Let's compare & contrast the origins of the two premier artificially induced supermen of the Bronze Age, as suggested this time by pal of this here blog Nefarious Neil Hansen ( or Friend Of Old Bronze Age as I'm now calling you lot. We're completely FOOBA, every one of us! )
The Six Million Dollar Man magazine was from Charlton, by way of Continuity Associates, or in other words Neal Adams & Dick Giordano, and though it was short-lived ( 7 issues and out ), it was all solid stuff, with some magnificent covers. Not to mention better special effects than the TV show.
Here's Steve Austin's origin, courtesy of uncredited Continuers, and Charlton's hardest working writer, the ubiquitous Joe Gill. Race you round the playground in slow motion.
Pat Mills, of course, never met a TV show he couldn't do a harder, cooler, nastier version of.
Initially, to me at least, MACH 1 actually seemed like the least interesting of the early 2000AD's strips, being as it was absolutely the most derivative. John Probe, the secret agent with the vaguely porn star sounding name, was of course Steve Austin crossed with Deathlok, except he was British and he got to kill people.
Later on, of course, the strip rang the changes with the introduction of the Hulk-like Mach Zero, and Probe himself started to question just who and what he was busting a gut for, particularly in a superb serial where his sleazy boss killed a couple of friendly aliens.
But before that, we got a series of short, brutal adventures for the Hyper Hero, which very quickly convinced me about this guy, being as they were increasingly similiar in tone to Dredger's early exploits over in Action. In fact, clearly I was wrong by dismissing Probe out of hand as, if anybody was the inheritor of nasty, vicious two-fisted action from Action's secret agent, it was him.
And looking back on his adventures now, I can't help going 'Ah yeah! Remember the one where he kills the guy with one karate chop to the neck?!'
