August 15th, 1979 - Marvel UK, 40 years ago this week.

This day in 1979 was not a special day for television.

But the day after was - because, at 8:30 pm that evening, BBC One gave us a show called The Persuaders.

No, it wasn't that thing which starred Roger Moore and Tony Curtis and featured the greatest theme tune in television history.

Instead, it was a documentary which looked at the world of advertising and marketing. It featured a segment devoted to Disney's plans to launch a $20 million space epic called The Black Hole, at the time, Disney's most expensive movie ever.

However, the real news that mattered was the show also featured a segment about the launch of Marvel UK's Hulk Comic and included an interview with the man himself, as Dez Skinn talked about the venture.

And he had ITV's technicians doing their best to help him in his quest for publicity because this week of that year saw the start of their legendary strike which shut that whole network down for over two months and famously led to Doctor Who getting the biggest viewing figures in its history.

That strike meant there were suddenly only two TV channels available to the British public - and Dez was on one of them! And the other one was BBC Two, which no one ever watches! With a break like that, it could, surely, only be a matter of time before Dez was as big a household name as Stan himself!

Hooray! We get the return of Star-Lord, in a tale entitled Less Than Human, drawn by Bill Sienkiewicz. I suspect this must be my earliest introduction to that man's talents.

We also get a Tales of the Watcher treat about an astronaut who finds himself on a planet filled with giant bugs. But, when his rocket returns to Earth, where, exactly, is its pilot?

We also get that Guardians of the Galaxy tale in which our heroes find themselves on a world that resembles New York - only for it to turn out to be a lunatic asylum. It might seem like clumsy satire now but it seemed clever when I was fifteen.

Tragically, as far as I can make out, the return of the Guardians means it's curtains for Adam Warlock who seems to have been given the push to make way for the Lord of Star.

The Hulk no sooner disposes of Groot than he finds himself up against the Blip who he, understandably, mistakes for Zzzax. That foe dispatched, he finally learns the identity of his true foe.

Ant-Man and the Wasp come up against Egghead's deadliest weapon yet - an anteater!

Merlin's tackling the evil king of somewhere or other.

The Eternals are still faffing about, getting nowhere in particular.

Rick Jones is in a life or death battle with Annihilus and becomes separated from his Hulk alter-ego, thanks to Mr Fantastic.

And I don't have a clue what Nick Fury's up to.

Reed Richards is still invading Latveria, as Doc Doom gets Alicia to carve his statue.

Thor's going on a subterranean journey with Ulik, while Odin's on Earth, having taken on mortal form for reasons I can't remember.

Whatever his reasons, I think we can guarantee this development will end up endangering the whole planet because it's a scheme cooked up by Odin and we all know how they always go.