Carry On Sergeant!

[Lew Stringer]

I also have a feeling that to call Commando a boys picture paper may be slightly misleading as I believe it has always garnered most of its audience from an older age-group altogether. Surely it is a title beloved of the squaddie and ex-serviceman rather than the average 21st century schoolboy and a fact, if true, that might well explain its enduring appeal. As an adult readership, once grabbed, has a loyalty that no fickle twelve year old, prone to so many distractions, can match.

Yes, I was told by a local newsagent 20 plus years ago that it was adults who bought it. Ex-squaddies as you say, plus military enthusiasts.

I assume there must be kids who buy it though or otherwise surely Thomsons would have toughened the stories up a bit, showing the horrors of war, the cost to human lives and families, the propaganda on both sides etc. Although I suppose this has been done to an extent, in subtle ways.

Have any Commando stories ever been set purely in the Blitz, focusing on the story at home? I'd be more interested in that than in tales from the battlefront.

Lew

[Corporal Clott]

Anti-German stories? Having been born in Germany I suppose I should agree that we mustn?t, in the immortal words of Noel Coward, be beastly to the Huns. The sad truth is that the nation that gave us Goethe and Schiller also produced some unspeakable monsters. Like Amon Goeth, the commandant of the Plaszow forced labour camp. Looking through his office window one day, Goeth noticed a mother and daughter peeling carrots. Thinking they were peeling too slow, Goeth opened the window and shot them both. Personally, I consider Goeth more evil than Hitler. Hitler never got his hands dirty and murdered anyone. He never even went near a concentration camp. His twisted racial theories merely encouraged these atrocities. In fact, it could be argued that Hitler didn?t have the balls to kill someone in cold blood. (There was a rumour he shot his niece, but it was never proved.) Another clue is that in the First World War, rather than get involved in the dirty business of shooting at the enemy, Hitler was a company runner. Ironically, both Hitler and Goeth were Austrians. A country that came off better than its neighbour. So anything that keeps alive the memory of WW2 and the fact that it was started by the beastly Huns is fine by me.

Finally, the sad truth is that people don?t want to read stories about the Salvation Army. We?d rather read about the other one that does all the killing. That?s why Tom Clancy sells more books than the Bible, (when Clancy masturbates it?s said he thinks about an Abrams Battle Tank.) As long as most of us are fascinated by war people like me can continue to earn a little extra money.

As for squaddies reading them, I can vouch for that. There were always a number of them lying about at 6th Infantry Brigade HQ in Munster. Although no one would ever admit to bringing them in. It was even rumoured that the Brigadier himself consulted them when planning his tactics.

[Lew Stringer]

So anything that keeps alive the memory of WW2 and the fact that it was started by the beastly Huns is fine by me.

Finally, the sad truth is that people don?t want to read stories about the Salvation Army. We?d rather read about the other one that does all the killing.

Well, I can't speak for the national "we" but personally I used to skip most of the war strips in the comics. Sergeant Rock Paratrooper was the death knell for Smash! as far as I was concerned when I was a kid.

If Commando is now mainly read by adults then perhaps it should treat war as less of a big adventure and include more of the true cost of war: innocent human lives. Then perhaps its readers would be less keen to sign up as squaddies.

Lew

[Corporal Clott]

Whenever I've tried to make the stories more adult, DCT object. Anyway, I doubt if it would put many people off from joining the army. There have been numerous books and films that illustrate the horrors of war. Yet it hasn't had a significant effect on recruiting figures.

[colcool007]

...If Commando is now mainly read by adults then perhaps it should treat war as less of a big adventure and include more of the true cost of war: innocent human lives. Then perhaps its readers would be less keen to sign up as squaddies.

Lew

I am going to have to object to that comment Lew. Most join up as an escape from the dead-end jobs that are available in the local area, so that when they end up on the front-line, it comes as a total shock to the Playstation generation.

I will admit that my attestation was slightly even more mercenary. I knew that if you lasted 22 years, then you get a pension, so that once you have done your time, leave and get a job, then you have that extra financial cushion to sit back on. And while I am a self-confessed DCT fan, I was under no illusion that life in the Military was all let's go smack the enemy and be back in time for tea and medals!

To be honest it would be brilliant if Commando took on a more hard-core view to war, but I know of at least one 10 year old that would be devastated if his favourite comic suddenly took a more adult approach to war instead of aiming the slant at his age-group. For a leading example of why this may not be the best idea, then take a look at how the sales of the beautiful graphic novels of Charley's War have not had a better sales profile.

I think that Commando has the right idea. It has taken stories and made sure that they appeal to all age groups in the male demographic. For the younger ones, it satisfies the need for a bit of gore and for the older and wiser ones, it allows us to pick holes in either details or the political/historical climate of the time, the naivete of the viewpoint or to just enjoy a cracking story. But to add weight to George Low's stewardship of Commando, this is a comic that has lasted 46 years and is still a going concern. While the sales figures may not be the greatest, George is still ensuring that original comic art and scripts are still being published in the UK and are still aimed at the core market.

I know that this is a bit of a rambling post, completed while under the affluence of incohol, but I hope that non-war comic readers understand that Commando is still great value and is still trying to keep the Adventure genre alive without the advantage of a TV tie-in (Don't get me started on that subject as that would be a whole new thread! )

[Lew Stringer]

...If Commando is now mainly read by adults then perhaps it should treat war as less of a big adventure and include more of the true cost of war: innocent human lives. Then perhaps its readers would be less keen to sign up as squaddies.

Lew

I am going to have to object to that comment Lew. Most join up as an escape from the dead-end jobs that are available in the local area, so that when they end up on the front-line, it comes as a total shock to the Playstation generation.

I don't want to continue this political tangent too much but in this day and age of terrorists and warmongering politicians how can anyone enlist in the army and find it a "total shock" that they may be sent to war?

(Incidentally, I came from an area of dead end jobs too, and perhaps a poorer background than some, and our "careers advisers" at school seemed fixated on army careers for us, but I never remotely entertained the idea of signing up.)

Lew

[colcool007]

...If Commando is now mainly read by adults then perhaps it should treat war as less of a big adventure and include more of the true cost of war: innocent human lives. Then perhaps its readers would be less keen to sign up as squaddies.

Lew

I am going to have to object to that comment Lew. Most join up as an escape from the dead-end jobs that are available in the local area, so that when they end up on the front-line, it comes as a total shock to the Playstation generation.

I don't want to continue this political tangent too much but in this day and age of terrorists and warmongering politicians how can anyone enlist in the army and find it a "total shock" that they may be sent to war?...

You would be surprised as many peepul knows wot there rights are and they didn't join up to be cannun foddah.

[Corporal Clott]

Alas, I fear it?s the smell of gunpowder that still attracts a number of people. As for knowing their rights, I got a shock when I came across a copy of Queen?s Rules & Regulations and discovered just how few rights a soldier has. For example, one of the favourite military offences was Dumb Insolence. A charge that?s virtually impossible to refute. You?re damned if you speak and damned if you don?t.

[brisey]

Have to say as child most of my schoolmates read commando-battle and the like(early 70's) and we may be a sizable part of the readership.But none of my friends went into the army.

And we were brought up on a diet of Army advertising that stressed the pleasure side of the Armed Forces

Join the Army -see the world. and learn to ski with the army were two i remember.Squaddies with tans pointing at Hong Kong.No tours of NI mentioned in those ads.

Trying not to be political but nearly all troops will end up doing at least tour in a hotspot now whereas in the past you could avoid one if you were lucky.

another ramble from brian

[colcool007]

Alas, I fear it?s the smell of gunpowder that still attracts a number of people. As for knowing their rights, I got a shock when I came across a copy of Queen?s Rules & Regulations and discovered just how few rights a soldier has. For example, one of the favourite military offences was Dumb Insolence. A charge that?s virtually impossible to refute. You?re damned if you speak and damned if you don?t.

Darn! I wish that I had known that one existed. I could have used that one so often!

...And we were brought up on a diet of Army advertising that stressed the pleasure side of the Armed Forces

Join the Army -see the world. and learn to ski with the army were two i remember.Squaddies with tans pointing at Hong Kong.No tours of NI mentioned in those ads.

To be brutally honest, I have only met 6 collectors in my time so that I can honestly say that those adverts were not the greatest success. Those adverts never tempted me as I had so many relatives in the mob so that I knew the score before I signed on that dotted line.

[Corporal Clott]

I fear Colcool may be being modest. Our drill sergeant certainly knew about the offence of Dumb Insolence. It was one of his favourites. Fortunately, I never fell foul of that one. However, I once foolishly laughed at one of his jokes whilst on parade. I can hear him now calling me a ?F***ing a***hole? and telling me he was no effing stand up comedian. He then proved it by making me shovel over a ton of coal from one side of the yard to the other. Then there was the sergeant from the SIB who was a member of the Brigade pistol-shooting club. This guy could virtually quote entire sections of the QRR?s and would bore us to death reciting them. In fact, we seriously considered shooting the bugger. We reckoned we?d never get caught because his mates in the Special Investigations Branch couldn?t even catch a cold, let alone a murderer.

[Lew Stringer]

To be honest it would be brilliant if Commando took on a more hard-core view to war, but I know of at least one 10 year old that would be devastated if his favourite comic suddenly took a more adult approach to war instead of aiming the slant at his age-group. For a leading example of why this may not be the best idea, then take a look at how the sales of the beautiful graphic novels of Charley's War have not had a better sales profile.

Charley's War was aimed at kids and it proved to be the most popular story in Battle! There are ways to produce an anti-war strip and still keep it exciting and heroic, as Pat Mills and Joe Colquhoun proved. Presumably the book collections also sold satisfactorily for them to have reached three volumes so far.

Lew

[Garen]

When I was a kid I was obsessed with war comics, I bought everything that was on the racks at the newsagent. I don't know for sure if it was *because* of those comics, but I knew for certain I didn't ever want to join up!