Friday, October 10, 2014
The Grooviest Covers of All Time: Marvel Goes Giant-Size (Part One)
Ah, Groove-ophiles, can ya remember back in early 1974 to early 1975 when Mighty Marvel unleashed their 68 page, fifty cent Giant-Size line of quarterly comics? A bonus-length lead feature plus a classic Silver Age (or even Golden Age if we were lucky) tale, all square-bound and stapled under some of the best Gil Kane, John Romita, Frank Brunner, Rich Buckler, and many others' color-splashed covers... Here (in no particular order) are a few of Ol' Groove's faves from the pre-re-print Giant-Size era!
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I only have 6 of these... X-Men is expensive
ReplyDeleteFunny--they were just fifty cents where I bought mine. ;D Seriously, the square-bound format is notorious for splitting and covers coming loose, so good condition copies of these puppies are steep, indeed. If I knew then what I know now (and my folks had known), I'd have gotten at least 10 copies of each!
DeleteI bought mine for $15 when I was 12, and I thought my Dad would flip out!!! Shame I had to sell it a few years later...still, I got $45 out of it. Wonder what my Dad would think at what a Mint condition copy goes for now...
DeleteThat Conan Giant was a real standout, with Kane inked by Sutton, serialized over a few issues, but, heartbreakingly, never finished by Kane in the color format. Eventually it was concluded by Buscema in SSOC, but what a monumental collection it could've been, if Giant-Size Conan hadn't suddenly converted to a reprint book.
ReplyDeleteAnd most of 'em are here on the blog!
Delete"Howard the Duck faces death at the hands of Gorko the Man-Frog."
ReplyDeleteI'm disturbed by how much I want to see what happens with this.
Of all the elements of the Bronze Age (new characters, stretching the Code, etc.), really nothing screams to the era like these Giant-Size mags. Love 'em!
ReplyDeleteMarvel made such a huge error in not including these in the dvd-roms from Gitcorp about a decade ago. Of course, not continuing to capture all of their material in that format may have been the bigger error, as far as consumers are concerned!
Doug
This entry has had me grinning all evening.
ReplyDeleteThank you.
I can still remember finding that Giant Size Spider-man in a second hand store for only a few bucks in the early 90's. I was so tickled to find such a early punshier appearance so cheap.
ReplyDeleteI only have three here and agree they are very hard to find in nice grade. I saw the X-Men Giant size once for 200 in a second hand book store and just didn't have the money. But man does that come to mind everytime I see the book.
Shand G.
Another great post, Groovester! I think at one time I had all dese comix....sniff....
ReplyDelete