An exciting day at the 7-11 when a new issue of FANTASTIC FOUR showed up. This one was the second half of a two-parter featuring Diablo and Darkoth the Death-Demon, and was set during the year when the FF had broken up, with each member going his or her own separate way. I didn't believe … Continue reading BHOC: FANTASTIC FOUR #194
These days, thanks especially to the global reach of the Marvel Studios films, you can't turn around but for bumping into some piece of merchandise based on the Marvel characters. There truly is a cornucopia of stuff out there, both wonderful and less-than-wonderful. But in the early days, before the characters had exploded in popularity, … Continue reading Make Mine Marvel Memorabilia
I recently came across a copy of the 1967 MARVEL STORY BOOK ANNUAL, published in the United Kingdom by World Distributors, working in concert with the American company Western Publishing. Such hardcover Annuals were ubiquitous in the UK in the 60s and 70s--there are a number of Marvel releases that reprint various early Marvel stories … Continue reading Marvel Story Book Annual 1967 – The Chains of Abdul Rey
Picking things up where we left off last week, above is the cover of FANTASTIC FOUR #186, the second of two issues that I bought on an unexpected trip to Heroes World in 1979. With the acquisition of this and the previous issue, my run of FF now stretched unbroken back to #181. #180 had … Continue reading BHOC: FANTASTIC FOUR #186
While I was at Heroes World, I took advantage of the rare opportunity to fill in a couple of the holes in my FANTASTIC FOUR collection, including this issue and the next. This finally bridged the gap between the new off-the-racks issues I had been buying and the older ones that had been showing up … Continue reading BHOC: FANTASTIC FOUR #185
I don't remember at all what prompted it at this late date, but for some reason my family wound up going to the far-off mall that housed the Heroes World store once again. Possibly my father needed to get something he'd left at his office, which was in the same complex. Or maybe I just … Continue reading BHOC: MARVEL COLLECTORS’ ITEM CLASSICS #6
I bought this issue of MARVEL'S GREATEST COMICS on one of my regular weekly 7-11 runs, and I can remember having it with me and being over at the house of my neighbor and sometimes-friend Charles Grella down the block. As usual, it reprinted an issue of FANTASTIC FOUR from a few years earlier (9 … Continue reading BHOC: MARVEL’S GREATEST COMICS #77
We've been talking a lot about the unofficial crossovers between characters and the homages that were done. But beyond that, there's a whole other category of instances in which one company either appropriated or parodied or referenced the characters of another. These instances tended to take many different forms--there was one memorable instance, for example, … Continue reading 5BC: Five Times DC Referenced Marvel Characters in Interesting Ways
This was another book that I got out of a 3-Bag at the Two Guys discount store, and a book that would have made such a bag a must-buy for me. Because at this time, FANTASTIC FOUR was my favorite comic book series, and so an opportunity to get another new-to-me issue was something I … Continue reading BHOC: MARVEL’S GREATEST COMICS #71
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
The Tom Brevoort Experience 