Howling Commandos of S.H.I.E.L.D.

Hidden deep beneath AREA 13 lies the clandestine headquarters of S.T.A.K.E.--a top secret division of S.H.I.E.L.D. housing aliens, mythical beasts, and all manner of extra-normal entities. Under the command of legendary Soldier DUM DUM DUGAN, these monsters step out of the shadows and defend the world against supernatural threats too dangerous for normal men as THE ALL-NEW, ALL-DIFFERENT HOWLING COMMANDOS OF S.H.I.E.L.D.!

I picked up a copy of The Howling Commandos of S.H.I.E.L.D. on a whim one day while at the local comic book shop solely because I saw Dum Dum Dugan on the cover. Despite being a huge comic book fan, I am terrible about looking through the preview rags and seeing what is about to create some buzz. Due to the fact that I don’t keep track of what’s coming up, I tend to accumulate a lot of new titles based on cover art or the name of an author, artist or character that I really like. So when I saw Dum Dum Dugan standing at the low ready with a group of monsters wearing S.H.I.E.L.D. uniforms, I knew I was in for a treat.

This series is fantastic so far (currently at issue #4 and awaiting the release of #5). The story begins with the introduction of Dum Dum Dugan and his team who are working for S.H.I.E.L.D. under the newly formed team, code name S.T.A.K.E. (Supernatural Threat Analysis and Kill Experts) which is ironic because Vampire by Night is a member of the team. This team is awesome! They reminds me of a cheesy 60’s horror movie mash-up, the kind where the monster turns to attack and you can see the zipper on the back of the suit, which is not to say that its bad. Actually it’s the opposite of bad it’s great. It’s horror movie characters turned hero and with every panel your smile will grow larger and larger. So the team consists of the following characters:

1. Dum Dum Dugan (who is a life model decoy aka: LMD)
2. Orrgo
3. Man-Thing
4. Hit Monkey
5. Vampire by Night
6. Manphibian
7. Zombie jasper Sitwell
8. Teen Abomination
9. Warwolf

Does that not sound like the comic book version of the Monster Mash? As a huge Deadpool fan I absolutely love that Hit Monkey was included on this team since he was first introduced in Deadpool Vol. 2 #19.

This series starts out action packed and carries it through in every issue so far. The team gets called in when a bunch of Egyptian ghosts are terrorizing citizens and find a young woman at the epicenter of the paranormal event. Realizing that she has powers that she, clearly, cannot control Dum Dum decides to take her back to S.T.A.K.E. HQ and help her to cope with her abilities. Later we are introduced to another villain you may  have heard of known as Sphinx who is basically out for world domination as per the typical bad guy archetype. So now we have a bunch of good guy monsters battling with a bunch of bad guy ghosts, as I said this book is action packed. That being said the Howling Commandos are not without their comedic relief, lets just say RPG toting Zombies rarely work out the way a team leader would hope.  There is also a fair bit of internal strife due to a power struggle between Dugan and Warwolf who are still learning to work together.

If you are looking for a dark, bloody, scary comic book then this is not the one for you. If you are looking for a funny, action packed, feel good light read then I absolutely recommend you pick up a copy of The howling Commandos of S.H.I.E.L.D. I actually just recommended this title to a friend of mine to read with his son who has recently shown an interest in comic books. I thought that this was entertaining as an adult and would make a great title to share with a son or daughter who like cheesy horror flicks. I hope you give it a chance and let me know what you think down in the comments!