I continued to make my way through the complete run of SHAZAM that i had borrowed from my grade school friend Donald Sims one week. While it's taking us months to go over these books, I read them all in two, maybe three days when I first borrowed them. This next issue was a return … Continue reading BC: SHAZAM #12
I'm not 100% certain who I borrowed this issue of BATMAN from. it might have been my grade school friend Donald Sims as with most of the books that we've been looking at recently. But I suspect that it was actually my next-door-neighbor Johnny Rantinella. Johnny was a year younger than I was and a … Continue reading BC: BATMAN #257
I'm pretty certain that I had owned a copy of SHAZAM #11 at some point. I believe I got it in one of those 3-Bags that could be found in supermarkets, toy stores and department stores, with three comics of recent vintage for a barely-discounted price. I'm also sure that I traded this comic away … Continue reading BC: SHAZAM #11
The cover to this next issue of SHAZAM, which I borrowed along with the rest of the compete run of the title from my grade school friend Donald Sims, presaged changes that were coming to the series. For the first time, the cover image isn't the work of the character's co-creator C. C. Beck but … Continue reading BC: SHAZAM #10
As we talked about last week, Jerry Siegel's creation Robotman, while not being a trend-setter, grew into a reliable back-page feature over the course of his career. And in fact, the strip was popular enough to survive its home, STAR-SPANGLED COMICS, being rebranded as a western title. When that happened, the strip migrated to the … Continue reading The Last Robotman Story
First of all, it's got to be said: at a time when a regular issue of a new comic book cost 60 cents, the fact that this first MARVEL GRAPHIC NOVEL was priced at $5.95 was almost intolerable. Yes, it was 64 pages long by a top creator, yes it was on far better paper … Continue reading FSC: MARVEL GRAPHIC NOVEL #1
We covered Marvel's propensity for replacing late-running stories in their meant-to-be-new magazines with emergency reprints in depth a while ago. Here's that piece again for those who may have missed it: https://tombrevoort.com/2021/01/09/a-guide-to-marvels-unannounced-1970s-reprint-issues/ For the most part, DC didn't suffer from this same problem. Their editorial staff was both larger and much more well-organized and regimented … Continue reading BC: WORLD’S FINEST COMICS #229
For the next year or two, JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA turned into a bit of a forgettable series. I still was buying it every month, but some of that was simply out of momentum. I had loved the series when I was younger, but whether it was that nostalgia made those earlier issues look better … Continue reading BHOC: JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #169
By 1942, Jerry Siegel seemingly had it all. He was the creator and writer of Superman, a character whose first appearance set off a fad that changed the comic book industry, but who had thereafter gone on to conquer the worlds of newspaper strips, radio shows, the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade and animated cartoons. Siegel … Continue reading The First Robotman Story
I was continuing to work my way through the stack of issues of SHAZAM that I had borrowed from my buddy Donald Sims that comprised a complete run of the series. But issue #9, changes were starting to take place. First off, following the prior issue's all-reprint format, from this point forward the book would … Continue reading BC: SHAZAM #9
The Tom Brevoort Experience 