*Girls’ Comics: We proudly present the latest in our ‘British Are Coming’ event, showcasing the very best in British comics. Spellbound hit the newsagents of the UK in 1976, and brought a different complexion to the British girls’ weekly. Rather than the token ‘strange story’ beloved by the regular anthologies, every strip in the comic was devoted to supernatural or science-fiction stories. The stars of the show, of course, were the quartet of interplanetary super-heroines, the ‘Supercats’, who roamed the universe fighting evil while wearing far too much mascara, courtesy of artist Enrique Badia Romero and his studio. But there were myriad other strips starring willowy wenches in trouble, and schoolgirls facing mysterious enemies: ‘When the Mummy Walks’, ‘Vampirine’, ‘I Don’t Want to be a Witch!’, ‘The Haunting of Laura Lee’, and many more brought us stories of possession, resurrection, nocturnal avengers, struggles against destiny, and other weird events. We are delighted to have a large run of the ‘Mystery Paper For Girls!’ (Bought by many furtive boys, then and now, we assure you…) in stock, from the very first through to #57 – not a complete run, but an unbroken sequence (57 out of 69). Moreover, we have the free gifts with the first three issues. Issue #1 in FN with free gift (Mystic Sun Pendant) in VF/NM (never opened) is available for £100; another #1 in GD with Free Gift (VF) is £50 and comes with a bonus free incomplete #2; our complete #2 is FN with Free Gift (Supercats Diary) in VF at £100; (#2 is the rarest of the Free Gift issues, as its inside front cover had the coupon to send away for membership of the ‘Supercats Club’, so unmutilated copies are scarce indeed); #3 FN with unopened free gift (Black Cat Cameo) is £75 and a second #3 VG with Free Gift VF is £50. Free Gift copies of early Spellbounds are uncommon, and this is an embarrassment of riches we don’t expect to be encumbered with for long, so get your orders in quick! Oh, and remember that mention above of the ‘Supercats Club’? Well, check out our merry ‘Memorabilia & Esoterica’ catalogue category for Great News, Chums! HURRY, JUST A FEW LEFT!

*DC: This issue has a double-feature of debuts, of one of Barry Allen’s closest allies and one of his most relentless nemeses. The cover devotes itself to the meteorological shenanigans of the Weather Wizard, making the first of many appearances, but lurking unheralded within is the debut and origin of Wally West, aka Kid Flash, who shared Barry’s adventures (and became an integral part of the Teen Titans) for decades before assuming the mantle of the Flash himself. This is a highly attractive VG+ cents copy, with vivid unimpaired cover scene, moderate but unobtrusive corner and edge wear, and superior interior pages, on sale at £325. SORRY, THIS HAS NOW SOLD

*DC: Unusually, some low grade Golden Age issues feature in our round-up of DC titles added to our boxes this week, as well as a nice selection of Silver. Titles include: Action Comics (#181 & #184), Adventure Comics #166, Aquaman (#29 1st Ocean Master FA/GD p £20), Batman (inc #253 with the Shadow), Detective Comics, Phantom Stranger (early second series), Showcase (inc #36 3rd Atom, #82 1st Nighmaster), Superman (#87 & later) and World’s Finest #113 (not only the Mxyzptlk/Bat-Mite team up, but also the debut of Miss Arrowette!).

*Marvel: The comics-reading public loved cuddly brain-eating symbiote venom so much that Marvel, knowing when they were onto a good thing, brought Carnage – The ‘Spawn’ of Venom, as Marvel pointedly related on the strapline (Spidey artist Todd McFarlane having recently decamped to do Spawn for Image) to life with Amazing Spider-Man #361. Carnage’s popularity soon rivalled that of his alien ‘parent’, and, with Carnage’s cinematic debut imminent, he may soon eclipse Venom altogether! This copy of ASM #361 is a sparkling NM+ p copy at £80. Buy now, or regret it later! SORRY, THIS HAS NOW SOLD

*Marvel: Close on 200 new issues added to our Marvel boxes for the following titles: Journey Into Mystery (with Thor), Marvel Two-In-One, Not Brand Echh, Power Man, Secret Wars II, Skull The Slayer, Son Of Satan, Strange Tales, Sub-Mariner, Tales Of Suspense, Tales To Astonish, 2001, Warlock, What If, X-Factor and last but by no means least, dozens of issues of X-Men between #28 and #203. 

*Western: During the transitional decade from its Timely heyday to the Marvel Universe, Stan Lee’s domain was known as Atlas Comics, and unobtrusively kept itself going by following whatever trend was cresting, whether it was romance, war or comedy. One big phenomenon in the 1950s was Westerns, and Stan and his crew obligingly turned out myriad titles featuring Western adventurers, some loosely based on historical figures, and some rather more fanciful. New to our lists this update are Atlas-era issues of Annie Oakley, Apache Kid, Black Rider, Frontier Western and Gunhawk. Despite the punishing deadlines, artists like Joe Maneely, John Severin, Werner Roth and Syd Shores did outstanding work on these series, and many of them are a visual delight.

*Boys’ Adventure & War Comics: Two ‘orphan’ Specials which were omitted from our previous updates for these titles: Scorcher Holiday Special 1980, which, we now have on good authority, was the final Scorcher Special, GD/VG at £12.50, with a ‘bonus’ free incomplete copy of 1973’s Special and Valiant Holiday Special 1979, in an appealing VF at £30.

*Humour Comics: We reach the end of our bumper Buster top-up of regular weekly issues with a selection from 1977 through to 1988 – heavier on the former side of the period, the late 1970s, and kind of spotty and skimpy thereafter, with only token touches to the 1980s. During this period, Buster, as the longest-surviving IPC funny weekly, cannibalised a lot of its fallen brethren, including Jackpot, School Fun, the frankly rubbish Nippper, Oink! and, eventually, Whizzer and Chips. This brought a huge array of popular and long-running strips into the titles’ pages – among which ‘Big Daddy’ (yes, the former pro wrestler) was probably the most bizarre and inexplicable. Watch out for two special further Buster updates coming soon!

*DC: This DC update centres upon the members of the illustrious Justice Society of America, the super-team which defended democracy in the 1940s. Returning in the Silver Age Flash series, the veteran heroes, explained as denizens of a parallel world, reunited for regular team-ups with their modern counterparts, and occasional adventures of their own. This update, we are delighted to present some of our favourite comics of the 1960s. We open with Brave & Bold #61, which united Black Canary and Starman; then, a trio of Flash issues where Barry Allen teams up with Jay Garrick – #129, #137 (with the first Silver Age appearance of the JSA as a group) and #151; Green Lantern #40, retconned as a ‘Crisis On infinite Earths’ prequel and co-starring Alan Scott, the GL of Earth-2; Justice League of America #21, in the first full JLA/JSA team-up, which became an annual tradition for decades; Showcase #55 and #56, with the power-packed pairing of Doctor Fate and Hourman and Showcase #60, which brought the Spectre, the Ghostly Guardian, back to… non-death? Stellar creators Fox, Infantino, Broome, Anderson, Sekowsky; epic villainy from the Mist, the Shade, Vandal Savage, the Psycho-Pirate and Solomon Grundy and amazing odysseys spanning two universes – it doesn’t get better than this! Illustrated: Flash #137 VF- p £160, Green Lantern #40 FN £120, and Justice League of America #21 VG- p £50.

*Marvel: Following his debut in Fantastic Four #48, readers clamoured for more of the Silver Surfer, originally winning him his own solo series in 1968 – and to do justice to the character’s cosmic adventures, Marvel took the unusual step of launching the Surfer as a double-length book, with Tales of the Watcher as the back-up. This series is frequently cited as one of the finest examples of John Buscema’s lyrical flowing artwork… and as one of the leading examples of Stan Lee’s affection for many, many words! Despite the reservations of those of us who thinks that Norrin Radd just Goes On A Bit Much, this series remains highly sought-after, especially the earlier issues before (with #8), it shrank down to a standard size. Of particular interest to collectors are the first issue, predictably, and issue #4, a spectacular crossover with the Mighty Thor, which had a low print run, and is notoriously hard to find in any grade. Lasting only 18 issues, all now in stock, the short first run of the Silver Surfer’s series is one of the Holy Grails of Silver Age Marvel collectors. Pictured are #1 FN+ p £175, #2 FN/VF £70 (1st Badoon), #3 FN/VF £75 (1st Mephisto), #4 FN- £150 (1st 2 signatures off interior staple), #5 VF/NM £140, #14 VF- £70, and #18 (Kirby art) VF+ £73. For details of the other issues, check the Marvel section of our online catalogue.

*Marvel: Marvel’s tabloid-sized comic books, generally published as ‘Marvel Treasury Editions’, enjoyed a flurry of popularity in the 1970s, and are often the first format in which a certain generation encountered the heroes and villains of the Marvel Universe. Now highly sought after collectibles, these always turn over quickly in our stock, and we’re pleased to have a new wave of Marvel tabloids. In Marvel Treasury Edition ‘proper’, we have a selection of numbers from issues #2 to #19, featuring the Fantastic Four, Thor, Spider-Man and Conan (including #4’s ‘Red Nails’ saga, in which Barry Smith’s art looks superb at the larger size). We also have a few one-offs and tabloid specials: Marvel Super Special #8, with the comics adaptation of Battlstar Galactica; Marvel Special Edition, with the conclusion of the Star Wars adaptation and a pair of Marvel Treasury Specials, 1974’s Giant Superhero Holiday Grab Bag (with no Giant Superheroes in sight! Swiz…), and 1976’s Captain America’s Bicentennial Battles, in which the Star-Spangled Avenger travels through time in a phantasmagoric odyssey of all-new (then) art by Jack Kirby!

*Miscellaneous 1940-1959: We turn our attention to Superman’s greatest imitator, who at one stage outstripped even the Man of Steel in sales – Captain Marvel! Issue #58 of Captain Marvel Adventures, dated April 12th, 1946 (yes, it was so popular it was published fortnightly!) features a three-part confrontation between Cap and his greatest nemesis, Doctor Thaddeus Bodog Sivana, a follically-challenged criminal genius who was no influence at all on later iterations of Lex Luthor, ahem ahem. In addition to this epic adventure, two further Cap stories are “Nature Goes Wild!” and “King of the Apes!” Paper salvage was still in effect at this time, so post-WWII copies are uncommon, and of course were never available in the UK, so the Big Red Cheese’s original series is seldom seen in the UK. This copy of CMA #58 is a VG-, with moderate wear at the lower corners, but unimpaired cover scene and interior pages, on sale at £45.

*Teen Humour/Funny Girls: Previously in this series of Teen Humour/Funny Girls updates, we’ve focused on the merry maidens of Timely/Atlas Marvel, but following the smash success of Archie and his pals in the 1940s, every publisher wanted to get in on the act, and here’s a batch of what would, these days, be termed the ‘indie’ contingent from three decades: Candy (Quality), Cookie (ACG), Freckles & His Friends (Argo), Freddy (Charlton), Georgie (Timely – okay, that one slipped the net), Junior Hopp (Stanmor), Lucy the Real Gone Gal (St. John), Mazie (Harvey), Mopsy (St. John), My Little Margie (Charlton), and Thirteen (Dell). With artwork ranging from the gorgeous to the grotesque (no clues which!), these paint a picture of the evolution of the ‘teen-ager’ in popular culture.

*Undergrounds: We’ve topped up our Underground comics section with 75+ items from more than twenty series, including (deep breath) All-New Underground Comix (“Two-Fisted Zombies”), Arik Khan, Black & White Comics, Home Grown, San Francisco Comic Book (Crumb in all), Blood on the Moon, Red Raider and White Comanche (Jaxon), Doc Chaos, Doll (Guy Colwell’s outrageous erotic thriller), Fresh Blood, Fantagor, Jeremy Brood and Mutant World (all Corben), High Adventure, the rare and controversial Kids’ Liberation Coloring Book from 1971, Subvert Comix (Spain), Underground Classics, Teaching Through Trauma, Wet Satin, Wha..!? (Ditko), Yow and Zippy, and virtually complete runs of the cult series Star*Reach and Wimmen’s Comix. Illustrated: Kids’ Liberation Coloring Book VG/FN £15, Subvert #3 VF £12, Wimmen’s Comix #1 FN+ £15. For grade and price details on all the others, check out our Underground section in our burgeoning online catalogue!

*Boys’ Adventure & War Comics: In 1969, despite the fact that Power Comics’ UK reprinting of the Marvel super-heroes was waning by then, the publishers and distributors Top Sellers were inspired to try something similar, launching a black & white monthly, ‘Super DC’. Batman, Superman, Superboy, Jimmy and Lois were the featured players, and, not having to be reprinted in sequence like the continuity-tight Marvel stories were, bewildered readers could experience tales from the late 1940s to the late 1960s in the very same issue. High grade copies of Super DC are extraordinarily rare, and we have never actually seen a #1 with free gifts before in our almost quarter-century of trading, so we are disproportionately chuffed to bring you this FN/VF Super DC #1 with all three free gifts in their original manila envelope (all in VF/NM condition), on sale for £120! SORRY, THIS HAS NOW SOLD

*Humour Comics: Continuing our monster top-up of Buster, we hit the years 1975 and 1976, which saw the debuts of comedy series ‘Kid Gloves’, which ran more than a decade, and one of the last – and certainly the most successful – adventure series to run in Buster, ‘The Leopard from Lime Street’, illustrated by veteran artists Mike Western and Eric Bradbury, and written by…well, no-one’s actually confessed to it, which may be because it’s a tad…familiar. Plucky orphan? Check. Radioactive critter giving strange powers? Check. Ailing aunt? Check. Part-time job as a newspaper photographer? Check. Ah, but this do-gooder – variously known as ‘Leopardboy’, Leopardman’, or ‘The Beast’ – is a 13-year old schoolboy who has an abusive uncle as well as an ailing aunt, so that’s completely different. Whatever the similarities, ‘Leopard’ was a huge hit, running almost ten years, and beating out previous record holder ‘Fishboy’ for the title of Buster’s most enduring adventure series. This period also saw Buster snap up the ailing ‘Monster Fun’, fully half of whose contents found new homes, so it was more a true merger than most such, with ‘Kid Kong’, ‘Martha’s Monster Make-Up’, ‘Teddy Scare’, ‘Draculass’, ‘Gums’ and more adding to the antics. The Leopard debuts in the 27/3/76 issue VG £10.

In our “Another chance to see” slot this week, a pair of premier issues from IPC/Fleetway’s comedy line, each with their original free gift! 1975’s Monster Fun #1 introduced the world to ‘Kid Kong’, ‘X-Ray Specs’, ‘Martha’s Monster Make-Up’, ‘Draculass’, ‘Tom Thumbscrew, Torturer’s Apprentice’, and more. This copy is an attractive FN, with the ‘Badtime Bedtime Story’ supplement and the Plate Wobbler Free Gift (VF), on sale at £100. Cheeky #1, from a couple of years later, is only Fair, with significant tears to the back cover and inside back page. Our eponymous hero’s comic co-starred ‘The Six-Million-Dollar Gran’, politically-incorrect ‘Mustapha Mi££ion’, token adventure strip ‘Space Family Robinson’ (yet another version), and ‘Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner’, among others. Despite its modest grade, all pages are present and readable, and the free gift – ‘Red Jet Rattler’ – in excellent condition, VF/NM. On sale at £30.

*DC: Ranging from 1942 to 1947, four issues of Sensation Comics, the DC anthology in which the Amazing Amazon, Wonder Woman, was the lead feature. Created by H.G. Peter and William Moulton Marston, the dynamic diva’s derring-do caused not only Sensation, but Comics Cavalcade and WW’s own series, to be top sellers during this decade, and these issues feature her at her prime, before censorious cretins and creator illness caused her to become a shadow of her former self. Other popular and long-running features in Sensation were her fellow Justice Society members, crusading pugilist Wildcat, and show-off polymath Mr. Terrific, and the trio were backed up by some of the odder series in DC’s history – the Black Pirate, the Gay Ghost and Little Boy Blue and the Blue Boys. No, really. Sensation Comics #11 is GD/VG £165; #49 VG+ £125; #51 VG/FN £135 and #61 GD+ £65. With the recent blockbuster Wonder Woman movie, and her reappearance in the upcoming Justice League film, interest in Diana’s doings has never been keener, so now’s the time to grab yourself a slice of Amazon justice! SORRY, THESE HAVE NOW SOLD

*Marvel: While the first couple of issues of the Fantastic Four were an unqualified success, it wasn’t until the third issue that the team’s rough edges were smoothed out, and they became the familiar First Family we know and love. Issue #3, in addition to the menace of the Miracle Man (no, not that Miracle Man), had the team in costume for the first time, and the debut of their unique transportation the Fantasti-Car (aka ‘The Flying Bathtub’), as well as showing the readers in detail the team’s Baxter Building headquarters. With this issue, all the foundation for the FF’s future of high adventure and exploration were in place. Our newly-acquired FF #3 is a GD/VG cents copy, with only very minor ‘Marvel chipping’ at the cover’s edge precluding a higher grade. On sale at £390.

*Marvel: Although she was not cover-featured, the enigmatic woman known as Mantis made her debut in Avengers #112, and rapidly became both a thorn in the side of the Avengers and a crucial ally, deploying her empathic skills and her martial-arts mastery in a succession of adventures, primarily the ‘Celestial Madonna’ story arc written by Steve Englehart, before marrying a sentient plant inhabited by the ghost of her dead boyfriend and becoming one with the cosmos. As you do. Having been reiterated (albeit in somewhat altered form) as one of the Guardians of the Galaxy in the second GOTG movie, Mantis’ early appearances are spiralling up in value, so this FN/VF cents copy is relatively bargainaceous at £50. Buy it now – ‘This one’ says so! SORRY, THIS HAS NOW SOLD

*Marvel: Remember when we got a set in of Jim Starlin’s ‘Infinity’ trilogy – Gauntlet, War, and Crusade – a couple of weeks back? Well, following sales of several issues, we’re delighted to have another run of Infinity Gauntlet and Infinity War in stock! These cosmic epics are fondly remembered by a generation whose first exposure to Thanos was as a nigh-omnipotent force of destruction in the Marvel Universe. The Infinity Gauntlet saga is soon going to be reprised in the Avengers/Guardians of the Galaxy movie crossover, so prices on these are only going to rise.

*Horror/Mystery 1960-1980s: A classic 1970s title from Charlton extensively updated this week, with over a third of the run of the Many Ghosts of Dr. Graves added to our listings, as early as #6 and as late as #75, the final issue. First rate artists were let loose on Charlton’s horror line allegedly without much editorial rein in place, so a great chance to experience at relatively modest prices the unfettered artistry of Steve Ditko, Tom Sutton, Don Newton, Jim Aparo, Pete Morisi. Mick Zeck, Joe Staton and many other famous names whose work appear in the pages of this title.