Hero Histories

Friday, June 22, 2012

Reading Room: JET DREAM "Terror of Ting-a-Ling"

What happens when an innocent stumbles upon a heroine's secret hq?

Ask Johnny Kai, Ting-a-Ling's boyfriend, when he ends up in "No Man's Land"!

"Stray dog"?

Jet doesn't have a very high opinion of men in general, does she?

Story by Dave Wood, art by Joe Certa.

This new story from Man from U.N.C.L.E. #21 (1968) backs up a reprinted U.N.C.L.E. tale, so most people (myself included) thought it was a reprint as well.
Good thing I took a look inside the book! ;-)

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Saturday, June 16, 2012

Reading Room: JET DREAM "Menace of the Feathered Warriors"

The time had come for Jet Dream's final battle...

...and it's against her evil doppelganger...who's also her only recurring foe!

Well, so much for recurring foes...

Story by Dave Wood, art by Joe Certa.

We thought this story from Man from U.N.C.L.E. #20 (1968) was her final strip chronologically, but we've just found out that it's not the case!
While the final issues (#21 and #22) of the title reprint earlier U.N.C.L.E. tales, the Jet Dream stories in both issues are not reprints but new stories!
Those two tales will appear over the next couple of weeks.

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Friday, June 8, 2012

Reading Room: JET DREAM "Fall to Freedom"

The Stunt-Girl CounterSpies go back to their roots...

...unfortunately, for one of them, the roots include Nazis!

Remember, when this story from Man from U.N.C.L.E. #19 came out in 1968, it was only 23 years since the end of World War II, so those pesky Nazis were still pretty spry, especially in spy fiction!

For example: Baron Strucker was battling Nick Fury both in the 1960s in Nick Fury: Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D., and in the 1940s in Sgt Fury and His Howling Commandos!

Blackhawk, himself a WWII vet, was still fighting various hidden Nazi factions until his first series ended in 1968!

Nazis also popped up in the Matt Helm, Flint, and James Bond films, as well as the Man from U.N.C.L.E. tv series.

Story by Dave Wood, art by Joe Certa.

This is the penultimate Jet Dream short story.

Next week, we'll be presenting the final four-pager (which features the return of a past foe), then we're moving over to our sister blog, Heroines™, for the complete full-length one-shot tale that ended Jet's original run!

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Monday, June 4, 2012

Reading Room: JET DREAM "Captive Jet"

What happens when you take "Jet Dream" out of...

...and the team has to rescue their erstwhile leader?

"Jet-A-Reeno"???

Well, it ain't no "Hawkaaa!", but it'll do.

It's good to know they can function without Jet's leadership when necessary.

Script for this tale from Man from U.N.C.L.E. #18 (1968) by Dick Wood, with vastly-improved art by Joe Certa.
(We can finally tell which StuntGirls are which!)

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Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Reading Room: JET DREAM "Farmer Brown Fiasco"

It's difficult fitting a team into only four pages...

...so Jet Dream usually had solo action stories or a team-up with one of the Stunt-Girl Counterspies!

Unfortunately, because of the 4-page per story limitation, the individual Stunt-Girls never had any real characterization.

Add Joe Certa's passable art using the same facial features for all the female characters, and the only things differentiating the women were hair color and stereotyped accents.

Script for this tale from Man from U.N.C.L.E. #17 (1968) by Dick Wood, art by Joe Certa.

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Monday, May 14, 2012

Reading Room: JET DREAM "Day of Infamy"

Is one of the Stunt-Girl CounterSpies a traitor?

Jet Dream must discover the truth in only four pages before it tears the team apart...or worse!

Didn't Ting-a-Ling do something similar because her family was threatened several issues ago?

Script for this tale from Man from U.N.C.L.E. #16 (1968) by Dick Wood (who also wrote the earlier tale so he should have remembered), art by Joe Certa.
(To be fair, Ting wasn't a member of the StuntGirls at that point...nit-pick, nit-pick...)

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Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Reading Room: JET DREAM "Set-Up Sultan"

When your bodyguards are Jet Dream and her team...

...you would want bodies like those as close to you as possible! (Wink, wink, nudge nudge)

Script for this tale from Man from U.N.C.L.E. #15 (1967) by Dick Wood, art by Joe Certa.

Unfortunately, Certa has problems differentiating women, and uses hairstyles to tell them apart.

(I didn't know one of them was Pacific Islander Ting-A-Ling until Jet mentioned it on page 4!)

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Monday, March 5, 2012

Reading Room: JET DREAM "Splash-Down to Death"

Usually we see Jet in action solo or with the entire team...

...but here we get to see her kicking evildoer butt with just one of the team at her side.

Script for this short, but effective, tale from Man from U.N.C.L.E. #14 (1967) by Dick Wood, with art by Joe Certa.

The one problem I had with the story is that Certa has difficulty visually-differentiating Jet and Ting, who look very similar (almost generic) in most panels!

Mike Sekowsky was able to make their faces different enough in Ting's intro tale (as seen HERE) to make it easy, even the group shots, to see who was who.

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Monday, February 20, 2012

Reading Room: JET DREAM "Powder-Puff Derby Caper"

Jet Dream meets up with her evil counterpart...

...and can someone tell me why there's always an evil counterpart to a hero/heroine?
This one even has her own team of female assassins...

Raven Red will return!
(And, she's the only villain in this series to do so!)

Script for this tale from Man from U.N.C.L.E. #12 by Dick Wood, art by Joe Certa as he assumed his position as the permanent artist on Jet Dream, except the very next issue, featuring the return of Mike Sekowsky, which we presented on our "sister" blog True Love Comics Tales™.

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