From Battle Action Force dated 16th March 1985. Art by the fabulous Joe Colquhoun. I have to admit I just love his work. The amount of research and detail put into Charley's War is fantastic. This particular episode is post Pat Mills and set during the early days of WW2 and Charley is back in uniform again. The script is by Scott Goodall. I quite like this second series, it doesn't have the moral indignation of Pat Mills' run, but it still rattles along and tells a good yarn about a period of time that you don't usually see documented in war comics. That time at the beginning of the war where everything was turning to custard for the allies as the Germans smashed their way across europe. Just look at the work that JC put into these pages.
I emailed Titan Books a while back and asked them whether the Charley's War reprints would carry on into the WW2 series. They said that (at that moment) they weren't too sure. I think it is a shame if they don't, because I feel that Charley's War stands as a testament to Joe Colquhoun and his career and it'd be nice to see the last proper series he worked on in print. Uh, that and Johnny Red which he worked on before Charley's War....
I wonder whether that response is coloured by a desire to be diplomatic given Pat Mills' undisguised antipathy for IPC resurrecting Charley's War in the first place? Certainly several of the interviews with him I have read in recent years seem to suggest he was willing to put aside his beef with the company on that and on royalties so that Joe's family could get some (belated) recognition for his work. So the publisher coming out and saying 'Hey, what a cash cow! Let's release the bodged together WW2 series too!' (especially as I don't think they have committed to releasing all the PM /JC ones, instead putting out each on a let's-wait-and-see-how-the-last-one-did basis)
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