Among the series and miniseries that I read during this November, there were a few random books that really didn’t need a single review, so just like I’ve done in the past (and did last month for #HorrorComicsMonth), I decided to just do quick reviews of all of them. And this will wrap up #WarComicsMonth for 2024; funny enough, it will also wrap-up my stack of unread war comics, although I’m pretty sure that by the time November 2025 rolls around, I’ll have a few that I can read (or maybe some to re-read).

The Unknown Soldier #214 (DC Comics). The Unknown Soldier is a title I wasn’t too familiar with outside of the character’s appearances in other stories or in DC retrospectives. I knew that he was a man with a bandaged face and it looks like he’s someone who gets sent on secret missions. In this case, he has to rescue another DC Comics’ war character, Mme. Marie, from where she is being held prisoner by the Nazis. That happens to be Auschwitz. There’s no love lost between the two, which we get from Joe Kubert’s cover where she says “I would rather die than be saved by you, Unknown Soldier!” and the feeling is just as much in the book. However, he does rescue her and in the process empowers prisoners in Auschwitz (Jews, Romani, etc.) to rise up and fight their Nazi captors even though that’s probably a futile task (although there were uprisings in the camps, and one of them, I believe, did result in the destruction of one of the crematoriums, so the comic is fairly historically accurate). Robert Kanigher and Dick Ayers (with Romeo Tanghal) do a great job with this story and it served as a really good introduction to this character. I would say that I’m keeping this comic, but it’s only getting tossed because it was heavily water damaged and had a very strong mildew smell. It was very much worth the quarter, though. Trash.

Our Fighting Forces featuring The Losers #149 and 172 (DC Comics). Like a number of people, my experience with The Losers starts with their final appearance in Crisis on Infinite Earths along with The Losers special that was a Crisis crossover (and which I have in the crossover omnibus). Here are two Bronze Age adventures that involve the team either having to rescue or possibly being double-crossed by women soldiers and spies. In #149, they are looking for Ona, who is being held captive and whose rescue has her decide to head off on in her own direction. In #172, they’re all imprisoned because they were double-crossed by Rita … or were they? Both are one-off issues by Robert Kanigher. Issue #149 has art by John Severin and #172 features the artwork of George Evans. Severin is a masterful war comics artist and it was great to see his work. Evans is excellent as well, taking cues from Joe Kubert’s classic war comics style. Both were excellent reads, although like that issue of Unknown Soldier, issue #172 has to be chucked because of water damage and mildew (again, it cost a quarter). And I hate throwing comics out, but being around that particular mildew smell for too long gives me a nasty headache, so I kind of have to. Issue #149 is in much better condition (I think I paid about $2-$3 for this at the Baltimore Comic-Con this year) and I haven’t decided what I’m going to do with it. I might keep it or I might put it into the “Comic Book Circle of Life”, which is a great place for war comics like this to go because it’s fun to share these stories. Trash and Donate.

A Sailor’s Story (Marvel Comics). Written and drawn by Sam Glanzman, A Soldier’s Story is a graphic novel that I’d first heard of in the TwoMorrows book Our Artists at War. My comic shop had it for $5.99 but the day I bought it, there was a discount on back issues and graphic novels, so I got it for a little less than that (and $5 or so for a graphic novel isn’t a bad deal as it is). The story is autobiographical and literally takes us through Glanzman’s service in World War II when he was on a destroyer in the Pacific Theater. Less like Sgt. Rock and closer to what we’d see in The ‘Nam, this book is mostly about the day-to-day or reality of service in a war, which isn’t always shoot-’em-up adventure (no shade on Rock or any of those books; I love them). In fact, while there is some action in the book, much of what we see is the type of war that even Erich Maria Remarque wrote about: long periods of tedium punctuated by moments of combat where the chance of dying can be high. I will admit that sometimes, the everyday nature of the story got a little tedious, but then reminded myself that it’s a character-driven story and I’d been reading a lot of action-driven war comics. Once I shifted that (and remembered what I liked about The ‘Nam), I really enjoyed it. It’s well-told and the art is gorgeous. Keep.