Todays British comic spotlight falls on Countdown - something covered previously, but time restraints have caught up with me so even though some of this has been posted before some of the pictures haven’t. Here are some of the pages from the first issue - the pages were numbered in reverse order to simulate a “countdown”. The first issue contained a free giant wall-chart with stamps to be affixed, further issues would contain more stamps until the chart was filled.
It’s always nice to see some advertisements of the day…
…and the strip titled Countdown used imagery from 2001: A Space Oddysey ( I don’t know if they had to pay MGM or Stanley Kubrick for the right to do that).
Next Monday will feature the first part of the Marvel UK Comics story.
Yeah, well, sometimes nothin' can be a real cool hand.
I never lost the love of reading comics - alongside my devouring of pulp paperbacks (and owning a bookshop) I was never short of reading material 😁
My daily fix was stopping at the newsagents close by and picking up the daily papers and whatever comics caught my eye, especially new titles with free gifts.
Yeah, well, sometimes nothin' can be a real cool hand.
80-Page Giant was a DC title that lasted for 15 issues - it was mainly reprinted stories and each issue focused on a particular superhero. The title harks back to Secret Origins (Summer 1961) which had been a one-off comic featuring several reprinted stories…
This 80-page format was popular so 80-Page Giant was launched in 1964 featuring past tales of Superman. But today we are featuring issue #8 Secret Origins, which told another batch of umm…secret origins.
And the chosen story is How Aquaman Got His Powers…
And a couple of advertisements…
Tomorrow - a Famous First appearance of a Famous Villain…
Yeah, well, sometimes nothin' can be a real cool hand.
Adam Strange debuted in Showcase #17 (November 1958) in a 3-issue run. He made enough sales to graduate to a feature story that ran in Mystery In Space from issue #53 running for about 50 issues. He was loosely based on a John Carter type character.
Yeah, well, sometimes nothin' can be a real cool hand.
The Riddler belongs to that exclusive quartet of super-villains that have plagued Batman - Joker, Penguin and Catwoman being the others. He first appeared in Detective #140 (October 1948) during the Golden Age. His Silver Age appearances cemented his fame alongside Frank Gorshin’s brilliant portrayal of him in the 60’s Batman TV series.
And one of the advertisements for this issue…
I think that’s one’s the best villain introductions in comics history.
Another Famous First next week.
Yeah, well, sometimes nothin' can be a real cool hand.
you are correct CoolHand, 80 Page Giant was all reprints. That Aquaman origin story was originally printed in Adventure 260, May 1959. Written by Robert Bernstein, art by Ramona Fradon. Aquaman's not on the cover, as he was a backup feature, and at this point the lead feature in Adventure was Superboy, (the adventures of Superman when he was a boy). Green Arrow was the other backup feature.
Aquaman had actually been round since 1941. Created by writer Mort Weisenger (later the editor of the various silver age Superman titles) and artist Paul Norris. First appeared in More Fun 73, Nov 1941 (thats Dr Fate on the cover), where he had a different origin. In the same issue also debuted Green Arrow, also created by Weisenger.
Aquaman was a vanilla copy of the Marvel comics character Submariner. compare the silver age origin with Submariner's origin, from Marvel Comics 1, Oct 1939. art and story by the character's creator Bill Everett
Aquaman's golden age origin wasnt much of an origin, was it? the silver age version is a far better story, but even more blatantly derivative: he now has an Atlantean mother and human father just like the Submariner. Marvel hadnt published any Submariner comics in several years by 1959, so maybe DC thought they could get get away with copying the other character's origin story. Big difference is the early Submariner was a genocidal misanthrope, he invaded New York single handed one issue and knocked over skyscrapers, and in another issue unleashed a tsunami upon the city, before mellowing out and taking the americans side against the Nazis. Whereas, like all DC characters, Aquaman was always a purehearted boy scout.
We discussed above how Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman were the only DC superheros to survive the 1950s, when other comics genres became more popular. thats an oversimplification, they were the only ones to keep their own titles. Aquaman and Green Arrow also survived, as they were the backup features in Adventure Comics, safely sharing space with Superboy.
Ramona Fradon began drawing Aquaman in the early 50s, and she's another of my favourites. I really like her tight cartoonish style. She later drew Metamorpho the Element Man, a 1970s revival of Plastic Man, and the SuperFriends.
When Aquaman got a new origin in 1959, around the same time so did Green Arrow and Wonder Woman. This was the same year The Flash finally got his own regular comic after being tentatively revived three years earlier, and the new version of Green Lantern also debuted. I think 1959 was when DC was finally confident there was once again a market for superhero comics.
in Feb 1961 Aquaman finally got a whole comic to himself, starting with a tryout in Showcase 40. also drawn by Fradon. thats newly introduced teen sidekick Aqualad next to him, first seen Feb 1960
but a few months later, when Aquaman got his own regular title it was drawn by Nick Cardy , a great artist from the 1940s. Cardy drew magnificent females, and created the character of Mera, who you all remember from the movie
and after Cardy, Aquaman was drawn by Jim Aparo, who went on to become a great Batman artist in the 70s. Theres an episode of Big Bang Theory where Leonard mocks Sheldon for reading Aquaman, but that just proves Leonard is unhip, because the character had great art all through the silver age!
and that Riddler story above is an example of art by Dick Sprang, my favourite of the early Batman artists. check out all the crazy angles in the drawings. the chase scenes across giant novelty props was a recurring concept in Sprang's stories. Mike's Newsstand shows Sprang drew Batman from 1943-1960, though in later years Sheldon Moldoff was the primary artist.
I'll try to provide some expanded Adam Strange notes tomorrow, if my real life employers give me a break. CoolHand, if only you'd pay me to post about comic books, I'd much prefer to be doing this fulltime!
Wonderful reading. CHB, I loved the Batman story (Loudini? Misprint or deliberate?) and would enjoy more if possible. caractacus, you know your stuff and it's fascinating.
Sir MilesThe Wrong Side Of The WardrobePosts: 27,718Chief of Staff
This is great stuff…I’m learning so much…thanks guys 👏🏻
I'd like to put in a request for something on the history of teen sidekicks. Was Robin the first? How quickly did other characters acquire one? Did it fade away quickly, slowly, or not at all? And many other questions!
I can try to put together a detailed and illustrated bit on teen sidekicks if given a few days.
short answer is it was mostly a 1940s thing, and theres a supposed sociological reason for the phenomenon. But there was the Teen Titans in the 1960s, a superteam originally made of all teen sidekicks. Stan Lee famously hated the idea of teen sidekicks.
Marvel did have teen sidekicks in the golden age, or boy sidekicks since it was never clear exactly how old they were
Captain America had Bucky. Lee and Kirby made a point of killing off Bucky when Cap was revived in the 1960s, and the movie rewrites the character to be Steve Rogers' grownup friend.
the original Human Torch had Toro. misnamed, because toro means "bull", nothing to do with torches
Bucky and Toro had their own title where they teamed up with nonsuper streetkids to fight the Nazis, called Young Allies (created by Simon & Kirby), decades before the Teen Titans
I dont know when I'll get the chance to research and write a longer reply, so I'll try to answer quickly now:
I dont know for a fact Robin was the first teen sidekick, there may have been earlier examples in newspaper strips or pulp magazines. But Robin was the earliest I know of in superhero comics and certainly inspired the many that followed. A year or two later, every new superhero character seemed to have one, as there was a glut of imitation superheros most were very formulaic.
The reason Bob Kane and his collaborators added Robin was because they wanted Batman to have someone to talk to, it was getting boring Batman just having thought balloons or not speaking for pages on end. Kane said exactly that in his memoir Batman and Me. And with Robin was introduced a quickly cliched type of comic book dialog, with the two character trading bad jokes as they beat up the bad guys, mostly the kid making the wisecracks. Other characters in the golden age handled this problem either by having girlfriends (like Lois Lane or Hawkgirl) or comedy relief characters who'd get in the way (like Plastic Man's Woozy Winks).
the sociological explanation why there were so many boy sidekicks during the golden age: these comics were read mostly by kids who's fathers were away fighting the war for four years, and they imagined the superhero to be the absent father figure and the sidekick to be themselves helping the brave father. This also explains why superhero comics quickly waned in popularity after the end of the war.
the reason Stan Lee says he doesnt like them (in his book Origins of Marvel Comics) is he says he never identified with the boy sidekick, and in fact resented their presence. He always wanted to identify with the superhero himself, and I think his style of writing flawed superheros worrying about day to day problems reflects that. SpiderMan is a teen, same age as Robin, but he's his own boss even if not 100% competent (which does indeed make for more interesting reading).
Kirby for his part did like boy sidekicks, and most of the superhero comics he created with his original creative partner Joe Simon prior to Fantastic Four featured such a character. and that comic I showed above with the Young Allies, Simon and Kirby created several other "kid gang" titles as well throughout the 1940s. so the silver age Marvel bias against boy sidekicks was a Stan Lee thing.
and I've gone several boring paragraphs without any pictures, so here's the cover of Detective 38 April 1940 where Robin is introduced. art by Jerry Robinson. I think this is his first Batman story and he has commented on the coincidence of the character's name as being unintentional
this is really a great Batman story, adapted reasonably faithfully in the Batman Forever film. Maybe if we ask nicely @CoolHandBond will post the complete story?
Thank you so much @caractacus potts I am also learning so much from your posts!
@caractacus potts said - CoolHand, if only you'd pay me to post about comic books, I'd much prefer to be doing this fulltime!
Unfortunately my days of employing staff are long over, but I do know that I would have opened a comic shop to run alongside my bookshop and made you manager if the timelines were different, and that is a solid fact!
@Barbel I’m sure that my learned friend @caractacus potts will answer any query that you may have 😁 and if you have any requests to see any comic stories just post them here and I will do my best to feature them - Batman request already noted - (and that goes for anyone else reading this thread).
Meanwhile we must continue with…see below.
Yeah, well, sometimes nothin' can be a real cool hand.
The content of this comic strip contains very strong language not permitted in the ongoing threads of this site. It also contains themes that some readers may find upsetting. Reader discretion is advised for those who may be easily offended. The content has been cleared for posting by the moderators.
It's immersive. Makes me want to go get binoculars and sit on the shores of Loch Ness. Seriously, it's a great read. The reader truly doesn't know where the story is going to go, all the while passing through well-known bits of ... folklore? Myth?
Conspiracy theories?
Sir MilesThe Wrong Side Of The WardrobePosts: 27,718Chief of Staff
The content of this comic strip contains very strong language not permitted in the ongoing threads of this site. It also contains themes that some readers may find upsetting. Reader discretion is advised for those who may be easily offended. The content has been cleared for posting by the moderators.
Comments
😁
Why is the light SO bad in here? I guess I’ll have to read Danger Girl in the loo…because the light is better in there…honest 🤗
😂🤣 Mrs Sir Miles will be wondering if the Canadian food is upsetting your stomach 😂🤣 glad to see you’re enjoying the adventure!
Todays British comic spotlight falls on Countdown - something covered previously, but time restraints have caught up with me so even though some of this has been posted before some of the pictures haven’t. Here are some of the pages from the first issue - the pages were numbered in reverse order to simulate a “countdown”. The first issue contained a free giant wall-chart with stamps to be affixed, further issues would contain more stamps until the chart was filled.
It’s always nice to see some advertisements of the day…
…and the strip titled Countdown used imagery from 2001: A Space Oddysey ( I don’t know if they had to pay MGM or Stanley Kubrick for the right to do that).
Next Monday will feature the first part of the Marvel UK Comics story.
Thanks as ever, CHB. I don't remember this comic as well as others (I think I was by that phase by then, busy reading books).
Its great reading these…brings back happy memories…I read a few of the Countdown annuals…
Nah, she’s just happy I’m out of her way 😁
I never lost the love of reading comics - alongside my devouring of pulp paperbacks (and owning a bookshop) I was never short of reading material 😁
My daily fix was stopping at the newsagents close by and picking up the daily papers and whatever comics caught my eye, especially new titles with free gifts.
80-Page Giant was a DC title that lasted for 15 issues - it was mainly reprinted stories and each issue focused on a particular superhero. The title harks back to Secret Origins (Summer 1961) which had been a one-off comic featuring several reprinted stories…
This 80-page format was popular so 80-Page Giant was launched in 1964 featuring past tales of Superman. But today we are featuring issue #8 Secret Origins, which told another batch of umm…secret origins.
And the chosen story is How Aquaman Got His Powers…
And a couple of advertisements…
Tomorrow - a Famous First appearance of a Famous Villain…
Adam Strange? Him I don't remember.
Adam Strange debuted in Showcase #17 (November 1958) in a 3-issue run. He made enough sales to graduate to a feature story that ran in Mystery In Space from issue #53 running for about 50 issues. He was loosely based on a John Carter type character.
Hmm, no bells being rung with me. Thanks, though.
I've not heard of him either…but then I was always more a UK children’s comic reader than Marvel or DC…
FAMOUS FIRSTS - 1st appearance of the Riddler
The Riddler belongs to that exclusive quartet of super-villains that have plagued Batman - Joker, Penguin and Catwoman being the others. He first appeared in Detective #140 (October 1948) during the Golden Age. His Silver Age appearances cemented his fame alongside Frank Gorshin’s brilliant portrayal of him in the 60’s Batman TV series.
And one of the advertisements for this issue…
I think that’s one’s the best villain introductions in comics history.
Another Famous First next week.
you are correct CoolHand, 80 Page Giant was all reprints. That Aquaman origin story was originally printed in Adventure 260, May 1959. Written by Robert Bernstein, art by Ramona Fradon. Aquaman's not on the cover, as he was a backup feature, and at this point the lead feature in Adventure was Superboy, (the adventures of Superman when he was a boy). Green Arrow was the other backup feature.
Aquaman had actually been round since 1941. Created by writer Mort Weisenger (later the editor of the various silver age Superman titles) and artist Paul Norris. First appeared in More Fun 73, Nov 1941 (thats Dr Fate on the cover), where he had a different origin. In the same issue also debuted Green Arrow, also created by Weisenger.
Aquaman was a vanilla copy of the Marvel comics character Submariner. compare the silver age origin with Submariner's origin, from Marvel Comics 1, Oct 1939. art and story by the character's creator Bill Everett
Aquaman's golden age origin wasnt much of an origin, was it? the silver age version is a far better story, but even more blatantly derivative: he now has an Atlantean mother and human father just like the Submariner. Marvel hadnt published any Submariner comics in several years by 1959, so maybe DC thought they could get get away with copying the other character's origin story. Big difference is the early Submariner was a genocidal misanthrope, he invaded New York single handed one issue and knocked over skyscrapers, and in another issue unleashed a tsunami upon the city, before mellowing out and taking the americans side against the Nazis. Whereas, like all DC characters, Aquaman was always a purehearted boy scout.
We discussed above how Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman were the only DC superheros to survive the 1950s, when other comics genres became more popular. thats an oversimplification, they were the only ones to keep their own titles. Aquaman and Green Arrow also survived, as they were the backup features in Adventure Comics, safely sharing space with Superboy.
Ramona Fradon began drawing Aquaman in the early 50s, and she's another of my favourites. I really like her tight cartoonish style. She later drew Metamorpho the Element Man, a 1970s revival of Plastic Man, and the SuperFriends.
When Aquaman got a new origin in 1959, around the same time so did Green Arrow and Wonder Woman. This was the same year The Flash finally got his own regular comic after being tentatively revived three years earlier, and the new version of Green Lantern also debuted. I think 1959 was when DC was finally confident there was once again a market for superhero comics.
in Feb 1961 Aquaman finally got a whole comic to himself, starting with a tryout in Showcase 40. also drawn by Fradon. thats newly introduced teen sidekick Aqualad next to him, first seen Feb 1960
but a few months later, when Aquaman got his own regular title it was drawn by Nick Cardy , a great artist from the 1940s. Cardy drew magnificent females, and created the character of Mera, who you all remember from the movie
and after Cardy, Aquaman was drawn by Jim Aparo, who went on to become a great Batman artist in the 70s. Theres an episode of Big Bang Theory where Leonard mocks Sheldon for reading Aquaman, but that just proves Leonard is unhip, because the character had great art all through the silver age!
and that Riddler story above is an example of art by Dick Sprang, my favourite of the early Batman artists. check out all the crazy angles in the drawings. the chase scenes across giant novelty props was a recurring concept in Sprang's stories. Mike's Newsstand shows Sprang drew Batman from 1943-1960, though in later years Sheldon Moldoff was the primary artist.
I'll try to provide some expanded Adam Strange notes tomorrow, if my real life employers give me a break. CoolHand, if only you'd pay me to post about comic books, I'd much prefer to be doing this fulltime!
Wonderful reading. CHB, I loved the Batman story (Loudini? Misprint or deliberate?) and would enjoy more if possible. caractacus, you know your stuff and it's fascinating.
This is great stuff…I’m learning so much…thanks guys 👏🏻
I'd like to put in a request for something on the history of teen sidekicks. Was Robin the first? How quickly did other characters acquire one? Did it fade away quickly, slowly, or not at all? And many other questions!
I can try to put together a detailed and illustrated bit on teen sidekicks if given a few days.
short answer is it was mostly a 1940s thing, and theres a supposed sociological reason for the phenomenon. But there was the Teen Titans in the 1960s, a superteam originally made of all teen sidekicks. Stan Lee famously hated the idea of teen sidekicks.
I had noticed it was mainly a DC phenomenon, and now I know why.
Marvel did have teen sidekicks in the golden age, or boy sidekicks since it was never clear exactly how old they were
Captain America had Bucky. Lee and Kirby made a point of killing off Bucky when Cap was revived in the 1960s, and the movie rewrites the character to be Steve Rogers' grownup friend.
the original Human Torch had Toro. misnamed, because toro means "bull", nothing to do with torches
Bucky and Toro had their own title where they teamed up with nonsuper streetkids to fight the Nazis, called Young Allies (created by Simon & Kirby), decades before the Teen Titans
I dont know when I'll get the chance to research and write a longer reply, so I'll try to answer quickly now:
I dont know for a fact Robin was the first teen sidekick, there may have been earlier examples in newspaper strips or pulp magazines. But Robin was the earliest I know of in superhero comics and certainly inspired the many that followed. A year or two later, every new superhero character seemed to have one, as there was a glut of imitation superheros most were very formulaic.
The reason Bob Kane and his collaborators added Robin was because they wanted Batman to have someone to talk to, it was getting boring Batman just having thought balloons or not speaking for pages on end. Kane said exactly that in his memoir Batman and Me. And with Robin was introduced a quickly cliched type of comic book dialog, with the two character trading bad jokes as they beat up the bad guys, mostly the kid making the wisecracks. Other characters in the golden age handled this problem either by having girlfriends (like Lois Lane or Hawkgirl) or comedy relief characters who'd get in the way (like Plastic Man's Woozy Winks).
the sociological explanation why there were so many boy sidekicks during the golden age: these comics were read mostly by kids who's fathers were away fighting the war for four years, and they imagined the superhero to be the absent father figure and the sidekick to be themselves helping the brave father. This also explains why superhero comics quickly waned in popularity after the end of the war.
the reason Stan Lee says he doesnt like them (in his book Origins of Marvel Comics) is he says he never identified with the boy sidekick, and in fact resented their presence. He always wanted to identify with the superhero himself, and I think his style of writing flawed superheros worrying about day to day problems reflects that. SpiderMan is a teen, same age as Robin, but he's his own boss even if not 100% competent (which does indeed make for more interesting reading).
Kirby for his part did like boy sidekicks, and most of the superhero comics he created with his original creative partner Joe Simon prior to Fantastic Four featured such a character. and that comic I showed above with the Young Allies, Simon and Kirby created several other "kid gang" titles as well throughout the 1940s. so the silver age Marvel bias against boy sidekicks was a Stan Lee thing.
and I've gone several boring paragraphs without any pictures, so here's the cover of Detective 38 April 1940 where Robin is introduced. art by Jerry Robinson. I think this is his first Batman story and he has commented on the coincidence of the character's name as being unintentional
this is really a great Batman story, adapted reasonably faithfully in the Batman Forever film. Maybe if we ask nicely @CoolHandBond will post the complete story?
Many thanks!
Thank you so much @caractacus potts I am also learning so much from your posts!
@caractacus potts said - CoolHand, if only you'd pay me to post about comic books, I'd much prefer to be doing this fulltime!
Unfortunately my days of employing staff are long over, but I do know that I would have opened a comic shop to run alongside my bookshop and made you manager if the timelines were different, and that is a solid fact!
@Barbel I’m sure that my learned friend @caractacus potts will answer any query that you may have 😁 and if you have any requests to see any comic stories just post them here and I will do my best to feature them - Batman request already noted - (and that goes for anyone else reading this thread).
Meanwhile we must continue with…see below.
CONTENT NOTICE:
The content of this comic strip contains very strong language not permitted in the ongoing threads of this site. It also contains themes that some readers may find upsetting. Reader discretion is advised for those who may be easily offended. The content has been cleared for posting by the moderators.
———————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————
THE DEPARTMENT OF TRUTH - Chapter Eight: A Hunter’s Diary (Part Three)
The final part of chapter 8 is tomorrow…
It's immersive. Makes me want to go get binoculars and sit on the shores of Loch Ness. Seriously, it's a great read. The reader truly doesn't know where the story is going to go, all the while passing through well-known bits of ... folklore? Myth?
Conspiracy theories?
You go sit on Loch Ness and I’ll start roaming the Pacific Northwest 👀
It’s great how the story ties all these folklore’s & myths together through a central hub…
Thanks to @caractacus potts & @CoolHandBond for expanding - or really starting - my knowledge on these graphic novels/comics 🙂
Thank you, gentlemen, your praise is appreciated.
CONTENT NOTICE:
The content of this comic strip contains very strong language not permitted in the ongoing threads of this site. It also contains themes that some readers may find upsetting. Reader discretion is advised for those who may be easily offended. The content has been cleared for posting by the moderators.
———————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————
THE DEPARTMENT OF TRUTH - Chapter Eight: A Hunter’s Diary (Part Four)
The next chapter begins next Thursday.