Lee & Kirby: The Discarded Pages from INCREDIBLE HULK #4

Larry Lieber, the last surviving member of the original Marvel Bullpen, has been recently divesting himself of some of his possessions, selling off artwork and mementos that he's carried with him for decades. And among what he put up for auction at Heritage Auction House recently is a pair of discarded pages intended for a … Continue reading Lee & Kirby: The Discarded Pages from INCREDIBLE HULK #4

BHOC: GREEN LANTERN #120

This was another comic book that my younger brother Ken also picked up a copy of after I had bought one. To this day, i really don't quite understand why he would do that, but it was a pattern that repeated again and again. Sadly, what he got was a bit of a dud--Green Lantern … Continue reading BHOC: GREEN LANTERN #120

FSC: OMEGA MEN #1

At the beginning of the 1980s, after a number of rough years, DC really began to get its act together and to modernize its approach to doing comic books. The primary instigator of this change was new publisher Jenette Kahn and the vehicle through which it became viable was the emerging Direct Sales marketplace of … Continue reading FSC: OMEGA MEN #1

BC: SHAZAM #28

This next issue of SHAZAM, which I experienced while reading through the complete run of the series which I'd borrowed from my grade school friend Donald Sims, is noteworthy in that it reintroduced a character who in the coming years would explode in popularity and eventually even get his own self-titled movie: Black Adam! And … Continue reading BC: SHAZAM #28

BHOC: BRAVE AND THE BOLD #154

This issue of BRAVE AND THE BOLD was another comic book that my household wound up owning two copies of, meaning that at some point my younger brother Ken picked up his own copy. Which is understandable in a way, as I would never let him read my comics for fear of them getting damaged. … Continue reading BHOC: BRAVE AND THE BOLD #154

BHOC: ADVENTURE COMICS #465

The one real immediate benefit of finding my new Stationery Store source for new comic book purchases is that suddenly all of the thicker books that my 7-11 had quietly stopped carrying at some point in the past were now readily available to me. Case in point: ADVENTURE COMICS. I would have been interested in … Continue reading BHOC: ADVENTURE COMICS #465

FSC: COMICO PRIMER #1

By 1980, I started to attend comic book conventions in New York City. My father would take myself and occasionally a comic book reading friend or two on the Long Island Railroad into New York City and give us a couple of hours inside one of the cons that were going on there. These were … Continue reading FSC: COMICO PRIMER #1

BC: DEFENDERS #33

THE DEFENDERS was always a bit of a weird series to me. On the outside, it looked like any other regular Marvel comic of the period. But crack the cover and get into the contents and the stories were almost all unrelentingly weird. This was definitely the case for the run of stories masterminded by … Continue reading BC: DEFENDERS #33

BHOC: ACTION COMICS #499

ACTION COMICS was pretty much the first title that I read with any regularity; it and THE FLASH. And that was due to the fact that, as opposed to SUPERMAN or JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA or most of the DC line, ACTION was published monthly. That meant that there were new issues arriving more regularly … Continue reading BHOC: ACTION COMICS #499

BHOC: UNCANNY X-MEN #125

UNCANNY X-MEN was on a roll at this point in time, and while this latest issue was something of a transition story, moving events in the direction of resolving some long-percolating plotlines, it was still ultra-enjoyable. These days, this whole era is considered a classic period, but at the time, we just looked at it … Continue reading BHOC: UNCANNY X-MEN #125