1993: MARVEL UK in WIZARD MAGAZINE ISSUE 19

From March 1993: WIZARD MAGAZINE covers MARVEL UK's transatlantic incursion.

At this point, after a triumphant 1992, it was all boom and no bust (except Tuck) at the Annex of Ideas (and, more generally, within the industry) so this decently put together piece looks ahead to another year of UKverse expansion. Indeed, Marvel UK, published a lot more books that year than the article mentions. Possibly a sign of how swiftly new projects were added to the schedule. 

Wizard, notorious for hyping the next big thing (especially if their pals were involved somehow), never quite fully embraced the British books. Maybe being in London meant the British creators and PR people couldn't quite tap into that informal network. Or maybe Wizard thought its hype machine was better deployed to other projects. 

The new piece of Liam Sharp artwork on the first page looks like it was bidding to become an prospective Wizard cover. The purple wizard's cloak was a semi-consistent feature in the newly commissioned art on the early covers and it looks like Sharp was playing by the style guide. 

1993: DEATH'S HEAD II "FAMILY" House Ad (Marvel UK)

1993: Bring on the clones!  Imitation is the surest sign of success and MARVEL UK certainly tried to make the most of the initially perky sales of DEATH'S HEAD II by knocking out several in-house immitators.

Great art on this Summer 1993 House Ad from the US-format books. 

1993: OPENING SHOT TV DOCUMENTARY in THE EXPLOITS OF SPIDER-MAN (Marvel UK)

From 1993: some behind-the-scenes stills from Tim Quinn's (who also happened to be both the Editor of the very comic these appeared in... as well as the author of the gag strip below) OPENING SHOT documentary devoted to MARVEL UK. 

The documentary captured the British Bullpen at the height of the Genesis Explosion, a time when it genuinely looked like it might be a contender... even if some of the titles being churned out seemed a little - ahem - on the rushed side.  

Unfortunately.... it all collapsed when the bottom dropped out of the market at the end of the year.  

This reveals that the overall series, a spin-off from LWT's Sunday night mainstay THE SOUTH BANK SHOW, had the working title 'The Young Bank Show'.  I can't imagine why they changed that...

This is from THE EXPLOITS OF SPIDER-MAN issue 9, cover-dated 2 June 1993. 

1993: ON SALE THIS MONTH: OVERKILL Issue 20 (Marvel UK)

On sale this week in 1993: OVERKILL issue 20, from MARVEL UK, with (slightly surreal) cover by Steve Sampson.  

Following the successes of the previous year, early 1993 was a boom time for the British Bullpen with the "Genesis Explosion" in full swing.  OVERKILL started-out as a UK vehicle for the US-format 'Genesis' strips (albeit heavily edited) but, by the turn of the year, the amount of material heading across the Atlantic from Arundel House couldn't possibly be crammed into one comic.  

Overkill's line-up had already been shuffled with DIGITEK fading in and out of the running order (to accommodate delays in the fully-painted art) and KNIGHTS OF PENDRAGON dropped in favor of (inevitably) DEATH'S HEAD II.  

 The heavy editing of the strips also ended, subtly shifting Overkill from a fantasy adventure anthology (chasing the 2000AD crowd) closer to a traditional Marvel superhero book (albeit still with the unique British sensibilities which made the Genesis line so interesting).

1992: STAN LEE PLUGS MARVEL UK in BULLPEN BULLETINS (Marvel Comics)

From late 1992: Stan "The Man" Lee turns his monthly plug machine to selling the wares of MARVEL UK across the US Marvel line.  

Marvel's output was growing so fast (and, some may argue, indiscriminately) during this period that securing such a lengthy bit of hard sell in BULLPEN BULLETINS must have been quite an achievement.  However, it's unlikely that Stan, firmly ensconced on the West Coast trying to convince someone (anyone!) to produce movies and TV shows based on the Marvel pantheon, ever actually read any of the British books.  

There a few titles there that must have been changed before the books went ahead: Team Helix (possibly published as Genetix), Death Rattle and Gene Machine.  Night Raven (or Nightraven according to Stan) presumably refers to the second edition of the House of Cards graphic novel (which I've covered in previous posts). 

1993: DARK ANGEL: AFTERMATH (Marvel UK)

The fallout from the Mys-Tech Wars: a (very nineties) double-page spread from MARVEL UK's DARK ANGEL issue 12, July 1993. 

1993: NIKKI DOYLE: WILD THING House Ad (Marvel UK)

Another MARVEL UK House Ad from the 'Genesis Explosion' period: NIKKI DOYLE: WILD THING.

The seven-issue run combined the surefire nineties elements of statuesque women (although, I have to say, I don't like the artwork at all), Virtual Reality (a nifty way of chucking in as many existing Marvel characters as required by the sales department without any consequences) and guest appearances galore (Venom and Carnage in the opener).

The single most distinguishing thing about this series is, judging by the covers, it managed to run a whole seven months without a single appearance by DEATH'S HEAD II.  

Early installments were reprinted in OVERKILL for the home market.  

She was also card number 132 in the MARVEL UNIVERSE 1993 TRADING CARD set published by SkyBox.

Doyle was due to be paired with DARK ANGEL for the scheduled-but-never-published (except in Italy) mini-series WILD ANGELS.

This is not to be confused with Marvel's later (and unrelated) WILD THING series from 1999/ 2000.  She was Wolverine's daughter in the alt-Earth MC2 continuity.  It ran for five regular issues following a free preview issue bagged with a copy of WIZARD. 

1993: SHADOW RIDERS House Ad (Marvel UK)

 

This House Ad for SHADOW RIDERS (a four-issue MARVEL UK mini from 1993) perfectly sums up M-UK's marketing strategy during the Genesis Explosion:  

1. Cover-enhancements galore.  To attract attention on crowded shop shelves, and generate some speculator buzz (all those oodles of perceived extra value), every new launch had to be somehow augmented to shift more copies.  This was deemed particularly desirable if it allowed the publisher to crank-up the cover price sufficiently to raise the profit margins compared with a standard-format copy.  

2.  M-UK did love those circulation-tweaking guest appearances by hot Marvel stars from across the pond.  Cable and Ghost Rider were shipping a lot of copies of their own books (and any others that Marvel New York parachuted them into) so it made sense for the British Bullpen to purloin them as well.  Except, funnily enough, any characters from the States who turned-up in the UK-verse seemed to suffer collective amnesia (very much the same ailment that struck anyone who interacted with the ULTRAVERSE characters post-merger) and never spoke of their adventures again.  

3.  There's no mention of the creative team attached to the book.  By the end of the year, M-UK's marketing would change track and start putting far greater emphasis on the "hot" (to use the WIZARD MAGAZINE parlance) teams working on their books.  For the record, this was from Freeman, Prentice, Dearsley, Peters and editor Stuart Bartlett. 

1993: FRONTIER COMICS UNLIMITED House Ad (Marvel UK)

A MARVEL UK House Ad from 1993, announcing the imminent launch of the new, quarterly, FRONTIER COMICS UNLIMITED, an anthology spin-off from M-UK's Frontier Comics imprint.

FC aimed to be something more akin to DC's Vertigo line: more edgy output that may, or may not, feature established Marvel characters.  

The line, edited by Michael Bennent, was made up of the Conan-alike BLOODSEED (announced as a four-issue limited series, of which two appeared, with a further two issues scheduled for 1994.  They never appeared), IMMORTALIS, DANCES WITH DEMONS and CHILDREN OF THE VOYAGER.  All of the above were four-issue series.

Not mentioned here are two original strips, Evil Eye and The Fallen which, presumably, were slated as possible contenders for their own FC books or, at the very least, return engagements in the quarterly.

Unfortunately, the Frontier Comics line was one of the first things to be jettisoned when the GENESIS EXPLOSION started to turn swiftly into an IMPLOSION.  Fortunately, with the exception of Paul Neary's own Bloodseed, the existing series were all wrapped-up (not a privilege given to many of the M-UK books as the situation swiftly deteriorated) but the line was shuttered and all future projects abandoned.  The first issue of Unlimited was hastily rebadged FRONTIER COMICS SPECIAL (they forgot to change the small print) and issued as a one-shot.  

MARVEL AGE MAGAZINE covered the launch of the line here and there was also coverage in the short-lived UK fanzine COMICS SPECULATOR NEWS (yuck!) here.

MARVEL UK HANDBOOK: GUN RUNNER

THE ROAD TO THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR:
THE MARVEL UK HANDBOOK

A dose of early nineties big gun silliness today: GUN RUNNER from MARVEL UK's GENESIS 92 sub-universe of books.

His book debuted towards the end of the Genesis Explosion, cover-dated October 1993 and shuttered six issues later (cover-dated March 1994) as one of the final casualties of the Implosion.

MARVEL UK HANDBOOK: MYS-TECH WARS

THE ROAD TO THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR:
THE MARVEL UK HANDBOOK

MYS-TECH WARS was another of MARVEL UK's blockbuster mini-series which followed the familiar formula of chucking in as many bankable characters as possible and letting them scrap for a few issues.

The four-parter, which sold great guns, appeared just as the Genesis 92 Explosion (cover dates spanning March - June 1993) was really taking hold.

The ubiquitous Dan Abnett supplied the storyline alongside Bryan Hitch's impressive art (including a run of really striking wrap around covers).

There's never been a reprint so, as with all the Genesis 92 books, the 50p back issue box is your best bet.

1993: FRONTIER COMICS HOUSE AD (Marvel UK)

Here's a MARVEL UK House Ad, from their US books (cover-dated September 1993), plugging the first (and, as it turned out, only) wave of books from their FRONTIER COMICS imprint.

The core GENESIS 92 sub-universe had been born of a creative rift within Marvel UK.  Many of the creators, no doubt with one eye on the big bucks being splashed around by US publishers, saw M-UK as an opportunity to create Marvel's version of DC's booming VERTIGO imprint: edgy, (sometimes) less commercial books which really (hopefully!) pushed the boundaries of the medium.

Paul Neary, newly ensconced as the British Boss and seeped in the traditions of mainstream superhero fare (as well as accountable to the New York HQ and their demand for more and more product, and profits, during the industry boom years) favoured more commercial fare.

Even the earliest issues of OVERKILL reflected that conflict: the US standalone books were packed full of appearances by US characters (a policy piloted, with great success, in the original DEATH'S HEAD II limited series) in an attempt to get some attention and traction in the ferociously competitive US market.  The British "reprints", chasing the 2000AD audience (and initially billed as science fiction comic), chopped out (by deleting pages in a weird and cumbersome dual running arrangement) the bulk of the appearances by US characters.

With sales at their peak, and the GENESIS EXPLOSION in full bloom, M-UK did have a belated crack at the Vertigo vibe with the FRONTIER range.

Not creator owned, more risky (there's tit in BLOODSEED) and with one foot (loosely) in the Marvel Universe, Frontier produced some of the best creative work from the entire GENESIS era.

All of the books were initially announced as four-issue limited series although BLOODSEED was subsequently halved to a two-issue run with the promise of the final two issues, bunched as a second series, in 1994.  That never happened.

The problem with the FRONTIER line is that all the books were fundamentally less commercial than the mainstream G92 books.  That still made them viable when business was booming but a disaster once sales dropped off a cliff... which they did, just as the line hit the shelves.

As retailers and readers trimmed their sails (or, simply, bowed out) in the face of a glut of product, Frontier was particularly vulnerable.  Marvel UK found their books, floating at the fringes of the Marvel Universe, the first to get the chop as retailers slashed their orders.  Frontier, an imprint of an imprint, was even more vulnerable.

Marvel UK announced the entire line would shutter once the first wave of books had wrapped (kudos for allowing all of them to run their course) and plans for a quarterly companion, FRONTIER COMICS UNLIMITED (borrowing the brand, and format, from the similar US books), were curtailed to a one-shot, FRONTIER COMICS SPECIAL, using the inventory material (new outings for all the first-wave strips along with several new shorts which were, presumably, considered possibilities for future solo-dom) created for the first issue.

The cuts marked the beginning of the GENESIS IMPLOSION, a wave of cancellations and delays (which, as events turned out, amounted to cancellations) which were intended to trim M-UK back to a core offering but, by early 1994, closed the whole thing down.

The Frontier books are regular 50p box fodder and well worth grabbing if you can find them.  They represent some great hidden gems, from creators about to hit the big time, and are (without doubt) Marvel UK's best kept secrets.

MARVEL UK HANDBOOK: BATTLETIDE

THE ROAD TO THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR:
THE MARVEL UK HANDBOOK

The four-part BATTLETIDE limited series reads like one of those ideas that popped into Paul Neary's head late on a Friday afternoon and arrived on his desk as a (allegedly) fully formed concept at 9am the following Monday.

It was a cack-handed combination of Shooter's SECRET WARS and - off all things - WWF (1992 remember) wrestling.  The basic plot revolved around aliens kidnapping various bankable Marvel characters (Hell's Angel, Psylocke, Wolverine, Sabretooth, Kill Power and - inevitably - Death's Head II) and pairing them off in tag teams to fight various non-discript aliens.  The titular "tide", since you asked, was a cloud of cosmic evil (not dissimilar to Galactus in RISE OF THE SILVER SURFER) drafted in when the plot began to splutter.

The script was by the ubiquitous Dan Abnett with art by Geoff Senior, who makes the best of a bad situation.

Sales were stellar at the height of the boom and a second, slightly superior, four-parter followed during the 1993 GENESIS EXPLOSION and a third instalment was on the cards when the IMPLOSION snuffed out the lot.

Marvel combined the entire four-parter into one staple-straining UK edition as the (one-and-only) OVERKILL EASTER SPECIAL.  The first part of the sequel appeared in the final issue of OVERKILL (indicating that the cancellation order arrived rather late) leaving would-be readers to seek out the original US format back issues if they wondered what happened next.

1993: FRONTIER COMICS TEASER AD (Marvel UK)

This is a landscape orientated teaser ad for MARVEL UK's FRONTIER COMICS imprint (think: less superheroes and homicidal 'bots and more VERTIGO) that appeared in the GENESIS 92 books (or, at least, some of them) cover-dated July 93.

This was at the height of what I call the GENESIS EXPLOSION, that six month (give-or-take) period during 1993 where Marvel UK flooded the booming pre-bust US market with more-and-more product.

More on Frontier in future posts...