Storytime STRAYA CUNT

Oh, I should storytime some Iron Outlaw for you.

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hilarious stuff, OP, thanks.
I'm off to buy myself a musical belt buckle.

This is YOUR CULTURE, user!

It actually does have a bit of charm to it so far, and the interiors don't look half as shit as that cover.

I though Mirror Master was a Scotsman?

Wait right Captain Boomerang took over as Mirror Master for a while.

Okay, I wasn't sure about this team before, but this guy has GOT to be a fucking badass!

Yeah, blame Mike Grell. He must have drawn that cover on a table napkin.

Here's the original.

Anybody said "noice" yet?

Oh, neat. I like seeing comics from other countries.

Good…
Very good…

Fuckin' sold.

He's not a hunchback, he's actually the Golden Age Australian hero, Crimson Comet. Those are his wings folded up under his coat.

Oh shit, so it actually is the DEEPEST LORE? Now I'm curious about Australian comics.

I wish I had those Mexican (or wherever) Spiderman comics where it was largely about Gwen Stacy's big ass.

Here's issue #2. Guest starring Mike Grell as "Fingers" Grillo. As the time Grell was doing Green Arrow, who puts in a lawsuit-friendly appearance.

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In the original published version of this story, it was an Australian politician who was caught screwing Cicciolina.
They also changed Kylie Minogue to Nichole Kidman for some reason. I guess more people internationally recognise Nikki as Australian, Kylie affects some weird mixture of French and Cockney, so it's hard to tell.

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Nice cover here by Jerry Ordway.
I'll say this for DeVries and Lumsden, they made a lot of friends stateside fast.

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I found an interview with the writer…
tabula-rasa.info/AusComics/DavidDeVries.html

Yeah, I remember the prequel to Walrus Rock being the backup. At the time I thought they were being clever. I didn't realise it was so random how that happened, lol.

Aussies shitpost even in their comics.

Funny thing, in the original run, Southern Cross was flaming homosexual, and his friend Denise was a dyke. I think the authors were taking a shot a Sydney, rather than trying to be SJW.
They retconned them to be a straight couple when they tried selling to the American market, as you couldn't get published or distributed in the 80's if you had gay characters.
Probably make a million bucks now, of course.

Anyone want the fourth issue?

Fuck yeare.

Well all righty then.

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Well, there you have it. I bought every issue I could get my hands on, but there's a massive prejudice against the local product in Australia. All the other kids at school bagged me for reading Australian comics, they just bought X-Men and New Mutants and never took them out of the bag to read them. I liked Southern Squadron because they actually took some time on the story and art.
It's a sad thing that we hate our own talent so much, but it's a symptom of a larger problem we call the "cultural crawl", where we don't respect anyone until they made it in the States or Britain, like someone isn't a "real" actor, musician, artist, writer, until they've made it overseas. DeVries and Lumsden finally had enough of trying to piss upwind in a hostile market and have worked for Americans ever since, on Puppet Master and The Phantom, and Gary Chaloner put out 7 or 8 versions of the same story but never finished it, the last completed work of his I saw was The Olympians, back in the 90's. Pity, for a while he looked like being the next Dave Stevens.

Damn, I want more. TBH this has been a nice series. Seems pretty down to earth, in its own way.

How many more issues were there?

Um, from memory, there were a bunch of stories in Cyclone Comics, then about 13, 14 issues of their own book, then a few collections and reprints, and they showed up in Dark Nebula for a couple of issues, and a crossover with Niteside & The Rock for a couple issues of Southern Aurora, and apparently showed up in Boris The Bear, which I had no idea about.
You used to be able to read the whole archive, minus the earliest stories, which were just "Smitty And The Nightfighter" at thedarknebula.com/
But Tad tried turning it into a paysite, then a webcomic that never gets updated.
I tried lifting the stories with the Wayback Machine, but it didn't save the images.
Is there any way of rescuing the archive? They also had the faux-golden age Southern Cross, and Dark Nebula, which was a pretty decent cosmic book.

These pages from Dark Nebula, drawn by Jason Paulos, who is more famous for Hairbutt The Hippo, who is more famous for being ripped off shamelessly by Elephant Men.