Writer:- The Victor editorial team? Artist:- Not known.

Main cast:- Barry Martin, actor; Butch McGraw, American born, American Footballer and sportsman; 'Brains' Tyler, computer genius; 'Wheels' Rogers, racing driver; 'Greasy' Wilson', ace pilot, (but called Williams by Sir James in the first episode, for some reason); Sir James Morris, their boss.

Time period:- 1990's Great Britain and abroad.

Force Five! are regarded as the finest counter-intelligence strike force in the world. The Force Five team members all use their expert knowledge in their own particular skilled area in fighting the terrorists. (Meet the team below). (Force Five operates as a cross between the old television series /film Mission Impossible and the British TV series The Professionals). They work for a secret British Intelligence department. Their boss is Sir James Morris who assigns them their missions. The team are usually alerted to a mission by the placing of an advertisement in The Times of London. (So the missions might be urgent and important, but not that urgent and important if the team doesn't need to go into action for a day or so!)

The Force Five team members:-

• 'Greasy' Williams has his own air-freight business and can fly any type of plane or helicopter.
• Barry Martin uses his acting and make-up skills to great effect.
• The American Footballer Butch McGraw provides the strength and muscle.
• 'Wheels' Rogers, is a top racing car driver whose skills behind the wheel of various cars come in very handy.
• Whilst 'Brains' Tyler is a computer genius and the brains of the team. All five team members though are gun and combat trained.

Missions include tangling with Apocalypse a deadly terrorist group, investigating a dangerous ex-Colonel Barker, who has a heavily guarded house of armed men and weapons, preventing an assassination, rescuing kidnapped people and so on. For nine episodes the team are the hunters on the trail of terrorists and other criminals, but in the final episode it is the hunters who find themselves hunted. Will the team survive being assassinated and if so what happens to the team? The answers can be found in the final episode of the four strips below.

This particular series is from the early 1990’s Victor and reflected the world and action genre television and films that were prevalent and popular at this time. This series is an original strip was not adapted from text stories published in earlier D.C. Thompson comics.

The artwork for this series is interesting. Panels on some pages overlap other panels and the artwork reminds me of Arthur Ransom's work. (Although, I have no idea if he is the artist or not). The reader gets to enjoy the action from different viewpoints, looking down from roofs, close, middle and long shots of the action and the characters faces.

One last point about the series, the printing isn't of the best quality. I'm not an expert in printing matters, but it looks as though the printing of the series was done from photocopies or possibly the comic was being printed in a new style, which might account for the poor quality printing. Then again I could be wrong!

In the following adventures Force Five tangle with assorted terrorist groups and attempt to avoid being assassinated by someone out to kill the team. Episodes from issues 1516, 1518, 1519 and 1525 respectively.

© Adrian Banfield, 2009.