*DC: Issue #54 of Brave & Bold teamed up three junior partners of DC’s major super-heroes – Kid Flash, Aqualad and Robin – as a kind of junior Justice League. This proved to be such a hit that issue #60 of the same title ‘got the band back together’, with the addition of Wonder Girl, this time with their own name, the Teen Titans! Often overlooked is the fact that B & B #60 is actually a double debut: not only the premier of the Teen Titans title, but the first appearance of Donna Troy as Wonder Girl – previous WG tales had just been stories of Wonder Woman’s younger adventures, a la Superboy, but this was the first WG as an independent entity. Donna and Robin both being mainstays of the Netflix ‘Titans’ series, interest in the ‘classic’ Titans line-up is once again gathering momentum. This copy is a very lovely FN/VF, with the black cover background largely unmarred, only a few light spine ‘ticks’. Firm staples at cover and centrefold, with good interior page quality.
PICTURED: BRAVE AND THE BOLD #60 FN/VF p £275

*DC: Spinning out of a popular back-up feature in the Superman titles, a three-part World of Krypton saga was supposed to appear in numbers 104 to 106 of Showcase, originally intended to coincide with the release of the Superman movie. When Showcase fell foul of the infamous ‘DC Implosion’, the prepared pages were held in storage for a couple of years, until 1979, when DC decided to release them as a stand-alone mini-series, the first such by DC or any other publisher. Until then, series that were at least intended to be ongoing, even if they didn’t ‘ongo’ very far, had been the industry norm, but this was the first series released, at the dawn of the Direct Market, with an intentionally fixed span. Written by Paul Kupperberg, it explores the last few years of Krypton’s existence, the events immediately prior to the planet’s destruction, illustrated by Howard Chaykin and Murphy Anderson. This complete 3 issue series is averaging NM-, cents copies with no UK stamp or overprint.
PICTURED: WORLD OF KRYPTON #1 NM- (SET OF 3: £25)

*Marvel: Perhaps the greatest of Iron Man’s many enemies is the Mandarin, a master of science, martial arts, and controller of an international network of operatives, whose ruthlessness is outmatched only by his ingenuity. And he’s got the bling, too! Famously, each of Mandy’s digits carries a ring (“More than Zsa Zsa Gabor”, as Ben Grimm once remarked) with its own unique powers, at their master’s deadly disposal. This is a superlative copy of the Mandarin’s first appearance, VF+ with vivid colour, excellent gloss and only the most minimal spine ticks. A pence copy, labelled rather than the usual stamp or overprint. The definitive Iron Man arch-foe (albeit a bit non-PC nowadays, which is why you’re unlikely to see a ‘straight’ version of him on screen any time soon). High resolution images are available on request.
PICTURED: TALES OF SUSPENSE #50 VF+ p £750

*Marvel: By the time of Spider-Man’s 50th issue, ‘new’ artist John Romita had made the series his own, and this milestone number was marked with the debut of a new villain, the Kingpin – so long associated with Daredevil, in the post-Miller years, that younger readers are unaware of the fact that he originated in Spider-Man’s Rogues’ Gallery! The cover of #50, with Peter temporarily abandoning his Spider-Man identity, has become etched in the minds of a generation, endlessly imitated and ‘homaged’, in comics and other media. This copy of Spider-Man #50 is a sound and clean, attractive FN+ pence copy with the classic cover scene unmarred. It would grade higher but for the presence of a previous owner’s name and a date on the upper back cover margin – neat and unobtrusive writing.
PICTURED: SPIDER-MAN #50 FN+ p £375 SOLD

*Marvel: Created in a cocoon by scientists in Fantastic Four, the supernaturally gifted being known only as ‘Him’ made a couple of cameo appearances in previous issues of Thor, but #165 featured the first full appearance of the character, and the earliest inkling of the extent of his powers. Eventually, re-named Warlock, ‘Him’ would become a mainstay of Marvel’s cosmic sagas in the 1970s and beyond, but here was the first full outing, in a two-part battle with Thor for the hand (and other parts) of the warrior-maiden Sif, Thor’s main squeeze. This two-parter is newly available; #165 is GD/VG with approx. 1/2″ upper spine split. #166 is VG/FN. Both are cents copies with no UK price stamp or overprint.
PICTURED: THOR
#165 GD/VG £75
#166 VG/FN £55

*Marvel: After a one-off black & white magazine in 1975, Legion of Monsters, used up a rag-bag of separate inventory stories starring Frankenstein’s Monster, Dracula, Manphibian and other horror heroes, someone at Marvel decided that the title was nifty enough to merit a further outing, and therefore the bizarre and otherwise inexplicable Marvel Premiere #28 came about. Unlike the Legion of Monsters one-shot, which featured unrelated stories, Marvel Premiere #28 brought Ghost Rider, Man-Thing, Werewolf By Night and Morbius the Living Vampire together as an actual team, albeit one even more mis-matched than the Champions! From the team of Bill Mantlo and Frank Robbins, it’s… everything you might expect! For decades discarded in bargain boxes everywhere, this issue has acquired white-hot collector’s status in the last decade.
PICTURED: MARVEL PREMIERE #28 VF p £55 SOLD

*Marvel: Following his successful mini-series, it wasn’t going to be long before Frank Castle, vengeful ex-family man and assassin-for-hire, got his own ongoing title, and in 1987 Marvel duly obliged, kicking off Fearless Frank’s longest-running series to date, in which he travelled around the world exterminating, erm, assassins and other criminals (yeah, but they were worse criminals than he was, all right?), while occasionally teaming up with super-heroes who logically should have been queuing up to arrest him. Be that as it may, here’s the first ish!
PICTURED: PUNISHER (1987) #1 VF p £20

*Horror/Mystery 1960-1980s: From the late 60s to the late 70s, Marvel had a thriving line of horror/mystery series, both anthologies (with new and reprint material) and series-led once the liberalisation of the Comics Code in the early 70s allowed classic monsters such as vampires to be presented as, at least, anti-heroes. We have new stocks to Chamber of Chills (from #2), Chamber of Darkness (from #3), Fear (starring the Man-Thing and Morbius the Living Vampire – the latter with the first and final issues of his solo series, plus a crossover by film star Blade, Vampire Slayer, in a wide variety of grades!), Frankenstein Monster/Monster of Frankenstein (from #6), Giant-Size Chillers #1 (first series from 1974, starring Dracula and introducing the Daughter of Darkness, Lilith!), and Supernatural Chillers (from #5, featuring the premiere of the Living Mummy!). Exact details of grades and prices to be found in our online catalogue.

*Vintage Magazine-Sized Comics: Always keenly-pursued (and keenly perused, come to that), Marvel’s magazine-sized comics have been extensively restocked this update, with new entries for Bizarre Adventures, Deadly Hands of Kung Fu, Marvel Preview – starring Blade Vampire Slayer, Moon Knight, Star-Lord and Sherlock Holmes, among others – Rampaging Hulk, Vampire Tales, and Savage Sword of Conan – Marvel’s longest-running magazine, clocking in at 235 issues ending in 1995; we have his very first edition from 1974, plus a scattering of others! A Marvelous medley of plus-size pandemonium!
PICTURED:
MARVEL PREVIEW #1 VF+ £25
MARVEL PREVIEW #21 VF £35
SAVAGE SWORD OF CONAN #1 FN+ £35 SOLD

*Marvel UK: In the early 1980s, Marvel UK was broadening its readership and acquiring a reputation for high standards of creativity, largely revolving about the works of Alan Moore, who, in conjunction with Alan Davis, had taken the recently revived Captain Britain character away from a series of clichés and into new imaginative heights. In 1983, Captain Britain was the headliner for the Daredevils monthly, with extra-length Moore & Davis Captain B. episodes, plus new Night Raven text stories, reprints of Frank Miller’s acclaimed Daredevil series, and many other articles and features, frequently also written by Moore. We have all 11 issues of the Daredevils series back in stock, averaging FN, each one of which, in addition to the obvious creative appeal, has a full-colour centrefold pull-out, usually by Davis.
PICTURED: DAREDEVILS #1 FN £15 SOLD

*Boys’ Adventure & War Picture Libraries: Continuing our systematic restock of Air Ace, we have now reached the 400’s, with yet more tales of daring pilots in combat. This is virtually a complete run, lacking only a handful of the range from #400 to #499, but the condition is exemplary. From one single source, a newsagent’s unsold inventory, these are copies which have never been circulated, and are in a remarkable state of preservation, averaging VF, an unusual grade for British comics of this vintage. Our massive Air Ace stock-up will touch down in the very near future – keep watching for the final (for now) update!

*Girls’ Comics: The long-running companion to Bunty, Judy launched in 1960 and lasted in excess of thirty years. Home of proto-feminist ‘Bobby Dazzler’, peripatetic nurse ‘Fay Farrell’, exploited Victorian waif ‘Wee Slavey’ and many more well-remembered strips, we have restocked our Judy inventory with just over 150 issues, ranging from 1967, when sci-fi series ‘Marina and the Blue Mountain’ and secret agent ‘The Girl From D.O.R.S.E.T’ ruled the covers, to 1976, when the front of the mag was devoted to some truly hideous and unrecognizable portraits of pop stars, drawn by someone who had clearly never seen the people in question – or possibly never even seen another human being!

*TV/Film Tie-Ins: This update significantly increases the law and order quotient on the book shelves. First up is Columbo #2, The Dean’s Death, then the eponymous Dixon Of Dock Green (tracing Dixon from constable to station-sergeant over seven stories). Policewoman #1, The Rape, features Angie Dickinson on the cover and is based on a TV script. The final book is The Expert, featuring forensic pathologist Dr John Hardy ‘helping the police with their enquiries’. All four books have TV covers, and Dixon Of Dock Green also includes two black and white stills.

*DC: Another more ‘modern’ addition to our listings is Preacher #1 from DC’s Vertigo imprint. A mere 23 years ago, Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon brought us the tale of the eponymous Preacher, Jesse Custer, who travels across America on a mission to track down God with the assistance of his gorgeous hitwoman girlfriend and his best friend, an Irish vampire. As you do. Sexist, racist, violent, twisted, homophobic, misogynist and thoroughly, thoroughly blasphemous, Preacher was also intelligent, viciously insightful, and outrageously funny. Lasting 66 issues and a handful of Specials, Preacher broke boundaries and won both acclaim and controversy in abundance. Recently made into a TV show which has attracted a cult following, readers should be advised that the TV series is restrained and discreet compared to the original comic! No, really.
PICTURED: PREACHER #1 FN p £45

*DC: DC’s 1987 company-wide crossover Legends introduced a fistful of new concepts they were generating post- Crisis On Infinite Earths. Issue #1 saw the first appearance of the formidable Amanda Waller, and the final issue #6 saw the introduction of the ‘new’ Justice League, as manifested in their own series by Giffen, DeMatteis and Maguire. The later breakout issue of this series, however, was #3, which brought in the most successful version to date of the Suicide Squad, under the direction of the aforementioned Ms. Waller. While the name ‘Suicide Squad’ had been used twice in the DCU before – once for a team of non-superpowered adventurers in Brave & Bold, and once for a series of stories in the war titles, this was the one which caught on. Unwillingly reformed super-villains, the team took on insanely hazardous missions with the dangling promise of freedom if they earned enough ‘time’ off their sentences – or the alternative of a swift and brutal death at the hands of their governmental captors if they crossed the line. A massive hit, this Suicide Squad spun off into several acclaimed series, and of course, a flawed-but successful major film release in 2016. This entire 6 issue set of Legends is NM pence copies.
PICTURED: LEGENDS #3 (COMPLETE SET OF 6 NM £50) SOLD

*Marvel: They don’t come much hotter these days than Iron Man #55, wherein the cosmic arch-villain Thanos, nemesis of Marvel’s Cinematic Universe, made his first appearance, the brainchild of fan favourite writer/artist Jim Starlin. Thanos has of course gone on to plague Marvel’s heroes in comics and movies ever since, but here is where it all started. This landmark issue also features the debuts of Drax the Destroyer, Mentor, Eros (later Starfox of the Avengers) and Kronos. With Avengers: Endgame, in which Thanos is the Big Bad, having broken box-office records in cinemas worldwide, the character’s debut is only going to become more sought after. This copy is VF, bright and tight with firm staples at cover and centrefold, sharp corners and vivid cover colour with no discernible creasing or blemish. A pence priced copy. High resolution images are available on request.
PICTURED: IRON MAN #55 VF p £550

*Marvel: There are few more significant debuts in the latter days of the 20th Century than that of cuddly brain-sucking symbiote Venom, who graduated from being a genetically modified costume in a jar to the fully-fledged Emperor of Spidey’s Rogue’s Gallery! ‘The Venom Trilogy’, is Amazing Spider-Man #298-300, leading up to the first full appearance of Venom. Having debuted in Secret Wars #8 as a semi-sentient blob which configured itself into Spider-Man’s new costume, the ‘symbiote’ became a regular feature in Spidey’s own series before being revealed as a malevolent alien parasite which disclosed its true agenda in these very issues! #298 is the first brief appearance of Eddie Brock (the man who would become Venom) and the beginning of Todd MacFarlane’s run as artist; #299 features the first cameo of Venom himself and the big one, #300 (light to moderate spine ‘ticks’) is the first ‘Full Venom’.
PICTURED: AMAZING SPIDER-MAN
#298 NM- p £55
#299 VF/NM p £40
#300 FN+ p £150

*Marvel: Two science-fiction based super-teams long associated with the X-Men are the Imperial Guard and the Starjammers, and both, oddly, were the result of artist Dave Cockrum’s impatience. Cockrum had illustrated a critically acclaimed and successful run of DC’s Legion of Super-heroes, but following altercations with editor Murray Boltinoff, Cockrum quit the Legion and DC to co-create the ‘New’ X-Men. By way of cocking a snook at DC, Dave came up with a suspiciously similar team of alien super-heroes, the Imperial Guard, each one of which was a (just barely) non-litigious clone of a Legionnaire. Similarly, the Starjammers had been created by Cockrum for a solo tryout in Marvel Premiere or Marvel Spotlight, but on being told those books’ schedules were filled years in advance, Cockrum offered the band of space pirates to X-Men scripter Chris Claremont, who bolted on a retconned relationship to an X-Man and threw them into the mix. This issue saw the first full appearance of both teams (the Starjammers having done the ‘enigmatic cameo’ bit since #104), taking the cast list – never forgetting our mutant heroes – to around 50, for a full-on free-for-all! This copy of X-Men #107 is an outstanding NM, cents (no UK copies exists, as the issue was not distributed here).
PICTURED: X-MEN #107 NM £275

*Marvel: Following his debut in Marvel Spotlight #5, Johnny Blaze, a.k.a. the Satanic stunt-biker Ghost Rider, gathered momentum – as one would expect – and tore through a series of supernatural adventures until issue #11, after which he ceded the Marvel Spotlight gig to Son of Satan, and Johnny B. span out into his own successful 80+ issue series. We have the Ghost Rider run of Marvel Spotlight, courtesy of his creator ‘Groovy’ Gary Friedrich and artist Mike Ploog, from #6, the character’s second ever appearance, to #11, in superior condition, all cents copies.
PICTURED: MARVEL SPOTLIGHT
#6 VF/NM £76 SOLD
#7 VF+ £58

*Marvel: Following her guest appearances in Conan the Barbarian, demand for a Red Sonja solo series mounted, and after a trial run in Marvel feature (second series) the ‘revised’ version as redesigned by Frank Thorne gained her own series in 1977, notorious chain-mail bikini and all. Despite the skimpier clothing, Thorne’s Sonja was often more scary than sexy, as Thorne drew her with intense expressions that bordered on the deranged, for a very mixed message indeed. We have the entire 15 issue series from 1977-1979 newly in stock, averaging VF/NM, all cents copies.
PICTURED: RED SONJA #1 (1977) NM £50 SOLD

*Miscellaneous 1940-1959: Launched in 1950, Captain Science, aka Gordon Dane, was a sci-fi hero in the vein of Buck Rogers who fought all manner of outer space villains including flying saucers, monster gods, alien warriors, and even domestic traitors, with the help of his young assistant Rip Gary (a name, not an instruction!) and his shapely Gal Friday Luana, who favoured the ever so practical bra-n’-panties-under-cellophane-‘spacesuit’ ensemble so beloved of pulp sci-fi heroines – or at least by their illustrators! Since one of said illustrators was the fabulous Wally Wood, what ought to have looked cheesy and exploitative, mind, often looked sophisticated and glamourous. The intrepid trio faced down the Cat Men of Phobos, the Space Pirates of Lenthus IV, the Deadly Dwarfs of Deimos, the Martian Slavers, and the Insidious Doctor Khartoum, among others, while in the back-up pages, interplanetary private eye Brant Craig battled space crooks while sporting a rather silly-looking ‘Thunderbirds’ titfer. These are very lovely and highly sought-after issues, seldom seen on the market, and we’re lucky to have attained a complete run of Captain Science, #1-7. #1 has its spine glued and rebuilt, extra staples removed and a right edge microtrim. #3 has extreme spine wear (and a shameless cover swipe from Wings Comics!). #4 has its cover detached from both staples. #5, by contrast, has extra staples reinforcing the original ones and #6 has moderate spine wear. Wally Wood’s art graces #1,# 4 & #5. With issue #8, it morphed into a more general SF series, Fantastic, though the Captain continued to appear for a while.
PICTURED: CAPTAIN SCIENCE
#1 App. VG+ £100 SOLD
#2 VG/FN £125 SOLD
#3 GD- £75 SOLD
#4 FA+ £75
#5 GD/VG £125 SOLD
#6 FN £300 SOLD
#7 GD £125 SOLD

*Western: Launched as a reprint title in 1970, DC’s All-Star Western chugged along, adding a couple of original series, including the rather splendid ‘El Diablo’ illustrated by Dick Giordano and Gray Morrow, achieving respect but not a great deal of attention. With its tenth issue, dated Feb-March 1972, all that changed. Jonah Hex, a horribly scarred, surly and cynical bounty hunter with a compulsion to defend the innocent, joined the line-up, and a superstar was born. Created by writer John Albano and artist Tony DeZuniga, Hex was heavily ‘influenced’ (ahem ahem) by the spaghetti-western fad prevalent at the time, as popularised by such actors as Clint Eastwood, but his own twisted code of honour kept readers fascinated through his own 92 issue series and myriad subsequent relaunches, as well as other media appearances in film and in DC’s Legends of Tomorrow TV show. This copy of Jonah Hex’s debut is CGC Blue Label (no restoration) 4.5 VG+.
PICTURED: ALL-STAR WESTERN #10 CGC 4.5 £135 SOLD

*Alan Class Reprints: Five more plate sets from the Alan Class Private Collection, each one reprinting a story from the Silver Age of Marvel’s super-heroes – in most cases, as previously remarked, the first reprinting of these classic tales, very shortly after their first release! All five feature, in addition to publisher Alan Class’s file copies of the comics, the four lead printing plate sets originally used in production, plus a hand-signed Certificate of authenticity from Alan Class himself. All sets are supplied in a plastic presentation/display case.

Creepy Worlds #34 is one of a string of CW issues reprinting early Fantastic Fours, not quite in sequence. This issue re-presents Fantastic Four #4, in which an accidental encounter with the Human Torch brings the Golden Age anti-hero, the Sub-Mariner, into the Silver Age Marvel Universe! Creepy Worlds #71 re-presents issue #9 of the Amazing Spider-Man, with the first appearance of Electro. In addition to the usual four cover colour plates, this set offers an additional two interior plates – one of which is the splash page of the Spider-Man story! Suspense #91 presents a Daredevil double-feature, reprinting issues #35 & #36 of the original series. Suspense #104 features not one, but two issues from the original Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD series, #13 and #14. And Astounding Stories #80 reprints X-Men #55, behind an early cover by Barry (later Windsor-) Smith! Full details as always in our catalogue.
PICTURED: CREEPY WORLDS
#34 VG £125
#71 VG/FN £100

*Boys’ Adventure & War Comics: 70+ new issues to our lists for Valiant, home of such noted adventure series as ‘Captain Hurricane’, ‘Kelly’s Eye’, ‘Steel Claw’, House of Dolmann’, ‘Raven on the Wing’, ‘Mytek the Mighty’, ‘The Wild Wonders’ and dozens more remembered fondly by generations. This selection, from 1968 to 1976, includes the titles absorption of fallen stablemates and step-siblings Smash!, TV 21 and Lion, bringing popular series such as ‘Janus Stark’, ‘Adam Eterno’, ‘Zip Nolan’, and TV’s ‘Star Trek’ to an already stellar line-up. This run goes up to the penultimate issue of 1976 – shortly after which it fell into the gaping maw of the upstart Battle, and Valiant’s proud legacy was done. But you can re-live it with this selection from the title’s prime!

*Humour Comics: It’s a one-two punch for the funnies this update, as we have loads of Knockout, the comic with two lives! Series one was launched in 1939, one of the earliest funny weeklies as we recognise them, pre-dated only by the D.C. Thomson superstars Dandy and Beano. Home of ‘Deed-A-Day Danny’, ‘Sporty’, ‘Mike’, and ‘Stoneage Kit the Ancient Brit’, among many more funny folk, the series also ran a respectable number of adventure strips, including ‘Buffalo Bill’ ‘Thunderbolt Jaxon’, ‘Battler Britton’, and ‘Davy Crockett’. Star of the show, though, was Billy Bunter, who had migrated from Magnet in 1940, and the heavyweight humour champ transferred over to Valiant when Knockout breathed its last in 1963, after a very respectable 1,251 issues. Our newest selection of series one ranges 110 issues from 1948 to 1951, in grades averaging GD/VG. We then follow up with the second series, launched in 1971 and having nothing to do with the first other than the name. Although Knockout Mk. II didn’t having the staying power of its predecessor, lasting a mere 106 issues before merging into Whizzer & Chips, ‘The Toffs and the Toughs’, ‘Fuss Pot’, ‘Pete’s Pockets’ and ‘Joker’ (no relation to Batman’s arch-nemesis) all lasted long enough to make the jump and enjoy rather longer careers in W & C than in their original home. We have 35 of Knockout series 2 new in, averaging VG, and including the final issue.