By the fifth issue of Fantaco's CHRONICLES series, the bloom was off the rose in terms of their relationship with Marvel and Editor in Chief Jim Shooter, and so access to materials and permissions had been severed. This would be the final issue of the magazine devoted to Marvel, although Fantaco would publish one more … Continue reading FANTACO CHRONICLES #5: Fred Hembeck interviews Roger Stern
THE X-MEN CHRONICLES #1 was a fanzine published in 1981 by FantaCo, a small publisher situated in Albany, New York that was an adjunct to a notable comic shop. It was produced with the approval of Marvel, who went on to do a short-lived licensing agreement with the company, allowing them to do a number … Continue reading The X-MEN CHRONICLES: Smilin’ Ed and X-MEN #94
This next issue of GREEN LANTERN (Co-Starring GREEN ARROW) guest-starred the original Green Lantern of Earth-2, Alan Scott. I assume that this crossover had been planned before the DC Implosion that cost Scott his back-up series that had been running across the prior three months, but it was a nice way to fold the character … Continue reading BHOC: GREEN LANTERN #111
This is another comic whose contents I barely remember, whose story didn't really make much of an impact on me, and that I likely bought simply because it was there and I had the forty cents to spare. I was still lukewarm on BRAVE AND THE BOLD in general--it still felt "off" to me as … Continue reading BHOC: BRAVE AND THE BOLD #145
FOOM #4 was the final issue of Marvel's fan club magazine to be put together by Jim Steranko. After this, production on the irregularly-published fanzine would be brought in-house and done by the people on staff beginning with Tony Isabella This resulted in a change in the design and the aesthetics of the magazine. But … Continue reading FOOM #4
There's a lot to unpack about this issue of THE FLASH for me. For starters, I bought it not at any of my regular comic book haunts but rather in a far-off stationary store in distant Ronkonkoma where my family had gone for some reason. That store was a supply chain for the Cub Scouts … Continue reading BHOC: THE FLASH #268
My regular 7-11 still wasn't getting copies of THE FLASH, so I wound up keeping up with the title by running across them in other further-off locations, during family shopping trips and the like. And so, I came across this particular issue at a distant 7-11 that was across the street from the fast food … Continue reading BHOC: THE FLASH #267
Crossovers among characters originating in different comic books have become by this point so commonplace as to not even be worthy of notice, and crossovers between characters from different publishing entities have similarly increased to the point where, while they've still got a bit of built-in excitement to them, they're still relatively commonplace. But the … Continue reading 5BC: Five Times Super Heroes Met Real People
One of my absolute favorite creators in the late 1970s and throughout the 1980s and beyond was Fred Hembeck. I first encountered his work as a single-tier strip on DC's in-house promotional page, the Daily Planet. Eventually, my friend Glenn Hauman showed me one of the collections of Fred's material that were being released by … Continue reading HEMBECK 1980: Fred Hembeck Reviews SUPERMAN: THE MOVIE
Now this issue was the beginning of a three-part epic that is probably my favorite DEFENDERS story of all time. That said, it's a story that, by necessity, turns something like a dozen and a half Marvel characters into little more than action figures that do what the plot requires without any concern about the … Continue reading BHOC: DEFENDERS #62
The Tom Brevoort Experience 