Good Lord (choke)! Big Dog, Big Dog, Bow Wow Wow We’ll crush evil now now now By Andy Roberts

“Good Lord! Choke” has been an occasional feature in Comics Forum since the first article in 1995, and is one of our most popular features—so be assured there will be more to follow. Andy Roberts is our correspondent from Britain’s small-press and self-publishing scene, and also to be found on the British indie-music scene in his band Linus.

Illo #1 from Superboy 131
You can’t say you weren’t warned

For a brief period in the mid-Sixties, the above rallying cry struck terror into the hearts of all the evil dogs and cats within spaceflight-range of planet Earth. This is a tale of a lost band of heroes from comics’ murky, mysterious past: the Space Canine Patrol Agency. Other failed super-teams—the Champions; the Mighty Crusaders; the Defenders—have been merely naff, or incongruously assembled (just take a look at the Champions’ line-up: Hercules, Ghost Rider, The Black Widow, Angel and Iceman—a random roster surely calculated to cause comic buyers to flee in terror). The SCPA transcended naffness to become perhaps the stupidest, most unlikely, most absurd team in the history of mainstream comics.

When Comics Forum co-editor Howard Stangroom first suggested I write about them, I thought he was having me on. But I should have known the company which had Lois Lane fall in love with Super-Horse wouldn’t balk at bringing us a shaggy version of the Green Lantern Corps. This must be what they meant by “a deep desire to expand the boundaries of the medium” on the back of The Greatest 1950s Stories Ever Told.

Yes, the SCPA were ground-breaking. In fact, the very first panel of their very first appearance (in Superboy 131, July 1966) shows one of their membership literally breaking the ground. This remarkable beast, Tusky Husky, can extend one of his teeth into a three foot tusk, and is shown spinning around on its point in order to drill into the floor. Pretty impressive super-power, huh? Other members shown in this historic splash panel are Hot Dog�a dachshund, of course�who can make himself very hot; Bull Dog—a bulldog—who can grow bull horns (decorative, but I’d like to see him try and beat Darkseid); and Tail Terrier, who can stretch his tail “like a long rope”. Since this is obviously the most fearsome power of the lot, Tail Terrier is also known as Top Dog, leader of the SCPA. The membership also includes Paw Pooch, “who can turn into a many-legged ‘centipede’ canine”, and Chameleon Collie—able to turn into other animals, such as “a fork tailed cat”, “a feathered bear” and “a monster blob”. Yes, they have feathered bears in space.

Illo #2 from Superboy 131
Historic introductions take place

Krypto, the super-dog (for it is he) first becomes aware of the team when he spots what he takes to be a large balloon in orbit around a planet. This turns out to be Mammoth Mutt, the inflatable super-canine, who has just been mortally punctured by the Canine Caper Gang, a bunch of “dog crooks over on the next world”. That’s what you get for fighting crime when you’re inflatable, I guess. Certainly the news doesn’t seem at all unexpected, or indeed unwelcome, when Krypto breaks it to the others: Tusky Husky asks, “When did you join the SCPA?” “When Mammoth Mutt was killed by those dog crooks! See? I’m wearing his collar! But actually, I’m Krypto, of Earth!” “Krypto the super-dog? Bow-wow!” And that’s it for poor old Mammoth Mutt. No tears, no mourning. Still, I’m sure it’s what he would have wanted.

Equally odd is that Krypto feels the need to disguise himself—“with these spare Clark Kent glasses I always carry in my cape” (well, it works for Clark)—when rounding up the baddies. A flying dog in glasses does, of course, look completely different from your common-or-garden flying dog, but why the anthropomorphic villains should give a toss either way escapes me.

Illo #3 from Superboy 131
“Striped dinosaur bones”, indeed?

  Oh, no, You Don’t Get Away That Easily

Illo #4 from Superboy 132
You think the babes will go for it, Krypto?

Whoever dreamed up these dogged daredevils clearly thought they were onto a winner, because they appeared again in the following issue. Krypto is chasing a stick for Superboy, “through the sea, toward the Earth’s core” (hence the telling comment: “I only have to super-bore for a thousand more miles!”), and then into space, where he spots a signal—a glowing dog shape—placed there with remarkable forethought by the SCPA. Speeding to their HQ, he is furnished with a Gerry Anderson-style space-age uniform and invited to sit in on a meeting. It’s here that we first see the assembled heroes utter their cry of “big dog, big dog, bow wow wow”—in honour of the constellation Canis Major (Latin for Big Dog, of course). Curiously, although SCPA members are only supposed to have one super-power each, Top Dog has changed from his previous brown fur colour to an inexplicable green... possibly, an evil colourist slipped some kryptonite in the printer’s ink.

Anyway, the powerhouse pooches are interviewing a candidate for membership: an impressionist who can change into a cat (rejected for being distracted by catnip). Next they fly to “the canine-feline world” for a fund-raising sports show (though how the SCPA is going to exchange fake bones and fish for hard currency is left unexplained); however, this tour of the organisation’s hectic but less-than-fascinating routine is interrupted by a heist, pulled by the Cat Crime Club. They KO Krypto with a kryptonite-laced hot dog (you’d think they’d call ‘em something else, but...), and he’s taken back to SCPA HQ in disgrace to memorise the faces in the “mutt and meow gallery of well-known criminals”.

Illo #5 from Superboy 132
Some of our heroes’ fund-raising feats

Next up is a parade, where the inevitable happens, and having failed to nab the felonious felines twice in a row, Krypto is forced to turn in his uniform. There follows one of the most unconvincing denouements I’ve seen even in old DC comics, and that’s saying something. Krypto lures the Cat Crime Club to “a world just beyond Asteroid Alley” by pretending there are some “treasure bones”—whatever the hell they are”on the planet. It also supposedly has twin red suns, rendering his powers inoperative. But when they get there, the pile of bones (“Treasure bones of Pirate Pup! Paws off!” says the cunning counterfeit sign) turns out to be Chameleon Collie in disguise, further transformed by Krypto’s x-ray vision (this convenient device was also used in the previous story, though I’ve seen no other reference to the Kryptonians’ ability to project an x-ray effect anywhere else).

The red suns are fake, too, and that’s the best part: Krypto kicked two translucent red discs, all of six feet across, into orbit “to ‘eclipse’ this world’s two yellow suns!” Which presumably then moved around obligingly (in their extremely low orbit) according to the angle the Cat Crime Club’s spaceship happened to be at in relation to the suns at any given time. Or something. Maybe they didn’t look up until they landed. And then didn’t move more than a few inches. Yeah, that must be it. Sure. It might just work.

Illo #6 from Superboy 132
Krypto explains his ingenious (!) trick

  On “Knowing When You’ve Outstayed Your Welcome”

Illo #7 from Superboy 136
The End. It’s OK. They’ve gone. It’s safe to look now.

The anticipated wave of popularity for our heroes did not materialise, but they did appear again in Superboy 136 (March ‘67, just as flying dogs and other psychedelic wonders were becoming commonplace sights for America’s acid-dropping teenagers). This story features two new members—Prophetic Pup, a fortune-telling dog with a “ ‘crystal ball’ cranium” rather like an obscenely overripe boil; and Mammoth Miss, Mammoth Mutt’s girlfriend, who has the same pointless power as her unfortunately thin-skinned lover (one big boil, basically). It also has giant fleas, another gang of cruel and corrupt cat criminals, more kryptonite (ho-hum) and a totally boring trap for Superboy. At the end, which goes on for several pages actually, Krypto waits with increasing dismay for the “hound” which Prophetic Pup predicted would save him and his master. Stranded on the outskirts of Smallville, he can only watch helplessly from afar as various SCPA members swan about the early-morning streets of the town (whose citizens clearly think nothing of a troupe of talking mutant dogs), chasing sausage-shaped blimps or digging up bones. Finally, he and Supes are rescued by a boy—who then asks for Superboy’s autograph. That’s right, he’s an autograph hound! D’oh!!

That, you will not be surprised to learn, was the last appearance of the Space Canine Patrol Agency; at least until their very brief cameo in Grant Morrison’s Animal Man, in 1990.

Illo #8 from Animal Man 25
Hey, we care, don’t we? Kind of.

The real story, of course, remains obscure. Who exactly was it who thought, “Hey! Kids love animals, right? And they love superheroes, right? And we got away with Krypto the super-dog, Streaky the super-cat and Comet the super-horse, didn’t we? So they’re bound to love a whole pack of cute doggies with completely stupid, almost useless and utterly tedious powers, aren’t they??” Did this person or persons remain in employment even after this theory proved, unsurprisingly, incorrect? If so, why? If not, where are they now (writing campaign speeches for Christian fundamentalist Republicans, perhaps)?

These three stories embody the best and the worst of the old DC. The concept is pleasingly moronic, following a sort of child-logic alien to most adults, and it exemplifies the delightful tendency to render the most outlandish ideas totally mundane—also very child-like: children’s imaginations often marry bizarre visions with the details of everyday life (which fascinate when you’re that young, and everything is new). However, the stories are themselves very boring in their own right; each one was, frankly, a dog.

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