Does JOHNNY Have A FUTURE? PART THREE...

Copyright REBELLION

LUIS BERMEJO, FANTASTIC, POWER COMICS, ODHAMS PRESS, 1967.  That's all the info you need to know, adventure lovers, regarding the latest episode of the one-time MISSING LINK now called JOHNNY FUTURE.  Now, why not visit the comments section and say just how much you enjoyed it and would love to see the next one?

Go on - you don't want Johnny to feel neglected, now do you?

The BRITISH HULK - PART THREE...

Images copyright MARVEL COMICS

Oh, you lucky peeps!  Here's HULK COMIC #3 from 1979 to thrill and entertain you, and show you what you were missing if you weren't around at the time.  (Or were around, but not buying the mag.)  To think we Brits had our very own Hulk stories, lovingly hand-crafted on these fair shores - just for us!  (Though at least one tale did turn up in the back of a U.S. colour Marvel reprint mag, I believe.)

Anyway, better not hold you back from the excitement that awaits you - get stuck in!

TO THE BATMOBILE(S)...

You'll remember a few days ago I posted a piccie of my newly acquired HUSKY BATMOBILE from the '60s.  It wasn't a pristine example, showing signs of 'play wear' about it, though once I'd donned my magnifying visor and applied my trusty brush to it, I managed to bring it up to a more acceptable presentation standard.  So here's a photo of it, gleaming with 'newness'.

In the second photo, the Husky Batmobile is joined by the later CORGI JUNIORS version, as well as the one by MATTEL from a few years ago.  Replica Husky BATMAN & ROBIN figures are available from a couple of places on the internet, so I think I'll buy them and place them in the Mattel car.

It'll finish it off rather nicely. 

  

And here are some more photos of the Husky version.

MONDAY IS 'WHAM!' DAY - OR AT LEAST IT USED TO BE...

Copyright REBELLION

I thought you'd enjoy seeing some of the contents from the comic lying on the floor in the photo in the previous post, so here are a handful of pages from WHAM! #134, cover-dated January 7th 1967.  Regarding the classic FRANKIE STEIN strip, I'm lucky enough to own the original art for this legendary KEN REID page, and it's indeed an enormous joy and wonder to behold.  There's no point begging, you can't have it and that's final.  The SAMMY SHRINK page is drawn by DAVE JENNER, who would be followed by TERRY BAVE not too long after, at first imitating Jenner's style but gradually supplanting it with his own.

The FANTASTIC FOUR page consists of two U.S. sized pages, cut and pasted into a single U.K. one.  I think The TIDDLERS pages are drawn by MIKE LACEY in a pseudo-BAXENDALE style, and are typical of the kind of humour to be found in most ODHAMS PRESS publications of the period.  I just love that colour cover!

  

Copyright MARVEL COMICS

COMICS AND CHAIRS AT TWELVE O'CLOCK...

It's been 32 years since the chair on the right of the picture has occupied that position.  I
brought it downstairs to recreate the scene.  On the floor is WHAM! #134 (cover-dated 7th
January 1967) which lies open at the FANTASTIC FOUR tale, "MASTER Of PLANET
X!"  Just think, that was 46 years ago - where did the time go?

When I was a boy, I lived just up the road from my primary school and sometimes nipped home for lunch.  As I sat at the table, I would steal surreptitious glances at whatever comic I happened to have, lying next to me on the floor as I scoffed my midday meal.  Even when we moved some years later, I maintained the habit of putting a comic on the floor to look at as I ate.  I couldn't read it of course, but I'd leave it open at a favourite page and just gaze at it between stuffing forkfuls of food into my gob.

The other day, while browsing through a 1960s back issue, I realised I could easily be sitting on the exact same chair on which I perched while looking at my original copy of the same comic back in 1967.  We had four dining room chairs, two of which were given away (along with our original dining room table) when my parents bought some new ones in early 1981.  Two chairs were kept as spares though, and eventually found their way into other rooms, one of which happens to be my own.

In fact, I'm sitting on the chair as I type (the other one currently residing in the loft, being in need of minor repairs), and the notion that there's a one in four chance it may be the very one I sat on back in 1967 as I read that issue is an extremely comforting one.  (I'd have sat on each of the chairs at some time or other, as I didn't always sit at the same table-place, depending on who else was present.)

There's something about a sense of continuity that's immensely reassuring.  It connects us to our past in such a way that allows us to occasionally forget that we're farther along in life's journey than we care to consider.  And, if you ask me, that's a good thing.

CAPTAIN BRITAIN 'HULKS' OUT...

 

Copyright MARVEL COMICS

 

I have the strong impression that I picked up this particular issue in the offices of 2000 A.D. in the mid-'80s, although I'd no doubt bought a copy when it first came out in 1979.  THARG was obviously agreeable to my request to keep the comic, and here I am, nearly 30 years later, and it's still in my possession.  Hoarder?  Moi?

 

Looking at it today, it's hard to believe that only three years had passed between the debut of CAPTAIN BRITAIN #1 and his origin being reprinted in HULK COMIC #31.  Thinking back, it seems to me that it felt like a much longer period between the two issues at the time, but it's hard to be sure.

 

Anyway, I thought you might like to see the second British weekly presentation of the Cap's origin, re-sized, de-coloured, but still with the same Magnificent Mighty MARVEL Magic!   

PART SIX Of MIGHTY MARVEL COVER GALLERY...

Images copyright MARVEL COMICS

Just point your pulsatin' peepers at these incredible images from The MIGHTY WORLD Of MARVEL #s 14 & 15, presented in this pertinent post for your patient and 'preciative perusal.  So indelibly ingrained in my memory are these cataclysmic comics that I can tell you what I was doing on each of the Saturdays I purchased them, over 40 years ago.

The day I bought #15 was the day my brother brought our first dog home, a mongrel who looked like a mini-Alsatian.  PRINCE was his name (the dog, not my brother), and all that now exists to record his time with us are two or three colour photos of him out in our back garden.  Ah, the years pass far too quickly.

But enough of my reminiscences - you'll have recollections of your own to re-live as you re-acquaint yourselves with these picto-pages from the poignant and potent past.  So, forget your aches and pains and all the wearisome woes of the world, and let's once again tread the enchanted paths of yesteryear.

DO YOU KNOW SUSIE?

 

 

If you knew Susie, like I know Susie - well, then you wouldn't know Susie either.  However, I've always harboured a bit of an infatuation for SUSAN STORM, aka the INVISIBLE GIRL.  In 1962, FANTASTC FOUR #10 had a pin-up of her in her section of the FANTASTI-CAR, which was also published on the back page of issue #17 of a British comic called FANTASTIC back in 1967.  It was also published in THE MIGHTY WORLD OF MARVEL #11 in late 1972.

 

 

The top photograph is a re-creation of the above pin-up, using a figure and Fantasti-car from different manufacturers quite a few years apart.  However, they fit so well together that it would've been a crime not to combine them for a photo opportunity out in my back garden.

 

Whaddya think?