40 years ago this month is the anniversary of my first ever Marvel comic: Fantastic Four #126. I was 12.
I'd been buying comics since the 'Batman craze' of 1966 and then expanded my interest to other DC titles over the next few years - particularly 'the Supers' (any of the Superman titles), but by 1972 DC was losing me as a reader. 'The Supers' were looking tired, page count was decreasing and there was little else of interest. Even my school friends were growing out of comics and we didn't discuss, them let alone swap them around, anymore. Was I getting too old for them too?
I remember lazily looking through the new comics of the spinner rack in my local newsagents and then suddenly this issue of FF seemed to jump out at me. It included their origin and some slick art a style that reminded me at the time of Swan/Anderson. This was going to be my first Marvel comic. I remember walking home thinking I was some kind of traitor not buying a 'Super', but excited too. I also felt a bit older reading a Marvel book. The only frustrating thing was - how was I going to catch up? There were 125 previous issues to read.
Fate must have been listening as the very next month Marvel UK started it's first black and white weekly with The Mighty World of Marvel #1 and I was set. I felt very privileged to be able to read about the core Marvel heroes in order from the start of the Marvel age - albeit in black and white. All except Ant-Man - for some reason I don't think his stories were ever reprinted.
But I'll never forget that sunny September day 40 years ago this month.
Replies
When I was 12 (30 years ago for me), I was also sucked into the FF title by an issue on the spinner rack. This one:
Dandy Forsdyke:
"All except Ant-Man - for some reason I don't think his stories were ever reprinted."
You just needed a really big magnifying glass to read them...
I'm afriad that that FF #126 issue was just about the final FF issue for me until just about FF #232, which is ironically close to the one depicted above, #243!
Quite some long time ago, I managed to get a set of back-issues, which just happened to go from #126 (the beginning of Roy's run) up to where I started buying regular (the "50's" storyline). At the time, it struck me that Roy's issues were far in excess of character histrionics, and an intensity of overblown melodramatic emotions and expression that almost made a parody of the characters they were allegedly portraying. I mean... WHO KNEW Gerry Conway-- or all people-- was actually, for once, an IMPROVEMENT?
Many years later, I got ahold of all the issues from the 1st by John Romita up to #125. I couldn't believe what I encountered. Roy was actually an IMPROVEMENT over what he followed. (shudder!!)
I guess that-- in my view, at least-- FF as a series steadily improved from #103 (the first without Jack Kirby) all the way to about the end of Roy's 2nd run. Yes, when he came back, he'd improved greatly. But then, a good part of that could have been Rich Buckler having replaced John Buscema. While Buckler was "stiffer" than Buscema, his characters at least LOOKED more like the real characters. FF is simply one book John Buscema should never have touched...
Meanwhile, MY very 1st Marvel Comic was... can you believe it????? -- FF ANNUAL #3. What a place to come in! It was always a toss-up as to which story I enjoyed more-- the wedding free-for-all-- or the Sub-Mariner / Dr. Doom crossover. To this day, I feel FF #6 was one of the BEST Sub-Mariner appearances in all of the 1960's. He was so SYMPATHETIC in that one!
Hi, Dandy,
I came in a year later than you but a year earlier.
My first FF was No. 138, a year after your No. 126 - but I was 11 rather than 12 at the time. More. This was after discovering the UK Marvels with the immortal classic Mighty World of Marvel no. 46, reprinting the first Avengers story and the second half of the FF vs. the Hate-Monger in the back. I have yet to look back.
Oh, and the original series of Ant-Man stories was reprinted in The Super-Heroes (1975 on?), IIRR.
That's hilarious, Tim. About 6 months after I started buying MARVEL'S GREATEST COMICS regular, new from the drugstore (instead of at random, usually with half the covers missing from 2nd-hand stores), I decided to also see what the "current" FF was like. My first (of many, many issues) was FF #137-- "Rumble On Planet 3".
I had no idea at the time that the cover was-- no doubt-- an idea from Roy Thomas, doing a "tribute" to the cover of FF #1. (Roy is FOREVER looking back at series' "ORIGINS"... heh heh heh.)
Thanks, Tim. I think I'd moved on from the UK Marvel weeklies by 1975 so it's interesting to learn that Ant-Man finally got his 'moment' in the UK.
Tim Boo Ba said:
Oh, I moved on from the U. K. Marvel weeklies pretty rapidly; I just still kept the corner of my eye on them in the newsagent's just in case.
Lew Stringer's excellent essay on the birth of Marvel UK. Ohh, that green spot colour really takes me back!