ORIGINS OF MARVEL COMICS...

Images copyright MARVEL COMICS.  Art by JOHN ROMITA Sr

In the beginning Marvel created the Bullpen and the Style.

And the Bullpen was without form, and was void; and

darkness was upon the face of the Artists.  And the Spirit

of Marvel moved upon the face of the Writers.

And Marvel said, Let there be The Fantastic Four.

And there was The Fantastic Four.

And Marvel saw The Fantastic Four.  And it was good.

******

The first hint I had was in a BULLPEN BULLETINS page in 1973, perhaps '74. Just a passing reference in a brief sentence of a MARVEL ORIGINS special or book in the works that might one day see fruition.  "That'd be nice!" I thought.  Comics were often described as 'books' in those days (and probably still are) so, truth to tell, I expected it to be a 72 page KING-SIZE SPECIAL which I'd be able to pick up for no more than about 25 pence.

Time passed.  I kept an eye on the shelves and spinner-racks to see if this proposed publication was ever going to materialize, but no joy.  I'd left school and was working when, in October of 1975 (I think), the back pages of the British Marvel weeklies carried an advert for - wait for it - ORIGINS Of MARVEL COMICS, a softcover book containing the origin tales of The FANTASTIC FOUR, The HULK, SPIDER-MAN, THOR, and DOCTOR STRANGE, as well as later tales to show how the characters had developed since their inception.

I sent off the required amount and waited, wishing my life away with each new day. Eventually, a padded envelope arrived containing the sought-after treasure - and indeed, treasure was the word which described this pulsating paperback to a tee.  I pored over its contents innumerable times, drank in the four-colour fantasies which I'd only ever seen in black and white or spot-coloured reprints in U.K. comics, a poor second to the fabulous volume I now possessed.

American advert for Origins

I later learned that there was a hardback edition and wondered why we Brits never got the chance of one, but that was a minor niggle.  Two things, however, bothered me about the titanic tome and slightly detracted from its Marvellous magnificence.  The first was that the corner page numbers of each and every strip had been clumsily pasted over to obliterate their existence, and the second was that some panels bore evidence of 'touch ups', where thin lines at risk of not reproducing too well had been 'enhanced' by another hand - though one far less skilled than the original inkers of the art.

STAN LEE's behind-the-scenes accounts of how these tales had been created read just like a dream - which was ironic, considering that was how some cynics later described Stan's version of events.  But you have to hand it to 'The Man' - he knew how to keep his readers glued to each page.  Interestingly, first editions mixed up the Doctor Strange section, printing the stories and their accompanying text out of sequence, but this was corrected for subsequent printings.

Even today, the book is a delight to read, thanks mainly to Stan's mastery of words and his ability to spin a good yarn, even though his recollection may be a little faulty at times.  It's certainly a book worth having, but for a more faithful presentation of these cataclysmic classics - without the inferior 'restoration' evident in Origins - readers are advised to try and obtain MARVEL FIRSTS: The 1960s, a massive volume published about a year or so back.

However, for its time, Origins of Marvel Comics was a well-deserved best-seller that had comicbook fans everywhere screaming "Make Mine Marvel!"