The first and apparently only issue of the Mighty Marvel Messenger was published in the opening months of 1967--it's announced on the Bullpen Bulletins page of Marvel titles cover-dated June 1967--and sent for free to all current members of the Merry Marvel Marching Society. It was a little four-page newsletter fanzine that gave some promotional … Continue reading The Merry Marvel Messenger
THE COMIC READER was one of the longest-running and critical comic book fanzines of the Silver Age of Comics. It was created, as so many things were, by uber fan Dr. Jerry Bails, who was also responsible for the first super hero fanzine (Alter Ego) and the first comic book adzine. And in fact, the … Continue reading The Comic Reader #13
Woweekazowie #4, produced by Phil Iro, was really a pretty good fanzine. It contained a balanced mix of text features and fan-created comic strips, with the emphasis more on the latter. A number of creators who would later work in and around the industry produced their own home-grown strips for Woweekazowie. It's another one of … Continue reading More Woweekazowie #4
One of the best of the fan cartoonists of 1960s and 1970s fandom was Alan James Hanley. Hanley had grown up during the Golden Age of Comics and had retailed a fondness for their adventures and their style of storytelling. In particular, he was a aficionado of Captain Marvel, and the Captain's demise caused him … Continue reading Thug the Unkindly
Here's another forgotten, fannish collection, a story that was serialized across three issues of the long-running fanzine The ROCKET'S BLAST COMICOLLECTOR. It was produced by artist Brad Caslor, who would eventually go into animation as a storyboard artist and director. But here, he channels the individual styles of close to a dozen other creators to … Continue reading Forgotten Masterpiece: The Massacre of the Innocents
There were some relatively professional fanzines published by the late 1970s. One such fanzine was Woweekazowie, the fourth issue of which concerns us today. It was produced by Pete Iro and was staffed with contributions from people who would either go on to work within the comic book field itself or who would circle it … Continue reading Woweekazowie #4
The fourth issue of FantaCo's short-lived CHRONCILES series carried with it a new logo for the title--things were perhaps already growing dicey between the company and Marvel, whose output they were reviewing and indexing in these publications. And interview they had run in their FANTASTIC FOUR edition, #2, had earned them the ire of Marvel's … Continue reading Brand Echh – Avengers Chronicles #4
A short-lived publication from the early 1980s, FantaCo's CHRONICLES series of fanzines devoted each issue to a specific Marvel title (until their final annual, in which every comic book series published up to that time was reviewed.) These fanzines were pretty great, chock full of interesting information and articles as well as checklists and indexes--and … Continue reading Brand Echh – Fantastic Four Chronicles #2
In response to having serialized his final Fantastic Four story, the wonderful Leonardo Ortolani sent me over an additional tale very much in the same spirit which I had never seen before. He told me that he had done it in early 1994, right after Jack Kirby passed, and that it ran in a fanzine … Continue reading Lee & Kirby & Ortolani: Farewell to the King
This is the back half of the fourth and concluding installment of the Final Fantastic Four story that Italian creator Leonardo Ortolani produced for the tenth issue of the Italian fanzine MADE IN USA in 1994. It was set immediately after the last FF issues produced by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby and was intended … Continue reading Lee & Kirby & Ortolani: The Last Fantastic Four Story, Part Five
The Tom Brevoort Experience 