DC's Original "Freedom Fighters" from Earth-X Appreciation Thread

[MajorHoy]

During the Golden Age of comics (late 1930s-early 1950s), there was a company called Quality Comics. Their first comic book, Feature Funnies, was published in 1937 and, as was somewhat common back in the early days, was filled with reprints of comic strips that had previously appeared in the newspaper comics sections.



Eventually they also printed comic books with new material and featured such characters as Doll Man, Black Condor, The Ray, Plastic Man, Blackhawk, and many others. But by the 1950s, the public interest in many comic books, especially those featuring superheroes, had waned, and in 1956 Quality became another of the fabled Golden Age comic book publishers who called it quits. DC Comics wound up buying some of the titles / characters that had been published by Quality Comics, such as Blackhawk and G.I. Combat, with DC even continuing the publishing of the books with little-to-no-interruption in either the scheduling or the numbering. Another Quality Comics property DC eventually began publishing was Plastic Man, but there was almost a ten year break between the last issue by Quality Comics and DC's first issue. (Also, DC did not continue the issue numbering from the Quality Comics run.)

Now, what does all this have to do with the group known as the Freedom Fighters, you ask?

Well, in the early 1970s, when DC tended to publish a series of issues/books known as "100 Page Super-Spectaculars" which were filled with reprint material, DC started including reprints of some of the Quality Comics heroes along with those originally published by DC.

And then, in the summer of 1973, for the annual meeting of Earth-1's Justice League of America and Earth-2's Justice Society of America, DC decided to bring several of Quality Comics' Golden Age superheroes into the DC universe by placing them on an yet another alternate Earth . . . one where the Nazis had been the victors of World War II!

[MajorHoy]

For those unaware, every year (dating back to 1963 and lasting through 1985 / Crisis on Infinite Earths) there was a story in Justice League of America where members of the JLA would have an encounter/team-up with members of the Justice Society of America who resided on a different Earth (Earth-2 or Earth-Two; they meant the same thing).
For 1973's annual meeting, the two teams were testing devices that would allow the members to easily travel between the JSA's Earth-2 and Earth-1, where the JLA was from.
But there was one little . . . complication.

The Red Tornado had originally been on Earth-2, but as a result of his sacrificing himself in the previous JLA/JSA meeting to stop a major menace, he had wound up on Earth-1 and seemed unable (so far) to find a way back to his original Earth.
When the six members of the JLA and JSA were making the test runs to see if they could safely travel between the two Earths, well . . . they sort of got side-tracked, possibly because there were actually seven of them.

(Needless to say, . . . TO BE CONTINUED!)

[MajorHoy]

(Needless to say, . . . TO BE CONTINUED!)

After the JLA and JSA fought with the Nazis and wound up on the losing end, the Earth-X version of the cavalry arrived!



And once they beat the Nazis, they were able to tell the JLA/JSA members a bit more about the Earth they were now on.

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[Phoenixx9]

I love those guys!

While not the most powerful team ever, the combo of looks, colors, powers and personalities made them a favorite!

[MajorHoy]

Back to the team origin . . .
With the help of the members of the JLA and JSA, the Freedom Fighters attempt to finally defeat the Nazis.

[MajorHoy]

[MajorHoy]

[Phoenixx9]

I remember a friend having that comic. It was my first introduction to the Freedom Fighters.

[Frontier]

I was really bummed we didn't get to see more Freedom Fighters in the Crisis on Earth-X crossover.

And no Uncle Sam either there or in Freedom Fighters: The Ray was disappointing .

[Raijin]

I was really bummed we didn't get to see more Freedom Fighters in the Crisis on Earth-X crossover.

And no Uncle Sam either there or in Freedom Fighters: The Ray was disappointing .

I thought it was completely dumb to have a crossover episode set in Earth X without any characters from Earth X. Instead it was just doppelgangers from the main earth. Pure laziness.

[Jekyll]

I was really bummed we didn't get to see more Freedom Fighters in the Crisis on Earth-X crossover.

And no Uncle Sam either there or in Freedom Fighters: The Ray was disappointing .

I’m still waiting for the SUPER DC/CW Fanboy to appear and claim that Crisis on Earth X was better than Avengers: Infinity War

[Phoenixx9]

I was really bummed we didn't get to see more Freedom Fighters in the Crisis on Earth-X crossover.

And no Uncle Sam either there or in Freedom Fighters: The Ray was disappointing .

I thought if the Freedom Fighters were ever going to appear on that show, that was definitely the time. They blew it!

[Frontier]

I’m still waiting for the SUPER DC/CW Fanboy to appear and claim that Crisis on Earth X was better than Avengers: Infinity War

I haven't seen any of that.

I've seen more people compare it to Justice League.

[MajorHoy]

from Who's Who in the DC Universe Volume VIII (October 1985)

[MajorHoy]

A little more from Justice League of America #108 . . .

After the three groups of heroes each succeeded in destroying the mind control devices they went after, that still didn't solve the problems on Earth-X. That's when Red Tornado got involved . . .



to be concluded in a future post . . .