Showing posts with label fireside books. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fireside books. Show all posts

Sunday, April 24, 2022

The Comic Book Trade Paperback You SHOULD have Bought...but DIDN'T!

Remember this spectacular wraparound cover?
This superb, never-reprinted Murphy Anderson illustration encapsulates what made DC's science fiction line in the 1950s and 60s so entertaining!
  • Adam Strange and Alanna! (DC's premiere Silver Age space-going heroes!)
  • Winged Apes! (DC was famous for using apes almost anywhere you could think of!)
  • A ridiculous, physically-impossible image (giant arrow thrown by aforementioned winged [but normal-sized] ape through the Earth) that you just must know the story behind! (Though, sadly, in this case, there's no actual story behind this particular piece!)
Fireside's Mysteries in Space (1980), a $7.95 trade paperback reprint compiled from Strange AdventuresMystery in SpaceTales of the Unexpected, and From Beyond the Unknown came and went quickly through bookstores.
Sadly, it didn't sell well, and many copies were returned to the publisher and pulped!
It's not available in e-book form, and a different 1999 trade paperback, Mystery in Space, doesn't reprint any of the stories featured in this compilation!
When you can find a copy now, it runs from $30 to $100, depending on condition!
Please Support Atomic Kommie Comics
Visit Amazon and Order...

Sunday, August 28, 2016

It's Jack Kirby's 99th Birthday...

...now re-read his final Marvel project, unseen by the general public since 1980...
...Marvel's first original graphic novel.
It starts as a retelling of the "Coming of Galactus" storyline from Fantastic Four #48-50, but set in a reality without any of the myriad characters that inhabit Earth and the solar system of the Marvel Universe.
No Fantastic Four.
No Watcher.
No Alicia Masters.
However, there is Norrin Radd, who becomes the Silver Surfer, as well as Shalla Bal, his true love, and their home world, Zenn-La, and of course, Galactus!
After stranding the Surfer on Earth, the story goes off on a totally-new tangent and introduces new characters, the golden Ardina (whom Galactus uses to emotionally-manipulate the Surfer), and Master of Guile, a manifestation of Galactus' "Dark Side" who advises the planet-eating alien!
It's a unique take on the character, and, as we said, the last joint project by the two guys who co-created most of the Marvel Universe!

As to how and why it came about...
According to Bill Bagnall at T'aint the Meat... It's the Humanity, the basis of the graphic novel was a never-used story for a Silver Surfer movie rock musical that would've featured Olivia Newton-John as Ardina!
Unusual note, the copyright to the graphic novel is not Marvel's, but jointly-held by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby!
As of January, 2016, it's only available as a HTF, expensive, limited-edition hardcover or paperback.
But, in the interest of historical research, we've re-presented the entire tale starting HERE.
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Visit Amazon and order the HTF & OOP...