There's a long-storied tradition among comics of having the writers and artists of those stories themselves be depicted within the very pages they are producing--creating an idealized heightened version of reality. While this was common across all companies, nobody did it as often or as brazenly as the creators working for Marvel. They truly went … Continue reading 5BC: Five Times Marvel Self-Mythologized
What goes around comes around, and when it comes to the often-fannishly-induced game of dropping in references benign or malicious to a competitor's characters, there isn't any company who is entirely blameless in this endeavor. Here then are five times Marvel referenced DC characters in interesting fashion. ADVENTURE INTO FEAR #17 - Steve Gerber was … Continue reading 5BC: Five Times Marvel Referenced DC Characters In Interesting Ways
Comic books are a petty business, it must be said. And the same freedom to imagine and play that allows for the creativity in conceptualizing new stories about characters who, let's face it, were designed to appeal to children also somehow invites the darker side of itself--the version where grown-ups behave like petulant children on … Continue reading 5BC: Five More Mean Caricatures of Comic Book Creators
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
It was a weekend, I remember that much. I had a little bit of cash in my pocket (no idea where I would have gotten it from) and so I made an extra trek down to my regular 7-11 haunt to look at the spinner rack and see if there might be anything worth picking … Continue reading BHOC: AVENGERS #170
Comic books for years were considered a juvenile medium, and that sensibility often extended to the behavior of the practitioners in the field. Like those who work in any other industries, not all comic book creators get along, and on occasion some of them have felt the need to take their aggression out in public, … Continue reading 5BC: Five Mean Caricatures of Comic Book Creators
Beyond just inspiring mischievous creators to come up with ways to have characters at rival companies Marvel and DC meet, the anarchic and rebellious spirit of the Bronze Age extended beyond the bounds of the immediate industry, prompting writers and artists to come up with ways to appropriate other characters outside of what was permissible … Continue reading 5BC: Five Best Unofficial DC Crossovers
A million words must have been written over the decades about this issue of X-MEN, the conclusion to the Dark Phoenix Saga and the high point of the fabled Chris Claremont and John Byrne run. And in the shadow of what would follow in the years to come, perhaps the book has lost some of … Continue reading Perfect Game – X-MEN #137
This is the single greatest issue of SUPERMAN ever put together in the character's 80 year history. Closer to home, it's the special Anniversary issue that I'm always jockeying against in my own mind when it comes to put together a book of this sort for the Marvel characters. Of course, I fail to clear … Continue reading Perfect Game – SUPERMAN #400
Bought this issue of X-MEN most likely at the same time as I got yesterday's INVADERS issue, at my regular source for new comic books, the 7-11. Every issue of X-MEN in these days was a discovery, as the cast had changed so completely from the team that I had met in SON OF ORIGINS … Continue reading BHOC: UNCANNY X-MEN #110
The Tom Brevoort Experience 