Retro Comic Read Through: Team America #8

Team America #8
Cover date January 1983

It's the first issue since #2 that this book has gone back to it's team structure since starting their solo story spotlighting. And the cover tries to reflect this with multiple image panels, each with it's own action and blurb. All set around a RPM dial burying the needle into the red. Exciting! Well it should be, anyway. Instead it just looks messy. Maybe if Hannigan and Simons did a smoother job on the art it would work. It looks a little rushed.

Each cover image is from a part of the story. Cowboy is hugging Georgianna. Romance! Screams the blurb. A crudely drawn car is crashing. Adventure! Honcho is getting clubbed on the head in front of a belly dancer. Intrigue! Wolf is getting attacked with a tire. Action! And the promise that, 'Truly, this issue has it all!!' Two exclamation marks. Let's see if they can live up to such bold promises.

To begin with the promise of the previous issue that Shooter would return to scripting hasn't panned out. Instead he's taken over plotting and bumped Mantlo down to scripting duty. One of the benefits of being Editor-in-Chief, I guess. The pencilling has been given to Don Perlin. Luckily Colletta remains to keep a consistent patina of dreadfulness to the look of this book.

The opening splash is interesting. Big title and close-up of a tense Wolf. It's clearly been inspired by Frank Miller's work of the same time. It's effective and works. The story takes Team America to Eygpt. Which is kinda remarkable just for the fact that after seven issues the book finally realises that if you're going to put your characters on to an international race circuit, it's good to actually, y'know, send them to other countries on occasion.

Right off the second page the multiple plots start up. Georgianna's feeling ignored by Wrench, because Wrench is in fact ignoring her. Oh, and they're not married, by the way. This issue finally reveals their relationship status, which is boyfriend and girlfriend. Honcho stops to help a strange man with his bags and gets a secret spy message to help the CIA stop arms smugglers. So runs off from the team to do his Secret Squirrel routine.

Wolf gets seduced by the raven haired Ditko-esque stlye beauty heading up the opposing team and Reddy thinks that means Wolf's going to throw the race. Their seduction is something close to Shakespeare in it's beautiful use of words and meaning. To wit:
Monique: You intrigue me, Mister... Wolf. I like my men strong and silent. You drive well, I would guess.
Wolf: I do everything well! I am El Lobo!

Georgianna and Cowboy start cosying up together, leaving Wrench alone with his machines. So basically the whole theme of this story is fractures showing in the team, threatening to break them apart. That theme is nicely reflected in the multiple panel design of the cover, which gives it a stronger concept.

On this leg of the Unlimited Class Racing circuit, 'Where the rules are few and the stakes are high!', the contest is a one driver race in badly conceptualised supposedly futuristic looking dune buggies. So while they've managed to get the books focus back on the concept of team (though that story is of the team breaking down), the motorcycle hook is still missing in action.

And man, are these futro-buggies dumb looking. It's like they've asked a six year old to design them, then asked the kid to have another go at it, but this time to try not to do such a good job. In case I'm not getting the point across – the designs for these vehicles are bad. One of them has five wheels, for crying out loud. Wolf's new girlfriend and insane buggy competitor, Monique's car has only three wheels... and is pink and purple.

During the time trials, Wolf discovers that the car beating him is driven by Monique, which both outrages him because he's a sexist and also means that for a professional racer he doesn't pay any attention to who is driving against him, which is both odd as well as... well, odd. Anyway, Wolf is so angered by the insult of being beaten by a woman, he over-heats his engine and crashes his stupid looking buggy. And I mean really crashes it. He knocks all the wheels off and folds it in half. It's gone. It's toast. It looks like an old sponge and the race is the very next day! Luckily, Wrench is fairly certain it can be fixed-up in time.

A fight between the team quickly breaks out in anger at Wolf's crashing. Only to be broken-up by the Yoko of the group, Georgianna. Then she gets pissed at Wrench and runs off with Cowboy, because Wrench has to fix the car for the next day instead of going on a date with her. A lot of the dialogue between these two is well done. Some parts even come close to being mature. Which is due to the very good abilities of Bill Mantlo. He knows how to differentiate characters via their speech. And not just with catch phrases.

We cut back for half a page to Honcho's spy capers. He goes to a belly dancing club, ignores the half-naked ladies, naturally enough, then gets beat up by the arms smugglers. Honcho's kinda crap.

The next day Wrench presents the fixed-up car to the team. Monique comes by to mock them, and tell Wolf that she's the driver of the car that beat him. For some reason Wolf has forgotten he already knew this and gets outraged again. “There's a word for her kind in my tongue!” I'm guessing it's El Bitcho. Wolf's an overly sensitive sexist idiot.

Then the race is on in all the silly Wacky Race vehicles. Soon it comes down to just Wolf and Monique. “One on one. A true test of man against woman!”, thinks the sexist El Piggo. The race is very tense (no it isn't), then Wolf blows his engine again and limps off the track. An example for Wolf's ability to perform as a man when he's up against a women? The caption box says, 'There are no words for his humiliation'. Oh, I don't know about that. The words 'Ha-Ha, sucks to be you, yabooface!' would seem to cover it, for me. I'm not sure it's good writing to have the reader finding satisfaction in one of the books heroes being beaten.

Once again though, I think it's a bold move to have Team America not win a race. In this one they didn't even finish. In eight issues they've only had three Unlimited Class races, and only won one. Team America isn't coming across as very... um, good.

Back at the pits, the team commiserates with each other as a roughed-up Honcho rejoins them. “I had something to do. I blew it”. I suppose the rest of team have a pretty good idea about Honcho's 'night-life' by now, so don't question him further. Monique then turns up to gloat and tell Honcho that she was the arms smuggler and his getting his arse handed to him has set her smuggling operations back about a week. Which makes me go, “What the hell??” Was that threading of two plot lines really necessary? But Monique's bragging re-unites the team to bond together again. But it ends with Cowboy and Georgianna embracing with the enthusiasm of the moment. Leaving Wrench an unhappy camper and the caption box promising more racing chills and thrills next issue.

I'm not really sure they managed any 'chills' this time around. But it was definitely good to see the book back on track with it revolving the story around the great Unlimited Class Racing. Even with the team fracturing plot, the books a better read for having them all together again. Plus we learnt that Wolf wears his headband when he sleeps. Touches like that are what makes this book gold. And did you notice something unique to this Team America story? Something that was only noticeable by it's absence? Yep, the mysterious Marauder didn't make a single appearance. It didn't hurt the book either. In fact I think losing that fantasy, super hero element improved the tone of the book. Took it further into the Speed Racer, Johnny Quest and I Spy genre. This made it a stronger read, more character driven and by result more enjoyable. So it absolutely will never happen again, I'm sure.

BEWARE THE LUGGAGE!