Wednesday 22 June 2011

Duffness abounds






Had a trip down to Hastings and, as usual, popped into the Albion Bookshop for a fix of 70's paperbacks and comics.
Have said it before, but it really is a recommneded place - an old school secondhand bookshop, full to brim with clutter and coming across like the sort of place you'd expect to find Peter Cushing in while he's in one of those Vault Of Horror anthlogies.
Anyway, picked up an issue of Bullet and Warlord and, boy, two classic examples of why i don't remember them much and why i embraced Action so much when it came out.
Warlord 21st June '76 is duff beyond belief - crappy stories with crappy art. Two things of note though: "Cannuck King" conforming to the staple in UK comics of the heero having a talent or somesuch that, would you just believe it, keeps coming into situations that addresses it.
Great with Adam Eterno's fear of gold, not so great here where the hero used to be, er, a lumberjack. Makes you wonder if the script writers were scratching their heads week in and week out trying to find ways of incorperating tree felling into the action. This week we have him hollowing out a log so he can hide inside it, float down the river and blow up a bridge.
Hmmmm... How i wish he'd been stationed in the Sahara and then see how he gets on.
Other thing of note is "Rudd's Raiders", a complete Darkie's Mob variation, with one man leading a team behind enemy lines, causing trouble for the Japanese. if that wasn't close enough, the title font is EXACTLY the same.
Bullet May 22nd '76 is a tad better. "Hunted!" has a lad trying to prove his innocence after being accused of killing someone who's taken him in with a wrench. Its pretty forgettable, aside from the heavy handness of setting up the wrench as the pivotal piece of evidence. He's shown his room and the bloke mentions "I was about to put in a new wash-basin but i don't have the right tools". Up pipes laddie: "I'll borrow a WRENCH from work tomorrow", next panel he borrows it, next panel its "I'll just leave the WRENCH on the back stairs". Hey, do you think it'll be significent somehow?
Fireball is the only other thing of note which bizarrely, spends half the story dedicated to football matters before getting on to the spy stuff.

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