A UFO arrives on Earth and collides with General Henderson’s car as he returns from a vacation in America, causing a crash and injuring him. General Calper, who accompanies Straker in a ShadAir jet, takes his place at an International Astrophysical Commission meeting. Calper is hostile to SHADO, but a UFO is spotted homing in on them in flight.
Straker requests help from Skydiver, and Sky 1 arrives just in time for the UFO to fire on the ShadAir jet. Calper is slightly injured, but the plane and crew make it to New York in time for the conference. A recovered Calper addresses the delegates, telling them that he believes SHADO is no longer capable of defending Earth and calling for an investigation into Straker and the organisation…
- Magazine Number: 12
- Artists: Gerry Haylock
- Publication Date: May 8, 1971
This strip has double page feature, drag left and right to scroll across to read it at it’s best.
The more I see of Haylock’s work, the more I admire the quality of his drawings, particularly with regard to the vehicles and backgrounds.
This is a cracking good story that would have made an excellent episode – plenty of action and tension, the aliens up to their usual trick of ‘brainwashing’ someone, SHADO members going all out to protect their commander. Something for everyone!
We have car crashes, a UFO attack on the wonderful SHADO aerocopter (seen only once in Ordeal) Skydiver on the prowl, Sky 1 in action, even an old galleon in the studio! But the absolute winner in this comic strip was the racing car – reminiscent of the wonderful scenes in Timelash. Fabulous attention to detail!
Haylock has got into his stride here. The characters are instantly recognisable (for the most part) and the whole strip makes for compelling reading. There is no pause in the action and the dialogue and reactions of the characters are spot on. Five stars!
There’s a scene in The New Boss where Straker asks Alec and Paul to meet him at the ruined house where the UFO crashed “a few months ago”. Someone theorised it was the Croxleys’ house from ESP.
I can well imagine a second series of UFO including a story like this one, and indeed the previous two. Straker on the run and totally reliant on the loyalty of Alec and Paul, unlike in Kill Straker! when he had the whole of SHADO for back-up. Again, this is one of the early classic Countdown stories. For me, it was a good intro, along with the Robert Miall novels, to the series which hadn’t yet been screened in our region.
Thanks to Leo Cudder SHADO Facebook Admin for these scans.