“It seems to me that the Losers is a ‘people’ thing. A small squad of ‘everymen’ caught up in the crushing tide of events, pushing their ‘know-how’ to the limit in a wild effort to survive.”
Jack Kirby (1975)

After his run on the Fourth World titles (New Gods, The Forever People, Mister Miracle, Jimmy Olsen), Jack Kirby did a number of oddball projects for DC, many tucked away in forgotten corners of the DC Universe. One of them was to take on and reinvent the classic DC war title Our Fighting Forces, which featured the World War II heroes known as the Losers. It was a team-up of some of DC’s secondary WWII characters who at one time either had their own book or their own back-up feature: Captain Storm, Navajo Ace Johnny Cloud, Gunner and Sarge.

The Losers was created by Robert Kanigher and Russ Heath in 1969. Kirby took over in 1974 with Our Fighting Forces #151 and stayed on the book until issue #162. His loopy action tales were a drastic change from the previous stories by Kanigher and legend has it that fans of the old were less than pleased. However, taken on their own without the backstory and pre-Kirby logistics, these are really dynamic adventure stories that are based on Kirby’s own experiences during WWII.

Now DC Comics has added Jack Kirby’s The Losers to their fine shelf of hardcovers. The Losers collects the entire run, written and penciled by Kirby, and inked by D. Bruce Berry and Mike Royer. The collection includes a cover by Kirby and Royer. The 240-page book features a foreword by Neil Gaiman (Sandman; Coraline). On sale date is March 17, 2009. As Kirby himself blurbed at one time: “Don’t ask, just buy it!”

Mike Kidson has a great piece online on Kirby’s Losers – he dissects a complete issue with the skill of a comic book surgeon. Longtime Kirby authority Mark Evanier answers a million Kirby-related questions here along with a small bit of information about The Losers.
(Artwork © DC Comics, Inc.)