Pages

▼

Thursday, 28 June 2018

June 28th, 1978 - Marvel UK, 40 years ago this week.

Like all right-minded people, I shall never get over my discombobulation that Pluto is no longer recognised as an official planet. Does this mean that all my hard work at school, learning the rhyme that helps you remember the order of the planets, was wasted?

Yes it does.

I have a good mind to sue.

Still, the present may be an unhappy time for the only ex-planet to be named after a cartoon character but the past was a far happier place - because, forty years ago this week, not only was Pluto still being treated with the respect it doesn't deserve but it was going considerably up in the universe, as its largest moon Charon was first discovered. Astronomers later went on to discover another four moons.

Hold on a minute. Pluto has five moons? And they still don't count it as a planet? What kind of space madness is this?

There's only one thing for it. I'm going to have to take refuge in a galaxy far far away.

Star Wars Weekly #21, Crimson Jack

I don't have a clue who Crimson Jack is. Therefore, I shall Google him to find out...

Having Googled him, I now know him to be a space pirate, operating on the Outer Rim.

The outer rim of what? I have no idea but I shall definitely be staying away from it because it would seem that, so dastardly is he, he captures the Millennium Falcon and steals the reward Han Solo was given for rescuing Princess Leia. The man's obviously a bounder of the worst kind.

I don't have a clue who the woman, bottom right, is but she's clearly a member of the French Resistance and is, therefore, patently not a woman to be messed with.



Mighty World of Marvel #300, Hulk, Fantastic Four, Daredevil, Captain America, Sub-Mariner, Spitfire

Hooray! Marvel UK's flagship title celebrates 300 years of existence, a truly remarkable feat.

What actually happens in this landmark issue is beyond my recall.

I would claim that I expect it to be filled with extra-special features, appropriate to the occasion but, judging by that cover, I suspect it'll just be the same old stuff as usual.

Super Spider-Man #281, the Punisher

The presence of the Punisher on this cover suggests to me that Spider-Man's problems with the Hitman are still ongoing.

Isn't this the tale that climaxes with J Jonah Jameson dangling from the Statue of Liberty?

I'm not totally sure why the Punisher's shooting that wall. Is randomly shooting walls a thing he does now?

10 comments:

  1. dangermash28 June 2018 at 19:01

    Yes, Steve, JJJ ends up dangling from the Statue of Liberty.

    It's also the issue where a Harry Osborn loses his rag with psychiatrist Bart Hamilton and the two have a punchup, which ends with the silhouetted victor telling us that the Green Goblin is back.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Steve W.28 June 2018 at 23:24

    I remember being very proud of myself, at the time, that I'd instantly realised that Bart Hamilton, and not Harry Osborn, was the new Green Goblin.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Anonymous29 June 2018 at 04:19

    Speaking of Pluto, there are some that say it is merely a big-ass comet, a dirty ice-ball with an errant orbit (which transects that of Neptune) that is lucky to even be granted the humble recognition of dwarf planet.
    In my day we had nine planets, not counting Planet X, which lurks in the Outer Darkness, waiting to roll into the inner Solar System and destroy us all.
    The problem with Pluto is there's a lotta icy balls way out there and we'd be adding planets every other day if we didn't develop some kinda criteria for being a planet.
    Thus Pluto is doomed to ever inhabit a grey limbo of definition, never at home in any category as it endlessly tumbles through the void. We'll still think fondly of it, though.

    M.P.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Anonymous29 June 2018 at 05:28

    My self-imposed boycott of MWOM must have only lasted two weeks because I definitely had #300. It seems kind of tough on the Human Torch that Spitfire made the cover, in his place. I guess two Human Torches (original and Johnny Storm) may have been confusing. I'm now wondering what the collective noun for Human Torches is?

    DW

    ReplyDelete
  5. Aggy29 June 2018 at 07:27

    Ah Crimson Jack. Back when Star Wars was trying to find an ongoing villian to use instead Vader. He had his own Star Destroyer because a rag tag bag of pirates and smugglers can find a crippled Imperial ship and just take it.

    The lady in the beret is the permenantly underdressed Jolly/Jolli/Joli? She hates men until she meets Solo at which point she... hates him. Credit to Goodwin for not going the obvious route I guess.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Steve W.29 June 2018 at 08:33

    Thanks for the Crimson Jack and Jolly/Jolli/Joli info, Aggy.

    DW, I think you're right about the reason for the original Torch's absence. I was assuming it was because Spitfire was British and the publishers might have thought she'd help boost sales, even though most people who saw the mag on the shelf wouldn't have had a clue who she was.

    MP, poor old Pluto. :(

    ReplyDelete
  7. Timothy Field29 June 2018 at 10:15

    An interesting week for the Marvel UK weeklies, I certainly had the Star Wars issue and I'm pretty sure I had SSM but I can't recall having MWOM #300, odd because I would have obviously scooped up such an auspicious 'collectors item' and would now be living off the proceeds of my investment.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Steve W.29 June 2018 at 21:47

    I bought 500 copies of it. I sold them all in 1997 and, thanks to the proceeds, I now live in a flying house. It was the best financial decision I ever made.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Charlie Horse 4730 June 2018 at 11:15

    Okay, I can't stand it anymore! I have to digress 45 years and say something like "The Air Pirates venture in from the Outer Rim when they need to go to Uranus and battle the Klingons!"

    There! I feel better now and may continue to be my mature self!

    ReplyDelete
  10. Anonymous1 July 2018 at 06:22

    I've heard there were Klingons on Uranus.

    M.P.

    ReplyDelete