Steve Ditko

Marvel Premiere #3 (July, 1972)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

As this post goes out on April 30, 2022, we’re a little less than a week away from the premiere of the second multi-million dollar motion picture from Marvel Studios starring Doctor Strange, Master of the Mystic Arts.

But fifty years ago, in the last week of April, 1972, Marvel Comics was just hoping that maybe the good Doctor might be able to sustain his own solo comic book series again, his last such having been canceled in 1969.  Although they were hedging their bets a little by bringing him back not in his own title — not yet, anyway — but in the tryout book Marvel Premiere.  Read More

Amazing Spider-Man #109 (June, 1972)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

In early 1972, despite the fact that I’d been reading Amazing Spider-Man for four years (albeit with a single ten-month hiatus between March, 1970, and February, 1971), one of his longest-established supporting characters — Eugene “Flash” Thompson — was, if not exactly an unknown quantity to me, still less than a truly familiar face.  My first issue of Spidey’s title, #59, had been released one full year following #47, the issue in which storytellers Stan Lee and John Romita had shipped Flash off to military service in the Vietnam War.  Sure, I had read enough reprints of the early, high-school-set material by Lee and Steve Ditko to have a good grasp of the character’s original bullying-Peter-Parker-while-idolizing-Spider-Man shtick.  But my “real time” encounters with Flash had been limited to a few scenes that appeared in a run of late-’69 to early-’70 issues, where the young soldier had made a return visit stateside just long enough to incur Peter’s jealousy over Gwen Stacy, due to a misunderstanding that thankfully got cleared up (more or less) before Flash headed back to Southeast Asia.  Read More

Monsters on the Prowl #16 (April, 1972)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

You know, Marvel may have never quite licked the horror/mystery/fantasy/science fiction/what-have-you anthology format during the Bronze Age of Comics — at least not in the color comics arena — but you’ve got to give them points for trying.  From 1969 to 1975, the publisher launched at least sixteen titles that can be grouped within that admittedly broad category (more, if you include all the title changes).  It’s quite the bewildering array of funnybooks to try to get a handle on half a century later, even if you were buying and reading Marvels all through the era (as your humble blogger indeed was).  Trying to account for all those Loose Creatures and Dwelling Monsters, not to mention the Shadowy Towers and Crypts and the Chambers offering you a choice of either Darkness or Chills, can feel like a real Journey into Mystery at times; honestly, it can be hard to know if you’re coming or going.  Or Prowling or Roaming, if you catch my drift.

But never Fear, faithful reader — Attack of the 50 Year Old Comic Books is here to help.  While I can’t promise you’ll possess a comprehensive understanding of all the varied aspects of this little chapter in comics history by the time you finish reading this post, I believe that I can at least relieve you of feeling like you’re trapped within a Tomb of Darkness, informationally speaking.  Something like that, anyway.  At least for the first couple of years of the phenomenon.  Read More

Eerie 1972 Annual

Posted on by Alan Stewart

The 1972 Eerie Annual (and no, I don’t know why publisher James Warren stuck “1972” on a periodical published in July, 1971, though my guess is that he hoped that at least a few inattentive retailers might leave the item on the stands for a full eighteen months) was almost certainly the very first comics magazine from Warren Publishing that your humble blogger, then fourteen years of age, ever bought.

But it wasn’t the first Warren magazine I’d ever bought.  And it may not even have been my first Warren comic book, either — at least, not if you define the latter term as “a book full of comics”.

Lemme ‘splain.  Read More

Teen Titans #29 (Sept.-Oct., 1970)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

In the summer of 1970, when I was finding my way back into the regular habit of comic-book buying after almost giving the whole thing up a few months earlier, I seem to have been inclined to give just about any and every title a shot.  At least, that’s my best guess as to why I picked up this issue of Teen Titans — a title I’d only ever read once before, and that over two years previously.

If I had to come up with a more specific reason, however, it would have been the cover — which, in addition to being a typically fine effort by the series’ long-time semi-regular artist, Nick Cardy (pretty much at the peak of his powers in this era), promised that the issue’s story would feature an extra couple of superheroes in addition to the usual gang of Justice Leaguers’ junior partners I was used to; namely, the Hawk and the Dove.  Read More

Doctor Strange #180 (May, 1969)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

As I’ve related in previous posts, I was a little slow in warming up to Doctor Strange.  Marvel Comics finally got me in late 1968, however, through the double-barrelled approach of first giving him a visual makeover, and then guest-starring him in The Avengers.  Those moves caught my interest — which, according to what Roy Thomas (a Marvel associate editor at the time, not to mention the writer of both Doctor Strange and Avengers) would state decades later in his introduction to Marvel Masterworks – Doctor Strange, Vol. 3, was precisely what the publisher had hoped they’d do.

But the next issue of Doctor Strange to hit the stands after Avengers #61 was a reprint, featuring the good Doctor’s “old look” — though, since it was a reprint of a classic tale by Steve Ditko and Stan Lee that co-starred Spider-Man, and which was 100 % new to me, I didn’t really have much to complain about.  Still, I was happy to see Doctor Strange #180, the “real” follow-up to Avengers #61, when it finally arrived in early February, 1969.  Read More

Beware the Creeper #6 (Mar.-Apr., 1969)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

As I’ve mentioned n a number of previous posts, my young comics-reading self of a half century or more ago had rather conservative tastes.  All these years later, that’s my best explanation for why and how I missed out on virtually all the new DC comic book titles that came out in the years 1967 and 1968, in what comics historians Gerard Jones and Will Jacobs would later call “The DC Experiment”.  This sudden onrush of new series, most but not all of which launched with try-outs in DC’s Showcase title, roughly coincided with the ascent of former freelance artist Carmine Infantino to an executive role at the publisher.  The push was an effort on Infantino’s part to recover market share DC had lost to the ascendancy of upstart rival Marvel on one hand, and the ebbing of “Batmania”-fueled sales on the other, by coming up with something new — preferably, a lot of somethings.  Read More

Doctor Strange #179 (April, 1969)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

My younger self of a half-century ago was a little slow in warming up to Marvel Comics’ Master of the Mystic Arts, Doctor Strange.  As I related a few weeks ago in my post about Avengers #61, I think it mostly had to do with the good Doctor’s look — the mustache, the white temples, the blousy tunic, etc. — which didn’t seem quite “superheroic” enough for my eleven-year-old sensibilities.  However, the “new look” that artist Gene Colan and writer Roy Thomas introduced in issue #177,  effectively giving the sorcerous hero a more conventional costume of tights and a mask (the latter actually being a magical transformation of his physiognomy), intrigued me when I saw it in Marvel’s house ads — and the deal was sealed when I bought and read the aforementioned Avengers issue, in which Dr, Strange showed off his new look in a featured guest appearance.  That book primed me to check out the Doc in his solo series, and I made plans to pick up the next issue when it came out.

But when I finally did see Doctor Strange #179 in the spinner rack, roughly a month later, I was in for a surprise.  Because the face that gazed out at me from the cover wasn’t the new, blue one — rather, it was the mustachioed, white-templed visage that I thought was now old hat.  What was going on?  I had no clue, but hey — Spider-Man was guest-starring in the issue, and the wall-crawler was by now not just my favorite Marvel hero, but my favorite comic-book hero, period.  I didn’t see how I could go wrong buying this comic; and thus, I put my twelve cents down on the convenience store counter, and took it home.   Read More

Avengers #61 (February, 1969)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

The subject of today’s post, in addition to being another fine installment in writer Roy Thomas and artist John Buscema’s original run on The Avengers, also happens to have been my first real encounter (outside of a couple of cameos) with Marvel Comics’ Master of the Mystic Arts, Doctor Strange — or, at least, I think it was.

The problem here is that I know that, once upon a time, I owned a copy of Marvel Collectors’ Item Classics #19 — a terrific, double-sized reprint book that not only included a classic early Doctor Strange tale (from Strange Tales #128), but also an equally-classic Fantastic Four story (from the 27th issue of that team’s title) that guest-starred the good Doctor.  A double dose of Doc, if you will. And since that book would have been on sale in  November, 1968, it would necessarily have been my first Strange-featuring comic — if I’d bought it new off the stands, that is.  Which I have no truly compelling reason to believe I didn’t.

Still — and allowing for how vague many of my comics-buying memories are after half a century’s passage — I somehow don’t believe that was the case.  When I reread both these books now, Avengers #61 simply feels like it was my first Dr. Strange comic, and MCIC #19 … doesn’t.  So I’ve decided, for the purposes of this blog, that I probably came into possession of my copy of the reprint book some time later, probably via trade with (or sale by) a friend.  If I’m wrong — well, we’ll never know, right?  (Besides which, nobody but me likely cares all that much.)

But even if Avengers #61 wasn’t the first comic book I ever read that featured Dr. Strange, it was certainly the first non-reprint book to include the hero that I ever picked up.  Without it, I might well not have taken to the character as much (and almost certainly not as quickly) as I did; for, immediately following my reading this issue, I became a regular purchaser of the Doctor Strange series — and I’d remain a faithful reader of the title for years to come, sticking around through its rather frequent cancellations and revivals, with its star ultimately becoming my second favorite Marvel character (right after Thor).

Which is pretty much just what Roy Thomas and his colleagues at Marvel hoped would happen, when they decided to guest-star Doctor Strange in Avengers back in late 1968.   Read More

Silver Surfer #4 (February, 1969)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

The Mighty Thor has been my favorite Marvel Comics character for the better part of the last half-century.  The subject of today’s post is as responsible for that fact as much as is any other single comic book — even though it’s not “really” a Thor comic.

As I’ve recounted in previous posts, I first made the acquaintance of Marvel’s take on the Norse god of thunder in the summer of 1967, via Avengers #45 (which also happened to be my very first Marvel comic), in which he appeared in only the first few pages.  I didn’t encounter him again until almost a year later — this time in the pages of Avengers Annual #2, in which he played a somewhat more substantial role — but I didn’t get around to buying an issue of Thor itself until September, when the cover of #158 caught my eye.  That turned out to be a pretty good first issue to purchase, since it reprinted in full Thor’s origin story from Journey into Mystery #83, and its new-material framing sequence by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby also introduced me to a number of the settings and characters that had been brought into the series post-origin, such as Asgard, Odin, the Lady Sif, and so forth.  I enjoyed that comic book quite a bit, but for whatever reason, I didn’t pick up another issue of Thor for several months.  Read More