Line #44 ComicBook/JackStaff


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6	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/jackstaff_4.jpg]]
7	[[caption-width-right:350:Britain's Greatest Hero is back!]]
8
9	''Jack Staff'' is writer-artist Paul Grist's attempt to produce an authentically British superhero comic that ''works''.
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11	John Smith, salt-of-the-Earth builder and decorator of Castletown, Yorkshire, is really Jack Staff, Britain's greatest hero. Since UsefulNotes/WorldWarII, he's been defeating threats to the people of the islands, mostly by hitting them with a stick until they give up.
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13	Much of the popularity of the series comes, however, from the range of weirdos surrounding Jack, including '''BECKY BURDOCK, VAMPIRE REPORTER!''', the government Weird Shit Investigator Agency known only as '''Q''', [[CowboyCop old-fashioned copper]] '''Inspector Maveryk''', and robot guardian '''Tom-Tom the Robot Man'''. To reflect this, Grist eventually renamed the book ''The Weird World Of Jack Staff.''
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15	!!Tropes
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17	* AllGermansAreNazis: Played with in an interesting way with Kapitan Krieg, who's first presented as simply seeing himself as the German equivalent of a Golden Age superhero just like Jack and Sgt Stripes, in the late 30s. So of course he fights for his country when the war breaks out, because he's a CaptainPatriotic too. He finds out the hard way things aren't so simple.
18	* BandagedFace: "Mr Green"
19	* BelligerentSexualTension: Jack and Becky, right from the beginning.
20	* BigBadFriend: [[spoiler: Sergeant Stripes is actually the Castletown Vampire.]]
21	* BilingualBackfire: [[spoiler: The unfortunate end to the Brain Head / Capitan Krieg team-up.]]
22	* CaptainErsatz[=/=]{{Expy}}: After the Spider crisis, Grist turned to these instead of directly using older characters. Some of them are straightforward Ersatzes, others are playful combinations or remixes of multiple characters, both British and American.
23	** Jack himself supposedly began as a pitch for a Marvel Union Jack series. Although aside from [[WearingAFlagOnYourHead Wearing A Flag On His Chest]] and fighting one vampire, [[DivergentCharacterEvolution little of that remains]].
24	** Straight examples: General Tubbs is [[ComicBook.TheBeano General Jumbo]], Charles Raven is Janus Stark, Ben Kulmer is the Steel Claw (created by Ken Bulmer). Lord Nod is Dream from ''[[ComicBook/TheSandman1989 Sandman]]''. The Freedom Fighters are a new take on ComicBook/{{The Invaders\|MarvelComics}} - Sgt Stripes is ComicBook/CaptainAmerica, Blazing Glory the original ComicBook/{{Human Torch\|1939}}. The Druid is a crustier ComicBook/DoctorStrange. And Detective Inspector Maveryk [[Series/TheSweeney likes to think he's the kind of old-fashioned copper played by John Thaw]].
25	** The Eternal Warrior looks like Adam Eterno but is closer in concept to Creator/MichaelMoorcock's Eternal Champion. Tom Tom the Robot Man is Robot Archie with a little ComicBook/IronMan added in. The Hurricane is ''ComicBook/{{Valiant}}'s'' rage-powered, humourously foul-mouthed Captain Hurricane redone as a [[ComicBook/TheIncredibleHulk Hulk-level]] disaster with full-on SymbolSwearing. And Helen Morgan, with her immortality-granting crystal shard, is a very loose take on "Kelly's Eye", here linked into the Eternal Warrior.
26	** Bramble and Son, Vampire Hunters are Series/SteptoeAndSon... [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin if they were vampire hunters!]]
27	* TheCameo: Jack Staff himself would appear in the ''ComicBook/{{Invincible}}'' War CrisisCrossover, protecting London against one of the Evil Invincibles brought by Angstrom from other {{Mirror Universe}}s. He fights the same Evil Mark Grayson twice before [[SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome sadly losing]], although coming out of the counter alive at least.
28	* CaptainPatriotic: Jack Staff, Sergeant Stripes, and Kapitan Krieg.
29	* ClingyMacGuffin: The Steel Claw, which Ben Kulmer can't remove.
30	%%* ClockRoaches: The Time Leech
31	* DemonicPossession: Kapitan Krieg finds out the Nazis had more plans for him than just being a superhero...
32	* DueToTheDead: [[spoiler: Jack burying Krieg under his civilian name.]]
33	* DyingAsYourself: [[spoiler: Kapitan Krieg manages to avert being made ]]
34	* EvenEvilHasStandards: Chinard is very upset that his wannabe gratuitously shot and killed someone.
35	* EvilTwin: The [[spoiler: evil vampire Albert Bramble who survives the collapse of the MirrorUniverse reality]].
36	* EyeBeams: [[spoiler:Kapitan Krieg when possessed.]]
37	* FourthWallObserver: The Druid, who frequently [[NoFourthWall talks to the reader]].
38	%%* {{Ghostapo}}
39	* HatePlague: The Hurricane situation.
40	%%* HeroicSacrifice
41	%%* HeroicSecondWind
42	* HulkingOut: Captain Gust, whose rage problems manifest by turning him into the Hurricane.
43	* ImmortalLifeIsCheap: Helen Morgan. Not treated quite comically enough for "TheyKilledKennyAgain", but approaching it.
44	* JackTheRipoff: Chinard is lured out of retirement when a wannabe steals one of his old [[PowerArmour Spider-suits]] and starts committing crimes with it.
45	%%* LiteralSplitPersonality: Molachi
46	* MagicFeather: [[spoiler: General Tubbs's SuperWristGadget keyboard,]] as Commander Malone finds out the hard way.
47	* TheMenInBlack: Q are the mostly-sympathetic version.
48	%%* MirrorUniverse
49	* MisterBig: Brain Head or "Hässlicher Kleiner Mann".
50	* MuggingTheMonster: The Claw in the jewellers' shop, with a twist (he ends up robbing the place himself and using the dumb robber as a patsy). Played straighter when a hoodie tries to mug the harmless old Mr. Chinard.
51	%%* MyCountryRightOrWrong
52	%%* MyLittlePanzer: General Tubbs's toys.
53	* NiceJobBreakingItHero: [[spoiler: Jack's dissipation of the Hurricane's power into the environment ends up causing a HatePlague with several fatalities and a number of innocent people being turned into murderers.]]
54	* NoCelebritiesWereHarmed: Morlan the Mystic is an affectionate caricature of Creator/AlanMoore, while horror novelist Iain M Angel is an anagrammatic ShoutOut to Creator/NeilGaiman (with presumably a little Creator/IainMBanks added in). Lord Gilbert Pearce is a much less affectionate hybrid of Jeffrey Archer and Lord Lucan.
55	%%* NotSoImaginaryFriend
56	* OlderThanTheyLook: John/Jack looks in his 30s at most, but has been fighting crime since the 1940s. (The strip can't begin earlier than 1991, given the registration plate on John's truck in the very first panel.)
57	* OldFashionedCopper: Inspector Maveryk - in fact, it's practically his catchphrase, and usually manifests itself by getting in everyone else's way.
58	* OopNorth: Castletown is in Yorkshire.
59	%%* OurVampiresAreDifferent
60	* PoisonedChaliceSwitcheroo: Subverted. Both glasses were poisoned and it was the antidote that was ostentatiously added to one.
61	%%* PokeInTheThirdEye
62	* PowerArmour: [[spoiler: Tom-Tom the Robot Man]], the second Molachi, and less overtly Chinard's costume.
63	%%* PsychoElectro: Shock.
64	* PublicDomainCharacter: Grist introduced an ageing and semi-retired version of 1960s British comic supervillain ''ComicBook/TheSpider'' to the second arc, in the belief that either he was out of copyright or nobody would care. The copyright owners did notice, but fortunately they liked what Grist had done with the character and allowed him to carry on using the Spider, as long as he was identified in future only by the civilian name Grist had given him, "Alfred Chinard".[[note]]Incidentally, John Reppion and Leah Moore apparently liked this name enough to also use it as his alias in ''Albion''.[[/note]]
65	* RequiredSecondaryPowers: Lampshaded when Brain Head takes down [[PlayingWithFire Blazing Glory]] by turning off her ability not to get burned.
66	* SamusIsAGirl: [[spoiler: Tom-Tom the Robot Man]] is actually [[spoiler: disabled teenager Patricia Carthy in armour.]]
67	%%* SchoolForScheming
68	* SignificantAnagram: "A Chinard"="Arachnid"
69	%%* SociopathicSoldier
70	%%* SuperpoweredEvilSide
71	* UnroboticReveal: [[spoiler: Tom-Tom the Robot Man.]]
72	** And later zig-zagged with a straight RoboticReveal when [[spoiler:a villain blows a hole through Tom-Tom and Jack mourns Patricia as dead, only to discover that she upgraded the robot to being fully remote-controlled rather than PowerArmour]].
73	* VaguenessIsComing: The long-running Red Vs Green plot. Still not explained.
74	* WearingAFlagOnYourHead: Well, not his head, exactly, but on his chest.
75	%%* WhoYouGonnaCall
76	%%* WithGreatPowerComesGreatInsanity
77	%%* WorthyOpponent: Kapitan Krieg

Context ComicBook / JackStaff