Maybe it's just me, but I don't think that pink is a great background color for the cover of a super hero comic book. And yet, it got used with some regularity back during the beginning of the Silver Age, most often in my memory on editor Mort Weisinger's Superman titles such as this one. … Continue reading WC: ACTION COMICS #295
And we are back, with the last of our sequence looking at Marvel's archived stats from FANTASTIC FOUR #1 to see what they might tell us about how the book and the stories had been put together. Before we get into the fourth and final section of the issue, though, I want to share something … Continue reading Lee & Kirby: THE STATS OF FANTASTIC FOUR #1, Part 4
Continuing our sequence looking at Marvel's in-house production stats for FANTASTIC FOUR #1--the closest thing that still exists to the original artwork--and studying them up close to see if they can tell us anything about how the book was put together. So let's go! We're moving into the back half of the issue now, a … Continue reading Lee & Kirby: THE STATS OF FANTASTIC FOUR #1, Part 3
As those who have been following this page for some time are aware, there are a bunch of mysteries wrapped up in FANTASTIC FOUR #1, the seminal publication that kicked off the Marvel revolution in the 1960s. There have been several theories as to how this book may have been put together--whether it was all … Continue reading Lee & Kirby: THE STATS OF FANTASTIC FOUR #1
As I spoke about yesterday, there were about 150 comics in the long box I got in my big Windfall Comics score, all of the super hero books. One of the most plentiful titles was ACTION COMICS. Which makes sense--ACTION was one of the biggest selling books of that era, and yet interest in these … Continue reading WC: ACTION COMICS #290
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
The postwar era provided challenges for many of the super-powered costumed crusaders who filled the pages of the nations comic books as, without a ready-made national enemy to fight, they were faced with a crisis of irrelevancy. And none encountered this existential ennui more directly than Captain America. Cap had been created to win the … Continue reading Captain America Musters Out!
Continuing on in our analysis of the construction of the first three issues of FANTASTIC FOUR, our attention now turns to issue #2. But first, a bit of a statement of purpose. Somebody over the course of the last week asked me why I was writing these pieces, what the point I was trying to … Continue reading Lee & Kirby: FANTASTIC FOUR #2
Seems as though people were pretty interested in the first installment of this particular topic: in the short time that this page has been operating, nothing has drawn anything close to the number of views that piece has. Which is great! What's also great is the amount of discussion that the initial installment generated, as … Continue reading Lee & Kirby: FANTASTIC FOUR #1, Part Two
It was my neighbor Johnny Rantinella who got it, and boy did I want it. So much so, and so obviously, that I was in a terrible bargaining position. I don’t remember at this late date what I traded him for it, but it was considerable. But I had to do it. Because those were … Continue reading BHOC: LIMITED COLLECTORS’ EDITION #C-48
The Tom Brevoort Experience 