Marine War Heroes

(Charlton, 1964-1967)
™ and ©1965 Charlton Publications, Inc.

War comics, like their polar opposite, romance comics, exist to satisfy a narrow spectrum of fantasies for an audience presumed to despise any variation from the tried and true formulas. Some war comics have risen to greater creative heights than love comics, since the male creators may have had more sympathy and insight into their material, but at their most formulaic—in books like Marine War Heroes—there is little real difference once you substitute buzz cuts for beehives, green khaki for white lace, and bullets for wedding rings. Marine War Heroes runs grimly through the register of stock plots—the reluctant soldier, bravery under fire, seeking revenge for a fallen friend, one man against an entire division—all rendered in the artless, low-budget Charlton house style. It was mustered out of the Charlton lineup in 1967, when the threat of real war dampened the public appetite for war fantasies.

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