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'Twas back on Saturday October 19th 1974 that two new Marvel UK weeklies hit newsagents' shelves, likely resulting in kids across the country asking their parents for an increase in their pocket-money. The 'first' of these titles - Planet Of The Apes - lasted for 123 issues, having subsumed Dracula Lives - its sister periodical - at #88, which means DL obviously only managed to last until #87.
POTA also included at some stage various Marvel characters, such as Warlock, Captain Marvel, Ka-Zar and the like, with US Killraven strips being redrawn and relettered as Apeslayer strips, such was the shortage of actual Apes material. In fact, new Apes strips were specially drawn for the weekly title then later reprinted in the US mag, probably the first and perhaps only time such a thing has happened.
Dracula Lives reprinted (in b&w with grey tones) the main strip from the US colour title Tomb Of Dracula, along with Werewolf By Night and the Frankenstein Monster, as well as (later down the line) Ghost Rider and Man-Thing. Both of these British weeklies could've done with better printing, especially Dracula Lives, but hey, we were young and things like that didn't seem to bother us too much at the time.
So, 50 years later, let's think back to our youth and celebrate a time when Marvel UK was on the march, before its output started to dwindle and decline in later years.
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When composing this post earlier, I merely took the covers and posters from folders of earlier scans, but I decided to go that extra mile and dig out my copies of the mags so that I could show you some of the contents, the better to prompt your memories. Remember them?
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And in case you were wondering, below is how the above poster looked in its original form - as the cover for the US version of Dracula Lives #5. (Wish they'd left the burd in the UK version.)
As you know, Kid, I didn't discover the POTA weekly until No.5 and 50 years later I still regret missing the first four issues but of course I'm thankful I discovered the weekly at all thanks to the POTA TV series and only today I heard that Ron Harper who played the astronaut Alan Virdon in the series died last March aged 91. The Dracula Lives cover looks fantastic but I didn't start reading DL until No.25 and then continued reading it until the merger with POTA. Did you know the Dracula strip only featured in the merged comic until No.92 so the final 31 issues contained no Dracula at all despite his name appearing in the comic's title every week. But those two covers for the first issues are terrific and I wish I'd bought them when they came out.
ReplyDeleteI think I bought all of them at the time, CJ, though whatever few ones I have now are replacements I've had for decades. If I knew about Dracula disappearing from the title for the last 31 issues, I'd forgotten, so thanks for reminding me. And look - I've even given you the free posters for printing out and hanging on your bathroom wall. (The Dracula one should come in handy if you ever get constipated.)
ReplyDeleteOnly one comment from CJ? Where's everybody else - football on today, or something?
ReplyDeleteAnother great blast from the past.Started Grammar school in September 1974 which seems a lifetime ago ....yet vividly remember buying both these issues.Loved Christopher Lee as Dracula,untouchable in the role and the comic complemented the films which were still being produced at the time(just about).Loved the cover of Planet of the Apes #1...it was never bettered.Think the TV series was running at the same time with Burke and Virdon.Loved the opening sequence....scary at the time.We were blessed growing up in the 1970's.Stay well everyone and look out for the storm!
ReplyDeleteI've never seen that Dracula poster before, Kid, so thanks for showing it. That's the kind of free gift worth having unlike the crappy free gifts in Captain Britain and The Complete FF. It's funny to think how that image of Dracula only went back as far as the 1931 Bela Lugosi film, 43 years previously - the same distance we are now from 1981. (I've just realised that you've probably shown the Dracula poster before on Crivens so apologies for my terrible memory if that's the case).
ReplyDeletePOTA and Dracula Lives were the first 2 UK Marvel comics where I made the decision not to pick them up regularly ( in the case of POTA I only bought around 5 issues) . At this time I was able to live near a newsagents that sold lots of US Marvels (and DCs) so I decided to buy them instead.
ReplyDeleteTriple F, CJ, and McS - don't go anywhere, 'cos in around 5 minutes or so, I'm going to be adding the splash pages of these 2 mags to this post. Never saw the TV series, FFF, 'cos I don't think it was shown in Scotland at the time. Can't recall if I've shown the Drac poster before, CJ, so that's two of us. Do you ever regret not getting them, McS? I've got the Epic Collections of Frankie, Drac, and Wolfie in colour and the artwork looks much better.
ReplyDeleteDidn't Ka-Zar or Gullivar Jones appear in POTA #1, Kid?
ReplyDeleteNope - or I would've scanned their splash pages, CJ
ReplyDeleteThat's something I didn't realise, Kid - I already knew that the apes strip in POTA #1 was full-length as in the original US magazine but I didn't know that POTA #1 was 100% apes material.
ReplyDeleteToday is the 45th anniversary of something I strongly associate with buying POTA #5. It was actually my mother who bought the comic for me and then we went to a hairdressing salon called Mamselle's where my mother had her hair done while I explored my new comic. Mamselle's final day of business before closing was on Saturday, October 20th 1979 so exactly 45 years ago today.
Although I never owned the first four issues of POTA I was able to quickly discover what the covers of #1-3 looked like but the cover of #4 remained a complete mystery until the internet came along and I finally saw it on a POTA cover gallery.
Funnily enough, CJ, I still miss Barber shops in my home town that disappeared decades ago, 'cos I remember waiting for a haircut while reading certain comics my mother had bought for me. Ah, happy, innocent, carefree days, eh?
ReplyDeleteNice to see these splash pages again after so many years . Although I still have my copy of Dracula Lives #1, I haven't looked at it in years and I gave my first issue of POTA away decades ago. I do recall enjoying the POTA strip in the first 2 or 3 issues and George Tuska's art which I thought was excellent.
ReplyDeleteYes, he was a good artist, McS. Always enjoyed his Iron Man issues. My POTA and DL #1s aren't my originals, but I've had them for decades now so it almost feels like they are.
ReplyDeleteAnother 50th anniversary, Kid - today (Oct 21st) is 50 years since the first episode of Roobarb on BBC1.
ReplyDeleteRoobarb was brilliant, CJ. I've got a DVD of all the original episodes. There was a new series called 'Roobarb and Custard Too' in 2005, again with Richard Briers doing the voices. Must see if that's available on DVD - I imagine it will be.
ReplyDeleteKid, we recently discussed coincidence/chance so here are two Roobarb coincidences:
ReplyDelete1) Richard Briers died on February 17th 2013 and Roobarb's illustrator Bob Godfrey died four days later on February 21st 2013
2) Richard Briers died on my 47th birthday and Bob Godfrey died four days AFTER my 47th birthday. The first episode of Roobarb was broadcast nine days after my father's 47th birthday.
I think they would all be more of a coincidence if Richard Briers and Bob Godfrey died on the same day, both deaths were on the day of your 47th Birthday, and Roobarb was first broadcast on the same day your father turned 47. That's much more impressive. Otherwise everything is a coincidence. For example, my former pal died on the 10th January 2023, but so did thousands (if not millions) of other people.
ReplyDeleteIf you say so, Kid, but I think Richard Briers and Bob Godfrey dying just four days apart is quite a big coincidence.
ReplyDeleteBy the way, comments are back on Rip Jagger's Dojo - the comments were being treated as spam which I'd suspected all along.
Well, if they'd been the only two people that died that week, maybe. Coincidence to me would be if they'd died on the same day of the same cause, at a special screening of Roobarb in their respective towns or cities. See? Takes a lot to impress me, doesn't it?
ReplyDeleteI'm surprised it took RJ so long to check his Spam file, as he must have spotted his seeming lack of comments over several posts. Also, they would be waiting in his Blog's comments moderation file as well.
Had a newsagent subscription to Pota! I think it was the painted covers which I liked most . Also the fact that the stories were b&w anyway helped the art as I always felt the lack of colour hurt the superhero books.
ReplyDeleteBelieve it or not, PS, there were only around six painted covers in UK POTA's first year, the rest were line-drawn. Also, I think it was the clumsily applied grey (verging on black) tones that hurt the superhero mags more than the lack of colour. When Marvel eventually learned how to do the tones in a more subtle manner, they weren't so bad.
ReplyDelete1974 was a great year for popular TV Sci-Fi culture .... Six-Million Dollar Man on ITV, Star Trek Animated on BBC, and of course Planet of the Apes TV series (which I understand was not shown in Scotland in October 1974, being the only ITV franchise station to decline showing it at that time?). I audio-taped every episode, and cine-filmed bits of one episode on my Dad's 8mm camera. I got every POTA weekly from #1, but once I managed to get copies of the US Marvel B&W POTA magazine from Dark They Were & Golden Eyed and saw how superior they were in terms of printing, painted covers, and film articles, the US weeklies became quite a poor substitute in my eyes.
ReplyDeleteApologies for the delay in replying, B, but I never received an email alert for your comment, yet when I checked my 'awaiting moderation' file, there it was. Yes, as far as I know, the POTA TV show wasn't shown in Scotland back then, though may've been much later. Forgive my pedantry, but you meant UK weeklies were a poor substitute. I can no longer recall whether or not I ever bought a US monthly.
ReplyDeletePedantry forgiven, Kid :-) Comes from typing too fast. I don't think there is a way to go back and amend comments?
ReplyDeleteIf there is a way, I don't know what it is, B, but it sure would come in handy for my own typos.
ReplyDeleteI have some POTA comics and mags from the 70s like this in storage somewhere, Makes me want to find them and read them again.
ReplyDeleteHope you can find them, AF.
ReplyDelete