Gene Colan

Tomb of Dracula #44 (May, 1976)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

When you look back on it, it seems inevitable.  In 1976, Marvel Comics had these two leading men who, along with sharing a heavily mysterioso vibe, had a strikingly similar penchant for high-collared cloaks and neatly trimmed mustaches.  Not to mention that the exploits of both gentlemen were then being illustrated by the same art team of penciller Gene Colan and inker/colorist Tom Palmer.  If you were Marvel editor-in-chief Marv Wolfman, why wouldn’t you stage a crossover between Tomb of Dracula and Doctor Strange — especially since you, i.e., Marv, were also the regular writer of the former book?  Sure, it might take some time to coordinate the two stars’ respective continuities; but, as it happened, in February, 1976, both Wolfman and his counterpart over at Doctor Strange, writer Steve Englehart, were simultaneously in-between multi-issue storylines.  There would never be a more opportune moment for the Lord of Vampires and the Sorcerer Supreme to cross paths… and, in the end, that’s just what occurred, over the first two weeks of that month — as, naturally, we’ll be discussing here over the first two weeks of this month.  Read More

Doctor Strange #13 (April, 1976)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

As regular readers of this blog will recall from our November, 2025 post about Doctor Strange #12, that particular installment of the adventures of Marvel Comics’ Master of the Mystic Arts ended not with a whimper, but a bang.  Actually, a series of bangs, by the end of which the planet Earth (the “real” one, writer Steve Englehart’s script assured us) had been completely and utterly destroyed, along with all living things thereon.  “But then,” Englehart’s omniscient narrator pointedly asked us readers, “how is it you remain?”  How, indeed?  The answer to that poser was promised for the next bimonthly issue… which, of course, brings us to the subject of today’s post.  Read More

Doctor Strange #12 (February, 1976)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

Four months ago, we took a look at Doctor Strange #10, which presented the first chapter in writer Steve Englehart and artist Gene Colan’s latest (as of July, 1975) four-part saga of the Sorcerer Supreme — this one involving our hero’s attempt to prevent the awesome cosmic entity Eternity from destroying the Earth.  Naturally, that story had continued in the next bi-monthly issue of the series; but since we didn’t manage to fit a full post about Doctor Strange #11 into our September blogging schedule, we’ll need to cover its main events before moving on to the specific comic whose name and cover you see at the top of this post.  If you’re a regular reader, you already know how this goes… and if you’re not, I’m sure you’ll figure it out as we roll along.  Read More

Unknown Worlds of Science Fiction #6 (November, 1975)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

Last October, we took a look at the first issue of Unknown Worlds of Science Fiction — Marvel Comics’ latest (as of 1974), and, as things turned out, last (as of 2025) attempt to produce an SF anthology comic adapting well-known short stories and novels in the genre.  As I related in that earlier post, my younger self definitely enjoyed that premiere offering, but still somehow ended up not buying another issue until the August, 1975 release of the subject of today’s post.  Whether the magazine had been having distribution problems in my area in the ten-month interval between UWoSF #1 and #6, or I simply passed on #2 through #5 for reasons now forgotten, I’m glad that the stars aligned for me to buy this one.  Read More

Man-Thing #22 (October, 1975)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

When we last checked in with the Man-Thing back in March, at the end of his 18th issue, it was for the finale of the three-part “Mad Viking” trilogy — one of the most intense and memorable storylines to have yet appeared in the feature, perhaps matched only by “The Kid’s Night Out!” (which had in fact been published concurrently with it, in the Man-Thing’s quarterly Giant-Size vehicle).  As you may recall, Man-Thing #18 concluded with Manny, his human friend Richard Rory, and a distressed teenager named Carol Selby abandoning the small Florida town of Citrusville in the wake of a book burning incident at the town’s high school in which people as well as pages had perished.  That downbeat ending presaged a significant change in direction for the series — one which writer Steve Gerber and artist Jim Mooney would manage to explore in depth for only three issues before having to abruptly wrap up everything as best they could in the title’s terminal release, Man-Thing #22. Read More

Doctor Strange #10 (October, 1975)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

Fifty years ago this month, writer Steve Englehart and artist Gene Colan were just coming off a four-part storyline in Doctor Strange that had focused on a couple of the Master of the Mystic Arts’ best-established arch-foes — the Dread Dormammu and his sister Umar — when the latest issue of the title arrived on stands with a cover signaling that the creative team was returning to the well for another deep dip into the feature’s past.  After all, Baron Mordo was arguably Doctor Strange’s oldest adversary, having first appeared in the heroic magician’s second published adventure (in Strange Tales #111 [Aug., 1963]), and then soon thereafter being confirmed to have played a role in his origin story (Strange Tales #115 [Dec., 1963]).  Meanwhile, Eternity (who wasn’t exactly a villain, per se) had almost as distinguished a provenance, his debut appearance having come near the end of the seminal run of Dr. Strange’s creators, writer Stan Lee and artist Steve Ditko, in Strange Tales #138 (Nov., 1965).  Read More

X-Men #94 (August, 1975)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

As you may recall from our post about Giant-Size X-Men #1 back in April, that landmark comic book concluded with one of the mutant superhero team’s original members, the Angel, posing the query: “What are we going to do with thirteen X-Men?”  That question was reflective of the fact that while Marvel Comics had just introduced seven new members to the team (the majority of whom were also brand-new characters), there were still six veteran heroes of the old guard to be dealt with in one way or another.  It seemed unlikely that even a giant-sized version of the freshly-revived “X-Men” feature could easily accommodate such a large number of costumed crusaders in every issue — and once Marvel decided to use the existing regular-sized X-Men title (which since 1969 had only presented reprints of old X-stories) as the relaunched series’ primary vehicle instead, that question became even more acute.  Read More

Astonishing Tales #31 (August, 1975)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

The last time we checked in with Marvel Comics’ cyborg antihero, Deathlok the Demolisher, it was September, 2024.  (Or, if you prefer, September, 1974).  That’s been a good long while in comics periodical publishing terms, even taking into account the bi-monthly publication schedule of Astonishing Tales back then; so you might figure we have a lot of catching up to do before digging in to the character’s “latest” adventure.  But, as it turns out, the eight-month gap between issues #27 and #31 of the Astonishing Tales brought just two new Deathlok stories rather than three, as issue #29 was a fill-in featuring an unplanned reprint of the first Guardians of the Galaxy story, which (as we discussed in last week’s Defenders #26 post) had originally appeared in Marvel Super-Heroes #18 back in 1968.  Read More

Defenders #26 (August, 1975)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

The subject of today’s post is the first of four regular issues of Defenders that guest-starred the original Guardians of the Galaxy.  But the storyline actually kicked off in the fifth (and last) issue of the non-team’s other vehicle, Giant-Size Defenders, so you can probably guess what that means — yep, we’ll be taking a look at that one first.

Although, considering that we’ve never really discussed the OG Guardians on the blog prior to this post, and given that GSD #5 represented only their third non-reprint appearance overall at the time it was released, maybe we should look at least briefly at the prior history of the team?  Sure, let’s do that. Read More

Doctor Strange #9 (August, 1975)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

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 come on the closing page of Doctor Strange #7; for that reason, despite the fact that the title up there says this post is about issue #9, we’re going to be starting things off instead with a look at #8, whose cover by Gil Kane and Tom Palmer is shown at right.  If you’re a regular reader, you already know this drill by heart… so, let’s get started:  Read More