Monthly or Bi-Monthly?

In the early Silver Age issues of X-men, Daredevil, and seeral other Marvel books,  the printing/distribution schedule would only allow for every other month publication of some marvel books.

 

Do we have a list of which books were on that limited schedule and for how long?

My guess is that the X-men was running for almost 12 issues (TWO YEARS!) before being allowed to go monthly.

 

In the case of Daredevil, I suspect it was one year of bi-monthly publication before graduating.

 

Does anyone know how often the original six issues of the Hulk comic book came out before it was cancelled?  And is it true that it was cancelled to make way for something called "Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos"?

 

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  • Mike's Amazing World of Marvel Comics has month by month cover galleries. After a certain point it stops including all titles, but I think the galleries are complete for the period you're interested in. Click on "Time Platform", then choose the year and month you wish to start with. One you're in a gallery you can switch from browsing by cover date month to browsing by on sale month. Fantastic Four #1 was cover-dated for Nov. 1961.

     

    A point to note is that Ant-Man, Thor and Iron Man were introduced into titles that were already monthlies. Dr. Strange's feature skipped some issues early on.

     

    I went through the galleries for the early Silver Age and wrote down what I found here. I forgot to note the cancellation of the second version of My Girl Pearl at the start of 1961. Giant monsters start showing up on the SF/horror titles a bit earlier than I imply. I was trying to crystalise when the cover formula came together that included giving them dramatic names.

     

    It looks to me like Incredible Hulk was replaced by Sgt. Fury on the schedule, but the Captain has an idea he heard somewhere that the the former title was cancelled to make way for the new version of Two-Gun Kid. Be that as it may, Sgt. Fury was a success at the time.

  • You can often check when a comic went monthly by bringing up the title's cover gallery at the Grand Comics Database and checking the dates (these being cover dates) under the cover thumbnails. X-Men seems to go monthly with issues #14/#15, Daredevil with #11/#12.

  • I thought Amazing Fantasy was cancelled to make room for Two-Gun Kid, which still astounds me to this day how close we were to losing Spidey! Imagine if he were fated to be a one-shot hero?
  • Wow! That's more than I had hoped for....

    Do you know of any other Marvel monthlies that were bi-monthly when introduced?

     

    I had read that Marvel was constrained by a distribution deal with National that they could only distribute 8 books a month. I was wondering if this was an effort to alternate publication of a title or two, to get arround this.

     

    Also, when the deal was finally broken (there must be a story in there somewhere) there was an explosion of comics coming out from Marvel...  And, as I recall, Captain Marvel, got his own book after previewing in Marvel-Super-Heroes for two months, and Medusa had a solo try-out... even, gulp, Doctor Doom, in a seminal story that established an occult background for him and a lost love!  Didn't think the Phantom Eagle went anywhere, though he got a try out, and the Guardians of the Galaxy also appeared there first.

    How many other try-outs occured in that venue?

    Luke Blanchard said:

    Mike's Amazing World of Marvel Comics has month by month cover galleries. After a certain point it stops including all titles, but I think the galleries are complete for the period you're interested in. Click on "Time Platform", then choose the year and month you wish to start with. One you're in a gallery you can switch from browsing by cover date month to browsing by on sale month. Fantastic Four #1 was cover-dated for Nov. 1961.

     

    A point to note is that Ant-Man, Thor and Iron Man were introduced into titles that were already monthlies. Dr. Strange's feature skipped some issues early on.

     

    I went through the galleries for the early Silver Age and wrote down what I found here. I forgot to note the cancellation of the second version of My Girl Pearl at the start of 1961. Giant monsters start showing up on the SF/horror titles a bit earlier than I imply. I was trying to crystalise when the cover formula came together that included giving them dramatic names.

     

    It looks to me like Incredible Hulk was replaced by Sgt. Fury on the schedule, but the Captain has an idea he heard somewhere that the the former title was cancelled to make way for the new version of Two-Gun Kid. Be that as it may, Sgt. Fury was a success at the time.

  • ...I have wanted to speak of FANTASY MASTERPIECES/MARVEL SUPER-HEROES in general...
  • Yeah, the title really seemed to go through some changes over time as well.

    From reprints of classic monsters and morality tales, to reprinting Golden Age torch and Subby stories, and then becoming a venue for new projects, try-outs, etc.  It was all over the board for the several dozen issues that it ran.

    Does anyone know how much farther beyond issue #20 (Doctor Doom) it ran?  I don't recall much more than Capt Mar-Vell, Medusa, Phantom Eagle, Guardians of the Galaxy and Doctor Doom.  Does anyone else recall other try-outs?

    Emerkeith Davyjack said:

    ...I have wanted to speak of FANTASY MASTERPIECES/MARVEL SUPER-HEROES in general...
  • The GCD's thumbnail cover gallery is here. The only one you've missed from its try-out period is the Black Knight.

    Edit. My error. Also Ka-Zar

  • From what I can tell, it was quite ordinary for Marvel titles to start off on a bimonthly schedule into the mid 70s. Apparently they sometimes started off with issues in consecutive months and then went bimonthly for a bit.

  • OK, here's an odd one.  According to the GCD file on Fantasty Masterpieces, the first four issues list an india publisher as "Zenith Books, Inc".  Clicking on that provides a link to a page that lists all books that contained that and to my shock it contains approximately the first six solo Dr. Strange books as Strange Tales wraps up it's  long run #169-174!

    What gives? Does anyone know why this might have been noted, or what it indicates?

     

    PS: I also missed the Spider-Man issue #14 (did that reprint Spectacular Spider-Man vol.1 #2?)

     

    I was lucky enough to score both the first two 12 cent issues of Fantasty Masterpieces in the initial comic book white elephant sale in Spring 1966 that started me collecting Marvel Comics at age 10. Unfortunately, the first issue was coverless, but the spooky reprint tales in it really got to me. I recall Steve Ditko's "Those Who Change" vividly and now realize that it was a variant on the Butterfly Effect, a classic sciencefiction story.... just changed a little bit!

     

    Does anyone else have fond memories of these early monster/morality tales that were sellectively reprinted?

    Luke Blanchard said:

    The GCD's thumbnail cover gallery is here. The only one you've missed from its try-out period is the Black Knight.

    Edit. My error. Also Ka-Zar

     

  • The Spider-Man issue was an original story. It was Ross Andru's first Spider-Man tale.

     

    My understanding is Martin Goodman's corporate arrangements were pretty complex. Zenith Books, Inc. was likely one of his publishing entities. The issues of Fantastic Four I checked were apparently published through Canan Publishers Sales Corp. Avengers was apparently published, or sometimes published, through Vista Publications, Inc.

     

    Not all the GCD's indexers note the indicia publishers, so Zenith Books, Inc. may also have been used to publish other comics. Goodman sold Marvel to the Perfect Film and Chemical Corporation in 1968, and I think that's why the GCD doesn't list any comics as having been published through Zenith Books, Inc. after that year.

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