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"Hora Cero" Extra ("Zero
Hour" Extra) Nº5, December 1958, published by Editorial "Frontera"
of Buenos Aires, was the special edition of a monthly magazine which was
really among the very best stuff ever published in Argentina (a country
which has a tradition of good comics, by the way). In 1957, Héctor
G. Oesterheld, a writer who until then had made some competent comic scripts
for various publishers, began to publish in his own company, and from then
on (although only for the very brief lapse of time of two years), he managed
to set standards of excellence which are respected to this very day, almost
half a century after. His two monthly magazines, "Hora Cero" and "Frontera"
("Frontier") were filled exclusively with native stuff, but one which had
nothing to envy to foreign-made comics. He worked with the aid of some
of the most remarkable artists of the moment, such as the late Hugo Pratt
(who years later became quite famous, back in his native Italy, with the
"Corto Maltese" series), Alberto Breccia (a real master, also known in
Europe, where he made a reputation until his recent death), Solano López,
Carlos Roume, Arturo del Castillo and others, forming one of the most gifted
personell of all times. While "Frontera" was a magazine of outdoor adventure
(jungle tales, western stuff and historic yarns), "Hora Cero" had its best
asset in its famed war stories, by Oesterheld (who somehow managed to write
almost everything, in all genres, and masterfully). These stories, unlike
the ones coming from USA -which, understandably enough, were mainly chauvinist
and propagandistic-, brought out the tragic nature of war by itself, where
there were only losers, because of the lack of sense of that indiscriminated
killing. This cover, by the aforementioned Hugo Pratt, says it all with
no need of a single caption. (One can even "hear" a background music!...)
Other stories in the issue: "Patria Vieja" ("Old Country"), a magnificent
story of the Argentina of the XIX century; "Traidor" ("Traitor"), an episode
of WWI, with the exploits of brave Air Aces; "Sherlock Time" a sort of
detective "of time and space", by Breccia, which, in my opinion, may have
inspired the "Alien" creature in one of its episodes.
Regretfully, all this
excellence was in the verge of vanishing (due to a number of causes never
well explained), and, years later, by a supreme irony of life, Héctor
Oesterheld, who had written a lot about injustices of war, imprisonments
and torture, was in turn caught by the military dictatorship of the '70s,
and declared "disappeared" until the '90s, when his unfair death in prison
was acknowledged. Today, a wing of a cultural institute in Buenos Aires
bears the "H. G. Oesterheld" name. |
