Just in time for his sixtieth anniversary, it’s the first appearance of Nick Fury! Your Major Spoilers Retro Review of Sgt. Fury and His Howling Commandos #1 awaits!

SGT. FURY AND HIS HOWLING COMMANDOS #1

Writer: Stan Lee
Penciler: Jack Kirby
Inker: Dick Ayers
Colorist: Stan Goldberg
Letterer: Artie Simek
Editor: Stan Lee
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Cover Price: 10 Cents
Current Near-Mint Pricing: $3600.00
Release Date: March 5, 1963

Previously in Sgt. Fury and His Howling Commandos: Given the timing of the origins of modern comic books, it’s natural that many early stories dealt with World War II. Captain America’s Hitler-punching is the most obvious example, but dozens of heroes found their genesis in the worldwide conflict. As the superhero genre waned, war comics became increasingly common, with Charlton Comics devoting a large portion of their publishing line to tales of battlefield valor and DC debuting Sergeant Rock, The Haunted Tank, and more. By the time upstart Marvel Comics got into the game, the rules of the war comic were well-established, and the Howling Commandos leap fully-formed from the mold of Easy Company. Easy-going Junior Juniper is a handsome college boy, Reb Ralston is a Kentucky farm boy, Dum-Dum Dugan is the Irish strongman with a short temper, Dino Manelli is the handsome former actor… But, since this is Silver Age Marvel Comics, a little messing with the formula is de rigeur, so the squad’s motorhead is diminutive Jewish commando Izzy Cohen, who has lost family members to Nazi atrocities, while Gabe Jones is two-fisted musician from the mean streets of New York. More on him later…

Our story opens in a hidden base, where members of the French Underground radio for help, only to be gunned down one-by-one, with the leader captures by Axis troops. Their mission is crucial: To protect the plans for the D-Day invasion! But who would be crazy enough to sneak into Vichy France to liberate him?
Sergeant Nick Fury parachutes into the war zone with only six men in his command, pushing through enemy defenses with nearly zero resistance. Nick even takes out a tank with a single grenade, all of which is delivered in trademark explosion Kirby fashion. The inks of Dick Ayers add a different layer to the proceedings than his superhero work of the era, though, adding detail and depth while avoiding overt bloodshed. (Note the flying helmets of dying Nazis, without a single drop of gore to be found.)
Dino, Junior, and Izzy make their way behind enemy lines to rendezvous with La Resistance, while Dum-Dum, Reb, and Gabe provide covering fire, in defilade. That final panel there also shows one of the biggest points of contention/contemplation of Sgt. Fury #1: Black soldier Gabriel Jones, seen hefting a grenade, is colored as Caucasian almost every time he appears in the issue. It’s not the work of Stan Goldberg, this issue’s colorist, either, but a “correction” made by the company that actually engraved this issue’s printing plates. Apparently, the presence of a soldier of color was perceived as a mistake to be corrected, which honestly raises more questions than it actually answers. Either way, Nick and his squad are captured, allowing Dino (whose back story implies that he is, in fact, Dean Martin, having eschewed his screen name and enlisted) to act his way out of the situation.
Still, the Howlers are losing valuable time, and M’sieu LaBrave’s resistance to German torture can’t last forever, especially when Der Fuhrer himself is driving the operation. Fury himself is wounded by enemy bullets, and the Howlers nearly find their quarry, but instead fall into a cunning trap!
That cry of “WAH-HOOOOO!”, incidentally, is why they’re called Howling Commandos, and fury’s demonstration of it is enough to distract the baddies and turn the tide, allowing his men to take out the rest of the Nazis with the secret of the D-Day Invasion safely kept. Of course, they’re still stuck in enemy territory, so their lives are likely not worth the proverbial hill o’ beans, unless somebody can find a way out.

Oh, hey, remember Izzy Cohen?
As a general rule, I’m not as big a fan of war comics as I am the superheroes, but Sgt. Fury and His Howling Commandos #1 applies Stan and Jack’s inventiveness to a different genre (although not for the first time, in either creator’s case) debuting Nick Fury with a splash, earning 4 out of 5 stars overall. It will only be a few months before the same creative team brought Nick Fury into present-day Marvel as the head of SHIELD, which by 1965 meant that Fury was headlining two different Marvel comics in two different time periods. Surprisingly, Sgt. Fury outlasted Nick Fury: Agent of SHIELD by almost a decade, with the Sarge finally closing up shop in 1981, underlining the strength of the concepts introduced here.

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