Air Raid Robertson

Author notes

Composite Fruit Fight

Air Raid Robertson

on Feb. 20, 2012

Those of you who are familiar with comic books from the late 70's and early 80's will understand what this comic references. During that period Hostess devised an ad campaign where famous superheroes foiled crimes with the assistance of twinkies, fruit pies, and other assorted snacks. As you can probably guess, the plots for these one-page comics were pretty wacky.


Everyone from Patton Oswalt to Garth Ennis has lampooned these things. As a matter of fact, I've already done an Air Raid Robertson strip where the day is saved thanks to pie.


I did not, however, do a pie ad featuring Fantomah. Longtime Air Raid Robertson readers will recognize Fantomah from her appearances in "Welcome to the Jungle" and "Phenomenal Voyage". Comic book buffs in general will know Fantomah as the unintentionally absurd superheroine created by cult figure Fletcher Hanks in the early 1940's. Fantomah's status as a bizarre public doman figure allows many cartoonists, including myself, to use her likeness in their work.


I always get a kick out of writing and drawing Fantomah. However, I made the rough draft for this page almost a year ago. Other projects just kept getting in the way.


Naturally, it feels good to finally get around to doing this.


The Composite Human is a character that I threw together without any thought besides "I should draw a bad guy who is visually interesting". The name and appearance of this figure is derived from The Composite Superman. This semi-obscure DC Comics baddie had green skin, the powers of every member of the Legion of Superheroes, and a costume that mashed up the sartorial tastes of Batman and Superman.