Memory Lane Part 6: Collecting

So, I started buying my own comics with aplomb. The US titles were a bit of a scramble: with no idea of schedule, they just seemed to appear in random selections at the newsagents so there was little chance of following anything regularly.

The Marvel UK titles were a different thing entirely, appearing each week and easily obtainable. The Dez Skinn titles were eventually replaced by less interesting fare like Marvel Action (reprinting Buscema Thor), the seriously awful Marvel Super Adventure (Colan DD and Kirby Black Panther)Glossy-covered weeklies and Captain America (featuring Iron Man and Dazzler backups).

 

 

 

Eventually the line metamorphosed into a slicker affair, with the return of glossy covers, the addition of partial colour interiors and nice Alan Davis-drawn headers for each strip. Sadly, titles like Thor and The X-Men were not only already antiquated, reprinting 60s work by Kirby, but the awful colouring problems helped make them entirely unpalatable. Blockbuster was the only notable new monthly but this quickly faltered despite an interesting mix of Iron Fist's original series, the Neal Adams Inhumans and obscure character Omega the Unknown.

With the US titles, my loyalties would swing from time to time between Marvel and DC as I navigated the waters of the comics world and learned my tastes. Essentially though, I was a Marvelite. A lot of DC product didn't appeal to me (Superman was just so old-fashioned in the 70s/80s, the war, supernatural and western genres of no interest) but I usually enjoyed any Marvel issue I read...except if it had poor art, a problem I still struggle with.I loved Marvel Two-In-One...until Ron Wilson took over from Perez but I didn't really have an early fave title, picking up whatever struck my fancy.

Somewhere along the line, comics kind of fell away for me. I hated Cockrum's return to the X-Men (though loved his first run) but enjoyed the dying months of the Byrne reprints, following it from Rampage to Marvel Superheroes and finally to a relaunched, horrendously produced Mighty World of Marvel. When the Byrne run finished, I dropped comics altogether. I probably would have still followed Captain Britain in the Daredevils but I never saw that. According to the Grand Comics Database, that would have been 1982.

Couple of years later, I was bored rigid in 3rd year physics and began doodling Shang-Chi on the cover of my roughbook. The guy I was sitting next to recognised it and we got talking. He had still been buying  comics regularly and had healthy runs of certain titles as he lived about two minutes away from a newsagents. I couldn't believe what he was telling me. Spider-Man has a new black outfit? So do the FF? Robin is now Nightwing? There's a Secret War? Even bigger stuff coming for the DC characters?

My mind was reeling about all these developments and then not long after, I ventured into a newsagents, dragged in by mum. On the shelf, I saw a copy of Tales of the Teen Titans #47. Nightwing seemed to be shouting at me, demanding my attention. Right next to it was Marvel Team-Up #146, featuring the black-garbed Spider-Man.

I bought both issues, immediately loving the designs for Nightwing and Spider-Man. It was late 1984 and my comics passion had been reignited...

Sunday Shite

Quite often, I'll do work that just doesn't turn out right (such as a marker shaded Captain Kirk I did late last night which went horribly wrong when coloured in photoshop), is posted elsewhere, are simply corrections of errors of older oics, is too idiosyncratic/specific or just plain crap. As a result, I don't post everything I do so here's some collections of the crap I haven't posted over the past few weeks or so, hopefully at a small enough size they can't properly be seen but still give an indication...

Memory Lane Part 5: Finding My Feet

 

 So, early on DC was my favoured US publisher: I don't recall Marvels so freely available at the time and I was mainly familiar with them from Marvel UK reprints. Brave and the Bold was an early favourite but Justice League of America and Superboy and the Legion 0f Superheroes soon usurped B&B.  It was rare to get two issues in a row (though I did that twice with the JLA, the second being 1979's JLA/JSA teamup, where putting names to faces such as Power Girl and Dr Fate, as well as seeing them alongside characters such as the Golden Age Flash and the revelation of a whole other parallel world made me instantly fall in love with the JSA.

I had no organising of my comics at that time and would often do so by the colour of the DC bullet on the cover! Those were the days when the sheer impact of covers would intrigue you so I'd pick up whatever I could find or interested me the most, always leaving non-superhero stuff like Sgt Rock, Ghosts and House of Mystery as purchases of last resort.

I was buying Marvel UK stuff at that time too: the Dez Skinn 18 month tour of duty sucked me right in: my nan bought me Doctor Who weekly #1 and Hulk Weekly #1 (with a free sticker album and stickers based on the debuting TV show...kids at school had it and I wanted it desperately and I was thrilled when my nan had got it for me when I visited her that weekend!). Soon came the Spider-Man, Hulk, Conan and X-Men (originally Star Heroes) pocket books, newsprint-covered comics such as (my favourites) Marvel Team-Up and later Spider-Man and Hulk Team-Up (an amalgamation of three comics!) Marvel Comic was a bargain buy with a ton of features before transforming into the monthly Marvel Superheroes but it was Rampage monthly that blew my mind.

The weeklies, even lesser fare like Marvel Super Adventure, Future Tense and Valour were all frequent buys but the monthlies were more desirable. Longer stories, better covers...but at a better price. I'd managed to afford the first few MSH issues and the odd Hulk-starring issue of Rampage but one fateful Saturday, I trotted down to the newsagents near my nan and picked up Rampage #29.

No longer starring the Hulk but headlining the X-Men (again tapping into my earliest childhood memories of Cyclops but also my enjoyment of the Cockrum-drawn New X-Men--what a fresh concept that was at the time!--backups in the Hulk issues), I picked it up immediately: it was also either that or an Alan Class reprint (another begrudging bottom of the barrel buy, although this did expose me at an early age to Wally Wood and/or Al Williamson EC sci-fi reprints, thus imprinting those on me at an impressionable age).

 Anyway, the X-Men story just blew everything else out of the water. Previous favourites like Sal Buscema or Jim Aparo just couldn't hold a light to the Byrne/Austin art team. Attractively drawn characters, crisp detail was matched with Claremont's more introspective writing and that was it, I was an X-fan and stayed with the monthly reprints right up til the penultimate Byrne issue (Rampage #29 was only the third Byrne issue).

Then, one fateful day, there was nothing in that newsagents...so I crossed the road and went to another shop and found gold. It was 1981...and I'd found my first original Marvel US comics and in abundance.

The colours dazzled and excited, seeing the Marvel characters I loved how they were intended to be read for the first time. I picked up a fantastic Four (a poor Sienkiewicz-drawn issue that was only two issues before Byrne's run started, Rampage being a few years behind the States) and a Power man & Iron Fist, among others. I loved Kerry Gamill's art on the latter, an issue reintroducing me to the Constrictor (from the Mighty World of Marvel) with his sidekick...Sabretooth!

For a few months, I'd pick up about 5 copies with my £1 pocket money but was horrified one month when the newsagent said I needed to put one back...I hadn't noticed but the cover price had gone up so I had to agonise over which comic I put back. I can't remember what it was but I knew I picked up Marvel Super Action. I was attracted by the Clint Barton Goliath, who I recalled from the Avengers Annual my mum brought me but this reprint of a 1969 Avengers issue was stunning. Great art by Sal Buscema and Stuart Grainger, the run (and I couldn't get hold of all of them) led into the debut of the Squadron Sinister, the proto-Invaders and John Buscema's return. It was cancelled pretty promptly but I didn't care...I had cash in my pocket and marvels to hunt down...

More Doodles

Seems like it's been awhile since my last post, been busy with a few projects and had a few domestic hiccups which are hopefully resolved. I'll get back to the Memory Lane thread soon but here's some stuff recently completed...

Doodles

Been a while since I posted much but I've had repairmen around today so have taken the opportunity to colour some recently finished pics, a few amended/corrected older ones and a request (the Dr Who: I'm also halfway through 3 more requests from people at work). So. the stuff I coloured is as above...

Doodling

Been bit busy lately and certain domestic hiccups mean my time will be eaten up for the next few weeks...BUT I've finally managed to complete the mysterious YSKIL (preview pages and prelims below), as well as save a few old Lois lane pics. Both have new heads and the one with the shorter skirt (which could do with a few other tweaks but ones I can live with...at least for now) has new legs that are more in proportion.

That led me to tweaking the head of another figure (all will need colouring again), redesigning Alan Scott for an online thing and digging out my sketch books to do some inking of my own illustrations on my lunchbreak, continuing the liney drapery pix I experimented with before.

Anyway, next post will probably be back to memory lane...