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Post by Rob Allen on Feb 1, 2019 16:08:33 GMT -5
I understand about having a special affection for a short-lived series. I bought and enjoyed all of the Star Hunters issues, but the one series from that era that has a special place in my memories is Ditko's Shade the Changing Man.
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Post by brutalis on Feb 6, 2019 7:49:50 GMT -5
I love Shade. Oddly enough I only had the very 1st issue and read that bad boy until it was falling apart until mid 1980's I managed to pick up the entire run for a steal. Every Halloween the local LCS which I used would have regular customers "donate" series they had collected and no longer wanted and have them up for contest prizes during a Halloween week. The contests were each day to drawing your own Halloween themed "posters" and then customers shopping all week would vote. So there was a bronze, silver and gold prize to win. One year I drew up the Universal Monsters versus their Marvel versions and took the Gold prize which was the complete Ditko Shade. Splendid prize if you ask me with Ditko at his most surreal and doing some visually creative work. Always wanted my very own M-Vest
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Post by dbutler69 on Feb 7, 2019 10:44:53 GMT -5
I read one issue of Star Hunters- in DC Super-Stars #16 - and I really enjoyed it. I'd like to see more of it.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 9, 2019 8:26:41 GMT -5
Remember when Atlas Comics appeared on the news stands back in 1975? For those of us eager to read other super heroes outside of DC or Marvel the 70's was not a good time for that. Sure there were occasional series like Charlton's E-Man (1973-75) which I LOVED. After the Bat Mania died down in the late 60's all the other publishers superhero lines disappeared. Gone was Charlton's Action Heroes. Archie's Red Circle. Tower Comics Thunder Agents. And so on.
Then in 1975 I noticed some titles that looked similar to Marvel Comics that I had never read before. In most ways Atlas was a cheap knock off of Marvel but like anything there were some gems hidden in the titles. For a year there were new titles to explore, some "new" heroes to discover. Some remembered with fondness, others mercifully forgotten.
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Post by kirby101 on Feb 9, 2019 8:53:21 GMT -5
Michael D. I bought almost all of those. Unfortunately, the story behind the comics, with Martin Goodman trying to get back into the comic business, with his son as the editor, did not work as well as he thought it would. One assumes he underestimated how much Stan Lee and creative geniuses like Kirby and Ditko had to do with Marvel's success. The FF may have been meant as a Justice League knock off by Goodman, but Lee and Kirby made it something more, something great. But those Atlas books weren't all bad, and fun to read. With some Marvel alumni supplying the talent.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 9, 2019 9:13:37 GMT -5
Michael D. I bought almost all of those. Unfortunately, the story behind the comics, with Martin Goodman trying to get back into the comic business, with his son as the editor, did not work as well as he thought it would. One assumes he underestimated how much Stan Lee and creative geniuses like Kirby and Ditko had to do with Marvel's success. The FF may have been meant as a Justice League knock off by Goodman, but Lee and Kirby made it something more, something great. But those Atlas books weren't all bad, and fun to read. With some Marvel alumni supplying the talent. I think most of us reading comics at that time bought a lot of the titles. I think they would have survived a bit longer had the company been run better "behind the scenes". Some of the titles were "retooled" and ended up at Marvel so there were some good ideas and concepts.
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Post by kirby101 on Feb 9, 2019 19:05:23 GMT -5
Michael D. I bought almost all of those. Unfortunately, the story behind the comics, with Martin Goodman trying to get back into the comic business, with his son as the editor, did not work as well as he thought it would. One assumes he underestimated how much Stan Lee and creative geniuses like Kirby and Ditko had to do with Marvel's success. The FF may have been meant as a Justice League knock off by Goodman, but Lee and Kirby made it something more, something great. But those Atlas books weren't all bad, and fun to read. With some Marvel alumni supplying the talent. I think most of us reading comics at that time bought a lot of the titles. I think they would have survived a bit longer had the company been run better "behind the scenes". Some of the titles were "retooled" and ended up at Marvel so there were some good ideas and concepts. There were. Chaykins' stuff in particular, but not an editor who could keep it together. i think they also suffered from distribution problems. Something the direct market would have helped.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 9, 2019 19:58:37 GMT -5
I think most of us reading comics at that time bought a lot of the titles. I think they would have survived a bit longer had the company been run better "behind the scenes". Some of the titles were "retooled" and ended up at Marvel so there were some good ideas and concepts. There were. Chaykins' stuff in particular, but not an editor who could keep it together. i think they also suffered from distribution problems. Something the direct market would have helped.Really? I had no problems finding them. At that time I lived in a suburb of Philadelphia. The only publisher I couldn't find on a consistent basis was Gold Key.
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Post by kirby101 on Feb 9, 2019 21:34:25 GMT -5
My memory might not be correct.
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Post by brutalis on Feb 20, 2019 11:52:28 GMT -5
Do you Remember When your 1st exposure to an ongoing series was actually the monthly reprint series from earlier on? I am talking of the halcyon days of old when Marvel was the reprint king of monthly comic book series where you could find them cheaply and affordably. Those glorious days of Fantastic Four being reprinted in Marvel's Greatest Comics, Spider-Man found in Marvel Tales, Avengers in Marvel Triple Action and and other such wonderful cavalcades of reprints. For me all 3 of these were my 1st monthly exposure which helped start my collection. There were other Marvel and DC reprint series and collections but it was this Trifecta that captured my attention for the earliest days of the Marvel heroes. Seeing Lee, Kirby, Ditko, Heck, Romita doing their earliest work when the MU was fresh, new and still developing. It was from these early reprints from the 1960's that I went on to collecting the then current off the rack monthly issues of the mid 1970's. Having the "history" of these heroes alongside the new adventures created a unique bond for myself of appreciation and admiration for what had gone before that enhanced the newer stories and made them more fun to read.
This was in the days when there was no way to find back issues outside of a few small mail order ads you found within the comic books themselves. No LCS carried any stock and no internet to search out issues not found in your area. No Trade Paperback collections or big Harback Omnibus to be found. Comic books weren't that important to rate such collections. You found whatever the newest issues were each month and hoped you could fill in the blanks from some used bookstore's or a convenience store that was being too lazy to send copies back to the publishers. Luck was with me in that way as the 2 Korean markets in my neighborhood simply had each new week of deliveries sitting on the shelf alongside of 3-5 months of the later issues to pore through.
But the new monthly reprints of 60's comic's from Marvel must have been selling as well as the newest issues in order for them being printed. Such was the fun of finding these reprint titles as a child which all sparked my interest for pursuing new issues right there beside the reprints. Today the world is different and in some ways better for reprints and yet I still miss those monthly single issue reprints which helped ignite my comic book passion...
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Post by Rob Allen on Feb 20, 2019 12:11:37 GMT -5
Do you Remember When your 1st exposure to an ongoing series was actually the monthly reprint series from earlier on? Alas, no. I never had that experience. I'm too old; I remember when those reprint series started.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Feb 20, 2019 12:23:56 GMT -5
Do you Remember When your 1st exposure to an ongoing series was actually the monthly reprint series from earlier on? I am talking of the halcyon days of old when Marvel was the reprint king of monthly comic book series where you could find them cheaply and affordably. Those glorious days of Fantastic Four being reprinted in Marvel's Greatest Comics, Spider-Man found in Marvel Tales, Avengers in Marvel Triple Action and and other such wonderful cavalcades of reprints. For me all 3 of these were my 1st monthly exposure which helped start my collection. There were other Marvel and DC reprint series and collections but it was this Trifecta that captured my attention for the earliest days of the Marvel heroes. Seeing Lee, Kirby, Ditko, Heck, Romita doing their earliest work when the MU was fresh, new and still developing. It was from these early reprints from the 1960's that I went on to collecting the then current off the rack monthly issues of the mid 1970's. Having the "history" of these heroes alongside the new adventures created a unique bond for myself of appreciation and admiration for what had gone before that enhanced the newer stories and made them more fun to read. This was in the days when there was no way to find back issues outside of a few small mail order ads you found within the comic books themselves. No LCS carried any stock and no internet to search out issues not found in your area. No Trade Paperback collections or big Harback Omnibus to be found. Comic books weren't that important to rate such collections. You found whatever the newest issues were each month and hoped you could fill in the blanks from some used bookstore's or a convenience store that was being too lazy to send copies back to the publishers. Luck was with me in that way as the 2 Korean markets in my neighborhood simply had each new week of deliveries sitting on the shelf alongside of 3-5 months of the later issues to pore through. But the new monthly reprints of 60's comic's from Marvel must have been selling as well as the newest issues in order for them being printed. Such was the fun of finding these reprint titles as a child which all sparked my interest for pursuing new issues right there beside the reprints. Today the world is different and in some ways better for reprints and yet I still miss those monthly single issue reprints which helped ignite my comic book passion... I read Amazing Spider-Man and Marvel Tales pretty interchangeably when I first started reading comics. I think that I probably bought issues of Marvel's Greatest Comics before I ever bought any issues of Fantastic Four.
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Post by Farrar on Feb 20, 2019 12:50:33 GMT -5
Having the "history" of these heroes alongside the new adventures created a unique bond for myself of appreciation and admiration for what had gone before that enhanced the newer stories and made them more fun to read. Ain't that the truth! I started reading the FF with #68...then got #69...a bit later on I saw another FF comic on the stands, a little something with an impressive-sounding name, Marvel Collectors' Item Classics#12. The cover art seemed current*** so I thought it was a new, companion FF series (à la Superman and Action Comics at DC), so I bought it (or rather my grandmother bought it for me). I couldn't wait to read it! But when I opened it I saw it was a reprint mag, containing an older FF story (from FF #17). The art seemed so old-fashioned; Kirby-Ayers was inferior to the Kirby-Sinnott work I'd seen in #68 and #69. Also, what was with the nine panels a page? It made the page look cluttered. And the clothing, Sue and Alicia's matronly (I thought) hairstyles...so yesterday. It may as well have been a story from the 1950s (as if I knew what that was). Yeesh. But then I noticed that some of the themes in #17 were still present in #68-9, such as Ben's condition; and also in #17 Sue and Reed weren't yet married, so that indicated to me that a lot had happened to the FF over the years. That this was an ongoing saga. And now I wanted to read and know all about the FF, their past and present. MCIC became a must-have book for me. Sometimes I enjoyed the older FF stories more than the current issues. I liked comparing the art and seeing Kirby's various inkers before Sinnott. And despite the later title change to Marvel's Greatest Comics, it'll always be MCIC to me. ***later on when I got some back issues I realized that the FF cover images were paste-ups from other FF issues. In general, though, MCIC/MCG used the cover of the original FF comic it was reprinting. MCIC #12 was one of the exceptions to that rule.
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Post by beccabear67 on Feb 20, 2019 13:03:08 GMT -5
I started out with reprints in the early '70s that were DC, not Marvel, and though I didn't know it at the time the Scamps and Chip N' Dales I bought were pretty much all reprints from the '50s. DC reprints were in the 52 page and 100 page comics, and in Shazam, I remember stories of Kid Eternity, Super-Chief, Murphy Anderson Hawkwman, Gil Kane Atom, Air Wave, really old Aquaman and Green Arrow, Vigilante, John Forte Legion, Marvel Family... a great random selection of material from '40s-'60s, and then there were the giant tabloid sized things with the oldest Superman and Batman (and also Zatara and Slam Bradley!) Some of these didn't have covers though, neighborhood kids would trade stuff, there would even be '50s and '60s comics in with the current comics, I remember some older dated seeming Archies and Millie The Model, and one Kirby Fantastic Four that even had it's cover (#77) which made no sense at all to me. I did buy all the late '70s-early '80s Marvel reprint titles as well when they appeared, so Spider-Man, The Hulk, X-Men, Avengers and Fantastic Four were embarked upon as regular or semi-regular habits with two versions at once, plus I bought the Sub-Mariner and Silver Surfer/Warlock reprints. I also remember a reprint of Not Brand Ecch stuff under the title Crazy which you could say added a third dimension! Thanks to a very plain looking second hand bookstore with boxes and boxes of old comics all pretty affordable i did get a lot of the '60s 25cent Marvel reprint titles, the best was Fantasy Masterpieces after the first couple of monster issues which had these great golden age and '50s reprints including Bill Everett Sub-Mariner! Wow! I think I had all of them too. It turned into Marvel Super-Heroes with #12 and started having new lead stories (like the first Captain Marvel in green and white, Medusa, Phantom Eagle, Guardians... never had the Dr. Doom issue though, sob!).
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Post by Farrar on Feb 20, 2019 13:03:55 GMT -5
This was in the days when there was no way to find back issues outside of a few small mail order ads you found within the comic books themselves. No LCS carried any stock and no internet to search out issues not found in your area. No Trade Paperback collections or big Harback Omnibus to be found. Comic books weren't that important to rate such collections. You found whatever the newest issues were each month and hoped you could fill in the blanks from some used bookstore's or a convenience store that was being too lazy to send copies back to the publishers. Luck was with me in that way as the 2 Korean markets in my neighborhood simply had each new week of deliveries sitting on the shelf alongside of 3-5 months of the later issues to pore through... I can count the times I bought older issues off the stands on two fingers. Avengers #44 (I saw it nestled near that month's issue, #47, bought both!)... and later on at a bodega near my elementary school, a coverless Avengers #40, about a year after its publication. But I was lucky enough to live on the same block as a collectibles store. My mother had taken us kids there to buy old stamps and coins (during our very short-lived stamp and coin collecting phase). At some point I started selling my old Archies at this store; the store's owner bought them for 5 cents an issue. A bit later on when I got into DC and Marvel, I started buying back issues from him (for more than a nickel; he marked up the comics to 35 cents, and $1.05 for Giants/Annuals). Over the course of a couple of years I amassed pretty extensive collections of the FF, Avengers, Adventure (the LSH years), the 1968 Sub-Mariner series, Lois Lane, JLA, Teen Titans, and some other series. I had many,many more back issues than contemporary issues.
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