It's always been something of a mystery to me how the publishers of the Golden Age determined that one of their secondary features was the thing that was driving the circulation of their anthology series. Case in point: when he was first launched, Plastic Man was a secondary character in the pages of Quality's POLICE … Continue reading The Second Plastic Man Story
We're just about through the extended crossover between the Phantom Lady strip in POLICE COMICS and the Spider Widow strip appearing simultaneously in FEATURE COMICS. But before we get into these final installments, a moment to point out an interesting aspect of the cover to POLICE COMICS #22 above. Plastic Man creator Jack Cole not … Continue reading Lost Crossovers: The Forgotten Phantom Lady/Spider Widow epic, Part 3
As we detailed last week, artist Frank M. Borth, who was working on both strips, created a six-part epic crossover between his two series, Phantom Lady, which ran in POLICE COMICS, and the Spider Widow, which could be found in FEATURE COMICS. There wasn't any promotion for this crossover, so it appears to be something … Continue reading Lost Crossovers: The Forgotten Phantom Lady/Spider Widow epic, Part 2
Quality Comics was one of the finest publishers of the Golden Age of Comics. They lived up to their firm's name by featuring a high level of polish in both their stories and their artwork. Quality's most popular features included Plastic Man, Doll Man and Blackhawk, along with reprints of Will Eisner's The Spirit, and … Continue reading Lost Crossovers: The Forgotten Phantom Lady/Spider Widow epic, Part 1
Quality Comics was one of the best publishers during the Golden Age of Comics, and true to their name, the quality level of all of their titles was high. In part, this was due to the fact that Will Eisner did editorial work for the early Quality line and helped to innovate a number of … Continue reading Forgotten Masterpiece: MILITARY COMICS #1 and the Death Patrol
As we spoke about earlier, the deaths of super hero characters didn't really become a thing until the 1960s, and didn't become an industry-wide trend until the 1980s. Nowadays, virtually every character has died and been resurrected at least once over the years, but back in the day, this was relatively unthinkable. The Comet was … Continue reading The Death of #711
Here’s a pretty novel POLICE COMICS cover by Jack Cole featuring Plastic Man and the Spirit. It’s novel in that it conceals the lead character completely in shadow, and lets his subterfuge of being a lamppost provide both the drama and the humor of the situation.
The Tom Brevoort Experience 