A few days ago in the post concerning the prototype versions of Aunt May and Uncle Ben that had appeared in an earlier Lee/Ditko fantasy story, I mentioned an actual prototype for the Hulk that Lee and Kirby worked on prior to launching that character in his own title in 1962. So I thought it … Continue reading Lee, Lieber & Kirby: The Prototype for the Incredible Hulk
This was another comic that I got from my school friend Donald Sims, set smack-dab in the midst of Jack Kirby's return to Marvel after a number of years away at DC where he innovated his Fourth World Saga, among other things. Kirby's comeback was well touted by Marvel, but his approach--an approach which had … Continue reading BHOC: CAPTAIN AMERICA #204
As the back issue marketplace for certain key old comic books began to truly heat up in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and sums undreamed of were beginning to be demanded for and gotten for comics of a relatively recent vintage (comics that are in much greater supply than the Golden Age books that … Continue reading Lee & Ditko: The Non-Prototype of Uncle Ben and Aunt May
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
This was another comic that came from the drug store's Big Bin of Slightly Older Comics, this one selected by my younger brother Ken. He never got into comics quite in the same way that I did, but he dabbled with them throughout his youth in a way that was common for kids of that … Continue reading BHOC: TWO-GUN KID #126
The Golden Age craze for super heroes only truly lasted a couple of years, immediately following the debut of Superman and the entry of the United States into World War II. That said, it was a genre that was virtually unique to comic books, and so fortune-minded publishers would continue to toy with it for … Continue reading Brand Echh – Captain Flash #1
This is another comic that I'm pretty sure I got from my grade school friend Donald Sims in some long-forgotten trade. We would often swap comics, and I got a number of books from his collection that I really wanted that way. He was pretty much the only other person I knew during this time … Continue reading BHOC: THOR #253
In response to yesterday's post concerning DAREDEVIL #1, I received an e-mail from my friend Mark Evanier. Mark is one of the most knowledgeable people I know about classic comics and in particular the people who worked on them. He had a number of insights that he wanted to bring up, not just about yesterday's … Continue reading Lee & Kirby & Ditko & Everett & Brodsky: A Guest Post on DAREDEVIL #1 and Related Matters
This was the second of the two issues of MARVEL SPECTACULAR I picked up from my drugstore's Big Bin of Slightly Older Comics when I went looking for more Thor adventures, and it was the Thor story that I enjoyed the most up to this point--largely, I expect, because the antagonist wasn't some Asgardian god … Continue reading BHOC: MARVEL SPECTACULAR #19
Some recent comments by reader and historian Ferran Delgado prompted me to go back and to take a closer look at DAREDEVIL #1, the last of what we would consider the formative Marvel titles to be launched and one that was plagued in its delivery by a variety of delays. I've written about those delays … Continue reading Lee & Kirby & Ditko & Everett & Brodsky: The Long Road to DAREDEVIL #1
The Tom Brevoort Experience 