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	26	310
Jun 2022	1394/9	George Perez	19	227
Jul 2022	1413/8
Parents

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Aug 2022

 Fairgrounds and Carnivals

[Dave Palmer]

From Tom Brevoort https://tombrevoort.com/2019/12/01/more-on-color-separations-avenge... here are two early alternate covers.  Partridge Family #1 is cover dated March, 1971, while FF #110 is May, 1971, so PF #1 is earlier by weeks.  Avengers #10 is cover dated November 1964.

he surmises that both were printer errors that were caught and corrected part way through the print run.  The misprinted copies were still distributed.  

Since Charlton printed its comics in-house it can be suggested that the change was a conscious decision once someone say how it was turning out.  The two Marvel covers were printers errors and not the result of conscious editorial decisions to improve the covers.

I hope this helps.

Lee Houston, Junior said:

I was originally going to ask this yesterday, but does anyone know what the first comic book with an alternate cover was?

I don't mean because of a price change or a situation like the Dell/Gold Key-Whitman/DC/Marvel releases, but an actual comic with at least two different/variant covers.

I ask because I think I've found a strong contender for the honor with Charlton's Partridge Family #1. Apparently either the original printing attempt with a color photo turned out blurry so it had to be reissued with the photo in black and white and additional color changes on the left hand side or the issue was popular enough to earn an extra print run.

Either way, The Grand Comics Database doesn't explain and later photo covers in this title came out fine.

So now, courtesy of the GCD and the only time I'll be posting two covers in one day this month, here's both images...

[Lee Houston, Junior]

Except for the pinkish Iron Man and Thor's pink highlights, the Avengers cover doesn't look as bad as the Fantastic Four issue, but how such printing errors occur to begin with is beyond my technical knowledge on the subject.

I'm sure there are other printing errors throughout comic book history, many that either weren't caught or couldn't be corrected before the end of World War 2.

[Richard Willis]

In the late 60s I got a Charlton comic that had the cover of a different title. Charlton also "colored outside the lines" on the interior pages pretty much all the time.

Marvel was better, but not perfect. One of the early versions of Iron Man's helmet had a pattern of what looked like rivets on his faceplate. It was the dividing line between the red and yellow, but the red always printed further than it should. I wrote them a letter suggesting they change the rivet line to a solid line. Either they took my suggestion or just came to the same conclusion, because it soon became a solid line.

[Richard Willis]

One of my favorite "Imaginary Stories." And I kinda like the all-blue costume better than his traditional costume.

[MethodEng]

[JD DeLuzio]

The original family that was lost in space: Mr. and Mrs. Robinson and their offspring, "Tim and Tam." In this issue, they encounter the latest alien from central casting, along with.... crusaders and bats?

[Peter Wrexham]

Aquaman and Mera become parents (to Princess Andy).

[Jeff of Earth-J]

Magnus Robot Fighter and his mother.

[Dave Palmer]

[JD DeLuzio]

I love how a show that almost nobody recalls received a few issues over at Gold Key.

And I actually read one of them.

Dave Palmer said:

[Philip Portelli]

This is one of my favorite "Imaginary Stories". And I always felt sorry for little Kal-El II for not only NOT getting any super-powers but not even LOOKING like his famous Daddy!

Richard Willis said:

One of my favorite "Imaginary Stories." And I kinda like the all-blue costume better than his traditional costume.

[The Baron]

I like how he says "Lois Lane", so that Lana knows he doesn't mean Lois Witkowski or Lois O'Halloran.

Philip Portelli said:

This is one of my favorite "Imaginary Stories". And I always felt sorry for little Kal-El II for not only NOT getting any super-powers but not even LOOKING like his famous Daddy!