This issue of SGT FURY AND HIS HOWLING COMMANDOS was also the byproduct of a 3-Bag purchased in a toy store or a department store. I had an uneasy relationship with SGT FURY at this time. I felt motivated to read it because Nick Fury was such a key character within the Marvel Universe (though … Continue reading BHOC: SGT FURY #143
It's been said over the years that Marvel's publisher Martin Goodman had an unwavering faith in the sales appeal of Ant-Man. How much of that was due to him hearing about the sell-through numbers on the earliest appearances of the Atom over at rival DC I do not know--but it does account for the reason … Continue reading WC: TALES TO ASTONISH #38
The original Ghost Rider made his debut in 1949, in the pages of Magazine Enterprises' TIM HOLT #11. Nobody involved could have anticipated that the character, in a series of transformative forms, would still be a going concern today--and might have starred in a pair of big budget movies. While the publishers at Magazine Enterprises … Continue reading The First Ghost Rider Story
This issue of STRANGE TALES was another book that was in that long box of about 150 Silver Age comic books that I bought in 1988 for $50.00. As the Marvel super hero line began to expand, certain strips tended to stagnate. They also got used a lot of the time as a place to … Continue reading WC: STRANGE TALES #112
The series was only nine issue old, and already somebody--presumably editor/scripter Stan Lee--felt it necessary to raise the stakes even further. This SGT FURY AND HIS HOWLING COMMANDOS cover promises something unbelievable--and without even reading the story, you can likely intuit the outcome. SGT FURY was a weird title. It was created in response to … Continue reading WC: SGT. FURY AND HIS HOWLING COMMANDOS #9
SGT. FURY AND HIS HOWLING COMMANDOS was a foundational title launched during the heyday of the dawning Marvel Age of Comics in 1963. Rather than being a super hero series like most of the other Marvel books then garnering attention, it was instead a war series--war comics continued to be strong performers for DC and … Continue reading The Last Sgt. Fury Story
This was the very last issue of TWO-GUN KID that Marvel published. A string of issues that went back to 1948 (with admittedly several gaps) came to a final end here. I wasn't aware of that when I got this comic, nor did I get to enjoy this great Gil Kane cover--Kane was doing new … Continue reading BHOC: TWO-GUN KID #136
This book has been on my list to write about for a while now, but given the sad news regarding the health of artist George Perez, it now seems like something I should get too sooner rather than later. For those who are unaware, george has been diagnosed with inoperable and terminal cancer, and he's … Continue reading Personal Best: AVENGERS #1
As Dave Lister explains to Arnold Rimmer in an early episode of the British science fiction comedy series RED DWARF, "Death isn't the handicap it used to be." Today, it's a given that, in the world of super heroes, death is, at worst, a revolving door, and any character who breathes his or her last … Continue reading 5BC: Five Best Silver Age Character Deaths
One of the things that I tell people when we're talking about the history of Marvel Comics is that one of the amazing things about what those earlier pioneers created is the fact that, if you wait long enough, even the failures become successes. It was true of the Hulk, it was true of the … Continue reading WC: TALES TO ASTONISH #37
The Tom Brevoort Experience 