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Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books - Geek
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Doctor Strange #9 (August, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
When we last left Doctor Strange back in January, he and his lover/apprentice Clea were trapped in the Dark Dimension, facing down the demonic minions of the Dread Dormammu -- a group led by Dormammu's chief disciple, Orini, whom both Doc and we readers had just learned was Clea's own father. That startling revelation had…
Adventure Comics #440 (Jul.-Aug., 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
Arriving in spinner racks in late April, 1975, the 440th issue of DC's Adventure Comics featured an updated look, as the title's current lead feature -- the Spectre -- finally got a cover logo of his own. A number of artist Jim Aparo's earlier covers, excellent as they were, hadn't even featured the character's name…
Captain Marvel #39 (July, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
When last the regular readers of this blog saw Captain Marvel, he'd just been defeated and taken prisoner by the Watcher -- a formerly benign, self-declared non-interventionist, whose sudden heel turn after over a decade of Marvel Comics appearances seemed to come out of nowhere -- who had then proceeded to hand him over to…
Avengers #137 (July, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
As we discussed in our Giant-Size Avengers #4 post back in February, that comic had marked the end of a long sequence of stories by writer Steve Englehart and his various artistic collaborators -- the "Celestial Madonna" saga -- that had brought significant changes to the team. Perhaps the most of critical of these were…
Savage Sword of Conan #6 (June, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
We've discussed the so-called "Filipino Invasion" of the American comic book industry during the 1970s in several previous posts. As regular readers may recall, this development began with the arrival of artist Tony DeZuñiga at DC Comics around the middle of 1970, but really picked up steam in 1972 following a business trip to the…
Giant-Size X-Men #1 (May, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
Half a century after its original release, there's little doubt that the subject of today's post was the most historically significant mainstream American comic book released in 1975; indeed, it's arguably in the very top tier for the entire decade of the Seventies. But in April, 1975, it arrived with very little fanfare -- at…
Strange Tales #180 (June, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
Fifty years ago this month, the third installment of Marvel Comics' revived "Warlock" feature arrived sporting yet another cover pencilled and inked by Jim Starlin, as well as a 19-page story pencilled, inked, colored, and written by... Jim Starlin. Characteristically, the auteur didn't let his multifaceted role in the comic's production stop him from having…
Man-Thing #18 (June, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
Last month, we took a look at Giant-Size Man-Thing #4, whose lead story centered around the high school in Citrusville, Florida -- the fictional small town built on the edge of the swamp that the muck-encrusted star of the title called his home. In this post, we'll be covering a trilogy of issues of the…
Defenders #24 (June, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
Last month, we took a look at the first half of Steve Gerber and Sal Buscema's "Sons of the Serpent" storyline with a single blog post covering Defenders #22 and #23. Today, we'll be wrapping things up in a similar fashion, with one post serving for our survey of both the third and fourth chapters…
Stalker #1 (Jun.-Jul., 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
Following our coverage of Beowulf #1 in January, and Claw the Unconquered #1 in February, we come now to the third of the brand-new sword and sorcery series launched by DC Comics in the first quarter of 1975 -- the shortest-lived of the group, as things turned out, but your humble blogger's personal favorite, nevertheless.…
Captain America #186 (June, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
The last issue of Captain America we discussed in this space, was, as I'm sure you'll remember, a highly significant one for the series, featuring as it did not only the tragic death of Roscoe, the young man who'd attempted to replace Steve Rogers in the titular role, but also Steve's inevitable response to that…
Limited Collectors’ Edition #C-36 (Jun.-Jul., 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
By March, 1975, DC Comics had been utilizing its innovative 10" x 14" tabloid format for over two years. Thus far, most of the content for the company's publications in this format had been reprinted from its extensive archives, although some new material had appeared here and there. Still, it seemed inevitable that we readers…
Adventure Comics #439 (May-Jun., 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
Fifty years ago, behind the latest in a series of striking, near-wordless covers by artist Jim Aparo, Adventure Comics #439 gave us the opening installment in the first continued story we'd yet seen appear in the comic's current lead feature, the Spectre... ...not that you could tell from the story's opening splash page that this…
Giant-Size Avengers #4 (Jun., 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
Back in August, 1974, after laying the necessary narrative groundwork for many months, Avengers writer Steve Englehart had inaugurated his "Celestial Madonna" story arc with a pair of issues that came out within a couple of weeks of each other: Avengers #129 and Giant-Size Avengers #2. Half a year later, in February, 1975, the saga…
Claw the Unconquered #1 (May-Jun., 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
Fifty years and three months ago, DC Comics' releases for November, 1974 featured this house ad, hailing the upcoming debut of a new hero... So new a hero, in fact, that the guy apparently didn't even have a name yet. Though perhaps it would be more accurate to say that his name was a matter…
Defenders #23 (May, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
The fifty-year-old comic book referred to in the title line of this blog post presents the second chapter of a four-part storyline. And, seeing how we didn't feature a post about Defenders #22 here in this space last month, regular readers of the blog know what that means: we'll be covering that issue before moving…
Giant-Size Man-Thing #4 (May, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
If aging memory serves, it wasn't long after the subject of today's post first went on sale that it started to rapidly climb in value on the collector's market -- a phenomenon that was surely almost wholly attributable to the comic's nine-page backup story, which presented the long-awaited first solo adventure of Howard the Duck. …
Strange Tales #179 (April, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
Last November, we took a look at Strange Tales #178, featuring the premiere installment of Marvel Comics' revived "Warlock" feature, now written and drawn by Jim Starlin. In the first episode of a new multi-part storyline, the one-time savior of Counter-Earth learned for the first time of the galactic-level threat represented by the Universal Church…
1st Issue Special #1 (April, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about the relative dearth of DC Comics-related posts on this blog over the last twelve months or so, compared to how many I'd been turning out just a couple of years earlier. Today, we'll be talking about something that's been even more scarce in these parts in recent…
Avengers #134 (April, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
While it may say "Avengers #134 (April, 1975)" on the title line above -- and, yes, that is that very issue's cover (pencilled by Gil Kane, inked by Joe Sinnott, and probably touched up by John Romita) that's displayed right above that -- we'll actually be beginning this post by looking at the preceding issue,…
Beowulf #1 (April, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
Readers of this blog who have been following it for a while will probably have noticed the relative dearth of DC Comics-centered posts in recent months. In all of 2024, your humble blogger wrote a mere eight posts devoted to DC's offerings of half a century ago, compared to fifty-four about those of DC's primary…
Doctor Strange #7 (April, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
Fifty years ago this month, this issue of Doctor Strange (second series) continued the storyline begun one issue earlier by the book's ongoing regular writer Steve Englehart and "new" (actually returning, from the Doc's first series) regular artist Gene Colan -- a storyline that on first glance seemed to center on our hero's old foe…
Adventure Comics #438 (Mar.-Apr., 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
The issue of Adventure Comics we're going to be looking at today was the eighth in a row to feature the Spectre as its headliner, and as such, might well have been taken by a casual browser of the spinner racks in December, 1974 as simply offering more of the same. Yet this issue departed…
Captain Marvel #37 (March, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
Back in June, we took a look at Captain Marvel #34 -- the last issue produced by auteur Jim Starlin, who would soon be moving on to "Warlock" in Strange Tales. As you may recall, Starlin's swan song ended on a cliffhanger, with Mar-Vell lying unconscious after having been exposed to a deadly nerve toxin.…
Defenders #21 (March, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
Fifty years ago this month, the Gil Kane-Klaus Janson cover of Defenders #21 heralded the beginning of a new storyline. But as soon as we readers of the time turned to the comic's opening splash page -- not to mention the double-page spread that followed immediately thereafter -- it was clear that although the "A"-plot…
Savage Sword of Conan #4 (February, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
The fifty-year-old comics magazine we'll be looking at today leads off with a cover by fantasy painter Boris Vallejo that actually illustrates the issue's lead story -- something which wasn't exactly unheard of with Marvel's black-and-white comics of the 1970s, but wasn't quite what you'd call commonplace, either. About the only significant discrepancy between cover…
Captain America #183 (March, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
Fifty years and one month ago, on the final page of Captain America #182, writer Steve Englehart promised his readers that the next issue would feature "The Return of Captain America! Eight months in the making, and worth every second of the wait!" That bottom-of-the-page blurb struck an unmistakably triumphal tone -- but it was…
Strange Tales #178 (February, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
Back in June, we took a look at Captain Marvel #34, which was the last issue drawn and plotted by Jim Starlin. As we discussed in that post, Starlin abruptly quit the series after delivering only one chapter of his first post-"Thanos War" storyline, unhappy with Marvel Comics' seeming unwillingness, or inability, to give him…
Giant-Size Avengers #3 (February, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
Last month we took a look at Avengers #131, which ended with Earth's Mightiest Heroes being transported against their wills to the realm of Limbo, where they were set to face off against a Legion of the Unliving assembled by their long-time foe, Kang the Conqueror. This month, we'll be discussing the "two-part triple-length triumph"…
Defenders #20 (February, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
Fifty years ago, in November, 1974, Steve Gerber began his tenure as the regular writer of Marvel Comics' Defenders series with the very issue we're discussing here today. But, as we've covered in a couple of recent posts, Gerber had already been warming up for his new assignment for several months. In October, he'd scripted…
Wulf the Barbarian #1 (February, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
A week ago, writing about the advent of the short-lived comics publisher Atlas/Seaboard, I touched briefly on one of the company's first color comic-book releases -- the barbarian-themed Ironjaw #1 -- which, as you may recall, I didn't rate very highly. At the time, I promised you we'd be taking a look at the other…
Doctor Strange #6 (February, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
As we discussed in this space two months ago, the fifth issue of the second volume of Doctor Strange marked the end of the very successful collaboration of Steve Englehart (co-plotter and scripter) and Frank Brunner (co-plotter and artist) on the feature... more or less. That "more or less" refers to the fact that Brunner…
Grim Ghost #1 (January, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
In November, 1974, your humble blogger was pretty much a "just Marvel and DC, please" kind of guy where color comic books were concerned. But, naturally, that didn't mean I was unaware of the wares of other companies. How could I have been? All of the spinner racks I can recall from the first decade…
Captain America #182 (February, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
The cover of Captain America #182 -- drawn by Ron Wilson and Frank Giacoia (with probable touch-ups by John Romita) -- offered few, if any, hints of major surprises to be found within its pages. Here's Steve Rogers in his new heroic identity of Nomad, continuing his ongoing battle against the Serpent Squad, with a…
Giant-Size Man-Thing #3 (February, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
OK, let's get this out of the way first: Back in the nid-1970s, Marvel Comics actually published five issues of a series called Giant-Size Man-Thing. Hahahahahahahahah! Everyone good now? As I mentioned in my post about Man-Thing #8 a few months back, there's really no reason why "Giant-Size Man-Thing" should be exponentially funnier than "Man-Thing"…
Avengers #131 (January, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
Back in August, we covered Avengers #129 and Giant-Size Avengers #2, two memorable issues which together kicked off writer Steve Englehart's "Celestial Madonna" saga -- and the latter of which also saw the death of an Avenger, as the reformed villain called the Swordsman met his untimely end as an unquestioned hero. The next regular…
Unknown Worlds of Science Fiction #1 (January, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
In February of last year, we ran a post on the first issue of Worlds Unknown -- a four-color anthology title from Marvel Comics devoted to the science fiction genre, with a special focus on adapting short stories and novels by well-known SF authors. As we discussed at the time, this passion project of Marvel's…
Marvel Two-in-One #7 (January, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
As of October, 1974, Steve Gerber had been the writer on Marvel Two-in-One for a year -- ever since the series teaming the Fantastic Four's Thing with a rotating cast of co-stars had jumped from its previous home in Marvel Feature to its own brand-new title, in fact. Intriguingly (though perhaps also understandably), with the…
Captain America #181 (January, 1981) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
Last month, in our post about Captain America #180, we covered the debut of the former Captain America, Steve Rogers, in his brand-new superheroic identity of the Nomad. As regular readers will hopefully recall, the Nomad's initial outing was somewhat less than completely auspicious, as he tripped over his own cape and failed to prevent…
Giant-Size Defenders #3 (January, 1975) | Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books
As we've discussed in this space previously, Marvel Comics seems to have been in an almighty rush to get as many "Giant-Size" comics to market as possible in the first half of 1974. Along with a multitude of title, frequency, price, and format changes, most seemingly made on the fly, one likely result of this…