The villain's name was just Foreman.


I wonder how much input Mike Nasser had into the issue. I think he tried to sue Adams for ownership but lost. The 1987 reprint from Continuity credits Adams as creator and writer (so doesn't explicitly say he drew it), and credits Nasser with "some layouts." I don't remember if that had changed from the Pacific version.

I'm late, I'm late, for a very important date.......



JLA/JSA/All-Star Squadron crossover, New Teen Titans In Spaaaaaaaaccceee, Omega Men guest appearances, Great Darkness Saga, Frank Miller (missed Daredevil that month) and the Blackhawk revival, to capitalize on the non-existent Steven Spielberg movie.

Chris Claremont still fixated on Alien, too.

Bought Back in the day:

Adventure Comics #492
Avengers #224
Daredevil #188
Dennis the Menace #13
Fantastic Four #247
Justice League of America #207
Legion of Super-Heroes #292
New Teen Titans #24
Rom #35
Rom Annual #1
Uncanny X-Men #162
Warlord Annual #1
World's Finest Comics #284
X-Men Annual #6

Bought much more recently:

All-Star Squadron #14
Arak/Son of Thunder #14
DC Comics Presents #50
Incredible Hulk #276
Marvel Two-in-One #93

"Let's try this!"

"Okay".

"Mmmmh... It kinda looks crappy, doesn't it?"

"Yeah. It was worth a shot, but let's not do this too often".

I had pretty much all of the books cody posted above, plus a few more.
Of those, my absolute favorite was the X-men/New Teen Titans X-over (see what I did there?). That one just blew everything else out of the water for me: a suitably epic story with gorgeous art by Simonson. In fact, this book turned me into a lifelong Simonson fan - I had been aware of his work before, but this just made me realize how truly awesome he is.
The conclusion to the Starfire/Blackfire space opera story in New Teen Titans #25 and Annual #1 came in second, followed by Legion of Super-heroes and the ongoing Great Darkness saga in a close third.
I really recall liking the story in Captain America Annual #6, with all of the men who served as Capt. America, i.e., not just Steve Rogers, but also the Spirit of '76, Patriot and the 50s commie-hunting guy, sent to liberate an alternate reality Earth from its robot overlords.
Avengers Annual #11, on other hand... the story is all right, but man, the art by Milgrom and Abel was pretty dire, unfortunately.

Others not pictured above that stick in my memory are:
Amazing Spider-man Annual #16

A solid story by Roger Stern, with art by Romitas Jr. and Sr., that introduces the Monica Rambeau Captain Marvel. I liked the character well enough, but never liked that she had the hand-me-down name (and yes, I know it was to retain the rights to the name).

Marvel Fanfare #5


Now that I was regularly visiting a comic book shop, I was able to get my hands on books like this one. For me, nothing beats the Savage Land story arc in the first four issues, but I still found this one quite enjoyable, with the lead Dr. Strange story beautifully drawn by Marshall Rogers and P. Craig Russell.

And speaking of the Master of the Mystic Arts...
Dr. Strange #56


I was getting this series on and off, but the art in this one, by Paul Smith, was spectacular (a nice follow-up to the preceding issue, gorgeously drawn by Michael Golden). Smith would soon have a brief run as penciler on X-men, but I think it's too bad he didn't stick with Dr. Strange, as his style was perfectly suited to the magical/supernatural type stories.

Vision & Scarlet Witch #1

Another Marvel mini-series, and I was totally on board.

And there were DC offerings that I picked up, that ended up not impressing me, namely:
Arion #1

I'd seen the house ads for this one and was definitely curious, but I recall that besides some pretty nice art, nothing about this one grabbed me and I didn't become a regular reader.

World's Finest #285

I was disappointed that World's Finest switched from dollar to normal format a few issues before, but the cover art by Frank Miller and the copy indicating some kind of All New! direction got me to pick this one up. I remember not being too impressed and never bought an issue of this title again...

By the way, since cody posted the images of Capt. America 275 and 276, and Wolverine 3 and 4 together, it reminded me that I've seen this more than once at Mike's Newsstand and, e.g., it also shows that Amazing Spider-man 234 and 235 were also on sale in July 1982. I was following all three series back then, I don't recall seeing these issues on the spinner rack at the same time. Is this some kind of mistake, or were they, say, on sale at the beginning and end of the month?

www.mikesamazingworld.com/mikes/features/newsstand.php?publisher=all&type=calendar&month=8&year=1982&sort=alpha

This was a really special month for me as a kid, even though I only bought 2 comic books. One of them launched a life-long fascination with Silver Age comics, and cemented the Legion of Super-Heroes jumping to the top of my list (well, shared with Spidey anyways) as my favorite feature:



I knew of the Legion from reading some Superboy and the Legion issues in the late 70's (my first exposure was right at the end of Earthwar), but this introduced a whole new Legion to me and I loved it. It was also my introduction to the Challengers of the Unknown (which quickly became another favorite), not to mention I enjoyed the mix of all the other stories with Captain Marvel, Zatanna, Supergirl, and the Spectre.

I was only sporadically picking up comics the prior couple of years, and this one caught my eye in the magazine section of a CVS drug store. This issue hooked me, and I begged my parents every month to ensure we made it to the CVS in time for me to get the next issue (I was not aware of comic book shops at this point, and only this particular store seemed to carry this title where I lived). While I had read a fair number of comics when I was really little in the late 70's, I had kind of drifted more towards baseball cards in the early 80's. This digest changed everything, and really was my true launching off point with getting much more serious as a regular comic book reader.

The other selection I made that month was ASM Annual #16. Loved Monica instantly, super cool character and quickly became one of my favorite Avengers.

Bought in August 1982

Arak #15. Still an excellent run, and Arak loses his long hair to sport a mohawk. Less Conan, more Turok. I should re-read the first two years of that mag.

Avengers #225, which felt like a fill-in; it features a mythology I wasn't familiar with at the time, that of the Mabinogion. I seem to recall that inker Brett Breeding worked on the book, but that's all. (Why do such details stick in our minds, instead of really important stuff?)

Conan annual #7. It's an inventory issue, but I'll greet a Roy Thomas-scripted Conan any day. This is the start of the adaptation of the novel "Conan of the Isles", but Marvel paid so little attention to Conan in those days that readers were left hanging for a decade before seeing the end. (The whole adaptation would eventually be published as a Marvel Graphic Novel). This issue has the distinction of showing the very best picture of old King Conan I ever came across: pencilled by John Buscema and inked by Armando Gil, it shows a scarred and leather-tough old coot with greying hair... just what old Conan should look like.

Conan the barbarian #140. That one wasn't bad, although a bit light.

Daredevil #189. Ninjas!!! I loved the Hand when they first showed up!!!

Fantastic Four #248, and more of Byrne's excellent run on the book.

Ka-Zar #21. They were really playing the "Ka-Zar is dead" concept deftly. I liked seeing Peter Parker play an important role as himself and not as Spider-man.

X-Men/New Teen Titans #1. Now THAT's how you stage a grand event!!! Chris Claremont pays tribute to the New Gods and to his own classic Phoenix storyline, and his X-Men and Teen Titans all act in character. Plus, that Walt Simonson artwork... This couldn't have been better.

Raiders of the lost ark #1. My favourite movies for a decade or so, but I honestly didn't enjoy this adaptation. John Buscema seemed to phone it in.

Master of Kung Fu #118. Is Fu Manchu really dead, this time? It sure looks that way, and the mag's impending cancellation would do little to change our mind. In a sense he did die, because when Marvel decided to reuse the character years later they did everything to circumvent Sax Rohmer's trademark and turned Fu Manchu (a classic, classic villain in the tradition of Professor Moriarty or Dracula) into Joe Shmoe, the bad guy who can't even hold a candle to his imitators the Yellow Claw or the Mandarin.

Be that as it may, this was a fantastic issue. Both Moench and Day did an oustanding job on it.

Micronauts #47 and 48 : we're starting to see a few hints of a return to the mag's earlier quality. Biotron is back (after a fashion), and this new penciller Butch Guice is doing a great job, despite the utter inappropriateness of Bulanadi's inks. (Kelley Jones would soon come in to the rescue).

New Teen Titans #25. I love a good super-hero adventure in space!

New Teen Titans Annual #1. See above!

Night Force #4. Having missed the first three issues, I was hard-pressed to know what was going on... but was glad to see Marv Wolfman and Gene Colan back on a mystery/adventure mag!

Rom #36. I kept buying Rom because it was there, but I can't remember this issue. I think it had Akin & Garvey inks over Sal Buscema's pencils. Their style was quite distinct from what we were used to.

Swamp Thing #7. A nightmare at sea!!!

Savage Sword of Conan #81. A comedy adventure. Nice art by Buscema and Chan.

Savage Sword of Conan #82. More Captain Baor'aq Sharaq. The only thing I liked about that villain is that he quickly became a running gag! Damn, was he unlucky.

Star Wars annual #2. Han Solo is back??? Well, just for a flashback story.

Starslayer #5. Grell did great work on this book. Not a big fan of space vikings, though, especially if they ride "space drakkars" that look like actual drakkars. That and robotic parrots that sit on a peg-legged space pirate's shoulder make me cringe.

Thor Annual #10, which should be considered a milestone in the Marvel Universe. It explains what the deal is with mythological gods being an actual thing, even from competing pantheons, and having physical bodies. I really enjoyed the concept.

Uncanny X-Men #163. See my comment above about superhero space adventures! The original Brood saga was really good, even if the critters were never, ever used to good effect again.

Vision and the Scarlet Witch #1. Errrrr... can't remember much, honestly. It deals with the matter of Wanda's and Pietro's true parents.

Warlord #63. That was a light comic, but I enjoyed the dialogs and the covers were always nice.

Wolverine #3 and #4. Maaaan, what an excellent mini-series that was. I don't think Wolverine, as a character, was ever that interesting again.