He should fight the guy who designed his helmet.
The Peacemaker V3 #1
Charlton Comics Group (March, 1967)
I’m not sure where the “volume 3” is coming from. While this isn’t Peacemaker’s debut it is his first solo title. His stories first appeared as a back-up in The Fighting Five until it was cancelled and Peacemaker got his regular series for six issues. I might get to that eventually in the Friday reviews, but that’s a long way off. I don’t think DC ever took them on, so I’m just focusing on the solo comic. If you’re curious, Linkara did a review of his actual debut story.
“The Killer On The Reef” and “The Hidden Power”
no credits outside of a splash page credit I can’t read
The Fighting Five: “Ruler Of Darkness”
only credits are “Montes & Bache”
In the first story, Christopher Smith, aka Peacemaker, investigates fishing boats of the US, Russian, and Japan being attacked. While they start blaming each other, Christopher’s “taxi” is convinced that someone named the Commodore is actually responsible. When his men attack the boat Christopher is on, Peacemaker foils his plans…way too easy. One helmet laser and the villains’ submarine is damaged and has to surface, the nuclear power source exploding without covering everything with radiation. The story is too short and not thought out, but the plot had potential. Also the killer isn’t on the reef, he’s under the water.
The second story is even harder to believe. A representative from an unnamed Balkan nation slaps Christopher, the US Peace Envoy, and dares him to strike back, but because our hero is supposedly a pacifist, he opts to learn why the official would risk war. He finds out the country has a secret Antarctic base (the villain of the previous story does mention allies in Antarctica but no connection is made in this story) where they found pure uranium to make nukes and plan to take over the world (of course they do). This time we see Peacemaker use nonlethal nerve gas and his anti-missile flare ends up leading the enemy missile back to its base on accident. I also refuse to believe soundwaves caused by him dropping down a tunnel at high speed created a barrier as he dove INTO A NUCLEAR INFERNO AND SOMEHOW SMASHED A NUCLEAR GENERATOR WITHOUT RADIATION FALLOUT! Bongo Comics’ Radioactive Man has a better understanding of nuclear energy.
Just as Peacemaker had a backup story in the Fighting Five’s comic, so do their adventures continue in his. I think this continues from their last solo title, which seems like a mistake to me. The team’s leader is shot by their current adversary, except the lad who did the shooting is on their side because she’s too beautiful to be evil or some nonsense. Also, she turns out to be a Russian agent undercover. The Five and the agent attack the base, with one member dying out of nowhere and the leader injured, but managing to stop the villain from destroying the world. Is this the last run for the Fighting Five? I wish I cared, but my introduction to them leaves me wanting.
There may be only six issues, and Peacemaker has become a minor but important addition to the DC Comics roster…and that’s the only reason we’re continuing next issue. If I were around buying comics back in the day (kind of difficult seeing as I wasn’t born yet) I’m not even sure I’d buy this issue, nevermind the next one. Frankly it just wasn’t very good and thus far I don’t see why DC accepted Peacemaker except as a package deal, and there’s a reason the Fighting Five have gone to obscurity. Maybe I won’t read those early comics after all.
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