Thursday, 23 January 2020

POSTER 'PUZZLE' FINALLY SOLVED...


Copyright MARVEL COMICS

Remember this poster, peeps?  It was given away in return for 8 (I think) cut-out coupons from The MIGHTY WORLD Of MARVEL way back in 1972.  The one you see here is a scan of a preview in one of the weekly issues and is nowhere near as impressive-looking as the actual 'bigger than a breadbox' item itself.  I showed this in a post back in 2015 (how time flies) and was unsure whether this (and its subsequent SPIDER-MAN COMICS WEEKLY counterpart poster) was produced for the States and then pressed into service in Britain, or vice versa, as I seemed to recall them being advertised in US mags at some point.

Well, I've just seen the one above in an ad (below) in my facsimile edition of The INCREDIBLE HULK #180, the original of which came out in 1974, so it seems it was produced for the UK first, and then made available in the US. (Unless it had previously appeared in an earlier American issue.)  I still have the impression that I saw the Spidey one in a US mag as well, but so far haven't been able to confirm whether my seeming memory of it is accurate or not.  Still, it looks like I may've solved the mystery in regard to the above one.  (I have a replacement of the actual full-size poster, but it's never been up on the wall, though my original was back in 1972.)

Anyway, here's a question for all of our Stateside readers: Did any of you ever have this poster back in the day - or the Spidey one - and if so, just how did you acquire them?  (Reader Phil S probably had them when he stayed in Britain back then, but I'm thinking of those who lived in America at the time.)    


Update: I've just noticed that the ad also appears in F.O.O.M. #5, which I've owned for many years, so I must've seen it at some stage and simply forgotten about it.  And in case you've forgotten what the Spidey poster looked like (or have never seen it before), that's it below.  The colour error on the costume wasn't on the actual poster - only on this preview in an issue of SMCW.  I can't quite remember now, but they may have shown it again in another issue, as I remember seeing it without the colour error.  Either that, or it was spotted and corrected during the print-run, though that would probably have been expensive to do. 

ARE YOU A TRUE BELIEVER IN FACSIMILE EDITIONS? (THAT MEANS REPRINTS, MELVIN)...

Copyright MARVEL COMICS

Being someone given to periods of self-indulgent introspection from time-to-time, I've realised that I'm a creature of habit - a reveller in repetition.  I seem to derive some sense of satisfaction in re-creating moments from my past, though it's probably more accurate to say I feel compelled to rather than because I actually want to.  In the last few years, what with all the many TRUE BELIEVERS and FACSIMILE EDITIONS that have been released, I've been able to repeat moods and moments that I first experienced decades ago.

Take True Believers comics like the reprint of OMEGA The UNKNOWN #1, or JOHN BYRNE's first issue as regular writer and artist of The FANTASTIC FOUR (#232) for example.  I first bought the originals back in the '70s and '80s while living in the very house where I now reside.  To receive and re-read their reprints in the very same room of the very same house I stayed in back then has some kind of immense significance to me, and the period between the old and the new is reduced in the process.  A step back in time, as it were.


Same with MARVEL PRESENTS #3 (GUARDIANS Of The GALAXY). When the facsimile of that arrived, I was whisked back to the sizzlin' '70s (spoiler alert: Kid's favourite and oft-repeated catchphrase ahead) faster than a fart from The FLASH!  (Hey, you gotta admit - it's a classic!)  Am I the only one who reacts in such a way?  One glance at a new edition of an old comic and I'm reminded of when I first saw the original (even if I've still got it) and, for a brief moment at least, it's like my life's reset button has been pressed and everything old is new again.  (Or should that be everything new is old again?  See?  Philosophy - and for free, too.)

If you can relate to anything of what I'm trying to say (or even if you can understand it), feel free to expand and expound, and add your own thoughts, theories, and observations to the subject in our cataclysmic (hey, I gotta give it the hard-sell with you guys) comments section.