Sgt. Fury #20

Featuring: Sgt. Fury and His Howling Commandos
Release: May 11, 1965
Cover: July 1965
12 cents
Smashing script: Stan Lee
Awesome art: Dick Ayers
Inspired inking: Frank Ray
Luscious lettering: Artie Simek
20 pages

Previous	#370	Next
Strange Tales #135	Reading order	Avengers #18
Sgt. Fury #19	Sgt. Fury	Sgt. Fury #21

Mister, when it comes to being tough, us Commandos invented the word!! And we don’t need a ravin’ Fuehrer to remind us how good we are!! All we gotta do is pick up a history book!! Mebbe we don’t push our weight around like you Nazis do! But, mebbe it’s because we know we don’t haveta! We got all the muscle we need– when we need it! And the dictator don’t live who can push us around!! Waddaya think of us “inferior races” now? Answer me, ya creep!! And then answer all the innocent people, all over the world, that ya been tramplin’ on–!!

We just saw an eye-patched Colonel Fury take over the international spy agency, SHIELD in the 1960s. Let’s head back to the 1940s to see the adventures of Sgt. Fury with two good eyes.

The credits on these Sgt. Fury books have usually emphasized the creators’ status as former military. “Ex-Sgt. Stan Lee”, “Ex-Corp. Dick Ayers”, “Ex-Corp. Frank Ray”. In fact, I think they’ve done that in every one of the first 19 issues of this series, but seem to be done with the practice now. I wonder why. They’re not phasing it out; they’ll just never mention the military service of the creators again.

We see the return of Baron Strucker’s Blitzkrieg Squad, introduced in issue 14, the Nazi counterparts to the Howling Commandos.

That truck seems to have a target on it.

Unless somebody has a better explanation, I’m going to suggest the logo is the RAF roundel, simply miscolored here, and not indicative of the Target corporation. The Turkish Air Force roundels look like the Target logo, but no British ones that I can find.

A bit of poking fun at themselves here. Fury’s rival Bull McGiveney claims all Fury knows how to do is rip up shirts.

A torn chest-revealing shirt is basically Fury’s uniform.

Fury is still reflecting on Pam’s death.

The Howlers sneak into the castle for a battle with the Blitzers in an extended action sequence.

Sgt. Fury takes down Strucker with an impassioned speech about the “Master Race”.

We start to learn the names of members of the Blitz Squad. The narrator refers to Dugan’s rival as Siegfried. One Blitzer calls another Ludvig (though they sometimes spell German speech phonetically, so the name may be Ludwig). And then Howlers refer to another as Otto; it should be noted the Howlers often make fun of Nazis by calling them generic German names, so we should be careful taking their words as evidence.

In their introduction, each Blitzer had an identifiable trait, and a clear Howler counterpart. They also all got different hats, but it wasn’t always clear from the art which hat went with each person. The musician isn’t wearing a hat when we meet him, but everyone else is. So I infer the person with the helmet is the musician. Later comics may contradict that inference. Here’s the page from issue 14 to remind us.

I’ll try to capture what I can in the character listing, and compare with online opinions. It’s not particularly clear.

Attribute	Counterpart	Name	Hat
Brawler	Dugan	Siegfried	Bavarian
Charmer	Manelli	?	Ski cap
Musician	Jones	Ludvig/Ludwig? Otto?	Helmet? Toque?
Mechanic	Cohen	Otto? Ludwig?	Toque? Helmet?
Horseman	Ralston	?	Army cap
Aristocrat	Pinkerton	?	Beret

You can see the opinion of the Marvel Universe Appendix, a site I’m inclined to trust. Except that they have the toque on the musician, when the mechanic is clearly wearing the toque in issue 14. We both agree this issue suggests that Otto wears the toque and Ludwig the helmet.

I’ll leave the table as it is for now. We’ll see more clues in the issues to come and slowly figure out who is who.

Rating: ★★★☆☆, 50/100
Significance: ★★★☆☆

Scans are taken from a reprint in Sgt. Fury #122 (1974).

Characters:

• Baron Strucker
• Siegfried (brawler on Blitzkrieg Squad)
• Charmer on Blitzkrieg Squad
• Ludvig (Maybe Ludwig?)
• Otto
• Horseman on Blitzkrieg Squad
• Aristocrat on Blitzkrieg Squad
• Sgt. Nick Fury
• Sgt. McGiveney
• Captain “Happy Sam” Sawyer
• Dino Manelli
• Izzy Cohen
• Percy Pinkerton
• Gabe Jones
• Rebel Ralston
• Corporal Dum Dum Dugan
• Hans Rooten

Story notes:

• Blitz Squad seeks to free Luftwaffe pilots from Kerrydale Castle in Scotland.
• Strucker’s orders come from Field Marshal Goering.
• One British soldier from supply truck gets out warning; Strucker takes hostages in the castle.
• Howlers pretend to parachute into besieged castle, but really sneak in by underground tunnels.
• References to who might play Howlers in films: David Niven, Errol Flynn…
• Blitz Squad taken prisoner.

Previous	#370	Next
Strange Tales #135	Reading order	Avengers #18
Sgt. Fury #19	Sgt. Fury	Sgt. Fury #21

You may be noticing that for the last two issues of Sgt. Fury, I found the stories reprinted in somewhat random later issues. There’s not much rhyme or reason to what is reprinted where. I think a table will be handy. This information is mostly derived from the UHBMCC. With a couple corrections I’ve notified them about.

Sgt. Fury #1-79 is new content. Sgt. Fury #80-120 mixes new content with reprints of older issues in haphazard fashion. Issues 121 forward are reprints, which work systematically through the series.

Special Marvel Edition #5 reprinted issue 3, then #6-14 (1972-73) reprinted 8-16 in order. War in Hell #7-8 (1974) then reprinted issue 17-18 after a 6-month gap. Immediately following, Sgt. Fury #121-138 (1974-77) reprinted #19-36. Sgt. Fury #139-166 (1977-81) reprinted issues 44-64 then 68-72, with issue 154 reprinting a crossover with Captain Savage #6.

Why didn’t issues 42-43 get reprinted? Or #65-68? I don’t know. Issues 37-41 were reprinted in earlier issues.

We list the issue of Sgt. Fury with original content and the issues that reprint it, grouped by series. With two columns for Sgt. Fury, because often the same issue was reprinted more than once. So reprints from issues 80-120 are in the first column and 121 forward in the second.

Original Sgt. Fury #	Reprint: Sgt. Fury #	Reprint: Sgt. Fury #	Reprint: Sgt. Fury Annual #	Reprint: Special Marvel Edition #	Reprint: War is Hell #
1		167
2	95
3				5
4			1
5			1
6			5
7			5
8				6
9				7
10				8
11				9
12				10
13				11
14				12
15				13
16				14
17					7
18			6		8
19		121	6
20		122
21	80	123
22		124
23		125
24	82	126
25	85	127
26	87	128
27	89	129
28	91	130
29		131	7
30		132	7
31	92	133
32	93	134
33	99	135
34	101	136
35	103	137
36	105	138
37	107
38	109
39	111
40	113
41	115
42
43
44		139
45		140
46		141
47		142
48		143
49		144
50		145
51		146
52		147
53		148
54		149
55		150
56		151
57		152
58		153
59		155
60		156
61		157
62		158
63		159
64		161
65
66
67
68
68		162
69		163
70		164
71		165
72		166
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
81
83
84
86
88
90
94
96
97
98
100
102
104
106
107
108
110
112
114
116
117
118
119
120

I used to carry around a spreadsheet just like the above to comic conventions. I just wanted to make sure I had every unique story in some form, reprint or original.