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 | 26 | 310 |
Jun 2022 | 1394/9 | George Perez | 19 | 227 |
Jul 2022 | 1413/8 | Parents | 30 | 356 |
Aug 2022 | 1443/4 | Fairgrounds and Carnivals | 24 | 285 |
Sep 2022 | 1467/1 | Joe Kubert | 19 | 238 |
Oct 2022 | 1486/11 | First and last issues | 27 | 324 |
Nov 2022 | 1513/11 | Classrooms and Education | 22 | 264 |
Dec 2022 | 1535/11 | Robots and Cyborgs | 33 | 392 |
Jan 2023 | 1568/7 | Trials and Courtrooms | 28 | 330 |
Feb 2023 | 1596/1 | Doctors, Nurses and Hospitals | 24 | 292 |
Mar 2023 | 1620/5 | Detectives & Murder Mysteries | 34 | 411 |
Apr 2023 | 1654/8 | Birds and Winged Creatures | 35 | 419 |
May 2023 | 1689/7 | Strength in Numbers | 48 | 570 |
Jun 2023 | 1737/1 | Horses, Centaurs & Equines | ||
Jul 2023 | Railways |
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Incidentally, you may or may not be interested to know, that the above is my Photoshopped copy of my original cover of TT#21. I own that comic, but my copy has a battered and worn cover. A friend showed me how to "improve" it with Photoshop and the above is the result. Below is my original cover. Amazing what you can do with a bit of software!
If anyone doesn't know, a T-Man=an agent of the Secret Service, as it used to be part of the Department of the Treasury. Pete Trask was one of the most successful non-powered heroes before the Silver Age. He appeared in Police Comics from its makeover into a police/crime title with #103, and starred in his own title for 38 issues (but the later issues reprinted stories).
I actually loved TMCM, got most of the regular comics, before it became a magazine, and the collections. I first came across it after returning to the states from Greece in 1997 (I was in the Navy at the time) and was living in New London, Connecticut, and found a comics store there that had a great variety of material, including TMCM. I had stopped regularly collecting comics several years before but I still liked browsing through the shops to see if there was anything that appealed to me and wasn't the same old variety of superhero fight fests that no longer appealed to me. It was the mix of absurdity and angst of Too Much Coffee Man that resonated with me and it didn't matter to me that Shannon Wheeler's art was a bit primitive. I also started collecting a lot of Love & Rockets, American Splendor and Robert Crumb collections at the time.
Police Comics and T-Man can be found at Comic Book Plus. What would have happened if along with Blackhawk DC had also continued to publish T-Man (and Plastic Man) from Quality back in 1956.
Luke Blanchard said:
If anyone doesn't know, a T-Man=an agent of the Secret Service, as it used to be part of the Department of the Treasury. Pete Trask was one of the most successful non-powered heroes before the Silver Age. He appeared in Police Comics from its makeover into a police/crime title with #103, and starred in his own title for 38 issues (but the later issues reprinted stories).
That's a beauty.
I'm sure some writers would have Ben and Thor fight anyway, but since they are known to each other and known to be heroes to the general public there wouldn't be any reason.