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I forget exactly how many of the Giant-Size individual titles I own, but having recently shown you all six of Fantastic Four, I thought you might like to see several others I can readily lay my hands on. True, two of them are relatively new Facsimile Editions, but seven are originals from the '70s (with a new one from 2005), so the old outnumber the 'new'.
Do you have any of these issues, Crivvies (or did you have them way back when), and if so, which ones resonate with you all the way to the present day? Feel free to wax eloquent and lyrical in our ever-welcoming comments section. My favourite cover of the six is John Romita's Avengers one (above) - what's yours?
10 comments:
Have them all and have a special fondness for them. Even the reprints felt special somehow. Odd that I know. I was still in love with comics when these came out and not yet jaded by the passing of time. Marvel tried to make the giant-size comics feel special and they often succeeded.
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I didn't know about these issues until many years later, RJ, which is when I acquired them. Had I known about them, I'd assuredly have bought them.
I never owned any of them because I never saw any of them on sale but I've read Giant Size X-Men #1 when it was re-printed in Rampage monthly in early 1979 and a few months earlier the Spidey vs. Dracula story appeared in the 'Super Spider-Man' weekly. For my favourite cover I'll choose the Spidey one because I remember it from the cover of SSM.
I probably first read these stories in the same UK periodicals, CJ. After the Avengers cover, I kinda like the Captain Marvel one as well. The Spidey one is okay though.
I wasn't aware if the Captain Marvel or Power Man issues. Wasn't aware there we so many of these. Very nice looking books.
I think there was a Conan one as well, McS. In fact, I might even have it, will have to look.
I loved Marvels Giant Size comics.They were probably a response to the DC 100 page specials which were fantastic.They also coincided with each other(??)1974 to 1975 but the Marvel issues lasted longer but descended into reprints for their last few issues but what a run they were.About to date myself here but in the 1970s some(an awful lot actually)we're non distributed in the UK and Ireland so you will never find a GS issue with an English pence price as none were distributed here......or were they?Another aspect of American comics that were ND was that sometimes they arrived on our shores through ballast copies.In other words imported to UK via the holds of ships and therein lies my story.Whilst checking through the latest batch of Marvel comics in our local newsagent in 1975 my friend Martin found a copy of GS Amazing Spiderman #1 amongst all the copies of Marvel All Colour Comics(did I mention that Marvel changed the masthead and the price for UK distribution?)Anyway no one had seen a GS copy and Martin's copy was desired by everyone.Crazy deals were proposed for this rarity involving multiple comics up to 20 comics to be traded for this one issue.I wanted it so badly but was outbid by others.We put such stock on all ND comics,looking back they were a mixed batch but certain issues were great:GS FF #1-4:Avengers #1,2:Spiderman #1-5:Invaders #1:Conan #1-3:Defenders #1-5:and a certain X-Men #1.Truly a magical time.
I think at one time all US comics came to our shores as ballast in ships, Triple F, or at least that's what I've always understood. And non-distributed comics turned up too, as some comics shops and dealers imported them specially. (This was before the type of 'comics shops' we have today.) Funnily enough, I bought the first 5 issues of Omega The Unknown, which had the UK price and Marvel All-Colour Comics banner, done it was said, to alert casual buyers to the fact that US Marvel comics weren't the same as the mainly b&w UK weeklies. Then it disappeared from the shops, so I never got the next 5 issues (it only lasted 10). When I eventually tracked them down a few short years ago to complete my Omega collection, they were US priced and carried the Marvel Comics Group banner. I guess Marvel stopped distributing them in Britain when they saw how poor the sales were.
Recently Marvel published another version of Giant Size X-Men #1 in which each page of the original comic is re-drawn by a different modern artist, a different artist for every page!
I remember reading Conan's "Hour Of The Dragon" in the UK Savage Sword monthly.
Have to be honest and say I'm not really keen on a different artist per page in a comic, CJ. It make things too disjointed for my liking.
It's likely that I first read that Conan tale in the self-same publication. I think I might have a reprint of it in Conan Saga from around the mid-'80s.
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