Reviewing the 1988 Peacemaker mini-series

While the 1983 Vigilante ongoing series kept most of us on the edge of our seats (let's not even mention the ending), it was during writer Paul Kupperberg's tenure that new and not-so-new characters (ex: Harry Stein, Valentina Vostok/Negative Woman, Black Thorn, Harvey Bullock, The Agency, etc) would be introduced to the title in preparation for the upcoming Kupperverse Paul was gradually building. Most surprising -- to old school Charlton Comics fans, anyways -- would've been the very dramatic re-introduction of Peacemaker to the modern DC Universe.

Vigilante #36 (1986). Mike Grell cover. This would've been an instant 'buy' for me if I had seen it on the shelves.

Then

Created by Joe Gill and Pat Boyette, Peacemaker first appeared in 1966's Fightin' 5 v1 #40 published by Charlton Comics. In an 8-page back-up feature, the reader is introduced to Christopher Smith: an American peace diplomat... who moonlights as Peacemaker: a man who loves peace so much that he's willing to fight for it. Fun Fact: a 'Peacemaker' is also another name used for the Colt Single Action Army revolver and was the standard US military service revolver in the late 1800s.

Panels from Fightin' 5 v1 #40 (1966).

Fightin' 5 was cancelled after issue #41. Peacemaker then headlined his own 1967 ongoing series -- which lasted a total of 5 issues. Christopher Smith was depicted as a suave peace envoy (with a direct line to the White House) who used tools of diplomacy to resolve global conflicts before they could escalate. When that failed, he became the Peacemaker. This was a last resort, of course. Smith HATES war and violence.

Peacemaker #4 (1967). Charlton comics.

Typically, the threats came from a communist country wielding an atomic-powered whatever, but this was during the mid-to-late sixties, and the Cold War was all anybody was talking about anyways. Peacemaker's weapons played a bit more on the sci-fi side: jetpacks, a helmet with a laser on it, some sort of gizmo that can scramble enemy missile commands, and more that I'm forgetting -- all of these were Smith's own inventions. Try to image if James Bond secretly slipped into a costume to battle villains and you've got Peacemaker.

Peacemaker #4 (1967). Charlton comics.

A bit more of Peacemaker's history was expounded on in his 4th issue: he operates out of a Chateau (location never specified), his father was an army officer turned statesman, his mother was a laboratory researchist, he's a brilliant inventor who has helped the United States on numerous occasions... and his major motivation for all this?

Peacemaker #4 (1967). Charlton comics. What an altruistic guy!

Surprisingly, for such a fondly-remembered character, Peacemaker only appeared in eight Chartlon Comics issues -- yet was still considered to be among the Charlton Action-Heroes line-up. I could've sworn he was a member of Americomics' Sentinels of Justice in 1983 with the rest of the Action-Heroes, but apparently he didn't make the cut.

I was hoping to discover that Paul Kupperberg was one of the original writers for Peacemaker and this would've all been tied into a neat lil' serendipitous bow -- but alas, that is not the case. For anyone wondering: Kupperberg had indeed written for Charlton Comics... but it was in 1976...and it was only for supernatural anthology titles (i.e., Haunted, Ghostly Haunts, Ghost Manor).

Now (well,... the mid-to-late eighties)

If you had only started reading comics in the early 80s, Peacemaker would've been a totally NEW character to you. Prior to this, you might've spotted him in a few panels of the Crisis on Infinite Earths maxi-series, but the three-issue story arc in Vigilante #36 - 38 allowed Kupperberg a chance to flesh out this relatively obscure character to a brand new audience -- and what we got was a completely different Peacemaker from the version Charlton Comics fans grew up reading. He still has an arsenal of advanced weaponry, but now he's a little... 'unhinged'. He's a 'counter-terrorism freelancer' who loves peace enough to KILL for it. He has no hesitation blowing off a terrorist's head at point-blank range. Collateral damage is not an issue to him, he'll even fire on allies if it means getting the job done -- he's pragmatic like that.

panels from Vigilante #36 (1986)

In his first post-Crisis appearance, Peacemaker has gone AWOL and intercepts a hostage situation facilitated by Arab terrorists. His employer (the Agency) worries that he's a liability and wants him terminated. The machinations of these circumstances leads to an impromptu team-up with Adrian Chase. Absent is the debonair persona of Christopher Smith, and instead we get a disheveled civil servant who's apparently constantly talking to himself. Kupperberg makes a point to demonstrate what a loose-cannon Peacemaker is, and we are treated to gratuitous displays of Christopher Smith dispensing hot lead and pro-Americana slogans. Remember: Vigilante was a direct market title -- meaning that it was not available on newsstands and could only be obtained if you went to a comic book shop or ordered a subscription -- so the creative team could get away with a little more violence and mature content than would usually be found in a DC title.

panels from Vigilante #36 (1986)

This story arc must've been popular, because Peacemaker returned for another three-issue story arc in Vigilante #41 - 43. There's a lot more emphasis on just how mentally unstable the Peacemaker is -- he's having full-on conversations with his helmet, and is convinced there's some sort of conspiracy against him (which is his main driving reason to return to New York City and kill members of the Agency).

panel from Vigilante #41 (1987).

We get a bit more insight into Peacemaker's relationship with his helmet -- he's guided by the voices of the souls he executed and this seems to drive him on his quest for vengeance. After a narrow defeat, the story arc concludes with Peacemaker being detained.

Kupperberg's re-invention of Peacemaker as a 'take-no-prisoners patriotic killing-machine' was kind of an extreme parody of the blockbuster Hollywood action heroes of the time combined with a healthy dose of Reagan Era American flag-waving patriotism mixed in. During the 1980s, the United States' foreign policy was largely centered around winning the Cold War and ending communism, and the courageous muscle-bound American soldier single-handedly mowing down all of America's enemies with a large assault rifle (think: Sylvester Stallone in Rambo, etc) had pretty much become the people's hero. Kupperberg kept Vigilante grounded in reality and based many of his storylines on current events -- plane hijackings were the terrorist operation du jour (there were eight international plane hijacking between 1984 and 1985) -- and the infamous Karachi Pan Am Flight 73 hijacking occurred the same month that Vigilante #36 was printed.

Vigilante #42 (1987). Again with the "commies". sigh.

Which bring us to our feature presentation:

Peacemaker #1 (1988). Cover by Tod Smith.

If you were hoping that this 1988 mini-series would be the continuing adventures of a seriously damaged anti-hero, you'd be sorely disappointed. [And, admittedly, that would've made a great mini-series.]

Writer Paul Kupperberg and illustrator Tod Smith rejoin forces (this time with inks by Pablo Marcos) to bring us a new chapter in the life of Christopher Smith and picks up right after we left off in Vigilante #43.  While his appearances in Vigilante made Peacemaker out to be a morally reprehensible character, this mini-series paints him as a tragic hero who emotionally feels the toll of each life he didn't save from terrorism.

panel from Peacemaker #1 (1988). Pencils by Tod Smith, inks by Pablo Marcos.

What about his deranged extremist behavior in the pages of Vigilante? That's all explained away in two panels:

panels from Peacemaker #1 (1988). Pencils by Tod Smith, inks by Pablo Marcos.

I'm just going to re-iterate that the Christopher Smith/Peacemaker in this mini-series is a VERY different man from the one we saw in Vigilante; he runs something called the Pax Institute [some sort of humanitarian organization?], he feels guilt about not stopping terrorism fast enough, he lives like a billionaire in the Swiss Alps, he doesn't want to take human lives if he can help it, and those deceased souls he collects in his helmet that talk to him? That's done with. Instead, he's got a different type of psychological demon to confront. In a way, this is more like the Charlton Comics version of the character -- but he's still got residual mental issues.

panels from Peacemaker #3 (1988). Pencils by Tod Smith, inks by Pablo Marcos.

Seeing as how Peacemaker's modus operandi is stopping terrorism, this mini-series revolves around him trying to foil a large-scale international terrorist plot being spearheaded by none other than Doctor Tzin-Tzin -- all while battling his own personal demons, of course. [In case you were wondering, Doctor Tzin-Tzin appeared in the mid-sixties as a Batman villain, and was more or less played up as a Fu Manchu knock-off. Last seen in a 1977 Batman story.]  This is reminiscent of Peacemaker's earlier Charlton adventures in which he dealt with international threats.

panel from Peacemaker #1 (1988). Doctor Tzin-Tzin!

Kupperberg goes to great care to add details about Peacemaker's elaborately revised origin by including correspondences between various high-ranking officials at the end of each issue. These are actually pretty long and tedious reads, but they reveal how Christopher Smith became an anti-terrorist commando, we learn of something called PROJECT: PEACEMAKER and we get the full details on his support staff.

It was obvious that this mini was a pilot to see how an ongoing series would fare, and since an ongoing didn't happen we can only assume it didn't generate enough interest. [As far as I know, it was never reprinted, either.] To be honest, I had a bit of trouble maintaining interest in this mini -- it's heavy with international politics and seems extremely topical for the time it was written. Kupperberg is no stranger to writing about international political intrigue (see: Checkmate!), and -- from an 80s historical revisionist perspective -- rehashing the Cold War is kinda cool, but I just couldn't get into it and the plot kinda confused me.

The art was okay -- lots of action sequences and the pacing was steady. The biggest surprise in this mini (for me, anyways) was the inclusion of Doctor Tzin-Tzin as the main antagonist -- mainly because he was a villain in one of the first Batman comics I owned. By 1988, I'm not sure if Tzin-Tzin was considered to be an offensive racial stereotype or just one of those Z-list DCU villains everyone had forgotten about, but it was entertaining to see this long-forgotten Batman villain appear in a modern story.

Batman v1 #285 (1977). Jim Aparo/Tatjana Wood cover

It kind of boggles my mind that the SAME WRITER could revamp a character so dramatically. I'd understand if it was a new writer who decided to undo everything Kupperberg had previously done, but frankly I thought the 'psycho' Peacemaker as seen in Vigilante would've made for a much more interesting character to read about. Don't get me wrong -- I still love the idea of Peacemaker, but this mini left thirty-something year old me a little underwhelmed. I'm sure 10 year-old me would've purchased it, regardless.

I've dwelled on it a bit more and decided that the reason I wasn't so keen on this mini was because Peacemaker seemed isolated from the rest of the DCU. Other than an obscure Batman villain (last seen in the late seventies) and an appearance from Harry Stein, there was no real connection to the DC universe -- no mention of Superman, the Teen Titans or anything, really. I realize that Kupperberg was trying to build a foundation for his own universe of characters, but there was no need for Peacemaker to exist in a vacuum. Maybe he could have had other Kupperverse chararcters appear? I don't think Peacemaker was interesting enough on his own to keep an ongoing series going. As we saw, Peacemaker works MUCH better when he's accompanied with other established heroes (see: Janus Directive and Eclipso series)

The Vigilante was not MY first introduction to Peacemaker -- it was from an old, tattered copy of Who's Who that my parents let me buy at a flea market one Sunday afternoon. I would've been around nine or ten years old at the time and probably didn't read his bio unless it was to check if he was a 'good guy' or 'bad guy'. To be quite frank with you, it was adoration at first sight. How could a 10 year old who played with G.I. Joes not be drawn in by a gun-wielding super-soldier with a radar dish for a helmet? And his radar dish helmet emits a sonic wave attack? And he flies around with a jetpack? Damn. Needless to say, I have a fondness for this character.

This wasn't the end of Peacemaker, however. He would re-appear in Checkmate! and appear sporadically across the DCU shortly thereafter.

A few 80s moments:

It wouldn't be a Paul Kupperberg mini-series without a Ronald Reagan appearance:

panel from Peacemaker #4 (1988)

Or how about that Berlin Wall? (cue up Scorpions' "Winds of Change")

panels from Peacemaker #4 (1988).

A brief summary of The Omega Men ongoing series (1983)

When Marv Wolfman first discovered that he would be writing Action Comics in 1980, he had big plans for the Man of Steel. According to Wolfman, the writers at DC had a “tendency to create aliens faster than rabbits created heirs” and, for continuity reasons, this was difficult for a writer to keep track of. Thus, Wolfman’s first order of business was to create consistent alien races to be integrated into the DC Universe - hence he came up with the Citadel and the Psions*. Before Wolfman started writing Action Comics, he discovered that his proposal for a new Teen Titans series had been approved and decided to incorporate his new alien races into the New Teen Titans (ex: Starfire was on the run from the Citadel AND the Psions). Around the same this time, Wolfman was assigned to write the Green Lantern series, so he also took this opportunity to incorporate the Citadel in a story about Green Lantern battling space aliens in the distant future. Several months passed and Wolfman was looking to write a fill-in issue for Green Lantern and decided on a whim to write a story about a bunch of aliens on the run from the Citadel. Created by Wolfman and Joe Staton, they originally named the group “The Outcasts” but decided on a different name since Wolfman saw spin-off potential with this new team. The three Green Lantern issues that the Omega Men appeared in received a very positive reaction from fans and Wolfman realized they were on to something. Wolfman had the Omega Men appear in a few other stories he had written (ex: New Teen Titans, Action Comics) to gauge fan reaction before DC boldly unveiled the 1983 prestige format The Omega Men ongoing series to comic book shops across the country.

I refer to the 1983 The Omega Men series as ‘bold’ for two reasons:

• they were part of DC’s pilot project to publish deluxe books - these consisted of an offset printing process and superior quality Baxter paper (the books sold for more than newsstand prices) 
•  the series had no Comics Code Authority seal whatsoever - they could print all of the gore, foul language and sexually explicit material they wished

(Both of these modifications were made in an effort to appeal to serious comic readers who wanted higher-quality products with more mature content and mainly bought their comics from comic book specialty shops.)

The 1983 Omega Men series was a huge departure from the precedent Wolfman had already established. For starters, Wolfman was too busy with other projects so the writing tasks for this series were assigned to Roger Slifer (Wolfman remained as editor, however). Whereas Wolfman’s Omega Men was an adventure book about a team who banded together to battle foes, Slifer’s Omega Men was about a team of characters who joined to battle a common foe but were overcome with internal disputes and conflicting personal agendas. The series started with a bang and within the first six issues the Citadel War had been resolved with the Omegans as the victors. The first six issues were pencilled by Keith Giffen and were absolutely fantastic to look at. Giffen dropped the book after the sixth issue citing 'Science Fiction Super Team Overdose Syndrome’ as the cause - Giffen had to let one of his sci-fi books go, so he dropped The Omega Men and stayed with Legion of Super-Heroes (just for context, Giffen’s infamous Legion of Super-Heroes Poster came out around this time). Tod Smith took over as penciller after Giffen left.

The poster that almost caused Giffen to quit comics!

As previously mentioned, The Omega Men series did not have the Comics Code Authority seal, and the first six issues contained a lot more graphic violence, adult language and implied nudity than some fans thought was called for. Slifer defended the content by saying that war was not pretty and by toning it down, the book would water-down the horrors of war and lose the impact it was trying to make. Slifer recognized that the longer the series focused on the Citadel war, the sooner it would stagnate - so he opted to end it quickly. Instead, Slifer had the series focus on the aftermath of the war - so we had a lot of stories involving political intrigue, the rebuilding of war-torn cultures/planets, power struggles, the moral ambiguity of characters within the series and how relationships played out amongst the Omega Men. Not too many readers realized that Slifer was weaving a lot of political allegory into the plot lines reflective of present-day world political situations in 1983 (ex: Vietnam/South American conflicts). Additionally, Slifer tried to keep The Omega Men self-contained with not much involvement from other mainstream DC characters (probably because he had realized they had created their own comic universe). Roger Slifer left the book at issue #13 because of irreconcilable differences with DC (it was due to creator’s rights, apparently) and Todd Klein (former letterer for the series) filled in as writer for a few issues until Doug Moench became the regular writer.

When Doug Moench and Tod Smith became the regular Omega Men creative team (The Omega Men #17) the series took a sharp turn: the mood was lightened and the series was less about fighting a bloody galactic war and more of an action/adventure comic. Some fans criticized Tod Smith’s illustrations for being too cartoony. Other writers and illustrators came and went (ex: Sharman DiVono, Kevin O'Neil, Marv Wolfman) before the final creative team of Todd Klein and Shawn McManus was settled upon (The Omega Men #26). Marv Wolfman gave up editorship of the series to Alan Gold after issue #24 - mainly because he was too busy with other projects - but still provided Gold with editorial advice to keep the series moving along. Back-up tales featuring the citizens of the Vega star system began to appear after issue #24 - this was a popular feature with fans and included stories written by Alan Moore (among other great talent). McManus’ painted covers for the series also received a lot of praise and adoration from fans. Omega Men #33 experienced a format change as more pages were added and advertisements were removed - Klein and McManus had to stop accepting other assignments so that they could focus on the creative thrust in the series. Sadly, the series was cancelled after issue #38.

Shawn McManus painted covers:

With all of the brilliant things going for this series, why was it cancelled? Well...

A lot of fans were put off with Keith Giffen leaving the series after issue #6. Roger Slifer leaving after issue #13 didn’t help things either. I’m going to guess that the momentum that Giffen and Slifer created kept the series going strong, because in issue #18 the letter column reveals that The Omega Men was one of DC’s best-selling books at the moment. Strangely, while The Omega Men had excellent sales, they were somehow receiving hardly any fan mail. It was speculated that they started to lose readership around issue #22 - one theory was that the sea of other deluxe comic books being sold at specialty comic books shops were just too much competition for the title to bear. A new creative team (Klein and McManus) was brought in at issue #26, and in an effort to bolster sales introduced new characters (a former Green Lantern Corps member and Starfire’s younger brother) and a new war-themed storyline. Sales took a major dip around issue #28. Despite the boost in artistic quality that McManus brought to the table, he was unbelievably slow at getting issues illustrated and editor Alan Gold often had to find fill-ins to buy some time allowing McManus to catch up with whatever story he was working on. By the end of the series, The Omega Men had turned into an anthology book in an effort to tie up loose ends - the series was a victim of creative floundering (ex: characters were left under-developed, sub-plots were suddenly dropped for inexplicable reasons, some writers felt that The Omega Men should be a 'team book' and other writers did not, etc). In retrospect, Alan Gold admit that ending the Citadel War so early in the series may not have been the best story-telling strategy. The Omega Men mainly relied on word-of-mouth as far as advertising was concerned and you’d be hard-pressed to find an ad for the title in any DC publication at the time. Cancellation at issue #38 meant they couldn’t conclude a few storylines that had been developing. Most of the core team of the Omega Men died in the 1988 Invasion! DC comics company-wide cross-over event.

What was great about this series was that it was constantly evolving. It went from being a book about a band of rebels fighting a galactic war, to a book exploring the aftermath of a galactic war and the chaos that ensued. It then jumped to an action/adventure series - exploring the characters and their personalities further. It later turned into a giant space opera with weird sci-fi undertones. All the while the series explored themes such as diplomacy vs blind action, aggression vs trusting love, and blind obedience in religion (to name a few). Throughout the series the origins of just about every race that Wolfman dreamed up (Psions, Tamarans, Okaara) are gradually revealed and their cultures are thoroughly explored. This series lasted 38 issues and 2 annuals (which is not bad for a self-contained non-mainstream DC book) and covered a lot of ground in regards to Wolfman’s imagined Vega galaxy. I mentioned that Slifer wanted to keep this series self-contained but that ultimately did not happen - the Omega Men had a Crisis on Infinite Earths cross-over (The Omega Men #31), a Blue Devil appearance (Blue Devil #18) and a Teen Titans appearance (New Teen Titans v2 #16). Despite the Omega Men starting in the mainstream DC Universe (way back in Green Lantern v2 #141) they ultimately evolved into a sci-fi book with their own galaxy of characters.

First appearance of Lobo (1983)

If anyone remembers the 1983 Omega Men series for anything, it would be for the infamous first appearance of a bounty hunter named Lobo (debuts in The Omega Men #3). When Lobo (created by Giffen and Slifer) first debuted he was a skinny clown-looking guy who rode a flying chair. So, basically, Lobo looked nothing like the jacked-up space-biker anti-hero we all know and love, and that’s because he only got his makeover by artist Simon Bisley sometime in the early 90s. After The Omega Men were cancelled in 1986, Lobo became a recurring character in Giffen’s 1989 L.E.G.I.O.N. series and basically became the poster boy for comic book anti-heroes.

*An early prototype of the Psions first appeared in a back-up tale of 1973’s The Witching Hour #13 (written by Marv Wolfman)

Early Psions (sounds like 'science')

Addendum: 
Alan Moore was editor Alan Gold’s first pick to write the Omega Men ongoing series: “Alan Gold phoned me up and asked me if I wanted to write The Omega Men, but I couldn’t because I’ve got a lot of other stuff and The Omega Men is not something I could see myself do easily without making some really really major changes … But what I did was, I offered to write a synopsis of a possible way that the Omega Men could be sorted out and made into a more viable sort of concept. I wrote about 27-30 pages.” (Amazing Heroes # 58, October 1984)


Further Reading:
What was Marv's opinion on this series? Glad you asked...


[This article first published on DC in the 80s tumblr in October 2013]