Speaking of The Beatles (kind of), Marvel Super Special #7 (adaptation of the Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band film) was never released in the US due to the horrible response to the film, and the series jumped right to #8 with Battlestar Galactica. It was only released in a few foreign markets, including this Dutch version:

Weird. Never knew that. And as much as I love both the Bee Gees and The Beatles, that movie is unwatchable.

I watched it once out of curiousity, and oof it was a complete trainwreck.

Cover by Neal Adams and Dick Giordano.

Zowie how I absolutely love this story. First read it when I was 6 in my prized hardcover collection "Superman from the 30s to the 70s" and it absolutely blew my mind. Imagine being six and the story's twist first introduces you to the concept of

. Unreal.

Oh, that book (and the companion Batman one) were fantastic. When I was a kid, our local library had both and I borrowed them constantly to read and re-read. I really need to find copies of my own one day.

Not an actual cover, but a satirical homage to Adventure Comics #247 (1st Legion appearance). This is a page from Ambush Bug: Year None, and if you aren't reading Ambush Bug, shame on you!

Not a cover but awesome none the less....

Marie Severin

Cool cover but would have been cooler had the blast busted through the title logo as well.

Since I lost my childhood copies long ago, I bought both off eBay about 20 years ago, back when they still could be found at reasonable prices. I promised myself I wouldn't draw in them this time.

When it comes to Fantastic Four, it's always:

1) Stan Lee/Jack Kirby
2) John Byrne

but nobody ever brings up the great Walt Simonson, whose run on the title was in my opinion a very close #3.

And if you've read this comic, you'd know why:



That 12:33 at the lower right isn't just some random bit; it's a clue to reading the entire comic. Doom and Richards battle each other on a completely different timeline than the rest of the characters in the book. You could read the comic start to finish and understand what's going on, but like a "Choose Your Own Adventure" the Doom/Richards battle does not occur in linear order. As the battle starts a time is displayed, and you have to flip to that panel (either several pages forward or back from where you are) to follow how their battle progresses.

The cover is part of it as well. The comic would tell you to look at the cover (12:33AM) to see how Richards escaped from being trapped by Doom under tons of rock. Essentially, his past self has to blast him out of it (unwittingly).

It was one of the most imaginative and mindblowingly FUN comics I've ever read.

And soon after Simonson left the title and was replaced by... Tom DeFalco. Who utterly stunk the joint out with a five year run that was an absolute paradigm of 90s Marvel mediocrity. Remember Sue Richards running around in a scantily-clad costume and Alicia Masters (Johnny's wife) revealed to be a Skrull? Yeeeahhh....

I made the mistake of starting Fantastic Four right after Byrne left. I think I was suckered into buying the 25th anniversary issue & kept going for about a year, waiting for it to get good. I'm intrigued by a Walt Simonson run. I might have to look into that.



I really liked those 25th Anniversary portrait covers at the time. I don't remember how many I actually have. I should do a search to see if anyone has put them all together as a wallpaper..

The Simonson run is where I got off. I'm not a big fan of his art style. (Although, his work on the X-MEN/New Teen Titans team up was great.)

I've always been ambivalent when it comes to Simonson. Some of his art looks good, but more often than not, there's just something about that has always looked rushed and unfinished to my eyes. (Particularly on his X-Factor tenure.) Maybe it depends on who's inking him...

Scratchy artwork was a very prominent style from the early 80s to the early 90s... probably because of the influence of Sienkiewicz and Janson, and Simonson's art seemed to reflect that.

The Hickman Fantastic Four is great as well. And I always love Waid and Weiringo (RIP) on anything.

One of my older Action Comics I had as a kid. Weird Lois Lane stuff was always fun.



And a couple I didn't have but are fun covers. I find it funny that Lex's bride is bald too.



And a Clark Kent/Superman fight before Superman III!

I love how Lex is marrying some chick with allopecia.

Late 60s to early 80s Superman/Action comics had some amazing covers, but most of the stories weren't quite as compelling. But I loved how Alan Moore made the ENTIRE Silver/Bronze -age Superman mythos cool again in "Whatever happened to the Man of Tomorrow?"

I loved Simonson's art. It was never clean, but it was always dynamic and IMO amazing with the big cosmic Marvel stuff. His runs on Thor and FF are iconic IMO.

Funny. I don't want to turn this into a Tom DeFalco pile-on but he managed to Thor into a turd as well...

Even though I was never a huge X-Men fan as a kid, I devoured this series when it came out. I loved the Arthur Adams covers.

Arthur Adams is one of my favorites, a reasonably close third, maybe fourth, after Byrne and Perez, the two illustrators who inspired me directly as an artist (by copying them as a kid, of course!). I was glad to see Marvel release an omnibus of his stuff last December (at 1200 pages!).

The Art Adams covers and the backup stories were the main reasons to get these.

And the ones reprinting 17-page issues also had several new pages added.

Between the Art Adams covers, the back-up stories, and the newly added pages, each issue as an incredible package. My only gripes are that they only reprinted part of Giant Size X-Men #1, skipped over the two "Days of Future Past" stories, and stopped doing back-up stories with #44. Would have loved to have seen back-up stories for DOFP.