by tonydoug wright

Sgt. Rock – Between Hell and a Hard Place by Joe Kubert and Brian Azzarello (Vertigo 2003)

This month’s selection from the Champion City Archives is Sgt. Rock: Between Hell and a Hard Place by Joe Kubert (Sgt. Rock) and Brian Azzarello (100 Bullets). Released in 2003, Between Hell and a Hard Place was a graphic novel that resurrected one of DC Comics favorite characters: Sgt. Frank Rock.

Between Hell and a Hard Place takes place November 1944 in the Hürtgen Forest near the German-Belgian border where the U.S. Army has pinned down the German military. Unfortunately, the Germans have one advantage over the Americans: artillery. Sgt. Rock, the only hope for the American forces in the Hürtgen Forest, leads a group of soldiers that includes the familiar faces of Easy Company: Bulldozer, Wildman, Ice Cream Soldier and Little Sure Shot. They may not have the artillery of the German army but the men of Easy Company have a certain kind of mental and physical toughness to survive that is incomparable. During a battle with a small band of German soldiers Sgt. Rock, with the aid of Easy Company, captures four high-ranking S.S. officers. Unfortunately, Sgt. Rock and his men are ambushed by another group of German soldiers and the captured S.S. officers disappear during the skirmish. After Sgt. Rock and Easy Company defeat the German’s they discover three of the four S.S. officers dead due to being shot at point blank range.

“Killing ain’t murder if you’re fightin’ a war” screams Horace ‘Bulldozer’ Nichols to Sgt. Rock following the discovery of the three murdered S.S. officers in the Hürtgen Forest. Now Sgt. Rock must keep his soldiers alive and track down the main suspect, a S.S. officer who escaped his custody, while they do their best to stay alive in enemy territory. This is just the beginning of Sgt. Rock and Easy Company’s problems.

Between Hell and a Hard Place is an original and captivating graphic novel about murder during war. Comparable to Walter Dean Myers’ novel Fallen Angels, this collaboration by Kubert and Azzarello is gritty and at times violent but Between Hell and a Hard Place does not romanticize war, instead it shows the horrors of combat and the toughness of the soldiers who served our country.