Secret Agent #10

Secret Agent #10 (On Sale:August 1967) has an excellent cover featuring Sarge Steel by Dick Giordano.

I was a late comer to the Sarge Steel character, only discovering him in recent years, but what is not to like? We have Steve Skeates (my favorite Aquaman scribe)  writing and Dick Giordano (my favorite Aquaman Editor) drawing the feature. We have an American secret agent, a la Secret Agent Corrigan with a super hero twist of a metal hand. On top of that Steel is a private investigator and a CIA agent, so we get stories from both worlds.

The 18-page "The Case of the Third Hand" opens with Steel returning from a date with the lovely Linda Velvet, a girl Sarge has "fallen hard" for, when suddenly they become the target of a sniper. Steel worries that a guy in his line of work offers nothing but danger to any girl who dates him. Sarge keeps pushing Linda out of the line of fire and finally gets off a good shot at the sniper. He realizes too late that he only winged him as another shot rings out and this one hits Linda.

As the sniper runs away Sarge realized that Linda, not he, was the actual target. After checking Linda into a hospital, Steel heads back to the crime scene, but finds nothing but a bit of blood.  Steel checks with the police, but Linda had no criminal record. He checks his stoolies and roughs up a few gunsels, but gets nowhere. However, when he returns to his office there is a message form Lowell Cade of the CIA to call him about "some trouble" he got into last night. Wondering how the CIA fits into this all, Steel pays Cade a visit.

Lowell informs Sarge that Linda Velvet is a contact for The Third hand,l the biggest independent spy ring in the world. Steel argues that Linda is a highly-paid jazz singer and has no reason to take Third Hand money. Lowell says they don't know why Linda does it, but that they were hoping she would lead them to "the big boys." Lowell thinks someone from the Third Hand saw the two of them together and decided Linda could no longer be trusted. Steel isn't buying it, but just then they get word of trouble at the hospital.

They see gas pouring out of a broken window, the window to Linda's room and then learn the worst. Linda is dead, the victim of a gas grenade. Sarge is stunned by Linda's death, but knows someone wanted to be certain she didn't talk. In search of clues he heads to Linda's apartment, where the landlord informs him that he is the third "police" to show up today, that some of them are still up in her room. Steel confront the "cops" tearing Linda's apartment to pieces looking for something. A fight ensues and Sarge is knocked unconscious by a big thug. When he awakens he finds Sarah Tempest, Linda's neighbor who upon finding Linda's door opened came in to see if everything was alright.

Sarah says she knew Linda pretty well and Steel is about to ask her more when Hobart Jefferies, Sarah's tennis date arrives. As they are about to leave Sarge notices a fallen picture and asks Sarah if she knows the man in it. She says that yes, that is John, Linda's love fiance. Steel recognizes the picture as being  John Vance, a two-bit gunsel and figures it was John that got Linda mixed up with the Third Hand. Steel rushes back to his won apartment only to find it over turned as well. and is too distracted to notice that whoever did it, is still there. The thugs take Steel to a plush home in the suburbs where he meets Johnny Vance who tells Sarge, "You have something of mine and I want it back."

Johnny then sics some of his men on Sarge to make him talk. In the ensuing ruckus, Johnny accidentally shoots the big thug who then attacks Johnny. Johnny finishes the big guy off and Steel knocks out Johnny who Sarge discovers is the they sniper who shot at them the night before when he uncovers Vance's bandaged shoulder. Steel calls the CIA and to pick up Vance and his men then heads off to his apartment. he figures that Vance wasn't smart enough to head up the operation, but he thinks he know who is. Sarge see a light on in his apartment and  finds Sarah Tempest rifling through his desk.

She pulls his his gun out of his desk and they have a stand off. Steel explains everything. Johnny was trying to horn in of Sarah's job, but she had evidence of his criminal dealing, enough to put him away. She gave the evidence to Linda, told her to hide it and if anything happened to Sarah to give it to the CIA. She told Vance of the evidence and that if anything happened to her, he would go down. But Johnny found out that it was Linda who had it and when he saw her and Steel together he panicked and killed her.

But he couldn't find the papers and now wasn't sure it was Linda who had them. Both She and Johnny were searching for the papers, only she had to do it quietly so Johnny wouldn't catch on. When Sarah saw that Steel had been beaten up, she planted the picture of Johnny in the room, hoping Steel and Johnny would finish each other off. But when Sarge met Johnny he realized the Linda could never love a slob like him and then he figured out the picture was a plant, since it was the only think in Linda's apartment that had not been torn up. That's when Steel figured out that Sarah was the leader he had been looking for.

Steel makes a move and gets his gun away from Sarah, but Hobart Jefferies has snuck up behind Steel and knocks him to the floor. Sarah refers to Hobart as her "right-hand man" and Steel says, "..and I though I had been played for a sap!" Sarge then accuses Hobart of selling out Linda;s identity to Vance. Hobart denies it, but Sarah stares him down and when Hobart goes for his gun Sarah shoots him. This gives Steel the chance to disarm Sarah.

Back at the CIA Steel gives Lowell Cade a stuffed bunny that he had won for Linda at Coney Island that she had recently given back to him. Steel surmises that Linda had gotten scared and gave it to Steel for safe keeping. Inside they find the papers that will make Vance talk. As the story ends, Steel is lost in thought of the beautiful jazz singer and the romance that might have been.

Damn good story. A little heavy on the exposition on page 16 but other than that great work by Skeates and some nice Giordano artwork. But wait! There is more.

The back-up story is the nine-page "Espionage: Muscle Beach Style!" featuring Tiffany Sinn, the CIA Sweetheart by David A. Kaler and Jim Aparo (my favorite Aquaman artist). Dave Kaler also wrote the Steve Ditko-illustrated Captain Atom series. This was the last of only three stories about private eye turned secret agent Tiffany Sinn.

Interestingly, her first two appearances were in Career Girl Romances #38 and #39. Tiffany was created by writer Gary Friedrich and artists Charles Nicholas and Vince Alascia, who did both of her previous stories. She was quite a genre change for the romance book and a much better fit here in Secret Agent. where Aparo gave her the nifty logo.

The story starts with a recap of Tiffany's first two cases and then moves on from there when Tiffany is told to take an evening flight to San Francisco and that she will be given additional information from a contact on the plane. The contact ends up being a flight attendant who passes her a dossier. That in turn, sends her to a specific taxi cab where she and we find out even more. Apparently secret fuel formulas and parts information are somehow being leaked from a government defense plant. The last agent assigned to the case was found floating in the bay.

Tiffany is assigned to work undercover as a lab technician to Aldo Bateman, a hunky blonde lab scientist whom the CIA suspect of being the leak. Tiffany falls into her new undercover role and come the weekend Aldo invites her to the beach with him and to dancing later that night. Their day starts at Muscle Beach where Aldo lifts weights while Tiffany watches and wonders how he passes on the information. That night it is dinner with Aldo at Fisherman's Wharf, but Tiffany learns nothing new.

Week after week she learns nothing new though she spends all of her weekends with Aldo. Finally it is decided to bait the trap and Aldo is shown a new rocket formula. That weekend Aldo wears a set of blue trunks that Tiffany has never seen before to Muscle Beach. Tiffany notices that Aldo radically changes his workout, doing new exercises for the first time, changing the order of his routines, doing different numbers of reps. She sees a glint coming from an apartment window and sees that men with binoculars are also watching Aldo's every move.

She calls HQ using a phone in her lipstick, but Aldo has noticed her extra scrutiny of him and catches her in the act. He drags her into the water and tries to drown her, but Tiffany uses Judo to overcome him and push Aldo under the water. After they take Aldo away Tiffany reports that Aldo passed on information using a system of code involving weights and reps. When they ask her to report to HQ to fill them in, Tiffany decides to work on her tan instead.

OK, not the greatest of stories, but Jim Aparo's artwork is top notch and left me wanting more of Tiffany Sinn. Unfortunately, that was not to be.

So Skeates's writing and the artwork of Dick Giordano and Jim Aparo make this book well worth owning. You get to see the Aquaman SAG team (Skeates/Aparo/Giordano) in top form before they even worked at DC.

Edited by Dick Giordano.

Aquaman #53

Aquaman #53 (On Sale: July 1970) has a classic cover by the late, great Nick Cardy. Good lord they don't get much better than this!

It is 1970 and there is a rumor going around that California is going to have a major earthquake and sink into the Pacific. Kind of hard to believe these days, but this rumor got so much traction that then governor, Ronald Reagan found some flimsy excuse to be out of the state the day it was supposed to happen. Just a funny last minute schedule change his people said, but we all knew. "Is California Sinking?" by the SAG team (Steve Skeates, Jim Aparo and Dick Giordano) taps beautifully into this 1970 paranoia as only Steve Skeates could.


It opens on a mundane scene of a secretary typing away in an office, oblivious until the last moment to what is happening around her. From that startling scene we flip the page to one of Jim Aparo's great splash (no pun intended) pages, showing the power of his triple-threat penciling, inking and lettering. IS CALIFORNIA SINKING?


Well, is it? Californian millionaire Elliot Harlanson (gotta love that name!) has just been told that it will and what that means to him is his beautiful home will sink with it. And Elliot is having none of that. But he is being told that he can save his home, and California in the bargain, if he just buys an atomic bomb and blows up Atlantis. Because, you see, it is the rising of Atlantis that will cause the sinking of California and if Atlantis does not rise, well then, California does not sink! Or at least that is the story being peddled by Elliot's visitor, a mysterious "scientist" who we shortly learn is actually an agent of O.G.R.E. (Organization for General Revenge and Enslavement), who can't afford to buy an a-bomb of their own. They plan on seeing that Aquaman is in Atlantis when Elliot's bomb goes off.

It is now two weeks later and, on the east coast, Elliot and his ever-present girl-friend meet the "scientists" from O.G.R.E. on a dock, where Elliot's submarine, atomic bomb inside, await. We find out that O.G.R.E. has enlisted the help of Black Manta to keep Aquaman by Atlantis and preoccupied. They have given Manta a gun that scrambles brain waves and Manta uses it to thwart an attack of sea creatures on him orchestrated by Aquaman. As Aquaman leaves Atlantis to confront Manta, the sub leaves the Florida coast heading for Atlantis.

When Manta uses the gun on Aquaman, the Sea King is able to counteract the gun's affects by concentrating on getting Manta. While Aquaman takes care of Black Manta, Aqualad and some Atlantian police take care of Manta's men. When Manta mumbles something about "They said I'd have nothing to worry about," Aquaman wants to know who "they" are and sort of, well, beats the information out of Manta. When Manta confesses that he got the gun from O.G.R.E., Aquaman knows something bigger than Manta and a gun is going on and he begins scouring the area around Atlantis looking for danger.

Meanwhile on the shore the O.G.R.E. "scientists" have a run in with the feds. who take them down only to be told that they are too late to save Atlantis or Aquaman.

Back at Atlantis, Aquaman sees the sub coming in close and sends a giant squid to capture it. Caught in the squid's grasp, Elliot freaks out, "You act like you don't care what happens to my beautiful, spacious home!" and accidentally whacks a lever. The lever that releases the bomb! Learning what he has done a distraught Elliot proclaims, "I'm too rich to die! Do something!" But there is nothing they can do while caught in the squid's grasp.

Aquaman sees the bomb however and races toward it at speeds only the King of the Sea could muster. Alas, he is still to slow and the bomb hit the sea floor!

And bounces harmlessly away. It is a dud! Inside the sub, Elliot is furious! "Wait till I get my hands on the rat who sold me that bomb!" His girl-friend tells him to, "Just cool it!"

In the epilogue a few days later the feds tell Aquaman the O.G.R.E. are being taken care of by them and not to worry. They also tell him that they have let Harlanson go, as he was duped; he actually thought he was saving California from destruction and had no idea that Atlantis was populated. When Aquaman talks about the act a fate that resulted in a dud atomic bomb the feds reveal that they actually took care of that, or rather their agent on the inside did. That is when Elliot's girl-friend, in reality Agent 03, Honey James, shows up.

Aquaman says that he let Manta go, as the revelation that Manta was being duped by O.G.R.E. was more than enough punishment. After they leave the feds and head back for Atlantis, Aqualad wonders what will happen to Atlantis's people should it rise from the ocean depths. Aquaman says not to worry as that would not happen till well past the year 2000, so they have plenty of time to figure it out.

"And so our story ends. Yet, once question remains unanswered..." Shots of the secretary going under water... "Is California Sinking?" Shamefully, shamefully never reprinted.

Edited by Dick Giordano.