This is a strip which is just too damn ugly to live – and yet live it does, in the tortured imaginations of anyone was into comics in Britain as a teenager in the late Seventies. Hookjaw (Action 1976) was a kind of animal terminator that absolutely would not stop, could not be reasoned with, etc etc. With that level of violence in what was always a children’s comic you just knew it couldn’t last long – the forces of authority killed the host comic Action after thirty or so weeks! All the stories inside had merit but Hookjaw was the big draw. You’d have thought that these stories had limited scope but when you’ve got a shark attacking a crowded plane that’s just hit an oil rig in the middle of a hurricane a week’s a long time to wait for the next issue!
When comics can describe an adventure that no other medium effectively can, then comics will be ‘forever’. It might be gross, stupid, badly drawn even, but that is what Hookjaw does here – it gives the reader something no other medium could afford or consent to give. It’s something comic book creators would do well to consider. It’s because comics are trying to write novels and make films that they are failing. Comics are their own medium. I’m beginning to wonder if we understand them at all!
Spoilers ahead, not that you can spoil a strip as visceral as this by showing the climactic panels of the first arc, but believe me after I’d read this I drew nothing but sharks and people with limbs missing for weeks. The last panel has stayed in my consciousness for what? Thirty years! That’s what you want a comic strip to do boys and girls. These four panels still thrill me now. Our hero Mason has been picked up by a rescue helicopter, his belly ripped open by the hook. Now the villain of the piece and immovable object Red McNally who has just lost his leg faces his nemesis, the irresistible Hookjaw for the last time …
You won’t see stunts like this at the cinema!
Close-up. Great idea!
I can’t hold on much longer either. Ouch!
… ain’t comics great? What a climax! But y’know after a quick breather Hookjaw was back a couple of weeks later with the kick off to the ultimately disappointing second arc. I couldn’t possibly display the shocking depravity of that opening episode – oh no, not on this blog.
Can’t get enough Hookjaw (I know I can’t), well how about this rare treat -the giveaway poster that you had to destroy the comic to paste together. I’ve done all the hard work for you here.
PS. And I did talk about Hookjaw before here. If you want more – let me know!
October 29, 2009 at 4:36 am |
I wish i had kept all my Action comics back then cos HookJaw was my favourite.
October 29, 2009 at 9:33 am
And they’d be worth a bob or two
October 30, 2009 at 1:23 am |
Is there anywhere that you could download the Hook jaw pages (including the colour ones)as to maybe print them all off on a4 paper?
The book has them but only in B & W which is a shame.