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Comic Books and America, 1945-1954

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Antiwar literature entry: Index entry (p. 53)

[...]

But the war comics of the 1950s were different from the fantasy-driven titles published during World War II. They were darker, more realistic, and less jingoistic. "One thing to keep in mind is that from the end of World War II to the early 1950s, comic books were just as much an adult medium as a children's medium," explains Benton. "Many of the readers were young males in their 20s who missed World War II but had a desire ... to see war portrayed in a realistic fashion. Comic books allowed them to do that."

A few titles of the early 1950s, particularly those published by Timely Comics (later known as Marvel Comics), trumpeted the glory of war. But for the most part, publishers emphasized the negative consequences of global conflict, particularly in terms of human loss.

"There was a certain naïveté to the superhero stories published during World War II, and that changed abruptly in the 1950s," says William Savage Jr., a professor of history at the University of Oklahoma at Norman and author of Comic Books and America: 1945-1954 (University of Oklahoma Press, 1990).

"The only explanation I can come up with is that enough people ... in the comic book industry had participated in World War II and emerged from it with firsthand knowledge of what war was really like," says Savage. "It was a 180-degree turn from the gung-ho optimism of the World War II period to an almost totally pessimistic view of the individual in a combat situation. In my opinion, the war comics published during the Korean War were really the only antiwar literature of the day."