Peril:The Comics
Comics Gallery
[edit]Thrills! Chills! Explosions! Apologies! Welcome to the Skyscraper Comics archive—the permanent home of every known Peril Patrol comic, annual, graphic novel, spin-off and ill-advised prestige revival.
For years, Skyscraper Comics chronicled the adventures of the Peril Patrol in stories distinguished by their startling covers, bewildering plots and strict refusal to consult qualified experts.
Presented below are the surviving highlights of that remarkable publishing history. Issues are arranged by series rather than chronology, since nobody has been able to establish what the chronology was.
The Original Series
[edit]Peril Patrol #1
The astonishing first appearance of Mastermind, Chameleon, Tokyo Joe and Mister Chips! Everything readers needed to understand was placed on the cover, leaving the interior pages free to complicate matters.
Peril Patrol #12
By issue twelve, the Peril Patrol had survived several villains, two editorial reorganizations and repeated demands that someone explain exactly what Chameleon’s powers were.
The Peril Patrol Annuals
[edit]Peril Patrol Annual #1
A colossal treasury of all-new Peril Patrol action, supplemented by diagrams, pin-ups and several pages apparently included upside down.
Peril Patrol Annual #2
The second sensational annual offered even more pages than the first, although contemporary readers disagreed over whether this constituted an improvement.
Peril in the Deluxe Format
[edit]Last Tango of the Atomic Head
The landmark graphic novel that proved a Peril Patrol story could be longer, heavier and considerably more expensive without becoming any easier to understand.
Super Yeah! Okay, Chief!
Tokyo Joe takes center stage in a book-length adventure featuring robots, explosions, extremely confident engineering and the heroic declaration heard wherever danger threatens:
Spin-Offs and Other Warning Signs
[edit]The Stranger Limited Series #1
The mysterious Stranger received his own limited series, allowing readers several uninterrupted pages in which to discover almost nothing about him.
The Glamazons #1
Vavoom! Yokohama Mama! Gunbunny! MILLIE! Beauty, brains, bullets and better cable management came together in the spectacular first issue of the Glamazons.
Downunda #1
Adventure from the far side of the world! This first issue demonstrated that Skyscraper Comics could endanger an entirely different continent without appreciably changing its editorial methods.
Combat Wombat #7
Oh no! Swarmed by a horde of nature's own kleptomaniac marsupials, them Quokkas! 'struth!
The Peril Patrol Returns
[edit]Older! Darker! Grimier! The heroes returned in a prestige revival that finally asked what the Peril Patrol would look like without optimism, restraint or adequate interior lighting.
A generation after their original adventures, the Patrol came crashing back into comics in a story of aging heroes, urban decay and accidents subsequently described by witnesses as “completely unavoidable.”
Interior Art
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Interior page — The official account of events becomes increasingly specific and decreasingly convincing. Full size
Peril Patrol: Watchmen
[edit]Who patrols the Peril Patrol? More importantly, who took the last jelly doughnut?
The Patrol entered the age of deconstructed superheroes with an intricate mystery involving masks, vigilantism, urban corruption and a suspicious absence of jelly doughnuts.
Critics praised its oppressive atmosphere, painstaking symbolism and unusually thorough documentation of Chameleon’s lunch break.
Interior Art
[edit]
“Skyscraper Comics—because somebody already paid the printer!”