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From the Archives: Deck Log Entry # 59 Saturday Morning Silver Age: Part Five--Marvel Makes the Scene

As difficult as it may be for some of you youngsters out there to believe, there was a time when Marvel Comics wasn’t the overwhelming, cross-media monolith of the comics industry.  In the early and mid-1960’s, Marvel was the Avis of comics publisher

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From the Archives: Deck Log Entry # 63 Saturday Morning Silver Age: Part Seven--Who Killed the Super-Heroes?

If you were a kid and a comic-book fan from the fall of 1967 through the summer of 1968,  Saturday mornings were television heaven.  Super-heroes had taken over kid-vid; between nine a.m. and two p.m., there was nothing but.  Those of us who were tel

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From the Archives: Deck Log Entry # 61 Saturday Morning Silver Age: Part Four--the Super-Hero Universe of Hanna-Barbera

In the 1966 season of Satuday-morning kid-vid, Bill Hanna and Joe Barbera had accomplished a remarkable feat.  In Space Ghost, they had created an original super-hero whose cartoon was running neck-and-neck in the ratings with Filmation’s powerhouse,

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Deck Log Entry #201 The Earth-Two Silver-Age Challenge---Answers!

Whew!  I don’t think I’ve ever had every question in a quiz shot down as fast as they were this year.  Clearly, I underestimated the popularity of the Silver-Age appearances of the Justice Society heroes.  My Earth-Two questions proved to be not as d

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Deck Log Entry # 197 Kryptonite---a Glowing Reference (Part Two)

By the start of the Silver Age, Mort Weisinger had complete control of the Superman family of magazines, and he was stuck with a nigh-invincible hero who could juggle planets, outrace comets, and shrug off atomic blasts.  Fortunately, he had also inh

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Deck Log Entry # 200 The Earth-Two Silver-Age Challenge!

It’s summertime, and a half-century ago, if you were a DC fan, it meant the arrival of the annual team-up between the Justice League and the Justice Society.  In the spirit of those fondly remembered sagas, I’ve dedicated this year’s quiz to Earth-Tw

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Deck Log Entry # 199 So, You Want to Join the X-Men . . . .

If you lived in the Marvel Universe during the Silver Age and you wanted to join the Avengers, you had to be a super-hero, or a super-villain who promised, cross your heart, to reform---the Assemblers were take-your-word-for-it sort of guys---then pa

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Deck Log Entry #198 Kryptonite---a Glowing Reference (Part Three)

In Adventure Comics # 350 (Nov., 1966), a cloud of green-kryptonite particles drifts down from outer space, engulfing the stratosphere of the Earth, A.D. 2966.  The varied abilities of the Legion of Super-Heroes prove futile in removing or destroying

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From the Archives: Deck Log Entry # 66 Short-Term Avenger, Long-Term Party Animal

Imagine that you’re participating in one of my “Comic Book Jeopardy!” quizzes . . . .

 

Under ‘Silver-Age Avengers Tenures’ for $50, the answer is . . . . “This hero left the Avengers only five issues after being made a member.”

 

The clock is ticking, f

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Deck Log Entry # 195 Merry Christmas 2016!

I’m going to do something different this time.

 

In past Christmas Deck Log entries, I’ve written about wondrous events that took place when people were imbued with the Christmas spirit, that feeling that transcends religion and fills one with the hear

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Deck Log Entry # 194 Happy Thanksgiving 2016!

For many of the millions of Americans celebrating Thanksgiving to-day, one thing rises above all else. Football!  Go on, admit it---there's a game going on your television set right now, isn't there?

 

Much to my late father’s chagrin, I was not, and a

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Deck Log Entry # 193 The Silver-Age Challenge---Secret Identities. Answers!

Time!

 

I always get a kick out of reading the posts in response to one of my quizzes.  I get to see the sharp headwork you fellows apply, and there’s always one or more of you who manage to dodge a snare I’ve laid down.  You’re a tough bunch to fool. 

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Deck Log Entry # 192 The Silver-Age Challenge---Secret Identities

It’s summer again, and time for the annual tradition here.  No, I don’t team up with my parallel-world counterpart to tackle a crisis.  I mean, it’s time for my annual Silver-Age trivia quiz.

 

These things are getting tougher to write.  I’ve always ha

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Deck Log Entry # 191 What's on TV in the DC Universe?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

How many of these DCU shows do you remember?

 

 

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From the Archives: Deck Log Entry # 76 The Champions (No, the OTHER Ones)

(After the Baron's thread on the Marvel Comics' Champions series wound up last month, I couldn't resist dusting off, polishing up, and re-presenting my piece on the other guys.)

 

 

 

The Champions: Craig Stirling, Sharron Macready, and Richard Barrett.

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Deck Log Entry # 183 The Silver-Age Challenge---So, You Think You Know the Batman?

The summer-quiz bug bit me again, gang, although I have to admit, the season almost got by me.  I got the idea for a couple of really good questions early in the year, but it took me several months to fill out my card.  By then, I had to finish my tw

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Deck Log Entry # 190 A Forgotten Gem: Fantastic Four # 39-40 (Jun. and Jul., 1965) (Part Two)

“The Battle of the Baxter Building”

 

Editor and writer: Stan Lee   Art: Jack Kirby (pencils), Vince Colletta (inks)

 

 

The first half of this forgotten gem left off with the individual members of the Fantastic Four---now powerless from the effects of th

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Deck Log Entry # 189 A Forgotten Gem: Fantastic Four # 39-40 (Jun. and Jul., 1965) (Part One)

“A Blind Man Shall Lead Them”

 

Editor and writer: Stan Lee   Art: Jack Kirby (pencils), Frank Giacoia (inks)

 

 

Scholars of the comic Fantastic Four mark 1965 as a watershed year in the series’ history.  Up to that year, the adventures of the title’s st

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Deck Log Entry # 187 Merry Christmas 2015!

This is the story of a Christmas present given in faith that it would be delivered fifteen years later.

 

Yeah, I’ve been rummaging through the dustbin of America’s cultural memory, again.  It’s surprising how much of our way of life and the freedoms w

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Deck Log Entry # 188 The Cop and the Cowl

Before the holiday break, I had been talking about Aunt Harriet, the character introduced in 1964 by newly appointed Batman editor Julius Schwartz.  The idea was to deflect accusations, first suggested by psychiatrist Frederic Wertham, that Bruce Way

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