Fifty years ago today - July 1976.

Thanks to Charlie Horse 47 and Killdumpster for their sponsorship of this post, via the magic of Patreon. 

***

Hooray!

It's July!

Already!

And we all know what's significant about that month!

It's the first month of the year!

And that means it's the one in which we all rush out and buy ourselves a brand new calendar!

And what better one to buy, here in 1976, than the one that Marvel Comics has issued to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the United States of Statesland declaring independence from the United Britain of Kingdoms!

And what a publication it is, packed solid with images of our favourite heroes - and Toro - as, month by month, it takes us through significant moments in both the history of the War of Independence and the history of Marvel and its creators.

Granted, there are some strangenesses, such as its depiction of Conan and the Black Panther leading the revolutionary charge. I'm not totally sure just when either of them became American.

But the good news for those with fond memories of that calendar is that, once again, it can be yours - and in pristine condition because Marvel has reissued it to celebrate that nation's 250th birthday and the calendar's 50th - and that brand-new version of it is available from all good retailers, including the likes of eBay and Amazon.

So, that in mind, let's see just what that calendar tells us awaits us in this the month of July.

And, now, the regular stuff.

Isn't this the story in which our favourite team are having all kinds of trouble with Orka the human killer whale until Thor turns up and flattens him before revealing he normally doesn't hit his foes as hard as he could, for fear of hurting them?

Given the threat posed to him by most of his opponents, I find this claim very hard to believe.

Regardless, it starts to raise doubts in the thunder god's mind as to whether he's slumming it by hanging around with mere mortals.

As far as I can make out, June 1976 saw the launch of legendary ITV children's drama serial The Feathered Serpent, starring Patrick Troughton and Diane Keen as the world's most Anglo-Saxon Aztecs.

Meanwhile, Conan's comic that's cover-dated a mere month later shocks us all with its reference to the fiends of the Feathered Serpent.

How can this be mere coincidence?

Apparently, it can be.

As for what happens in it, it would appear our hero establishes himself as the Feargal Sharkey of his generation by saving a village from an evil wizard who's dumping toxic waste in its river.

I've not read this one but the internet informs me that someone called Professor Harding breaks his ties with the Elites and decides to help Cap and Falc do something or other.

Meanwhile, someone called Malcolm orders the activation of the Big Daddy Madbomb.

I do believe this is at least the second time Daredevil's been wrongly accused of murdering the Jester.

And I suspect the villain's ploy will be no more successful this time than it was the first.

As that cover makes clear, It's the one in which Galactus is using the Destroyer as a herald.

More urgently, golden gorilla Gorr's taken the gang to Counter-Earth where they have to quickly prepare for the arrival of the planet-eater himself. 

"The most unexpected barbarian of all!" declares the front cover!

I suspect that's because no one's ever heard of him.

But it would appear that this issue's Conan wannabe is someone called Kronak which is almost an anagram of Arkon and I can shed no more light upon him than that.

The Blood Brothers are back and that's all I know of this one - other than that it's brought to us by Archie Goodwin and George Tuska.

Aunt May's weak heart survives yet another incident that'd inflict total cardiac arrest upon the healthiest of people.

But, meanwhile, it would seem the currently spectral Hammerhead manages to trick Dr Octopus into returning him to the world of the solid!

Nope. No idea what occurs in this issue - but it does look like Thor's finally developed the sense to give Odin the slap he's been asking for ever since he first appeared in the strip.

June 30th, 1976 - Marvel UK, 40 years ago this week.

Thanks to Charlie Horse 47 and Killdumpster for their sponsorship of this post, via the magic of Patreon. 

***

The longest day of the year has come and gone and, as the sun sinks lower in the sky, let us sink lower into the past and discover just what delights awaited us, within our local newsagents, this very week in 1976.

Neal Adams arrives on the Avengers' strip, even as their comic approaches its twilight days. It seems that even the power of Nifty Neal won't be enough to save it.

I do believe Conan's having an encounter with mystery minstrel Laza-Lanti who has problems with a demon from a place called Dark Valley.

And it's bad news for the Avengers, even beyond the impending cancellation of their book, because populist politician H Warren Craddock has launched an anti-alien commission and demanded the team hand Captain Marvel over to it!

Far more importantly than even that, I suspect, is that this is the issue in which we see the Vision wearing a casual sweater whilst playing a game of chess.

As for Shang-Chi, he's defending a mysterious circus from the Warlords of the Web.

Whoever that might be.

That's a very dramatic cover by Larking Bob Larkin. So dramatic, in fact, that I remember being motivated to whip out my sketchpad and copy it, as a youth.

But, inside, I do believe we may have reached the unforgettable phenomenon of Jason and Alexander taking refuge in a secret hideout inside one of the heads of Mount Rushmore.

Elsewhere, it seems that Blade and Dracula have teamed up against Doctor Sun, although Blade is quickly captured by the fiend, after being distracted by the vampire who murdered his mother.

In the Man-Thing's strip, we finally reach the end of the Foolkiller saga.

And I think Ka-Zar sets off in search of Zabu who he thought was dead but now thinks is alive.

But what's this? Despite the cover's confident claim, it doesn't look like Captain Marvel appears in this issue at all. Will we never get to see the conclusion of his battle with Thanos and the Cosmic Cube?

And does this mean the good captain changed his hair colour for nothing?

The fake Vulture's still causing trouble for our hero who has to begin the issue by trying to survive a fall from a great height.

But is that villain really the Vulture?

And just how does he tie in with a noticeably-similar looking professor at Peter Parker's university?

After that, no matter what the cover tells us, the Mighty Thor is, of course, in the grip of Infinity. Not Eternity.

Or, at least, Odin is, as he continues to battle a mysterious foe from who knows where.

Back on Earth, the Thing and Power Man must intervene when a scientist's useless experiment unleashes a 300-foot tall monster that's determined to flatten New York!

I suspect that Iron Man's still up against the menace of the Night Phantom.

And Dr Strange continues to have lookalike issues at the Dance of the Red Death.

But can it be?

Can our friendly neighbourhood Hulk be back in Canada?

Yes, he can.

And things are about to get inconvenient for him when the sister of the man who became the Wendigo decides to transfer the creature's curse onto him!

Following that, we discover the breath-taking origin of Nighthawk and see him frame Daredevil for a crime he has not committed!

The X-Men are, once more, up against the menace of Magneto who, as always, quickly gains the upper hand against them.

And that's not the only X action we get, because we're also treated to the Werner Roth drawn feature that tells us all we need to know about Cyclops and his powers.

Including the shocking revelation that his eye blasts don't give off heat!

The cover may trumpet that the Frightful Four are back, but the much bigger news is that Agatha Harkness arrives when the FF go looking for a baby-sitter and find one with abilities that are rare in that profession.

Next, we encounter the first appearance of Tiger Shark in the Sub-Mariner's life, as an ex-Olympic swimmer decides to trust the evil Dr Dorcas to restore his swimming abilities.

Elsewhere, Captain America survives an ambush before answering the Black Panther’s call to help defend Wakanda from mysterious invaders. I would not be surprised if Baron Zemo is about to raise his masked head.

Nick Fury, as you'd expect, prevents Hydra’s Overkill Horn from triggering global nuclear destruction.

The Ghost Rider survives a deadly fall before rushing back to the rodeo, in order to confront the evil Snake Dance.

And poor old Roxanne Simpson may, yet again, be in danger of getting sacrificed. I swear to God I've never encountered any human being who's as sacrifice-prone as she is.

Speak Your Brain! Part 128.

Thanks to Charlie Horse 47 and Killdumpster for their sponsorship of this post, via the magic of Patreon. 

***

Image by Tumisu
from Pixabay

It's clearly a very special month because, despite there only being 30 days in it, we've, somehow, managed to squeeze in three Speak Your Brains.

"But, Steverino," I hear you cry. "How are those who are new to this site meant to know what that even means?"

This is what it means.

It means it's the feature in which you - and only you - get to decide the topic of the day.

That topic could be about what's new or about what's old or about whatever the word is for something that's in between being old and new.

Therefore, feel free to make use of the comments section below, to register that topic. And then we shall discover just what the world makes of it.

The DC Lucky Bag - June 1976.

Thanks to Charlie Horse 47 and Killdumpster for their sponsorship of this post, via the magic of Patreon. 

***

Plans are of no use to a man like me. Like all men of destiny, I rely on random happenstance to guide me.

Therefore, let's see what appears when I spin the Steve Does Comic Wheel of Fate and see upon which DC comics that bear this month's cover date its untutored arrow settles.

Many times, as a child, did I see Jonah Hex comics on the spinner racks.

And many times did I see house ads for his book.

And, yet, strangely, in all that time, never once did I actually get round to buying an issue of his comic.

I suspect the lure of the Phantom Stranger, Spectre and Weird War Tales, sitting there, beside him, on those racks, always diverted my attention away from the gun-slinger.

Regardless, I do know that, in this thrilling epic, our hero's forced to contend with a rival bounty hunter who keeps stealing his captives, in order to claim the reward money for himself.

But forget all that. Whatever else happens, this is the big event of the month, when a brand new mag descends upon our favourite retailers.

And does so by creating a team consisting of DC's greatest villains - and Captain Boomerang.

Surely, no hero nor group of heroes, could hope to stand against such a gargantuan gaggle of gallivantingly galevolent galoots.

And it all happens when one of Manhunter's clones brings them all together under the auspices of a mysterious but wealthy benefactor.

But who could that benefactor be?

Could it be Lex Luthor?

Or Darkseid?

Because, let's face it, who else is it going to be?

But enough of such concerns. Karate Kid hits his second, thrilling issue. And, no doubt, hits a few wrongdoers, as well.

In fact, he probably hits Major Disaster who launches some sort of attack on the United Nations!

I don't know who he is but I'm not sure I'm impressed by any villain who wants to be known as Major Disaster.

Then again, maybe he's the mystery man behind the Secret Society of Super-Villains?

Jack Kirby may be long-gone but the last boy on Earth just keeps on lasting, thanks to the efforts of Gerry Conway and Chic Stone.

Which is a matter of curiosity to me, as I don't think I've ever seen anything pencilled by Stone. I know him purely as an inker.

As for what occurs within, it seems the trouble-finding teen seeks out someone called Mogul who may be to blame for recent attacks on him.

I've never read this one - and that cover does have a real Silver Age throwback feel to it - but I can sensationally reveal that the League is making some kind of effort to stop a bunch of natural disasters that turn out not to be so natural.

In fact, so not-natural are they that they're part of a plan to destroy the team!

It's the meeting that had to happen, as the Joker and Superman's arch-nemesis co-star in a tale called Luthor-- You're Driving Me Sane!

Not that I know what happens in it, beyond that it features a bunch of people called the Mountebank Malefactors.

From that name, I shall assume they are bad guys.

And that they are well-heeled.

June 23rd & 26th, 1976 - Marvel UK, 50 years ago this week.

Thanks to Charlie Horse 47 and Killdumpster for their sponsorship of this post, via the magic of Patreon. 

***

We're all wallowing in the highs and lows of the World Cup, right now, as our favourite countries battle it out to become champions of the globe.

But, this week in 1976, it was the European Championship that was on our minds. And its final was won by Czechoslovakia who beat West Germany 5–3 on penalties after the game ended 2–2.

This, of course, means the final was contested by two nations that no longer exist. Has that happened before or since in a major championship?

I cannot say.

Things were clearly looking up for those two countries but, in the land we know as Canada, the entire population was looking up, as the planet's tallest free-standing man-made structure, Toronto's CN Tower, opened its doors to the public.

Rising almost as high as that was the good old-fashioned British thermometer.

And that's because June 26th saw the UK heatwave hit 95 °F (35 °C).

Hot stuff indeed.

But what about other hot stuff?

The red hot hits on the red hot singles chart?

That week saw the Wurzels lose their Number One spot to the Real Thing and their latest platter You to Me Are Everything.

My main memory of the Real Thing is that their lead singer seemed to win Crufts every year and, thus, made a, presumably, goodly sum of money from advertising dog food.

Over on the accompanying album chart, there was no change, with ABBA's Greatest Hits retaining the pole position it had held for several weeks now.

Judging by that cover, Quicksilver's awesome tactic of defeating giant robots by bouncing off them and then landing on his backside proves somewhat futile, as the early stages of the Kree/Skrull War rumble on.

He should try that tactic he used against the Sentinels. The one that involved him running face-first into a wall and nearly killing himself in the process.

Granted, it wasn't the most repeatable of tactics but it did actually work.

And he found a wife because of it.

Someone else who might be on his way to finding a wife is the Vision who, while held captive by Ronan the Accuser, confesses his love to the Scarlet Witch!

When it comes to Conan, he and Red Sonja continue to be trapped in a tower with a brother and sister pair of sorcerers who want to have their wicked way with them.

However, the dashing duo do finally escape and the Sonj bashes our hero over the back of the head, with a rock, before riding off on a horse.

Shang-Chi, meanwhile, encounters a bunch of characters who are half-human and half-animal and being kept in cages, for reasons that elude me.

As we can see, the Thing's still fighting Torgo.

But he might not have to for much longer, as the rest of the Fantastic Four are on their way to liberate him from the clutches of gangster-inspired skrulls.

I can only hope they know the rules of fizzbin.

The Ghost Rider must contend with the menace of Snake Dance but it may all end badly for him because Sam Silvercloud's only gone and sabotaged his motorbike!

And there's bad news for Nick Fury. He's been captured by Hydra who want to use the Overkill Horn to detonate all the world's nuclear weapons!

Beneath the waves, Prince Namor must battle Attuma again. 

But, this time, the villain's wearing electrically-charged armour!

Bearing in mind that he's under water, I'm not sure that's a good idea.

On dry land, Steve Rogers has quit his role as Captain America and revealed his true identity to the whole wide world.

Needless to say, this is a terrible idea and it's not long before people are trying to replace him, kill him or lure him out of retirement.

It's the, "Long-awaited merger of Marvel's mightiest mags!" declares the cover.

But awaited by whom? I can't remember ever awaiting it.

In fact, it seems hard to believe that anyone was demanding a merger of Dracula Lives and Planet of the Apes. I can only assume I'm out of touch with the younger generation.

But what do we get in this new, improved comic?

We find Jason and Alexander still on the Planet of the Apes and encountering a thing called The Traveling Progress Show.

The Man-Thing's still having to put up with the antics of the Foolkiller - raising the obvious question of whether there's ever been a more annoying villain than that madman.

Dracula takes part in A Halloween Holocaust!! having been revived by his enemies to take on the menace of Dr Sun.

And Ka-Zar takes part in a yarn titled Terror of the Waves! which I think may be a tale of vengeance of the kind the Savage Land seemed to specialise in.

That's a better-drawn cover than we're used to from Mighty World of Marvel. Apparently, it's by Keith Pollard, which may well explain it.

I'm sure we all know Bruce Banner's sheltering in a remote mining town but things head south quickly when he discovers that local hero the Missing Link is becoming ever more radioactive and could explode at any inconvenient moment!

I suspect the Daredevil tale may contain Nighthawk's second Marvel UK appearance when the man without fear is quickly upstaged by the Batman-a-likes crime-thwarting antics.

But is the new hero in town the man he makes himself out to be?

Or is he only in it for the money?

The X-Men, meanwhile, attend Professor X's funeral and are surprised when Quicksilver shows up.

Here's a strange thing.

For some reason, while all other Marvel UK mags for this week have a cover date of June 23rd, Spidey's book boasts one for the 26th.

But things are about to get even stranger in Spider-Town when Mary Jane witnesses a murder and our hero comes up against a man pretending to be the Vulture.

I seem to recall that, not long after this tale, we get an impostor show up, pretending to be Mysterio.

And then Harry Osborn becomes a fake Green Goblin.

We can only conclude that writer Gerry Conway had a thing for ersatz super-villains.

Elsewhere, Iron Man's still fighting the Night Phantom.

And, then, we can only gasp as Power Man and the Thing encounter a scientist who must confess that I Created Braggadoom! The Mountain That Walked Like A Man!

Thor's still out to reach the bottom of the mystery over just who Infinity is and how he can have so much power.

And poor old Dr Strange must confront alternate versions of himself at the Dance of the Red Death.

Speak Your Brain! Part 127. Your Mount Rushmore of heroes!

Thanks to Charlie Horse 47 and Killdumpster for their sponsorship of this post, via the magic of Patreon. 

***

Image by Tumisu
from Pixabay

A wise man once said, "Silence is golden."

Admittedly, he wasn't being silent when he said it.

Such is the nightmare hypocrisy of mankind.

But there is a place in which silence is most definitely not golden.

And that is Speak Your Brain. The only feature on the internet [citation needed] in which you The Reader get to decide the topic of the day.

Bearing that in mind, make full use of that awesome responsibility and be sure to use the comments section below to register the subject matter of which you wish to speak.

2000 AD - May 1988.

Thanks to Charlie Horse 47 and Killdumpster for their sponsorship of this post, via the magic of Patreon. 

***

Politics will always be with us.

And it sometimes seems like some politicians will be too. For instance, May 1988 saw François Mitterrand, having already spent seven years as President of France, manage to get himself re-elected for another seven!

But some things were coming to an end. One of them being that, after more than eight years of fighting, the Soviet Army began its withdrawal from Afghanistan.

In other matters Soviet, the Moscow Summit involving Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev saw the finalisation of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty which made us slightly less likely to be annihilated.

And cinema? That magical place in whose bosom we can always escape the vicissitudes of reality? 

Unleashed upon the silver screen, that May, were such never-to-be-forgotten dramas as Dead Heat, Friday the 13th Part VII, Maniac Cop, Not of This Earth, Aria, Willow, Crocodile Dundee II, Rambo III and Killer Klowns From Outer Space.

How many of those have I seen? I think I've seen Maniac Cop, Willow and Crocodile Dundee II. I wish I could claim that any of them are timeless classics but I'm not totally convinced they are. I shall, therefore, have to go for Crocodile Dundee II as the Steve Does Comics Film of the Month.

And the galaxy's greatest comic?

It continued to provide us with The Journal of Luke Kirby, Judge Dredd, A.B.C. Warriors, Rogue Trooper and Strontium Dog.

However, some change was present, thanks to Prog 576's Return of Bad Company.