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in: Will Eisner/Cover Artist, Will Eisner/Writer, Bob Powell/Writer,
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Millennium Edition: Military Comics Vol 1 1

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""The Origin of Blackhawk"": This story is reprinted from Military Comics #1.

Millennium Edition: Military Comics #1 is a one-shot with a cover date of October, 2000.

Synopsis for "The Origin of Blackhawk"

This story is reprinted from Military Comics #1.

Poland 1939: Germany invades, and Nazi Captain Von Tepp leads his famous "Butcher Squadron" against the greatly outnumbered Polish air force. The Poles fight valiantly but are shot from the sky until only one jet-black plane remains. Finally, the lone flyer is overwhelmed and crashes in a "pancake" landing. He runs for a nearby farmhouse, but Von Tepp dives and drops a bomb on it. The flyer rushes in and calls for Jack and Connie, his brother and sister. Connie is killed instantly, and Jack soon dies, too. Before he goes, Jack asks his brother to get revenge.

Months pass, and a squadron led by the mysterious "Blackhawk" has the Nazis scared. The one question Blackhawk always asks is: where is Von Tepp? Von Tepp hears of this and lays a trap at a comfortable chateau in France with a pretty English nurse as bait. Blackhawk and his men surround the chateau and turn the tables on the Germans. He confronts Von Tepp and there is a brief distracting scuffle, but Blackhawk captures the chateau's German staff. They are blindfolded, packed aboard Blackhawk Squadron's planes (long-range 4-engine bombers), and flown eastward to Blackhawk Island. There, Blackhawk challenges Von Tepp to an aerial duel and gives him his choice of pursuit planes. Von Tepp chooses his plane but secretly loosens the gas petcock on Blackhawk's plane. They shoot it out in the air; Blackhawk gets a fuel-supply problem, crashing his plane into Von Tepp's. Both survive the resulting crash, and Von Tepp is finally killed in a pistol shootout with Blackhawk. Blackhawk sends the nurse back to England, despite the fact that she wants to stay with his unit, and prepares for future attacks against the Germans.

Appearing in "The Origin of Blackhawk"

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

  • Connie (Single appearance; dies)
  • Jack (Single appearance; dies)

Antagonists:

Locations:

Vehicles:

  • long-range 4-engine bombers
  • semi-obsolete Brewster Buffaloes and Bell Airacobras
  • Messerschmitt fighters


Synopsis for Loops & Banks: "Flying With the Red Dragon"

This story is reprinted from Military Comics #1.

Two civilian American aviators (Loops McCann and Banks Barrows), at the U.S. Marine base in China, get fired from their test pilot jobs, and go to work for General Cheng, better known as the Red Dragon. They fix up some fighter planes and soon are attacking formations of Japanese bombers. They dogfight with the bombers' escorts and get shot down but are lucky to crash land right next to a hospital where a pretty American nurse can care for their injuries.

Appearing in Loops & Banks: "Flying With the Red Dragon"

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

  • General Cheng

Antagonists:

Locations:

  • China
    • U.S. Marine Base, near Chung Sow
    • Chinese guerilla flying field, near Chung Sow

Synopsis for "Origin of the Blue Tracer"

This story is reprinted from Military Comics #1.

Captain "Wild Bill" Dunn, an American engineer attached to a British Army scouting division in Ethiopia, is the sole survivor of an ambush. He is found and cared for by a young Australian, Boomerang Jones, another sole survivor, this being of the 25th ANZACs. Both units have been wiped out by the M'Bujies, a race of superbeings, armed with ray-guns, living in an impregnable fortress city, by a nearby volcano called Ras Dashin.

For many months, Dunn puts his engineering skills to work and, using parts from a junkyard full of wrecked military equipment, cobbles together a flying, diving, burrowing, obstacle-climbing vehicle, with amazing capabilities and a million-horse-power engine: the Blue Tracer. He also puts together a super-hero costume and, with Boomerang as his sidekick, attacks the fantastic city of the M'Bujies. The heavily-armored flying tank easily withstands the evil city's antiaircraft barrage; and crashes through the outer defenses. A white girl (who, from where, why?) gets rescued, and the Blue Tracer grinds its own escape tunnel into the neighboring volcanic rock, then flies out through the crater, just before tons of molten lava pour out of the side of Ras Dashin, and consume the fortress city.

Appearing in "Origin of the Blue Tracer"

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

Antagonists:

  • M'bujies (most or all die)

Other Characters:

  • white girl

Locations:

  • Africa
    • Ethiopia
      • fortress city of the M'Bujies (Destroyed)
      • Ras Dashin volcano

Vehicles:

Synopsis for Archie Atkins: "Episode With a Goat"

This story is reprinted from Military Comics #1.

In a Senussi village in Libya, Archie Atkins, desert scout, and two other British soldiers are saved from seemingly-certain doom at the blades of some hostile, Italian-sponsored, Arab tribesmen, by a goat. After a narrow escape and a grueling march through the scorching wasteland, they then join a column of Free French troops, and in a three-day forced march, go back to soundly defeat the Senussi tribesmen and their Italian allies. But when they get back to the British camp, in Gopal, the goat butts their commander, and Archie and his friends are in trouble again.

Appearing in Archie Atkins: "Episode With a Goat"

Featured Characters:

  • Cpl. Archie Atkins, Royal Australian Tank Corps (First appearance)

Supporting Characters:

  • Sgt. Jack Bailey, Royal Fusiliers
  • Pvt. Achmed, Sudanese Camel Corps

Antagonists:

Other Characters:

Locations:

Synopsis for Shot & Shell: "Enlisting the Hard Way"

This story is reprinted from Military Comics #1.

At an airshow, two wannabe Army fliers (Colonel Shot & Slim Shell) take their home-built airplane into an Army Air Force formation, and do pretty well until the wings fall off. They parachute to the ground and just happen to land on some German agents (Herr Von Slobben, Nazi Military Attache, and his two aides), thus becoming heroes by accident. They do subdue the agents with some solid punches before the Army shows up to take over. One officer tells them "I must commend your heroic deed to the proper authorities! It's men like you the country needs!"

Appearing in Shot & Shell: "Enlisting the Hard Way"

Featured Characters:

Antagonists:

Vehicles:

  • Slim Shell's home-made airplane, (Destroyed)

Synopsis for "The Coming of the Yankee Eagle"

This story is reprinted from Military Comics #1.

In the South Atlantic Ocean, German sleeper agents take over an American battleship (the USS America), and they maroon the crew, and the whole graduating class of Naval Academy Midshipmen, on the deserted "Black Island." Meanwhile, the rich playboy son of a U.S. senator hires a boat to follow his pet eagle, Sam, out to sea. The eagle leads him to the stranded sailors, and his tiny speedcraft can carry the first 12 of them to safety. On their way to land, they encounter the stolen battleship (which is returning to shell the desert island), and Jerry whips up an extremely bold plan. He calls a very large flock of seagulls to aggressively attack the under-manned battleship's crew, providing cover while Jerry and a dozen Navy men capture the Nazi leader, Von Weissmann, and then take over the ship. Afterward Jerry asks Captain Webb not to reveal the day's events.

Appearing in "The Coming of the Yankee Eagle"

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

  • Sam the eagle (First appearance)
  • Senator Walter Q Noble (First appearance)

Antagonists:

Other Characters:

  • Captain Webb

Locations:

Vehicles:

  • USS America (a Pennsylvania-class battleship)
  • small rented speedboat

Synopsis for "Origin of the Death Patrol"

This story is reprinted from Military Comics #1.

Taking off from LaGuardia Field, fired airline pilot Del Van Dyne, millionaire owner of his own Stratoliner, gets hijacked by five escaping convicts (all of whom claim to be ace pilots), who order him to fly to Boston. He instead flies to England, and along the way persuades these mugs to fight for the R.A.F., as "a foreign legion of the air." They arrive in English airspace during a German bombing raid, and manage to take out one Dornier DO-17 by dropping two drums of oil on it, in mid-air. Some R.A.F. officers see this, and are very anxious to recruit all six of them.

There is friction between the very stuffy regular military and the unruly convicts, but they get an assignment: capture the complete attack plans from General Von Plump at his HQ in Ostend, and do so in the plane they rode in on. They fly across the Channel and land near Von Plump's HQ, which is isolated and surprisingly lightly guarded. They break in and steal the plans, but Peewee is shot dead during their escape. On their return, the five surviving adventurers are issued special uniforms, and begin calling themselves the Death Patrol.

Appearing in "Origin of the Death Patrol"

Featured Characters:

  • Death Patrol (First appearance)
    • Del Van Dyne, former airline pilot (First appearance)
    • Butch O'Keefe ex-safe-cracker (First appearance)
    • Gramps, ex-pickpocket (First appearance)
    • Hank, ex-rustler (First appearance)
    • Peewee, ex-forger (First appearance) (Dies)
    • Slick Ward, ex-con-man (First appearance)

Supporting Characters:

  • Colonel Rider (First appearance)

Antagonists:

Locations:

Vehicles:

Synopsis for "The Origin of Miss America"

This story is reprinted from Military Comics #1.

Reporter Joan Dale visits Bedloe's Island, the home of the Statue of Liberty. While dozing off on a park bench, Joan wishes she had "the powers that the Statue of Liberty must possess," in order to do some good in the world. She then falls asleep and dreams that the Statue has spoken to her, and given her magic powers. When Joan wakes up, she surprises herself by making a tree disappear; her dream has become reality. Joan hurries back to her office, but along the way encounters a gang of ruffians attacking an old man. Joan gestures, and turns the hoodlums into doves. The grateful man then calls her "the real Miss America," a name which Joan adopts as her own.

Joan catches up to her boss and receives an assignment, to investigate a munitions factory bombing, in Newark. At the scene, her questions are ignored by the FBI and factory boss, so she investigates on her own, and finds a bomb fragment. As she gazes into it, the image of a large house appears; she recognizes the house and goes there, instantly, in a puff of smoke. She peeks inside the mansion and spots Mr. Grost, the factory boss, laying out new plans for his gang of saboteurs. Their next target is the Burtis Airplane Company. Joan tries again to tell the FBI what she knows, but they again blow her off. She gives up on those dolts, and goes to the Burtis plant herself, that very night, alone. Three thugs jump out to attack her, and she gestures, turning them into trees. She finds two more men planting a bomb, and she gestures, levitating the bomb in pursuit of their fleeing car and blowing it up. She then visits Grost, levitates a pistol out of his hand, and compels him to write out a confession and sign it, and finally she delivers him to the FBI.

She then breaks the Fourth Wall by looking over her shoulder and winking at the reader.

Appearing in "The Origin of Miss America"

Featured Characters:

Supporting Characters:

  • Joan's newspaper boss

Antagonists:

  • three thugs (transformed into doves)
  • three thugs (transformed into trees)
  • two thugs (Dies)
  • Mr. Grost, Factory Superintendent

Other Characters:

  • FBI Chief Inspector
    • other agents and cops

Locations:

Synopsis for "Sink the Kaiser Adolf"

This story is reprinted from Military Comics #1.

An American sailing ship (called a "schooner" even though it is drawn as a square-rigged clipper) is outfitted as a disguised warship, a Q-Ship, to fight German naval forces in the North Atlantic and protect convoys.

Appearing in "Sink the Kaiser Adolf"

Featured Characters:

  • Captain Foghorn (Single appearance)

Supporting Characters:

  • Bob Wayne (Single appearance)
  • Dick Martin (Single appearance)
  • Freckles (Marmaduke van Weyden (Single appearance)

Notes

  • This issue reprints Military Comics #1 in its entirety.
  • Bob Powell is also credited as Bud Ernest in this issue.
  • Includes a one-page feature titled "Sabotage" by Tex Blaisdell and Lake French.
  • Includes a two-page text story by Dick Scopes titled "Gone With the Draft", an obvious allusion to the 1936 novel and subsequent film Gone With the Wind.

Trivia

  • The character of Blackhawk and his Blackhawk Squadron proves to be one of the most enduring aviator adventure strips of all time. The team goes through several permutations over the years, not all of which were considered favorable by readers.


See Also

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