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MARTIN GOODMAN wasn't too happy when he sold MARVEL COMICS and his son CHIP was rejected as part of the package, being passed over in favour of STAN LEE. So he did what any rich guy would do and started another comics company, using the name ATLAS, which had, at one time, been one of Marvel's names (after TIMELY). One of the many comics that Atlas released was The GRIM GHOST, which lasted for only three issues. Few, if any, of the other titles lasted much longer, but GG was one of the better ones, I thought. (The first two issues anyway.)
Loved the Grim Ghost. I was a huge Atlas-Seaboard fanboy and drank that Kool-Aid for the short time it was available. It was to support the then-ignored Atlas Comics which drew me first into the internets way back when.
ReplyDeleteErnie Colon's cover for the debut issue is magnificent! I can think of no other comic book company that showed such great promise which flamed out so fully in such a short time. You blinked and you missed them.
Rip Off
Indeed, Rip. Some of their mags weren't top tier, but others showed a lot of promise. It's a shame they weren't a success. Martin Goodman had to have lost a lot of money on this venture, I'd guess.
ReplyDeleteI had most of the titles at the time and I considered the material to be a bit more violent than I was used to, aimed at an older audience than I was,though not quite 'adult'.
ReplyDeleteI also bought the 'Thrilling Adventures" black and white compilations which were pretty good too and featured a first encounter with Tiger-Man,which maybe suggests I had these first.
They had a full page advert featuring a selection of the characters featured in their comics.
I really liked them and remember being delighted to see them on the old shelves of the wee RS McColls on the Hamilton Road in Bellshill.
I've still got a handful of them, Baab, and enjoy occasionally looking through them. Some were stinkers 'though, eh?
ReplyDeleteAtlas comics were so exciting at the time especially to a 14/15 year old comic book fan, a new US comic company which at that time in 1975 ( I think) was pretty novel - even better all their titles were on sale in the town I lived in at the time. I still recall popping into R S McColl's in Rutherglen which always had a healthy supply of US comics on their spinner racks and seeing the logo of the first issue of "Phoenix" and reading the "What's going on at Atlas" (or whatever it was called) news page listing what seemed like an endless supply of new comics, of course as it turned out not all were great but to me at the time they were all pretty good. Thrilling Adventure Stories issue 2 is probably still one of my all time favourite magazines some excellent art and stories. Grim Ghost was one of the better regular titles along with Ditko's "Destructor" although my favourite was "Planet of the Vampires". As "baab" says some of the titles were pretty violent especially "Targitt" ( revamped to "John Targitt Man Stalker") I managed to pick up every single issue of the colour Atlas comics line except Vicki (which I picked up about 7 years ago) in Rutherglen including all the B&W titles (except Gothic Romance") which was strange as I read in an issue to "The Comic Reader" fanzine at the time that distribution in the US and Canada was really poor. Yeah Atlas for me was a major part of my comic buying youth.
ReplyDeleteI think I got most of my Atlas colour comics in R.S. McColl's in the town centre, in the shop across from the fountain outside Bairds (formerly Henderson's of Sauchiehall Street). I remember getting an issue (maybe #2) of their black & white monster mag in another newsagent's in the old Westwood shops, in which they had an interview with Lee Majors (who at that time was The Six Million Dollar Man). The interview must've been transcribed from a 'phone conversation, because whenever he spoke of Martin Caiden's 'Cyborg' (the book on which the TV show was based), it was written as 'Sideboard'. Talk about shoddy journalism. I never kept the mag for long. but I still remember that after 40 years.
ReplyDeleteI wonder if the Atlas comics have ever been collected in book form, McS? I'll have to check.
Pretty certain that they haven't been collected Kid - I was hoping they might do that with a few titles when Ardeen comics revamped a few of the characters in 2010 but seemingly there was a law suite and they lost (the comics were not that great imho ) - I think Dynamite publishing has the characters or the Atlas name now. Still back issues always seem to be available for 50p - £1 in back issue bins if you can be bothered trawling through tons of crappy titles for them.
ReplyDeleteI got the first new ish of The Grim Ghost when it came out, but it was pretty underwhelming and I didn't bother trying to get any more issues - if there were any. There's probably a stack of old Atlas comics in Neil Craig's Futureshock shop in Woodlands Road, which still looks as if it shut its doors only yesterday. I wonder what its fate will be?
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