BHOC: MEET THE DEALERS #13

That next weekend, my family had some reason to journey down to the South Shore Mall in search of some time or other that couldn’t be so easily procured closer to home. This was fine by me, as I’d earlier discovered that the mini-strip mall that was adjacent to the main South Shore Mall structure was the home to the Batcave, an early comic book specialty store. The Batcave (later Long Island comics after the coming of the 1989 BATMAN film prompted a cease-and-desist letter concerning the name of the store) operated for decades. It was still in the same location when I moved back into the area in the mid-1990 and only relocated elsewhere at the end of the millennium. Comic book stores were still rare items in these days, so a chance to go to one was a rare opportunity for me. The Batcave stocked both new books (which they tended to get in a week or two before the mainstream outlets) as well as a voluminous number of back issues.

One of my take-aways from this trip to the Batcave was this copy of MEET THE DEALERS. While it’s mostly been forgotten today, MEET THE DEALERS (later COMIC NEWSLINE) was a monthly newspaper fanzine that previewed the events in upcoming comic book releases as well as some broad coverage of media events, such as the impending STAR TREK: THE MOTION PICTURE in this edition. It was also chock-full of ads for back issue dealers, which was its primary purpose, at least at the outset. I’m pretty certain that I was given this copy of MEET THE DEALERS in my bag along with my purchases as a freebie. The Batcave was a regular advertiser in the publication and may have had something to do with publishing it. Pretty much the only place I ever saw copies of MEET THE DEALERS was at the Batcave.

But upon cracking it open, I was immediately captivated by the previews of upcoming releases, which included a whole bunch of reproductions of covers that I wouldn’t get to see in real life for another couple of weeks. I was already making my own homegrown comics by this point, so I was increasingly interested in how the sausage was made, so these behind-the-scenes pieces fascinated me. Interesting to look back in retrospect and see what stuff didn’t come to pass: Archie Goodwin didn’t wind up taking over writing FANTASTIC FOUR with #218, nor did Al Milgrom and Jo Duffy become the co-editors of the series, for example. But this assortment of information and previews of upcoming covers made me excited about all sorts of upcoming developments. At a time before the Internet, or Previews, or any other regular source of upcoming comic book news, getting this was like a gift from the Gods.

There was also a completely oddball serialized strip that ran in MEET THE DEALERS called Reel Man, produced by a cartoonist named Mark Riedener. it was about a guy who was fused with a movie projector in a freak accident that turned him into a film-based super hero. The strip was neither especially well-written or well-drawn, but it was still light years ahead of my own creative efforts, and so I studied it closely. It felt like doing something along these lines was a goal that was within reach. Far as I can tell, Mark Riedener never made it into the field professionally, but he still posts pen-and-ink artwork on Instagram all these years later, though not about super heroes or movie topics.

So getting new copies of MEET THE DEALERS/COMIC NEWSLINE became a bonus to my infrequent trips to the Batcave. (I remember even getting a few older issues, copies of which were still in the store.)