And again in issue #5 one of the main protagonists, a Mexican bandito, is named Sergio Aragones.  And he bears more than a striking resemblance to Plotter, Sergio Aragones. 

On the subject of hidden treasures , Sergio used to hide a hidden message in every Groo comic when it was under the Epic line . My first wife used to read it and look forward to finding it. Also, the Jim Balents  Catwoman series used to have a Cat drawn into every cover for readers to search for.

Googles *Catamite*

Huh.

But, I mean, by 1969 "guy with a gun" IS what it meant, and I suspect that the period dialect was written more for flavor than accuracy in any Western book from that era.  

(I've only read a couple issues of Bat Lash. I really need to finish the series someday.)  

Beep Beep the Road Runner lasted 105 issues. I find this absolutely mind-boggling. The cartoon is not a concept that can work as a comic book. I know that they made everyone talk and gave the Road Runner a family. But it's just not a book I can see lasting that long.

They’re still going strong afaik. They’ve always had quality books and creators in my occasional sampling over the decades, I’m not sure why you’re surprised.

I’m more surprised that superhero comics from the big two lasted this long.

It's a logical fallacy common to many comic fans-I don't like that comic/those kind of comics, so I can't understand why anyone else would ever buy them. They can't be successful if it's something I don't like. It's also a big reason why the industry market is in the state it's in now and lacks growth potential. Nothing is made that might appeal to someone who isn't already a customer and that's the way current customers like it.

-M

It was the gateway drug, until the gate was mutually abandoned by retailers and the industry itself when newsstand distribution ended. Through the 90s, lots of kids started reading comics like Archie (or Dell or Harvey, etc.) well before they dipped into the Marvel/DC super-hero pool. They gained their comic literacy through Archie, which read in tone and content more like the material in most non-adventure comic strips. Some later moved on to super-hero comics. As super-hero comics became more prominent in the later Silver Age, particlarly on TV with cartoons and the Batman '66 show, people came to super-hero comics in other ways too, but comics appealing to younger readers were still the primary when readers came to comics. But then the gateway closed and comics became something for the already initiated when they became the primarily focused on the direct market. There was no gateway drug to comics, it was focused on selling to the addicts, and has been that way going into its third decade now, thus no new readers entering the hobby. Archie still sold well on the newsstands, where they remained while others didn't, but that wasn't going to lead potential new readers to the comic shops, niche locations you had to already be in the know to find to expand in to other comics. Archie could still have served as the gateway, except there was no other comics where they were sold and people weren't going to go form buying Archie at the supermarket checkout to seeking out a niche specialty shop somewhere else just because they enjoyed Archie.

At the time comics didn't need new readers to be profitable, they had enough addicts on the hook and a system that was gamed in their favor through non-returnability (i.e. the dealers assumed all the risk and took the hit if they didn't sell). No one looked at the long term though, which was bleak even if the short term was rosy because their business practices were short-sighted and neglected having a gateway for future generations to enter through, and too many comic "fans" tuned their nose up at the types of books that would do that as being childish or beneath them for those types of books to thrive in the direct market, so no gateway was established in the direct market for capturing younger readers and growing the customer base.


So in short, books like Archie were the gateway drug for comics for a long time, until comics hid themselves away in the equivalent of opium dens for comic addicts until their customer base thinned out. Now they try other gateways (hey kids it's Free Comic Book Day i.e. the first hit is free day), but it's too little too late you really need to capture new audiences of readers when they are young. There is a new generation of gateway comics now though, it's things like Raina Telgmeier GN and Dog Boy and such, but again these aren't going to bring readers to periodical comics sold in comic shops because the people buying them aren't going to comic shops and Marvel/DC books aren't where people/new customers are buying comics now, so the gateway to super-heroes and the big 2 is closed. Essentially, to quote the old down home Maine expression, "you can't get there from here..."

-M