Cheap Detectives Week: Atlas/Seaboard's Police Action

Martin Goodman's short-lived Atlas/Seaboard Comics was a factory for fad-based comics, to put it mildly. While editors Larry Lieber and Jeff Rovin used Goodman's ample wallet to hire much of the the best talent of the Groovy Age, the publisher stuck to his tried and true policy of "give the public what they want until they cry 'uncle'!" (Hey, he'd kept the original Timely/Atlas/Marvel afloat that way from the 40s through the 60s.) Goodman was cagey enough to know that there was a world outside of comics, so instead of just ripping off other comics, he wanted his editors to rip off other popular media, as well. Detectives and Cops were hot in the movies and on TV in the mid-70s, so it was only natural that he'd want to try to capture some of the heat in his comics. Thus was born Police Action (sounds more like the title for a Korean War mag, doesn't it?). P.A. gave us two cops: Sam Lomax of the NYPD and Luke Malone, Manhunter a San Francisco-based P.I. as its stars.

There's been speculation that Lomax's name was designed to cash in on the then-enormously popular Kojak TV show. Lomax was probably given the headline position in the mag for the very same reason. However, Lomax was much more like Clint Eastwood's Dirty Harry in attitude and love of using firearms. The first story was very violent, written by the elusive Russ Jones under the pen-name of "Jack Younger", the other two stories, by Gary Friedrich toned the violence down--a little. What really made the strip kinda groovy was the art team of Mike Sekowsky and Al McWilliams. They're styles meshed really well and gave the strip a slick, realistic look that would have fit right in to a Sunday comic strip page. Here's a Lomax story Ol' Groove just can't resist sharing with ya, "...One Hot Dog with Murder, Please..." (Police Action #3, March, 1975). I mean, c'mon, ya have'ta admit that title's a (wait for it) gasser, man! (Okay, I deserve any hate mail I get after that one...)

Luke Malone, Manhunter, is a far-out, noir-ish strip created by the always amazing Mike Ploog. The best of the Malone stories was the first one, written by Ploog, himself (the other two stories were written by Gary Friedrich--of course!). The only downside to the strip was the overpowering inks of Frank Springer, who nearly obliterated Ploog's Will Eisner influenced pencils. Here's Ploog's premiere Malone story, "Requiem for a Champ", from Police Action #1 (November, 1974)!









Like most of the Atlas/Seaboard line, the mag only lasted three issues, but they were well done and quite unlike anything else on the spinner rack.