and went for authentic, right down to the buttons on the uniforms and the firearms used. He says he wanted ‘war comics for people who didn’t like war comics’.
Later Marvel used it as a slogan for Sgt. Fury.
But you just know folks are going to open it up from there and recommend others. Mine would probably be Joe Kubert’s work for Sgt. Rock and Enemy Ace at DC (OUR ARMY AT WAR again and STAR SPANGLED WAR STORIES)

‘Super, I like where you went with that idea, Come to think of it, VOYAGE TO THE DEEP has the air of a divorce spat where the couple fights over who gets what Springsteen albums.

A nice selection, ‘Panther.

[SuperScrounge]

Marco Polo

I didn't realize Marco Polo was a romance.  I found myself searching my memory of various Marco Polo retellings and I could not remember any love story or battle against a coup. What I could remember was mainly his retelling of his travels of a strange far-away land that Europe was unaware of. No great romances or great battles.

As for the story itself, basic Hollywood story, with a little too much telling for the reader.

Some of Marco's expressions seemed a bit odd. A problem with reference pics perhaps?

The Case of the Third Taxi
Uhhhhh... yeahhhh... weird.

What You Do In Spare Time
Eh, okay, I guess.

Save the Beasts
Hunting bad.

Lest We Forget: Theodore Roosevelt
Not bad, for such a short article.

[Quirky Quokka]

Q.Q. I know you don’t like war comics, but if you have to check them out, Sam’s work is considered some of the best in the genre. He actually served in the war and his experiences made it into his work.  In softcover, U.S.S. STEVENS collects his D.C. stuff from OUR ARMY AT WAR. 
Now, of course, people are going to tell you that if you want to read a REAL well made war comic you HAVE TO go with the EC ones, TWO FISTED TALES, and FRONTLINE COMBAT. Harvey Kurtzman ran them and went for authentic, right down to the buttons on the uniforms and the firearms used. He says he wanted ‘war comics for people who didn’t like war comics’.
Later Marvel used it as a slogan for Sgt. Fury.
But you just know folks are going to open it up from there and recommend others. Mine would probably be Joe Kubert’s work for Sgt. Rock and Enemy Ace at DC (OUR ARMY AT WAR again and STAR SPANGLED WAR STORIES)

Thanks for that, Morgus. For me, I guess it depends on what kind of war stories. I'm not so crazy about battle scenes, though obviously that is the bread and butter of war. If there's something interesting about the story, I'll read it. For example, I've recently discovered an old Australian comic from the 1950s called 'The Phantom Commando'. Frew Comics who publish Phantom comics have included some of the old stories in compilations and I like those. But there's always a bit of a mystery or some evil plan the Phantom Commando has to thwart. So I guess they're not straight war comics.

I also own a volume of Superman war comics ('Superman: The War Years 1938-1945' compiled by Roy Thomas) and I enjoyed that, but mainly from a pop culture perspective. The enemy is very stereotyped and it's very 'Ra ra the red, white and blue', but it was interesting to see how Superman's creators were warning about Hitler way before America joined the war (not surprising as they were Jewish) and also how Superman was then used to keep everyone's spirits up and help promote the cause.

Maybe I should give some of the other war comics a try.

Cheers

QQ

[Quirky Quokka]

Thinking further about Voyage To The Deep I wondered if it was a post-divorce issue. (The Divorce is how Western Printing referred to the split between them and Dell.)

Thanks for the extra info, SuperScrounge. I didn't know any of that, so you could be onto something. Poor Dell. 

QQ

[Morgus]

An old friend called and we got talking about the comics we had in our misspent youth. Here’s another that’s too good not to pass along.
“The War That Time Forgot”. It was in DC’s STAR SPANGLED WAR STORIES in the early 60’s or so. The idea was that there’s this island where the dinosaurs are still living and American soldiers keep landing on it and have to fight the dinos to survive. Gnarly Andru and Esposito art.
Sort of changed my life. Uncle Bob saw me reading them and told me about this black and white movie called KiNG KONG, and that I should sit up and watch it with him...made me a huge fan of vintage movies and RKO.

[K1ngcat]

Well, gee, two of my least favourite things in one, War comics and Charlton! I guess overall this is more of a Sam Glanzman thing, though I was grateful for the other artists in Army War Heroes, who were a cut above some of the usual Charlton fare. Juan Dalfiume has an appealing "scratchy" style, not dissimilar to Glantzman's, though I was disappointed to find we never get to discover why the Corporal is Iron. I don't expect Tony Stark would have been worried. 

I agree with QQ, the fat shaming is annoying and unimaginative to say the least, was there a "Thin Earl" in the company that "Fat Earl" had to be distinguished from? He was a good fighter, so nobody cared if he was fat? So if he hadn't been a good fighter, everyone would have been disgusted by his chubbiness? Yikes!  Okay, as war comics go, I suppose this isn't too bad, but I'm with Morgus when he says EC was the place to go. Two Fisted Tales and Frontline Combat set the bar very, very high indeed, though I'm quite fond of Kubert's "scratchy" style on Sgt Rock. Perhaps all that cross hatching made the action seem grittier and more realistic? I think we can overlook the Howling Commandos for now! 

PS, if you're interested in lampreys, check out this true historical story...

http://the-history-girls.blogspot.com/2013/11/a-surfeit-of-lampreys-and-other.html?m=1

[crashryan]

The Sam Glanzman trilogy!

Voyage to the Deep #1

It took me a long time to warm to Sam Glanzman (or as we knew him, S.J.G.). I was a fan of the elegant Raymondesque line exemplified by artists like Al Williamson and Wallace Wood. Glanzman's rough-hewn inking struck me as crude. One of the things that got me to re-examine him was, oddly enough, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea and Voyage to the Deep. Glanzman had drawn the movie adaptation (Four Color #1230) in 1961 and its similarities to 1962's Voyage to the Deep series are, ahem, noteworthy. In both books Glanzman drew fascinating underwater lighting effects, great monsters, and exciting action. Not to mention unique montage sequences for VTD, of which more in a moment.

I'm guessing that whoever was running Dell after the "divorce"--I believe the editor was Leonard Cole--thought VBS would make a great series. Dell didn't have the rights to the movie, so they came up with a concept inspired (cough cough) by the original. The script of Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea wasn't exactly a classic, but it was miles above that of Voyage to the Deep #1.

First off, the idea of a skin-shedding submarine that expands and contracts is so stupid that even as a twelve-year-old I couldn't swallow it. Second, the "clever" Enemy's plan to destroy the USA would destroy themselves as well. In fact it would destroy the whole world. The same holds true for the Enemy's stunts in subsequent issues. Unless the Enemy are extra-terrestrials clearing the globe for redevelopment the whole idea is even less believable than having the Van Allen Belt catching fire as in the movie.

My third, and strongest, objection is that the story is padded to an insane degree. The totally irrelevant two-page montage of what the submariners might see at extreme depths is only a warm-up for a fourteen-page fantasy of what might happen, of which nine full pages are devoted to Admiral Leigh imagining New York being destroyed. No doubt about it, this endless sequence gives Sam Glanzman a chance to draw everything from Babe Ruth to the Metropolitan Museum in a parade of apocalyptic images. I was especially struck by the torrent sweeping cars down 42d Street. But heaven help us, the entire sequence, has absolutely nothing to do with the story because none of it actually happens! It's this bizarre dream sequence that convinces me the author was Don Segall, he of the "seemingly drug-induced" comic book plots. Incidentally, one scene always makes me laugh. The Admiral listens stoically as a talking head describes how half the nation has been destroyed in the flood, causing millions of deaths. But when the expert says New York may be next, that's when the Admiral perks up. 97% of the population of the southeastern states drowned, fine. But "Not New York!"

Yet with all this I like the series, dammit! Just because it's so weird. And because I like Sam's underwater artwork.

[SuperScrounge]

“The War That Time Forgot”. It was in DC’s STAR SPANGLED WAR STORIES in the early 60’s or so. The idea was that there’s this island where the dinosaurs are still living and American soldiers keep landing on it and have to fight the dinos to survive.

Having read the first volume of the Showcase Presents reprint, it was actually multiple islands and dinos even showed up in Europe, in at least one story. It was only later that it was retconned into being one Pacific island where all the adventures took place.

Did anyone ever do a story where the Blackhawks fought dinos? 

[Morgus]

'Super, if they didn't it was only because they didn't think about it. THAT would have been totally cool.

[K1ngcat]

Voyage to the Deep

It seems very like someone's not been taking their meds, though I don't know whether it's the writer or the Admiral. For a start, the Proteus is entirely infeasible, which should end the story before it's begun. The powers of The Enemy are pretty darn infeasible too, not to mention that they would certainly fall victim to their own evil intents. The dialogue doesn't even remain grammatically correct in some places, and yet, if you let it, it all seems somehow gripping, drawing  you into a strange world of furry fish, and obsessed submariners.

Thank the lord, then, that Sam Glanzman has enough imagination to rise to the occasion and pull out all the stops so this crazy tale can carry through to it's entirely incredible conclusion. It's an artistic triumph that renders this insane rubbish tolerable, all praise SJG!  If I'd've seen this when I was 12, I'd probably think the whole thing was pretty cool. As my  mental age hasn't progressed that much since 1962, I'm gonna give it a tick and a big gold star. 

Nice work, Sam. Thanks for posting, Panther.
All the best
K1ngcat

[Quirky Quokka]

Voyage to the Deep

It seems very like someone's not been taking their meds, though I don't know whether it's the writer or the Admiral. For a start, the Proteus is entirely infeasible, which should end the story before it's begun. The powers of The Enemy are pretty darn infeasible too, not to mention that they would certainly fall victim to their own evil intents. The dialogue doesn't even remain grammatically correct in some places, and yet, if you let it, it all seems somehow gripping, drawing  you into a strange world of furry fish, and obsessed submariners.

Thank the lord, then, that Sam Glanzman has enough imagination to rise to the occasion and pull out all the stops so this crazy tale can carry through to it's entirely incredible conclusion. It's an artistic triumph that renders this insane rubbish tolerable, all praise SJG!  If I'd've seen this when I was 12, I'd probably think the whole thing was pretty cool. As my  mental age hasn't progressed that much since 1962, I'm gonna give it a tick and a big gold star. 

Nice work, Sam. Thanks for posting, Panther.
All the best
K1ngcat

I'm with you, K1ngcat. The story was ludicrous, but the art made it kind of okay. I didn't even mind the stream-of-consciousness New York section. I enjoyed it in a weird sort of way 

[K1ngcat]

Marco Polo

This is quite a novelty. I can't say I'm familiar with the movie, but the adaptation is a very classy piece of work. I'm happy to accept the suggestion that Dick Giordano inked the whole thing, as it has a lighter touch overall, and there's a lot of detail in some of the facial expressions. The movie itself was made in Italy, and dubbed into English for the American release. More info and some stills appear at
https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0055141/
a bio of Rory Calhoun at
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rory_Calhoun
and Yoko Tani at
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yoko_Tani

I have no idea whether there's any historical accuracy involved but it's a good yarn, and it translates quite well into comic form. I feel sorry for Princess Amuray but Polo's obviously a self-absorbed jerk who doesn't deserve her.

The rest of the comic is typical, rather weak Charlton fare. Your Role In The Cold War is apparently go out for sports and keep in shape, which lets me out, so sorry to disappoint! Save The Beasts is a nice idea, though with the benefit of hindsight we can see how many readers were taking note. Is that meant to be a panda in the last panel? I'm sure there was more to Teddy Roosevelt than this one page suggests, I'm glad to know that he eventually eased up on the bear hunting! Full marks to Glanzman and Giordano for the main feature, though.

An unexpected treasure, thanks for posting
All the best
K1ngcat

[Quirky Quokka]

MARCO POLO

Marco Polo Feature

I've never seen the movie and I don't know how accurate it is. I suspect Hollywood may have added the ill-fated love story. The art was good, but I couldn't really get into the story. The action probably worked a lot better in the movie. It must have been an amazing adventure for the real Marco Polo, and the Europeans must have been fascinated with his tales of the Far East on his return. It's easy to forget what a difficult journey that would have been at the time. The poor princess was probably better off without him. He would have had her strapped to a horse, hiking up a mountain in no time.

The Case of the Third Taxi (short story)

I wasn't sure what to make of this. At the start, I was thinking it was short fiction. But by the time I got to the end, I was wondering if it was one of those 'truth is stranger than fiction' stories. I googled Mildred Bowers, but couldn't find someone matching that description. If it is fiction, it sort of fizzles out by the end.

Your Role in the Cold War

I couldn't really see what this had to do with the Cold War, as nothing about that was mentioned. Unless it was to lead a fit, active and responsible life to show that the American way of life is better than the one those 'commies' have. Probably not bad as a public service announcement, but would the kids who were heading for trouble be swayed by this comic?

Save the Beasts and Theodore Roosevelt

Interesting piece on the need for wildlife reserves. However, I hadn't realised that president and famous hunter Theodore Roosevelt was instrumental in changing American opinion about not over-hunting and creating reserves. (I assume that's true, because a comic book wouldn't lie  ) I thought it was then a bit ironic that the very brief article on Roosevelt on the next page included the fact that he hunted grizzlies.

Did he decide that reserves were a good idea before or after he was part of an African expedition that killed or trapped about 11 400 animals for the Smithsonian Institute?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smithsonian%E2%80%93Roosevelt_African_Expedition

I guess hindsight is a wonderful thing.

Cheers

QQ

[SuperScrounge]

However, I hadn't realised that president and famous hunter Theodore Roosevelt was instrumental in changing American opinion about not over-hunting and creating reserves.

Hunters understand the need for reserves. Once people realized that animals can go extinct people kind of realized that if you want to hunt or fish you kind of want to make sure there will be future generations that you can hunt or fish.

I thought it was then a bit ironic that the very brief article on Roosevelt on the next page included the fact that he hunted grizzlies.

He was a manly man! If I remember correctly someone shot him at a campaign event and he still spoke for an hour or so. 

That being said look up the origin of the teddy bear and how his refusal to shoot a bear led to it.

[paw broon]

Army War Heroes.
  I do not enjoy war comics and find this one a waste of paper. Some of the DC titles with soldiers and dinosaurs and a couple of others were entertaining.  But this nonsense?
I'm beginning to think I'm really old and grouchy as so many comics just don't interest me. I tried some EC.  At least the art on many of the stories was very good but the war stuff left me cold.  Not for me. 
VttD.
Even worse nonsense than the war comic.  I did enjoy a couple of the larger illustrations.  The full page of the sub being dragged to the depths by the beastie.  The half page of the sub electrocuting the giant lamprey thingy. The story is simply cobblers. I've not seen the tv series of VttBS
Marco Polo.
I haven't seen the film so I don't know if the treatment here is faithful to the screen version. I do know that this comic version isn't a patch on the Doctor Who Marco Polo:-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marco_Polo_(Doctor_Who)
There was a German series of comics based on the adventure of a character called Marco Polo:-
https://www.comics.org/series/53071/

[crashryan]

Marco Polo #1 (and only)

I'm going to swim against the current on this one. I will accept that Dick Giordano redrew the hero's head on the cover, but I believe Sam drew the rest of it, and the interiors, by himself. I offer pages 5, 8, & 11 as examples. They all show Glanzman's signature rough-hewn ink style. Giordano was a "featherer" who could put a slick, even transition on the edges of black areas. Glanzman wasn't much into feathering. He preferred getting halftones with a sort of brush stippling effect (hard to describe; look at the BG on page 7, panel 1, to see what I mean). When he did feather his strokes were thick and irregular, as on the hero's shirt in panel 1 of page 8. It's possible a few faces were redrawn by someone else. But taking page 8 again, all the heads have a Glanzman ink line. I suggest that most of what seems to be un-Sam-like is Glanzman struggling to capture Rory's likeness and to keep Yoko looking pretty. As always I warn that these are educated guesses and I welcome conflicting analyses.

I don't have much to say about the story. Like others I've never seen the movie. Has anyone here seen it? The story here stands up well enough as a historical action adventure. Glanzman does a good job with the action and the local color. Joe Gill's script has the leaden prose style common to most of his scripts, but at least, having been based on a film, the story made sense--something not common to most Joe Gill scripts.

There's little left to say about the random fillers, except that it's sad to read the glowing description of wildlife preservation in Africa in light of the current extinctions, near-extinctions, and large-scale poaching.

[The Australian Panther]

QQ said,

I hadn't realised that president and famous hunter Theodore Roosevelt was instrumental in changing American opinion about not over-hunting and creating reserves. (I assume that's true, because a comic book wouldn't lie  ) I thought it was then a bit ironic that the very brief article on Roosevelt on the next page included the fact that he hunted grizzlies.

Theodore Roosevealt was known as 'Teddy' and his preoccupation with Bears was the inspriation for the iconic 'Teddy Bear'. So if you had one for a toy as a child or gave one to a child or grandchild, thank Teddy Roosevelt.
I actually have one sitting on my lounge that I rescued from landfill.
I've been away for Easter - I'm just reading all the comments. Will have a bit to say at the end of the week.
I think it's great that we have such diverse opinions!