*Marvel: One of Marvel’s long-running and more beloved villains, Crusher Creel, the Absorbing Man, premiered in this issue, with his ability to absorb and replicate the properties of any person, object or substance causing quite a headache for our favourite Thunder God! Despite his surly mien, many folks feel that Crusher Creel is, to quote the Shangri-Las, ‘Good-bad, but not evil‘, and he has quite the fan-base, especially in latter decades since he married Titania. This first appearance of an enduring villain is a classy Fine, pence stamp in upper corner, minimal edge wear, unfaded red background, tight corners.
PICTURED: JOURNEY INTO MYSTERY #114 FN p £75

*Marvel: One of the phenomena of the last decade of the 20th Century was Jim Starlin’s Infinity Gauntlet, which spawned many crossovers and two direct sequels. This is the second such sequel, third series in the ‘Infinity Trinity’, Infinity Crusade, in which ‘The Goddess’ separated the more devout of the Marvel Heroes into a super-powered jihad, a move surely calculated to offend both the pious and the pagan alike!. The ‘Infinity’ series have been hugely popular ever since their inception, but with Thanos and the Infinity Gauntlet at the centre of the Avengers/Guardians of the Galaxy cinematic franchise, demand for them is at its height.
PICTURED: INFINITY CRUSADE #4 NM; COMPLETE SET OF #1-6 NM £35 SOLD

*Horror 1940-1959: More from Avon’s much sought after horror title, this time an unbroken run from #8 through to #13, featuring artwork by E. Everett Kinstler, Harry Lazarus, Gene Fawcette, Sid Check, Alvin Hollingsworth and a promising youngster named Joe Kubert! Of particular interest is issue #12, which breaks away from the short-story anthology format to offer a book-length adaptation of Bram Stoker’s ‘Dracula’ – the first appearance, we believe, of the Lord of the Vampires in comics form! With the exception of #12, which is a very presentable GD+, these are mid to low grade copies, averaging FA+, suffering from various combinations of browning, tears, and watermarking, but all complete, eminently readable and reasonably affordable copies of a hotly sought pioneering series.
PICTURED: EERIE
#8 FA £90 Piece out of upper back cover, front cover top edge staining and wear SOLD
#9 FA £90 Off top staple, watermarked at top edge
#10 FA+ £75 Two long taped back cover tears SOLD
#11 FA £70 3″ diagonal front cover tear from upper left, smaller tear at upper staple area
#12 GD+ £120
#13 FA/GD £90 Lower right front cover corner off, long lower spine split

*Classics Illustrated: It’s the turn of the British version of Classics Illustrated this update, with 50 additions to our stocks, ranging from #8 (the Odyssey) to #144 (The Queen’s Necklace). Along the way, less common issues include a first printing of #13 (Dr. Jekyll & Mr Hyde), #32 (Lorna Doone with Matt Baker art), #40 (Benjamin Franklin), #73 (The Black Tulip with original British cover), #124 (The War Of The Worlds), #128 (Wuthering Heights — one of the very few written by a woman!) & #130 (The Woman In White). Also included are a number of World Illustrated, including the UK original #529 (Great Escapes). Full publication data is as always given in our catalogue. 

*Power Comics: The earlier run of Odhams’ Smash, before it got taken over by IPC/Fleetway, is always in demand, with its eclectic line-up – traditional humour strips such as ‘The Swots and the Blots’, home-grown adventure strips like ‘Brian’s Brain’ and ‘Rubberman’, Marvel super-hero reprints such as ‘Daredevil’, and the front-billed ‘Batman’ newspaper strip. But the Free Gifts, generally requiring some assembly, almost never survive in good shape, so this pair from 1968 are genuine rarities; #108 has a ‘Swing-Wing Fighter’ VF, bundled in its original rubber band (exercise caution when handling!), while #109 has a ‘Secret Coder’ FN/VF, not punched out of its original supporting card. Comics are an exceptional Fine.
PICTURED: SMASH
#108 FN WITH FREE GIFT VF £60 SOLD
#109 FN WITH FREE GIFT FN/VF £60 SOLD

*Humour Comics: The large format semi-tabloid Beezer (home to ‘Ginger’, ‘Baby Crockett’ and ‘Pop, Dick & Harry’ among scores of others) doesn’t tend to wear well over time, so we’re particularly chuffed to have a Free Gift issue from 1964 in good shape; #457 17/10/1964 is VG, with the Free Gift – an inflatable noisemaker dubbed the ‘Bubble & Squeak’ – in FN. The gift actually looks VF, but we suspect the rubber/plastic in the inflatable component has long since ‘perished’, so in an excess of caution, we’re calling it Fine.
PICTURED: BEEZER #457 VG WITH FREE GIFT FN £35 SOLD

*Girls’ Picture Libraries: While the 1954 launched True Life Library is generally categorized as a romance title, things ran a little deeper than that. Certainly, romantic complications abounded, but said complications frequently included fraud, blackmail, robbery, abduction, infidelity, accusations of murder or the unwelcome popping-up of discarded spouses or offspring, to give readers a film noir frisson alongside their moonlight & roses. Titles such as ‘The Man She Feared’, ‘Gaol Girl’, ‘Beautiful Schemer’ and ‘Her Sister’s Man’ were advertised by lurid painted covers that wouldn’t have looked out of place on a movie marquee. We have 53 issues of True Life added to our stock, commencing with the second issue, and all within the first 100 numbers. Condition averages Good – sadly, staple rust does generally preclude a higher grade, though all are otherwise clean and sound.
PICTURED: TRUE LIFE LIBRARY
#2 GD £12
#17 VG £9

On a regular cycle, we sweep through our entire stock to delete sold items and keep our listing as up to date as possible. We’ve just finished deleting sold items from the following file in our British section
*Boys’ Adventure & War Comics V – Z
As of the time of writing, this file is bang up to date, with every item listed available.

*Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror: Poul Anderson may well have been inspired by Ian Fleming’s James Bond, but even Bond’s foray into space in Moonraker wouldn’t have prepared him for the adventures of Dominic Flandry, interstellar trouble-shooter. We’ve got four books, two collections, Agent Of The Terran Empire and Flandry Of Terra, both with wraparound covers by Bob Fowke and two novels, A Knight Of Ghosts And Shadows and Ensign Flandry.
PICTURED:
AGENT OF THE TERRAN EMPIRE VG £3.50

*TV/Film Tie-Ins: Here’s a haul of novelisations from the 1960s to 1980s, starting with the US side there’s Get Smart Once Again!, Knight Rider and two from the Mod Squad, Home Is Where The Quick Is and The-Sock-It-To-Em-Murders. On the UK side we have Gangsters, Sapphire And Steel and Strange Report. The final addition is the full script of West Side Story. Replete with TV, movie and stage covers, these are guaranteed to awaken fond memories.
PICTURED:
GET SMART ONCE AGAIN! GD £5                      
MOD SQUAD THE-SOCK-IT-TO-EM-MURDERS VG/FN £6  
SAPPHIRE AND STEEL VG £20 

*Clearance Corner: As you may realise, the purpose of our Clearance Corner lots is to clear space in our shop by discontinuing titles we’re no longer carrying to make way for new and incoming stuff. As such, they will only be offered for a short time. This Clearance Corner lot, listed on 25th January, has not been snapped up and is nearing the end of its time with us. If not purchased within the next few days, we will have to dispose of it. Here are the details from our original listing:
‘Who was ‘The Mystery Girl From the East’? What was ‘The Threat to Miss Fontaine’s Romance’? Why were ‘Pets On Trial at St. Kilda’s’? The answer to all these and oh, so many more questions can be found in our latest Clearance Corner! The venerable Schoolgirls’ Own Library of text stories featuring plucky young misses ran for two separate series, the first from 1922 until 1940, and the second from 1946 to 1963. We are offering 2 of the first series and 28 of the second, a total of 30 tales of daring and justice in boarding schools at home and abroad. The earliest two, from 1937, are Poor, but complete, though one is missing its back cover – not affecting the story content. The second series, number between #127 and #245 (publication dates from 1951 to 1957) average VG, generally sound and clean with occasional rusty staples. Just to spell it out once again: these are text stories with illustrations, not comics. This cornucopia of prototypical Girl Power is yours for a mere £25 – UK postage, if required, a further £5.’ SOLD

*Marvel: This early Lee & Kirby classic saw the introduction of one of the Fantastic Four’s nemeses, the malevolent Mad Thinker! A strategic genius, criminal mastermind and brilliant scientist in multiple fields, the Thinker’s intellect is believed to be the equal of Reed Richards himself. Despite being a thorn in the collective sides of the FF and multiple other Marvel heroes, the Thinker’s background and origin remained entirely unexplored for more than half a century. Also premiering here, the Thinker’s Awesome Android, initially just a near-mindless artificial henchperson, who over the years blossomed into an endearing supprting character as a co-worker of the She-Hulk in her later series. No, really. This is a beautiful Fine copy, minor wear at cover corners, but a lovely bright yellow cover background colour completely unmarred, firm staples, tiny trace of Marvel chipping at upper right cover edge not harming the main cover image at all.
PICTURED: FANTASTIC FOUR #15 FN p £150 SOLD

*Marvel: Two prime Pre-Hero Marvel anthologies of shocks and twist endings, from the fertile mind of Stan Lee, with artistic collaborators Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko, Don Heck, and okay, Paul Reinman, but never mind. Issue #34 brings us ‘Inside the Blue Glass Bottle!’, ‘The Forbidden World!’, ‘The Coming of the Giants!’ and ‘Who Am I?’, while #37 introduces us to ‘Hagg, Hunter of Helpless Humans!’, ‘Behold The Monster!’ and ‘A Voice In The Dark!’. Both are beautiful bright crisp copies, with sharp corners and only very fine wear at edges, unmarred cover scenes with vivid unfaded colour.
PICTURED: TALES OF SUSPENSE
#34 FN p £80
#37 FN+ p £110

*DC: Heralded at the time of its release with the house ad: ‘Just Imagine… the mightiest heroes of our time have banded together to stamp out the forces of evil’, and by Cracky, the original line-up – Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, Aquaman, Flash and the Martian Manhunter – gave it a good shot, devoting themselves not just to America – or even Earth – but to other worlds, galaxies and dimensions, thwarting the bad guys on a universal scale, as imaginatively portrayed by writer Gardner Fox and artists Sekowsky and Sachs! Following a three-issue tryout in Brave & Bold, the team was awarded its own title, and faced off for the first time against Despero, the alien warlord who was to menace them on many occasions. You can see why Marvel publisher Martin Goodman asked Stan Lee to come up with something as good; Stan’s response? The Fantastic Four! But for our money, as great as the FF were, the JLA were first and best! This GD/VG copy is cents, no UK price or overstamp, with clean flexible interior pages and firm staples at centrefold, although the bottom staple (only) has become detached from the cover. There is light wear at spine and a tiny shallow tear at lower cover corner, in the shadows behind the Flash’s chair. Generally an extremely well-presenting copy for its grade.
PICTURED: JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #1 GD/VG £475

*DC: Before Julius Schwartz took over the editorlal helm of the Batman titles in 1964, it was a time of strange transformations, bizarre aliens, the Batman family and, occasionally, the famous villains. Eight issues new in this time from this period between #116 and #163, including Bat-Mite and Bat-Girl in #144, Bat-Baby in #147, the classic ‘Robin Dies At Dawn’ in #156, Ace ‘The Super Bat-Hound’ in #158, the Joker in #163 and more.

*Marvel: One of the later breakout characters of Marvel, Frank Castle, aka bereaved urban vigilante the Punisher, became one of the company’s super-stars in the 1990s, but had spent most of the previous two decades ‘bubbling under’ as a guest-starring anti-hero. His media presence – and commercial appeal – has been heightened by numerous film and TV appearances. The Punisher’s first appearance in Amazing Spider-Man #129, February 1974, is particularly rare in the UK, where, owing to the presence of Spider-Man Comics Weekly, the US title was embargoed for distribution for several years. This is a cents copy (there are no pence copies, of course), CGC certified Blue Label (no restoration) graded 9.4 (NM equivalent).
PICTURED: AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #129 CGC 9.4 NM £2500

*Marvel: Amazing Spider-Man #252, like many Secret Wars ‘epilogue’ issues, featured a major ‘twist’ only explained retroactively. In Spidey’s case, it was a dramatic black & white costume which would eventually be revealed as an alien symbiote, which in turn would evolve into Venom, who eclipsed most longer-established villains to become Spidey’s crucial nemesis for the modern era. Although the first appearance of the symbiote in internal continuity was Secret Wars #8, its debut in real time was this very issue. This VF copy has bright cover colour, tight staples, sharp corners, minimal corner ‘blunting’.
PICTURED: AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #252 VF p £50

*Marvel: A chunky entry in our Spider-Mania Max event comprises the last few years of the original run of Amazing Spider-Man, from #366 to #441, with every issue present and almost all in a sparkling Near Mint grade. A period of variant, foil and die-cut covers, free gift inserts and much Venom and Carnage, of course. All now there on our website for your entertainment, but I guess many of them won’t last for long. We’ve chosen to represent this period scans of #430 & #431 with the Silver Surfer and the Cosmic Carnage. Enjoy!  
PICTURED: AMAZING SPIDER-MAN
#430 NM £35 SOLD
#431 NM £50 SOLD

*Marvel: Let’s be honest, on the face of it, the She-Hulk sounded like a really lame idea when we first heard of her — what was to follow? Hulk-Hound, the Hulkmobile, Planet Hulk? But intermittently chartreuse lawyer Jen Walters has gone on to become one of the most enduring and endearing characters in the Marvel Universe, with creators such as John Byrne and Dan Slott providing charm, wit and (mostly) intelligent humour in her own series and during tenures with the Avengers and the Fantastic Four. There wasn’t too much trace of that in Jen’s first series, the Savage She-Hulk, when it saw the light of day back in 1980 and she was as angry as her cousin (though didn’t burst out of quite as much of her clothing, thanks to the exigencies of the Comics Code Authority) but Savage She-Hulk #1 – by the legendary creators Stan Lee and John Buscema – is where Jen’s illustrious career got its start. Non-distributed in the UK, so there are no pence copies. A very slight ‘darkening’ of the cover’s edge, less than 1mm deep, means that this is a ‘mere’ VF, but a lovely copy nonetheless.
PICTURED: SAVAGE SHE-HULK #1 VF £65 SOLD

*Marvel: Civil War, the mini-series commencing in 2006, has attracted much attention lately by way of its ‘template’ status for 2016’s Captain America: Civil War film. While the movie dealt with a microcosm of events as compared to the comics series, most key plot points, including the climactic Iron Man/Cap battle, were re-used in the film, and as such this comparatively recent series has acquired some collectible lustre. This is a complete set of the series, all first prints, all NM.
PICTURED: CIVIL WAR #1 NM; SET 1-7 NM £55

*Horror/Mystery 1960-1980s: Who says comics aren’t educational? Did you know, for example, that the collective noun for Ghosts is a ‘fright’ of ghosts? Be that as it may, that’s just what we have for you this week, with several issues of Ghosts, accompanied by smatterings of Black Magic, House Of Secrets, the Unexpected and the Witching Hour.

*Boys’ Adventure & War Comics: Tiger weekly, birthplace of the iconic character Roy of the Rovers and scores more, ran from 1954 to 1985, a staggering total of 1,555 issues. We are delighted to have the first 185 of said issues now in stock, the longest unbroken run of early Tigers ever in our possession, from 1954’s premier issue to 1958’s #185 (plus a later issue from 1959 #235). Apart from Roy himself, most of Tiger’s iconic figures debuted in later years than those covered by this run, but one conspicuous exception is Olac the Gladiator, who premiered in 1957’s #166 and ran for more than a decade until 1969. This – I was going to say ‘pride’ of Tigers, but apparently the correct collective noun is an ‘ambush’, and it certainly took us by surprise! – is all from one careful original owner and all issues are in nice shape, with no tanning or browning and creamy off-white to white pages, very minor foxing at edges in a handful of later issues only. At some point in their history, the original owner has removed the staples to prevent rust incursion, which is minimal in most cases; indeed, the degree of light staple rust and size of holes (all small) following removal is the determining factor for the award of grades in most issues. There are just a few minor tears on a handful of issues, although these are all small and inconsequential. Although all copies have been folded with a single horizontal fold, this has not weakened the comics at all where the fold occurs. Tigers from the 1950s, when its slightly larger size exposed it to potentially more wear and damage, turn up very seldom, so a significant unbroken run like this is a rare sighting.
PICTURED: TIGER
#1 GD £175 SOLD
#2 VG £80 SOLD
#3 GD/VG £60 SOLD
TIGER #1-40 & MANY OTHER ISSUES NOW SOLD; SOME STILL AVAILABLE — PLEASE ENQUIRE

*Boys’ Adventure & War Comics: Launched in 1979 as a companion to 2000 AD, Tornado’s stars included psychic teen delinquency with ‘The Mind of Wolfie Smith’, rebellious slave ‘Black Hawk’, superheroic parody ‘Captain Klep’ illustrated by Kevin O’Neill, and the UK’s first – ahem – real-life super-hero, in the form of the ‘Big E’, acted out by not-yet-superstar artist Dave Gibbons in a fetching cape, tights & wellies ensemble! Lasting only 22 issues in total – after which Wolfie, Black Hawk and Capt. Klep migrated over to 2000 AD – we have the entire run again new in stock, averaging VG — see our catalogue listing for full details.

*Girls’ Comics: Many people don’t realise that, before its long association with June, School Friend was a weekly comic in its own right, launched in 1950 and running until 1965, best remembered as the original home of the ‘Silent Three’. We have three issues of School Friend from 1960, when the line-up of stories included ‘The Gay Princess’, ‘Ella and the Enchanted Garden’, ‘Schoolgirl Secret Agent’, and ‘Jane and the Ghostly Hound’, among others. This is a consecutive triptych of free gifts, the first featuring a charm bracelet with three charms, and the next two each supplying three more charms to complete the bracelet set. The first two comics are VG, the third GD, with the free gifts, in their original envelopes, FN.
PICTURED: SCHOOL FRIEND
21/5/60 VG WITH FREE GIFT FN £35 SOLD
28/5/60 VG WITH FREE GIFT FN £35 SOLD
4/6/60 GD WITH FREE GIFT FN £30 SOLD

On a regular cycle, we sweep through our entire stock to delete sold items and keep our listing as up to date as possible. We’ve just finished deleting sold items from the following files in our American section:
*Marvel A – C
and in our British section
*Boys’ Adventure & War Comics L – T
As of the time of writing, these files are bang up to date, with every item listed available.