Unca Cheeks the Toy Wonder's Silver Age Comics Web Site!
... AND THEY'RE ALL WEARING LEATHER PANTS.
PERFECTLY NORMAL.
DON'T STARE.
"IT'S A MAN'S LIFE ON BLACKHAWK ISLAND!"
(... or: "SPINNING INTO THE SUN WITH BART AND THE BOYS": Pt. 4)
... and as if the main feature each and every month in the pages of
DC Comics' BLACKHAWK wasn't war crime enough, mind you
The BLACKHAWK comics of the period featured a rotating pair of "back-up" features: the World War Two-era "Combat Diary" stories (in which the blue-suited 'hawks would square off against Nazi scientists and suchlike) and the modern-day "Detached Service Diary" shorts (focusing upon one particular member of the squadron, in modern-day solo action; Andre one issue, say; Chop-Chop the next, and so on and so forth).
It was the latter series (the "Detached Service Diary" efforts) which
most often (and most successfully) mirrored the good-naturedly goofy approach
of the "main" BLACKHAWK stories of the period; which (depending on how
you felt about that) was either cause for jubilation outright,
or else a darned good excuse to check out what was going on in TOMAHAWK
that month.
"Hendrickson's Secret Life" [BLACKHAWK #221;
June, 1966; France E. Herron, writer; Dick Dillin,
artist] opens up with a clearly concerned Blackhawk informing us
that: "Every time we worked out of a mainland barracks, it was the same
weird story... Hendrickson would get fidgety, nervous..."
"If there's no real action popping," a jittery and twitching
Hendrickson stammers to the others; "... maybe I could... you know...
go out for a... uhhh... walk..."
"Hendrickson!" the team's plainly aggravated leader barks. "What in blazes are you trying to say?"
(Call me crazy, O Venerated Leader of Men... but: maybe the old warhorse
just needs a little "quality time" away from this whole, sweaty
Island-of-Men- In-Leather-Pants trip the rest of you are into so heavily.
I mean: some fellahs actually enjoy the company of women, y'know?
Without wanting to do their hair for them, I mean. Or
commiserate over "boyfriends.")
After a sweating and shifty-eyed Hendrickson finally darts from the room, his fellow Blackhawks mull over the whys and wherefores of their elderly teammate's odd behavior.
"But what is that crazy Dutchman up to?" a pensive Blackhawk
muses. "What is he trying to hide from us?"
"Scare bleu!" a helpful Andre exposits. "I've got
it! A secret romance! And why doesn't Hendy
tell us about his mystery sweetheart? Obviously, mes amis,
he is worried about [Pick One]:
A.) "... my reputation with ze girls! He is afraid I will... uhh... move in!"
B.) "... how ze rest of us might react to ze unsavory and unwelcome knowledge that his 'mystery sweetheart' is zat hideous crone from ze OLD NAVY television commercials."
C.) "... how ze rest of us might react to meeting zis 'Ricky Jordan' person for ze very first time!"
D.) "... how ze rest of us might react to ze gruesome sight of Hendy 'doing it' with a sock puppet. A sock puppet named 'Mr. Hot Jell-O Gums'."
As it turns out, however: the actual truth of the situation
is nowhere near as sordid (or that interesting) as all of that.
The Blackhawks' Decidedly Dull Dutchman, it seems, has a positive passion
for the petunias; one which he indulges, in secret, whenever the
opportunity presents itself.
"Ach!" Hendrickson simpers, sniffing daintily at a posie.
"If der other Blackhawks saw me sniffing my prize petunias,
vot laughs I'd get! [...] And if dey knew how tenderly I care for
my geraniums -- my tulips from Holland -- ho, ho!
How dey vould laugh! I'll never tell!"
Oh, yeah. These guys are drop-dead butch, aren't
they...?
Meanwhile, however: bridges and train trestles are inexplicably going
CR-RASH and KA-WHAM with merry abandon the whole, wide world
over; " [...] and in all cases" (a grim Blackhawk informs us) "we found
one thing in common..."
That "one thing" all the disasters share in common, as it turns out,
is the presence of bizarre, alien plant life nearby; metal-cannibalizing
vines and indestructible spores and blossoms.
"After studying the strange plant with curiosity," the following caption illuminates; "... Hendy finally spoke up."
"I vant a favor," the distracted Dutchman murmurs, studying a sample of the fantastic flora. "... but don't ask me why! I vant a Detached Service assignment on dis case!"
"You mean work alone?" the team's leader responds, plainly flabbergasted. "Well... okay, Hendy -- no questions asked! Permission granted!"
(... and does that little exchange aforementioned strike anyone else
hereabouts as being just a wee bit on the El Whacko Grande side
of the county line, by the by? I mean to say: seven aging aviators
stumble across some outer space okra; one of their number -- the one who's
been acting all reclusive and secretive and mumbling to himself,
and whatnot -- tells the others: "I'm doing this number as a solo,
girls"; and everyone else just bobs their heads up'n'down like
a bunch of corks in rough water, and chirrups: "It's all you, baby."
What the freakin' heck -- ?!?)
In any event: retiring to the remote mountain fastness of his secret,
subterranean "HendyCave" (or what-have-you), the geriatric gumshoe straps
on an apron and sets to playing a quick round of QUINCY, M.E. on the corpus
of the cosmic chrysanthemum.
After ascertaining to his own curmudgeonly satisfaction that the alien
plant life in question is " [...] a result of -- vot you call it? -- cross-
pollination!" -- Hendrickson is thunderstruck when the star-spawned
shrubbery disintegrates right before his disbelieving peepers.
The oddling occurrence, however, triggers a stubborn scrap of memory within the mind of the Alzheimer'd Aviator, in turn.
"Dot's it!" the aged adventurer exclaims, triumphantly holding aloft a sheet of paper from his work desk. "Now I remember! Here's a note on unidentified seeds falling from der skies recently...!"
(There's simply no place in all of temporal/spatial reality your envious Unca Cheeks would rather live, ultimately, than the DC Comics universe of the Silver Age. Cub reporters wedding female gorillas, willy-nilly [JIMMY OLSEN]; scientists hefting super-dense collapsed stellar matter -- with their bare hands, mind -- and fashioning skin-tight fighting togs out of it [THE ATOM]; toddlers gaining fantastic shape-shifting abilities after being injected with monkey's blood [DOOM PATROL]; Unidentified Space Seeds raining down from the very heavens; etcetera, etcetera -- and people just... y'know... took seriously whacked-out, Timothy Leary-esque stuff like this perfectly in stride. IT WAS ALL JUST BUSINESS AS USUAL -- no more; no less.
(Oh. Yeah. Now I remember. Those nutty darned
space seeds I was reading about, just the other day. [::smacks
forehead::] Where was my head at, f'chrissakes...?)
Utilizing a weather map (!!) to calculate the airborne dispersal pattern of said seedlings ("Like many seeds, dese were carried by air currents... and der prevailing winds were blowing from... an island!"), Hendrickson commandeers one of the team's ubiquitous "Hawk-Copters" and heads out towards the desolate oceanic sandbar of his estimations.
"A clever scientist must be behind all dis!" the liver-spotted
lancer muses to himself, en route. "Vot a brain it
took to develop such fantastic plants!"
... orrrrrr : maybe just a great, whopping, butt-ugly purple
space cucumber, even.
"Welcome, human thing!" the gargantuan ambulatory bathroom
mold telepathically greets the thunderstruck Teutonic. "Yes,
I am a king- plant, and my subjects have brought you
before me to determine your fate!"
"I see this surprises you, interloper!" the alien being
continues. "Communication comes in many varieties!"
(Yeah: like really crappy comic books, for instance. I'm
just sayin', is all, really.)
"What you 'hear' now are telepathic messages!" the tuber transmits, in conclusion. "I am sending thought pulsations to your feeble mind!"
("...thought pulsations"? Did he really and truly say "thought
pulsations'...?!?)
"Feeble mind?" an outraged Hendrickson splutters, advancing with fists at the ready. "Listen, you overgrown weed, I'll... I'll... !"
In a truly heart-pounding instance of the trademarked, two-fisted
action style which made the BLACKHAWK comics of the Silver Age a household
word in the France E. Herron household, the charging Hendrickson is sent
reeling after being rudely smacked in the proverbial kisser by a really
mean, big blossom.
"Now hear this," the space scallion thunders, telepathically;
"... one more foolish move, and I'll feed you to my herd of
carnivorous violets!"
(Someday -- someday, mind, now; before his heart and lungs finally
give out, and he finds out once and for all if Death really is
a black man on bright red skis -- your irascible ol' Unca Cheeks is going
to compile himself a list, he is. Something with a title
along the lines of [I'm just spit-balling, here; we can run it by the
boys in Marketing, if you like] THE 1,001 GREATEST LINES OF DIALOGUE IN
COMICS HISTORY. "... one more foolish move, and I'll feed
you to my herd of carnivorous violets!" could conceivably make the
final cut, I suppose. Lobotomies happen.)
Fortunately for all we photosynthesis-challenged types on the planet, however: the rest of the Blackhawks show up in the very nick (some silly bit of business concerning a "hidden radio transmitter" in Hendrickson's Blackhawk costume, or somesuch; so much for all that high-minded "Well... okay, Hendy -- no questions asked! Permission granted!" hoo-
hah, huh...?), and defoliate the silly sod-thing to death. Lookit:
eight pages is eight frickin' pages, all right...?
The team's well-renowned sensitivity towards (and acceptance of)
bizarre alien life forms plays an even more pivotal role in a tepid little
tale entitled "Chuck's Pet Monster" [BLACKHAWK #223; August, 1966;
France E. Herron, writer; Dick Dillin, artist].
Responding to a frantic radio summons from an old college professor
and mentor -- one Professor Trippe by name -- team member Chuck
arrives at the remote castle laboratory of the latter in the midst of
a driving thunderstorm.
"I've done it, Chuck," the Professor exclaims. "I've done it! Remember my theory on teleportation?"
"Do I remember?" the American aviator shoots back, cheerily.
"You're talking to a former student who had to take the Teleportation
Theory class... twice!" (Oh, those darned silly NYC PoliSci
majors! Always bragging -- !)
One page later, an overly-excited Trippe is holding handsies with
(and making goo-goo eyes at) a tall, robed skeletal figure with
a scythe; and the Professor's gargantuan frammistat is serving as an inter-spatial
bypass for a big, honkin' something-or-other from De Bad Side O'
De Galaxy.
("I probed too far," the palsied Professor manages to wheeze,
whilst his eyes are filming over. "Probed into distant worlds
[...] h-hold me, Chuck... I-I'm faint... "
("Holding" this. "Probing" that. And this book proudly
carries the Comics Code Authority Seal of Approval, f'chrissakes.
Oh, dearest God... the children, Herron... what about the
children, you sick, degenerate ANIMAL -- ?!?)
(Y'know... the very last thing your grey and fading Unca Cheeks is
gonna see, on his death bed -- other than the signed and framed life-size
"nudie" print of Perry White that a drunken Kurt Schaffenberger
penciled for him at the Mid-Ohio Con a few years back, I mean -- is the
gaunt and horrible spectre of a Way, Way Seriously Cheesed-Off
Francis E. Herron, Esq. With a hammer.)
Well... anyhoo: the creature of the story's title -- a big, quasi-electrical
fuzzy wuzzy with a moon face and a toothy, imbecilic grin not unlike that
favored by veteran character actor Tom Bosley -- vanishes from
the (late) Professor's laboratory...
... only to re-appear, scant heartbeats later, smack-dab in the middle of nighttime Times Square.
Dressed to the nines in a sequined tuxedo. And spats.
And warbling old Ethel Merman show tunes.
Wellllllll... okay. Not really. But, admit it: you
wanted to see it.
As luck (and inordinately inept storytelling) would have it, the
Blackhawks just happen to be flying overhead at the precise moment of
the whatisit's corporeal manifestation; locked and loaded, as it were,
for bear and more bear.
In response to the anti-aircraft ammo attack on the part of the Action
Aviators, however (alliteration: "It Does a Body Good"),
the electro-magnetic Enoch discharges a series of self- contained "static
explosions"; which have the unfortunate effect of (as the accompanying
panel caption provides) " [...] whipping [the Blackhawks] around like
sheets of paper in a hurricane... completely out of control...!"
Their craft threatening to buckle under the onslaught of the preternatural buffeting, the Blackhawks are forced to land (right in the middle of Broadway, mind; a scene which the estimable Dick Dillin, wisely, elects not to afford any credibility whatsoever by rendering it onto the page); and are flabbergasted, in turn, as the creature takes this as perfect opportunity to vanish, straightaway, into thin air.
"Alors!" a sorely perplexed Andre (yeah... I know; I know) queries of his fellows. "What are we up against, mes amis?
"It ban one big nightmare," Olaf offers, in his typically
technocratic, jargon-laden way. "That's what!"
"Maybe Chuck and the Professor know something about this,"
Blackhawk counters, desperate to keep the conversation from getting too
rarefied and ridiculously cerebral. "Let's get out to the lab!"
Meanwhile, Back At the Lab: a frazzled and bleary-eyed Chuck is laboring
over the late Professor Trippe's voluminous scientific papers, in a heroic
attempt to undo whatever hoodoo he dood. Did.
"The Prof's notes," the glum airman muses; "... hundreds of them... it's all kinda over my head... but at least I think I've got an inkling to all this..."
"His figures show an error in his conclusions!" Chuck realizes, with a start; said "error" being hastily explained to the goggle-eyed reader as [Pick One]:
A.) "He didn't contact an alien world with his teleporter... the power of the mechanism can't possibly carry to another planet!"
B.) "Right here... where it says: '... and throwing the last switch will cause a gigantic electro-magnetic creature to appear, wreaking unimaginable havoc and destruction wherever it goes. Either that, or else maybe a puppy.' "
C.) "Right here... where it says: 'I'm kookoo for Cocoa Puffs! Kookoo for Cocoa Puffs!' Cripes, but the Prof was a twisted old fruit -- !"
D.) "Right here... where it says: 'He who reads these words
of wit/eats these little balls of -- '... oh, now that's just plain
old naughty!"
The creature mysteriously re- appears amidst the ruins of the Professor's
lab; with the Blackhawks hard on its non- existent heels.
Right at about the point where the creature is busily swatting the
agonized aviators about like so many pain-wracked jai alai balls,
a grinning Chuck bolts upright from his study of the Professor's papers
and confidently exclaims:
"These notes... I've got the answer! Yeah... I've solved the mystery... but bru-ther, I hope I'm not too late!"
Just as the rest of the team is drawing a collective bead on the rampaging whozis with their handy assortment of matching color-coordinated bazookas: a panicky Chuck sprints directly into their line of fire, waving his arms and shouting "No... NO! Don't fire at it!"
The creature -- oddly touched by this wholly unexpected display of simple human charity -- gingerly grips the (comparatively) tiny Chuck in one massive paw; holds him aloft; and crunches his head like a Tootsie Pop.
... or, rather: in a happier, far better world, it might have
happened that way.
In this vale of tears, however: Chuck informs his incredulous
teammates that: "It doesn't intend any harm! It's only trying
to find a way back to where it came from! I know!"
With his newfound friend now nuzzling him in a way that's every bit as fully disturbing as might be the sight of a nekkid William Frawley bumping and grinding in front of your mother, Chuck leads the fuzzy wuzzy back over to Professor Trippe's thingamahoozie; and -- after serving up a quick side order of comic book mumbo jumbo ("It's not from another world... it's not even a creature, really... I mean, it's a materialized something, out of our own atmosphere!") -- the team's token American disperses the big lummox back into the ether from whence it came.
"I kind of hated to see it go back, Chuck," a grinning Chop-Chop slyly offers. "After all, it made a cute pet monster for you!" To which a chuckling Chuck responds, in turn [Pick One]:
A.) "No, thanks... can you imagine leading that thing around on a leash? BR-R-R-R!"
B.) "Why? We already have Olaf, f'chrissakes!"
C.) "Speaking of 'leashes' and suchlike: on your knees,
Junior Birdman! The ol' Chuckster's other 'pet monster' is
a-goin' on a whole 'nother rampage! Hoody-hooo --
!"
This concludes (for the time being, at any rate) our protracted examination of that fabled repository of four-color fetishism better known as the BLACKHAWK comics series of the Silver Age.
Jesus H. HaaaaakaaaaRIST, but I feel so... dirty, and low.
The BLACKHAWK Comics of the Silver Age: PAGE
ONE
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