Sunday 27 December 2015

December 27th, 1975 - Marvel UK, 40 years ago this week.

Hooray! Santa's stuck in my chimney, Rudolph's eating my sofa and The Snowman's walking in my hair. It can only mean one thing.

It's more or less Christmas.

That means it's time to find out what tinsel-packed goodness Marvel UK was giving us on this very day of forty years ago.

Were they dishing out turkeys, left, right and centre?

Or were they giving us a veritable smorgasbord of crackers?

Marvel UK, Avengers #119

There aren't many Avengers tales from this era that don't grab me but, somehow, I've never been able to warm to the Cornelius van Lunt storyline. I think I just feel a need for super-villains in an Avengers tale.

Marvel UK, Dracula Lives #62, Legion of Monsters

Much as I might love Man-Thing and Werewolf by Night, I can't help feeling that, if Dracula really wants to take over the world, they'll prove more of a hindrance than a help, seeing as they tend to have a somewhat unfocused approach to life. In fact, when it comes to usefulness as partners, I'd feel happier about using Oddbod and Oddbod Jr from Carry On Screaming than those two.

Marvel UK, Planet of the Apes #62, Cornelius holds his dead wife as helicopters fire at them

Once more Cornelius finds himself up against people who took shooting training from the Star Wars Storm Troopers. Someone really does need to tell them that if you point your gun at the ground, you're not in any great danger of hitting anyone.

Spider-Man Comics Weekly #150, our hero cornered as people point to him on a screen

Spidey's still having trouble with the Spider-Slayer.

Mighty World of Marvel #169, Hulk vs Modok

Hooray! It's the tale where the Hulk strip goes completely mad and Modok turns Betty Ross into the Harpy.

Meanwhile, I detect the return of Psycho-Man to the pages of the Fantastic Four.

Marvel UK, The Super-Heroes #43

The Super-Heroes is still quietly trundling along.

Marvel UK, Titans #10, Iron Man vs Captain Marvel

I finally got round to seeing Iron Man 2 the other night. I must confess I preferred Iron Man 1.

Of course, I'd have preferred it even more if Captain Marvel had been in it.

4 comments:

Dougie said...

The Spidey cover is fantastic. I agree with you about the Van Lunt story. The art is gorgeous during this period of the Avengers but the stories are pretty tedious. Englehart ' s Hulk is terrific- I re-read the Captain Omen story yesterday and Aquon the Man - Fish comes out of nowhere.

Anonymous said...

Somewhat surprised you aren't really into that POTA cover, Steve, what with it having a pair of giant apes on it (shooting at the ground seems particularly odd with targets that big).

Don't think much of the MWOM cover - how does an artist manage to make Modok look so boring?

Have a good new year, Steve.
And everyone else, of course.

-sean

Anonymous said...

ps - Complete amateurs can draw a better Modok than MarvelUK cover artists.
www.marchmodokmadness.blogspot.co.uk/

-sean

Steve W. said...

Have a good New Year too, Sean - and everyone else who drops by the blog.