A Cover a Day

[Steve W]

Ok, how about this for an idea.  We take it in turns to post a favourite (British spelling) comic cover every day.  This went really well on the comic fan website that I used to frequent.  What we tried to do was find a theme or subject and follow that, until we all got bored with that theme.  I'd like to propose a theme of letters of the alphabet. So, for the remainder of October (only 5 days) and all of November, we post comic cover pictures associated with the letter "A".  Then in December, we post covers pertaining to the letter "B".  The association to the letter can be as tenuous as you want it to be. For example I could post a cover from "Adventure Comics" or "Amazing Spider Man".  However Spider Man covers can also be posted when we're on the letter "S".  Adventure Comic covers could also be posted when we're on the letter "L" if they depict the Legion of Super Heroes.  So, no real hard, fast rules - in fact the cleverer the interpretation of the letter, the better, as far as I'm concerned.

And it's not written in stone that we have to post a cover every day. There may be some days when no cover gets posted. There's nothing wrong with this, it just demonstrates that we all have lives to lead.

If everyone's in agreement I'd like to kick this off with one of my favourite Action Comic covers, from January 1967. Curt Swan really excelled himself here.

Date	Page/Reply	Theme (and clickable link)	Pages	Replies
Oct 2016	1/1	Letter A	19	228
Dec 2016	20/1	Letter B	17	207
Jan 2017	37/4	Letter C	18	214
Feb 2017	55/2	Letter D	17	208
Mar 2017	72/6	Letter E	15	178
Apr 2017	87/4	Letter F	15	184
May 2017	102/8	Letter G	13	157
Jun 2017	115/9	Letter H	16	195
Jul 2017	131/12	Letter I	12	133
Aug 2017	143/1	Letter J	16	194
Sep 2017	159/3	Letter K	19	237
Oct 2017	178/12	Letter L	24	285
Nov 2017	202/9	Letter M	24	280
Dec 2017	226/1	Letter N	19	236
Jan 2018	245/9	Letter O	21	245
Feb 2018	266/7	Letter P	25	295
Mar 2018	291/2	Letters Q & R	20	243
Apr 2018	311/5	Letter S	22	270
May 2018	333/11	Superman’s 80th anniversary	21	250
Jun 2018	354/9	Letter T	21	250
Jul 2018	375/7	Letter U	17	207
Aug 2018	392/10	Letter V	19	228
Sep 2018	411/10	Letter W	20	233
Oct 2018	431/3	Letter X	15	180
Nov 2018	446/3	Letter Y	13	156
Dec 2018	459/3	Letter Z	13	156
Jan 2019	472/3	Person being carried	16	190
Feb 2019	488/1	Real people	17	214
Mar 2019	505/11	Homages/parodies	19	224
Apr 2019	524/7	Green-skinned people	17	207
May 2019	541/10	Wanted posters	17	201
Jun 2019	558/7	Boxing rings	15	180
Jul 2019	573/7	Empty uniforms	15	177
Aug 2019	588/4	Beaches	25	297
Sep 2019	613/1	Apes	28	340
Oct 2019	641/5	Haunted houses/graves	21	250
Nov 2019	662/3	Motor bikes	21	254
Dec 2019	683/5	Foreign language covers	17	209
Jan 2020	700/10	Playing cards/tabletop games	23	275
Feb 2020	723/9	Valentines and Cupids	22	259
Mar 2020	745/4	Statues	21	256
Apr 2020	766/8	Elephants	22	263
May 2020	788/7	Heroes & villains cooperating	17	198
Jun 2020	805/1	The Moon	26	322
Jul 2020	831/11	Flags & patriotic symbols	18	215
Aug 2020	849/10	Foreign locations (non-US)	20	233
Sep 2020	869/3	MST3K (with commentary)	24	292
Oct 2020	893/7	Vampires and Werewolves	20	245
Nov 2020	913/12	Giants	24	286
Dec 2020	937/10	Snow & winter scenes	24	289
Jan 2021	961/11	Doppelgängers	32	377
Feb 2021	993/4	Movies	23	275
Mar 2021	1016/3	Cats/cat-themed adventurers	22	263
Apr 2021	1038/2	Dogs/dog-themed adventurers	25	305
May 2021	1063/7	Big guns/Heavy weaponry	25	302
Jun 2021	1088/9	Dinosaurs/Time Travel	28	338
Jul 2021	1116/11	Big Questions/Question Marks	28	330
Aug 2021	1144/5	Highways, Travel etc	19	232
Sep 2021	1163/9	Favourite Covers/Comics	28	330
Oct 2021	1191/3	Lineups	21	260
Nov 2021	1212/11	JSA 80th Anniversary	23	269
Dec 2021	1235/4	Logos in the action	26	317
Jan 2022	1261/9	Dynamic Duos	29	348
Feb 2022	1290/9	Romantic Scenes	26	313
Mar 2022	1316/10	Bridges	29	339
Apr 2022	1345/1	Unexpected Green	23	286
May 2022	1368/11	Neal Adams
Jun 2022		George Perez
Jul 2022		Parents
Aug 2022		Fairgrounds/Carnivals

[Dave Palmer]

So many good Tower covers to select from

[Jeff of Earth-J]

Arthur Adams has been under-represented so far this month.

[Philip Portelli]

The first issue of Captain America I had was #176 (Au'74). I never saw the Falcon NOT being able to fly and I never saw the Secret Empire issues. Such a dramatic cover with Thor and Iron Man, to boot!

[Richard Willis]

The third appearance of the JLA.

A great cover introducing Professor Ivo and Amazo, who have been referenced many times over the years.

[Jeff of Earth-J]

I left off my alphabetical listing with the letter "I".

I would like to conclude* with the cover to my first issue of Iron Man.

*(Yes, I realize that there are more than nine letters in the alphabet.)

[Lee Houston, Junior]

Here's two of a more recent vintage that I like.

When I first saw the cover to Detective Comics #1006, I thought DC was somehow incorporating the TV Oliver Queen post TV Crisis On Infinite Earths into print continuity.

Okay, I'm man enough to admit I was wrong about that.

The cover to the conclusion in Detective 1007 "speaks" for itself.

Both covers are by issue interior artist Kyle Hotz. Images courtesy of the Grand Comics Database.

[Peter Wrexham]

I think you're right, Richard.  Pity, I liked my hypothesis.  Oh, well! :-(

Richard Willis said:

Peter Wrexham said:

Notice the amazingly understated way in which the JLA's appearance is announced on the cover, seemingly almost as an afterthought. I wonder if this could be an example of cover art being produced before the story is written? In such a case, the production department might have been able to modify the cover copy to mention the JLA, but not make any changes to the finished art.

I think they pretty much intended for the JLA to appear in the story because Kanjar Ro (the other guy on the cover) had previously only appeared in the JLA book.

[Peter Wrexham]

Before the various sword-and-sorcery comics (Stalker, Claw, Starfire) that I've already posted, DC made an earlier foray into the genre with the character of Nightmaster.  He got a three-issue run in Showcase, starting with #82, May 1969.  I enjoyed it, but it appears not to have been a big success.  After the third issue, apart from a few tiny cameo appearances, the character vanished for a quarter of a century.

I've not seen any of his later appearances, but I gather from the GCD, he appeared a few times in the mid-1990s, before resurfacing in Day of Vengeance (2005) and Shadowpact (2006).  He has appeared in various places intermittently ever since.

[JD DeLuzio]

My dad was a kid in the 1930s and early 1940s, and a fan of the Tarzan films. He and his friends would get up early on Saturday and walk along the tracks to find coal/coke that had dropped out of the cars. They would sell it in the neighbourhood and they'd use the money to go to the movies. Although not a comic reader, he bought us comics before road trips, and he would always include Tarzan (and Turok-- more on that later). He would read those ones when it was mom's turn to drive. This adaptation left a strong impression on me, and I found a copy of it years later and bought it:

[Dave Palmer]

In the 60s I was up for any new superhero comic (there really weren’t as many as we “remember”— a case of history being written by the “victors”— there were tons of comics in other genres).  My parents assured me that this really wasn’t the Captain Marvel, or Plastic Man, that they remembered.

[Jeff of Earth-J]

I happened to get this one without realizing (despite the blurb of the cover) that it was the beginning of a new series. 

[Philip Portelli]

In a strange yet bizarre coincidence, when I found this one, it was my favorite Legion story from their Late Adventure period though at the time, I had no idea it was their last issue!