This month, Paul welcomes frequent network guest Captain Entropy to the show. They discuss DC Special #26 from 1977 starring Enemy Ace! Tune in for an entertaining combo of WWI aerial action and somber brooding! Plus a wolf!
This month’s instocktrades.com selections:
https://www.instocktrades.com/products/sep247462/atlas-comics-library-hc-no-4-war-comics-vol-1-(mr)
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“Cloud Dancer ” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
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somehow every sgt Rock I ever read had enimey ace in back. Ya think “I hope he never became a nazi
Can i say that “who Killed Batman was REALLY dumb. If Lex lUTHOR had ever punched Batman he’d feel the diffrence in hitting somebody as strong as full power superman! YOU feel it when you punch somebody with WAY more musscle than you
The Garth Ennis/ Russ Heath 2 part mini War In Heaven set in WW2 addresses if he became a nazi , it’s an incredible story. If anyone wants to read an awesome story with Enemy Ace in it pick up Saga of the Swamp Thing # 83, after reading that I was a fan & got his first appearance at a traveling flea market 30 years ago & grabbed any books he guest starred in, plus the archive edition for him (plus both Sgt. Rock) also the DC direct action figure.
Great stuff and great research all around – I have had the Showcase Enemy Ace intros in my collection for decades – but somehow never read them, or any other Enemy Ace, so I learned so much over this past hour. I happen to also have this issue of DC Special, so I was able to read it today before listening – which made your cast even more enjoyable. Liked having Captain Entropy on, providing the military aviation aspects! Here’s a question… I noticed in one story, there’s a third of a page of a house ad at the bottom of the page (on the left side of the comic fold) that, despite the fact that the story continues directly on the page to the right, with no page flipping needed, they nonetheless have “Story continues on next following page” at the bottom of the panel. I’ve always assumed that publishers had to put this on the bottom of a page when the next page you’d turn to would be an ad, to separate the content from the ads – sort of a warning to kids that they next page wasn’t content – maybe this was a legal requirement? Does anyone know. Just something I was always curious about. Keep up the good work.
I first met enemy ace in the Batman Brave in the bold cartoon that’s how met a lot of characters back then .
I like the wolf partner . I mad dc comics did not let enemy ace keep the small dog he found . As think any hero is always better with an animal parter an I love the of his squad having a dog as there mascot as believe, there are several heroic dogs in the war.
In real live possibly on both sides not sure.
Here’s a secret question: if some one wrote a graphic novel with enemy ace and wolf and give the wolf a name and let’s say change some things
First the puppy lives and becomes a mascot and balloon buster gets his own two animal mascots as well a bull dog named tex and other you choose also lets add two more enemy’s for ace a woman who from France who takes her brothers mantle of the hangman and a Chinese ace know only as blaze . Who would you want to write and draw this story and what would tittle it
Second posting of this reply:
The second mascot should be a lion, after the real life lion the Lafayette Escadrille had. They were a squadron of volunteer American fighter pilots who joined the French Air Force before America entered the war. And the story should be called “Friends, Foes, and Femmes Fatale.”
But those are just my suggestions.
Manfred Von Richtofen was the ace known to us as ‘The Red Baron’, which Charles Schultz made the nemesis of Snoopy in his WW1 fantasies.
I’m pretty sure that was mentioned on the show, Morgan.
Another great episode. I love this show. We get episodes of Strange Sports, superheroes and disasters, and WWI combat in the blazing skies.
I’m only familiar with Enemy Ace from his feature in the short lived Men of War comic from the late 70s, and the really fun pulp adventure Guns of the Dragon you guys mentioned. That’s a four issue mini I highly recommend tracking down. You get Enemy Ace, Batlash, Vandel Savage, dinosaurs and ninjas all running wild in search of a legendary pair of swords. Sgt. Rock, Code Name: Gravedigger and The Unknown Soldier were the war comic heroes of my youth. Of course once Marvel’s G.I. Joe hit the stands featuring a hi-tech modern day military force, all other war books were doomed. Sgt Rock managed a few more years and might have gone on longer had the Schwarzenegger film adaptation been made. G.I. Joe was a dominant ing force in toy aisles, comic book racks, and TV.
Glad the comments thread is starting to blow up, and thanks for the kind words about the show! I just told the illustrious Rob Kelly that Paul was a great host, and Rob said “He’s a natural.”
For the sake of completeness, the fourth force acting on an aircraft in flight — the one I forgot — is weight, caused by gravity. For another podcast where I talk about a time I forgot about weight and gravity, listen to Shag and me here: https://fireandwaterpodcast.com/podcast/jli50/
This was a fun episode even for a non-military uneasy flyer like myself. My first exposure to Enemy Ace was my first Justice League comic, Justice League of America #159. My original copy is long gone into the most of time, but I recently picked up another copy of this classic JLA/JSA team up.
And Captain Entropy, I love the idea of hidden treasure comics.
🙂
Great episode, Paul and Cap! Cap really brought the knowledge and I had to skip back four times to try to understand how wind currents lift an airplane. Spoiler alert: I still don’t understand, but that’s on me. I’m pretty sure the only time I’ve read an Enemy Ace story was in a Best Of digest, so it was really interesting learning more about him. Just a great episode.
Bernoulli effect diagram headed your way soon, Brett. Thanks for the kind words!
Diagram here:
https://www.valispace.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/Screenshot-2023-01-17-160919-300×191.png.webp
In science, fluids can be liquids or gases — any substance that conforms to the shape of its container. When fluids travel faster, the pressure they’re pushing in the direction lateral to their movement decreases. For example, if you hold your thumb partially over a hose and make the water travel faster, the hose will constrict slightly, because the lateral pressure of the moving water decreases, pushing the hose out less forcefully.
The top surface of a wing is curved, and the bottom is flat. Consequently, the distance from the leading edge of the wing to the trailing edge is farther across the top of the wing than along the bottom. But, since the whole wing moves through the air at the same time, the air that goes over the top gets to the trailing edge at the same time as the air moving along the bottom. Since it has farther to go in the same amount of time, the air on the top of the wing has to move faster.
Since the air on top of the wing is moving faster, it has less lateral pressure than the air moving below the wing. So, the air moving below the wing pushes the wing up. That’s Bernoulli principle lift. I think there are other things that can cause lift, but they’re more complicated. I don’t remember if our instructor ever tried to teach us those; the phrase “beyond the scope of this introductory class” came up a lot in the core STEM classes everyone had to take. But I certainly never learned (see aforementioned “D”).
Thanks, Cap!
Great episode! The cover might make it worth the price.
I found a copy of the Enemy Ace Archive addition still in the shrinkwrap for $20 at a book store and grabbed it. I love the main character, his conflicted feelings, his honor, his difficulty relating to humans, and his bond with the wolf. When you marry that complexity with Kubert’s superior art, from the brooding camp scenes to the incredible aerial battles, this is a big win.
The discussion about the parachute was fantastic too!
Great show as always.
Here are comments that were lost somehow:
Brian Ciufo
Excellent episode. And educational too! Captain Entropy was the perfect cohost for this issue. I never knew what a “tracer bullet” was beyond an alias used in Calvin and Hobbes.
Captain Entropy
I loved whenever Calvin & Hobbes went into Calvin’s fantasy world, but I especially loved the kid noir tales of Tracer Bullet.
Oh, and thanks for the kind words!
Anj also had one but he re-posted.
Rob K
This was a great episode, Captain Entropy’s military knowledge (something pretty rare on the network) really brought some fascinating real world context to the details of the story.
I have not read many EA stories, because when I was kid bi-planes = zzzzzzzzzzzzz. But now of course I have a greater appreciation for the material, and the subtlety that the creators were trying to bring to war comics and not have it just be action, action, action. It would be easy to make war comics make it all look fun, which is disservice to everyone involved.
Chris Mort
Great episode! I had never even heard of Enemy Ace before and now I’m on the hunt for anything I can find. The thought of an enemy being the protagonist intrigues me. Thanks for bringing my attention to this great character
Chris Franklin
Fantastic and very educational discussion Paul and Captain! I first met Enemy Ace…kinda…in the Tempo Batman paperback from the 70s which reprinted the O’Neil/Adams “Ghost of the Killer Skies” stories with Batman and “Enemy Ace”, or a reasonable facsimile. I honestly haven’t read many of his stories, but one that stands out to me was the short silent tale in Christmas with the Super Heroes #2 by John Byrne doing his best Kubert impersonation. It captured the character really well, me thinks.
I applaud DC for recognizing quality work like this and giving it a spotlight when it wasn’t really commercially viable at the time. It would have been easier just to put out another Superman or Batman reprint title to take up shelf space and appease advertisers, but they did something more here. Books like this were the road to the modern trade paperback. I’m so glad they are getting such a great showcase here on Paul’s show! If I ever see this book with it’s gorgeous cover at a reasonable price, I’m defintely going to pick it up. And yes, we need more DC war comics on the DCU Infinite app!
The Enemy Ace comics I’ve read are the same as those Chris cites, so I found this show very BBC – informative, educational and entertaining. I wonder if there was any prototype Enemy Ace in DC Comics, given how often a character would appear – and die – in a one-off tale before a very similar character was given a series. Maybe Robert Kanigher had another sympathetic German before Von Hammer appeared.
Anyway, cheers chaps, Paul is indeed a great host and Captain Entropy the expert fan we need.
Enemy Ace was a character I started collecting near the end of my collecting days. I met George Pratt at a con, when he was working on his Enemy Ace book. I chatted with him about the project , and his enthusiasm for the character infected me! I bought a sketch of E.A. from him and a non-E.A. print as well. For the next couple of years, when I had occasion to be in a comic shop, I hunted for affordable issues of Star-Spangled War, or Unknown Soldier that had E.A. stories. That was many years after the Special discussed on this podcast! When this book come out, I had no interest in it at all! However, I do have the original printing of the first story in the Special, so I was able to read along!
There is a repetition to Enemy Ace stories. One reads about Spads, and Nieuports, and Fokkers, and Camels. The “curse of the skies,” the isolation of von Hammer, and, of course, the inevitability of death. But each story on its own, especially when drawn by Kubert, is a gem.
This issue may be the LAST all-reprint comic from DC, at that time. When Jeanette Kahn became publisher, she launched a concerted effort to remove all the reprint titles from the roster. This title, like almost all the titles this podcast will examine, had started out as a reprint book! I remember, as a young reader then, many letter columns praising the move and scorning reprints in general. I did a search on Mike’s Amazing (praise be its existence) and there a few more titles that had one or two reprints in them over the next few months, but DC Special #26 seems to be the last book of just reprints.
Until DC realized the value of reprints in better packaging!
If there’s one man I trust to give us a podcast episode or series about Enemy Ace it’s the good Captain Entropy. This was inspired co-hosting choice Paul and excellent lobbying by Capt.
Loved the episode and I came away feeling smarter than I did before I listened, not sure how you both managed that because I was also thoroughly entertained at the same time.
Thank you both for this wonderful hour of listening.
Thank you for your kind words, Doug! I’m glad you enjoyed it.
Another great episode. I was so glad to hear that DC Special 26 – Enemy Ace was coming soon and it didn’t disappoint. Like a lot of people who grew up in the 1970s/80s superheroes were my comics, it wasn’t until much later that I discovered some of the amazing work that was going on in DC’s war books. The Kanigher/Kubert tales are amazing, and I think you did a great job capturing Von Hammer’s dedication to honour and the quiet pain that comes with it.
A couple of notes… Enemy Ace did face off against the Hangman a couple of times, but he also went head-to-head with DC’s other WWI flying Ace, Balloon Buster in a backup feature in Unknown Soldier 262-267. I’d also like to suggest a future episode featuring my OTHER DC war comic favourite – The Haunted Tank. DC Special Series #22. I’m not American, but it might be nice to hear first-time reader’s reactions in 2025 to a WWII tank flying a Confederate Flag. Recently I’ve also been fascinated by Joe Kubert’s work on Tarzan… another genre I’d always given a hard pass to. Maybe you could squeeze in an episode featuring Limited Collectors’ Edition #C-22 Tarzan as well. You might be surprised by how good it is.