The Marvel Lucky Bag - March 1978.

Mere days after I looked at what Marvel's major characters were up to forty years ago, it's time to investigate what their less high-profile colleagues were doing. With Marvel publishing around forty titles a month in that era, I can't look at all of them but I can at least peruse a selection of the more promising ones.

I have a copy of this issue. From what I can remember, Howard gets attacked by a pickled vegetable and this somehow leads to him being stranded in another dimension, with various misfits and a threat to all of existence, or something.

But don't take my word for it, you can read my review of the comic by clicking on this here link, right here.

I don't know much about Agent Axis but he clearly visits the same gentlemen's outfitters as the Shadow and Death-Stalker.

I do believe this tale is drawn by Frank Robbins, as was the first issue of The Shadow I ever read. No doubt, this means that, when I first encountered this tale in the pages of Marvel UK, it would have made it even harder for me not to see the wrong-doer as a Shadow knock-off.

I've always liked Tiger Shark, possibly because the Sub-Mariner had such a mediocre villain's gallery, that any ne'er-do-well who wasn't totally forgettable was likely to seem ten times more memorable than he actually was.

On the other hand, I suspect it was really down to the fin. Not enough villains have fins

I have a copy of this one too. Pestered by a buzzing in his ear, the Thing takes to demolishing chunks of New York. Fortunately for him, the world's greatest lawyer is on the case.

Granted, the fact that, if the cover is to be believed, our hero is the first man ever to be sentenced to twenty years in jail for vandalism, suggests Murdock may not be quite as good a lawyer as we're always told he is.

Either way, you can read my blink-and-you'll-miss-it look at this issue, by clicking on this link.

I haven't read this one - but I feel like I have. I'm pretty sure Red Sonja came up against a giant snake in every single tale I ever read that featured her.

I assume that's not Conan in the background because, presumably, the blurb would have mentioned him, if it was.

Clearly, it's a bad day for Dracula when it comes to father/son relations.

I have no idea what's going on with all the tentacles in the background, though.

I think I've read this one.

Sadly, you won't find a review of it anywhere on this site because I haven't encountered it since I was at school and, strangely enough, nothing about it has lodged in my memory.

You can, however, discover my general thoughts about the Human Fly, by clicking on this particular link.

It's all getting exciting - because Marvel's adaptation of the original movie is over and we're now getting the adventures of a talking space-rabbit.

While I vaguely remember the existence of the talking space-rabbit, I can remember nothing about him or what he got up to. He does feel more like a 2000 AD character than a Marvel one.