1993: DEATH-WRECK and DEATH METAL House Ad (Marvel UK)

From November 1993: A MARVEL UK House Ad promoting two DEATH'S HEAD II spin-off/ knock-off books... DEATH-WRECK and DEATH METAL.  

I remember thinking at the time that things must be pretty desperate if they were cloning DHII and spinning-off more books... and that this couldn't last.  It turns out I was right.

The books themselves aren't bad but, by this point, Death's Head II was so over-exposed that we needed a bit of a rest... not two more similar characters.  Especially, as was often the case with the Genesis Books, there's always the sense that someone came up with the names first and then crafted a book and character around the title.  

Simon Furman created the original DEATH'S HEAD but had been shoved aside by the previous year's revamp.  

Both of these series ran for the designated four issues... which makes them amongst the last of the M-UK line to appear before the Genesis Massacre hit.  

Neither of these strips appeared in the UK line.  

The adds themselves are in the late-Genesis House Style of bizarre captions.  Presumably the top one is a dig at the Image guys.... naming no names. 

1989: CAPTAIN BRITAIN TRADE PAPERBACK House Ad (Marvel UK)

From 1989: A MARVEL UK House Ad for the CAPTAIN BRITAIN TRADE PAPERBACK which reprinted, in colour (the original strips were in black & white), the post-Alan Moore CB strips from THE MIGHTY WORLD OF MARVEL (Volume 2) and CAPTAIN BRITAIN Monthly.  

I picked-up a copy recently and I'll get around to scanning and posting the cover at some point. 

1994: SPECTRUM MAGAZINE Issue 1 (Win-Mill Productions)

From September 1994: The first issue of SPECTRUM, the we'll-cover-(virtually)-anything spin-off from the TWIN PEAKS-centric WRAPPED IN PLASTIC.  

I REALLY liked this upmarket fanzine at the time because of the depth of analysis, quality of the writing and willingness to throw the spotlight on TV shows (and, to a lesser extent, movies) that other magazines weren't touching.  This issue looked back, via a detailed episode-by-episode analysis, on the first year (the only season I liked) of LOIS AND CLARK: THE NEW ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN as well as the art of Michael Golden, HOMICIDE: LIFE ON THE STREET and KUNG FU: THE LEGEND CONTINUES (the syndicated revival of the Seventies original).  

The writers/ editors were clearly picking the shows THEY wanted to write about... and going for it.  So, in many ways, a precursor to this very blog.  Indeed, I had some emails published in the letters pages of subsequent issues.  I hate to think what I said...

This in-and-out-of-favour approach meant that, despite being the main attraction here, coverage of the nineties Superman show faded as the writers lost interest in subsequent seasons.  Their attention shifted to HOMICIDE (a show also worthy of several books published at the time), XENA: WARRIOR PRINCESS, BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER, M.A.N.T.I.S, STRANGE LUCK, AMERICAN GOTHIC, ROAR and others.  They were often shows I wasn't watching... but I still found the coverage fascinating.  

WRAPPED IN PLASTIC also transferred its excellent X-FILES season retrospectives (WiP was really the first magazine to take the show seriously, a good year-or-so before it started to be a cultural phenomenon) to Spectrum. 

SPECTRUM ran for 35 issues over exactly 10 years, the last appearing in September 2004.

There were also three SPECIAL EDITIONS (devoted to THE X-FILES, XENA and BUFFY respectively) and three square-bound SPECTRUM SUPER SPECIALS (devoted to BUFFY, CONAN and the wider works of Robert E. Howard. 

1975: MARVEL UK CHECKLIST

From April/ May 1975: a Mighty MARVEL UK CHECKLIST of their six weeklies currently in print.  

This appeared in the weeklies cover-dated 3 May 1975.  

And, to fill a pesky gap, a small add for PLANET OF THE APES. 

1975: MARVEL UK House Ad

From late 1975: A MARVEL UK House Ad for Stan Lee's book (precursor to today's trade paperback compilations) SONS OF ORIGINS OF MARVEL COMICS, as well as Marvel's 1976 calender (with original art marking the United States bicentennial year). 

Both could be yours for only £6.10... so get your orders into room 106 now!

1993: MYS-TECH WARS House Ad (Marvel UK)

From 1993: Fight! Fight! Fight!  MYS-TECH WARS was an ambitious multi-book MARVEL UK crossover (then, as now, all the rage) that, in addition to the core four-issue limited series, also crossed over into a number of other UKverse books.  

I always got the impression, possibly entirely misplaced, that the British Bullpen had high hopes that they could bring some of the American books into the fold and make this a truly transatlantic event... but couldn't persuade the US editorial team to play along.  

The Genesis books that were official part of the arc were:

MOTORMOUTH AND KILLPOWER Issue 9 (the "it starts here" prelude)

DARK ANGEL Issues 10 and 11

WARHEADS Issue 11

KNIGHTS OF PENDRAGON Issue 12

DEATH'S HEAD II Issue 5

The black and white art in this House Ad was part of the massive, and most impressive, gatefold by Bryan Hitch.  

The series wasn't reprinted in OVERKILL, although it was considered for THE EXPLOITS OF SPIDER-MAN.  I can't recall whether the crossovers ever appeared either. 

1985: SUPERGIRL Movie Adaptation (DC Comics)

From 1985: the cover of DC's SUPERGIRL movie tie-in one-shot, complete with a distinctive piece of New York geography.  

The movie was, of course, something of a creative and box office stinker which hastened the sale of the rights to Cannon Pictures.  The result was their legendary SUPERMAN IV, the death knell for the once-lucrative franchise.  

1984: KA-ZAR THE SAVAGE Issue 34 (Marvel Comics)

From 1984: It was obviously last-day-at-term on this finale of KA-ZAR THE SAVAGE.

The cover, of course, is a homage to the Nick Fury classic which also formed the basis of the cover of the first issue of MARVEL UK's FUTURE TENSE... even through it didn't relate to any of the strips inside.  

Art by Paul Neary, ex of MARVEL UK and... from circa 1991... the man responsible for the Genesis Invasion of the States...

1977: THE HUMAN FLY Issue 1 (Marvel Comics)

From 1977: Another Marvel venture into the realms of licensed comics... THE HUMAN FLY.

This was based on the exploits of the alter-ego of real-life stunt performer Rick Rojatt (and not to be confused with Marvel's existing Spider-man villain of the same name).  A quick bit of Goggle action reveals that his final stunt was also in 1977, suggesting that Marvel came to the party a little late.

The problem with making a stunt man into a comic book superhero is that, on paper, his "real life" stunts would never look as impressive as those carried out by his super-powered contemporaries.  

Regardless, the comic book version managed a commendable nineteen issue run before shuttering.  As with many of Marvel's other licensed properties of the period, HF was fully integrated into the MCU with occasional appearances by Marvel properties including Ghost Rider in issue 3.  

It was also another book from the prolific Bill Mantlo, Marvel's go-to guy for licensed properties.

There was never any British editions (although this is a cents-to-pence import for sale in the UK), presumably because the character had no relevance here.  Or, Marvel's license didn't extend to a UK edition. 

This issue was another recent bargain box find.  I imagine that similar licensing problems (plus general disinterest) to those that have nixed reprints of ROM and THE MICRONAUTS have prohibited Marvel (or anyone else) from ever putting these stories back into print. 

I love his oh-so-phallic "belt" as well.  

1992: WARHEADS Issue 1 (Marvel UK)

From April 1992: an unread copy of WARHEADS, the first of the original "Overkill Five" books from MARVEL UK to ship.  

Another three (the revived KNIGHTS OF PENDRAGON, MOTORMOUTH and HELL'S ANGEL) appeared over subsequent weeks and the fifth, DIGITEK, launched in the States later in the year but also formed part of OVERKILL's launch line-up (starting with the second issue). 

This copy, which I snapped-up in a 50p box earlier this year, is still in the original comic bag that all the early GENESIS '92 titles were distributed in here in the UK.  The sticker (the "Genesis Seal") holding the bag shut is, as you'll see, a plug for the British fortnightly.  It neglects to mention that the strips appearing in the British edition were heavily edited (with about half the story pages removed and the remainder reworked so that they still made sense) so fans were actually better off, storywise, sticking with the US editions.

This weird compromise, which also saw imported copies held at warehouses until Overkill had shipped, was because the British Bullpen were concerned that easily available US copies would undermine the appeal of the UK edition.  The policy was abandoned once Overkill became a straight reprint (or dual-commissioning) title and the Genesis line expanded so fast that it was impossible to accommodate all the strips in the fortnightly (and even less so when the quantity of strips were cut and the frequency reduced to fortnightly).

Of all the first wave of Genesis titles, I was initially most won over by this one.  The idea (mercenaries dispatched by Mys-Tech to scavenge alien tech on other worlds) was a cracker (and, I suspect, inspired by the Colonial Marines) and Gary Erskine's art was very impressive.  I did, however, find it odd that, with all of time and space available to them, they kept running into the obligatory sales-boosting existing Marvel characters.