bc

Wow! Another gorgeous cover ! Like the A.C.M.P. logo on that issue. Thanks! -bc

The water ripples reflecting on the sub push this from a good cover to fantastic! (thumbs u +1 Fantastic coloring on the cover down to the purple shadowing on the divers ! Thanks for sharing that beauty !! -bc

Keeping in the same title... I got this because I dorked up my "$3.00" tracking bid - accidentally forgot the decimal point (alcohol may have been a factor). On the plus side, it was the only CLINK auction where I led from day 1 to close. -bc

Beautiful book ! Gonna have to find a copy to read The Slug story...how tough is it to out run a slug after all??? -bc

Picked this pair of 51's up this weekend at a garage sale mixed in with some magazines. Put on your sunglasses as there is a bit of glare... The Astonishing 51 is really nice, the Uncanny Tales 51 has some cover chipping at the top but overall very solid. Couldn't pass them up for 25 cents each. -bc

Weren't those all reprints of older PCH comics like Incredible Science Fiction, Strange Worlds (Avon I think), Journey into Unknown Worlds, etc. ? Just hesitant to suggest that a reprint has ever really influenced a new direction. Monster + Name + Kirby cover timeline: WOF18 (cover date 6/59) JIM54 (9/59) ST72 (12/59) TTA8 (3/60) TOS8 (3/60) Coincidence that both TTA & TOS start this trend on the 8th issue??? -bc I'm quite comfortable with these issues being the "first" in their respective titles for this changeover to "classic" pre-hero monster stories (most of which featured pants). I'm collecting the full #1-up runs of TOS and TTA, but it is most helpful for me to have a cutoff for where I'm "serious" about my ST and JIM runs. The classic monsters are my favorites, and thus I would aim to collect these in grade. I'm also after #1-up on ST and JIM, but am happy with raw VGs for the most part in the earlier stuff with the occasional beauty where I've been fortunate. First its the sheet, now the pants.... A few hundred pages back, the list of PHM books was defined as these 164 issues: AA 1-6 AAF 7-14 JIM 50-82 ST 67-100 ST Annual 1 SW 1-5 TOS 1-38 TTA 1-34 WOF 15-19 The issues I listed earlier represent the beginning of a very consistent style/format for a few years before the heroes emerged. I probably shouldn't have published that list since that has helped me to focus, but glad to finally give something back after lurking for 11 years. -bc

Kirby monsters pants: http://belatednerd.com/tag/moomba/ That's not one of my criteria.... -bc

While its cover date does precede TTA and TOS #1s, all three books were released at the same time. Hard to say any one is first. I agree, but to the unwashed masses the cover date and/or issue number are the easiest ways to create start and end points in anything comics related. Since Strange Worlds 1 has them both, I can easily see why it could be considered the "first" by many (it was one of my grails). Going back to the original question of which had the first monster - I guess it all depends on your definition of monster. I bet in the late 50's, it was conceivable that many people thought that a flying saucer could be full of "monsters" from another planet (alien life forms) as well as the King Kong/Godzilla type. -bc

I see your Goom and raise you a Googam -bc

Strange Worlds 1 has the "team" : Lee, Kirby & Ditko. Plus it's a first issue that preceded TOS1 & TTA1 - makes it the "easiest" to label as the first. Yes, Fin Fang Foom was the most popular monster by a landslide before Groot hit the big screen. Before Groot was in GoTG, the other prototype hero/monsters (Xemnu the Hulk in JIM63) were the next tier of favorites. On top of that, everyone seems to have their own favorite monster from this era. -bc

Is this Marvel jumping the Lo-Karr? I mean shark... If it exposes a wider audience to this era of Marvel history, that's truly great. If it makes the price of the back issues go up do to rampant speculation, that is significantly less than great. Might need to pick one or two of those up-thanks for the heads up! -bc

Weren't those all reprints of older PCH comics like Incredible Science Fiction, Strange Worlds (Avon I think), Journey into Unknown Worlds, etc. ? Just hesitant to suggest that a reprint has ever really influenced a new direction. Monster + Name + Kirby cover timeline: WOF18 (cover date 6/59) JIM54 (9/59) ST72 (12/59) TTA8 (3/60) TOS8 (3/60) Coincidence that both TTA & TOS start this trend on the 8th issue??? -bc I agree, but imitation is supposedly the sincerest form of flattery, and that 1958 reprint being sold on lots of newsstands (and even being fairly common today) could have represented a clear demand that Marvel might want to satisfy. It could also be coincidence that a (popular?) common issue (from a competitor) just precedes the start of the trend from Marvel. (thumbs u I'm not implying that what Marvel did was unique or without inspiration/imitation. I agree with you 100%. If it's one thing I've learned about all the publishers, if they smell a buck to be made they'll crank a lot of it out as fast as possible. This is almost like the thread asking when the Atomic Age officially started-it's almost a personal interpretation of what constitutes the beginning of classic PHMs. Just trying to define the criteria and provide some examples -bc

Weren't those all reprints of older PCH comics like Incredible Science Fiction, Strange Worlds (Avon I think), Journey into Unknown Worlds, etc. ? Just hesitant to suggest that a reprint has ever really influenced a new direction. Monster + Name + Kirby cover timeline: WOF18 (cover date 6/59) JIM54 (9/59) ST72 (12/59) TTA8 (3/60) TOS8 (3/60) Coincidence that both TTA & TOS start this trend on the 8th issue??? -bc

(thumbs u That's a beauty! Great pickup! Wow! -bc

+1 - is it missing the entire interior? -bc

Maybe it's just me, but not only does it need to have a monster on the cover, but the monster needs some nearly monosyllabic name plastered big on the cover as well for it to be a classic PHM. Of course, Kirby is a given. According to the info above, WOF18 with "XOM" is one of the earlier examples that meets all three criteria. Just my -bc

Bad Orrgo ! Looks like he conquered the sheet.... -bc

Was a nice day today, so I thought I'd let the PHM slabs out for their annual airing. I put a sheet down in case Orrgo had an accident. -bc

Beautiful books Rick! The JIM57 has some really striking colors! -bc

Thanks KJ! The runs you & Dr. X posted in June are serious, I'm just trying to catch up -bc

Just want to get this thread back on the first page on my birthday. Got these from CLink a few auctions ago: -bc

(thumbs u Very cool ! Its a treat to see the OA from the PHM issues ! I know almost nothing about OA, but I'd suspect that it's fairly rare to come by from the PHM era. Thanks for sharing! -bc

Jimbo,i cant tell you the feeling of pride and accomplishment I felt when I got my copy of this...no matter what others say...first Marvel superhero of the SA! Thanks also to houseofcomics..Marc,you rule! Ummmmm sorry but the first Marvel superhero of the Silver age is...... Groot. Okay Frankie...im with you...but only because ive one of those too.And Groot was a baddy... And an alien,not a superhero... One of my favorites as well Jimbo ! (yours has a better PQ and less wrap than mine): -bc

Very nice ! Wasting no time ! -bc

Hope you have as much fun as I did! Issues 2 & 7 were the most difficult to find in a presentable grade. The number 7 I snagged has the coupon ripped off the back cover (guess they didn't have easy access to scissors in 1957). Plenty of 5's in decent shape out there - I selected a supposedly Circle 8 per Metropolis documentation during one of their sales for a little over $100 : The rest aren't that hard to find online for under $50. Warning: shows/cons yielded very few additions to the run as this isn't a very popular title for dealers to lug around (heard that a lot when talking with them). The toughest part is trying to find copies where the whole "World of Fantasy" was readable under the Atlas logo - this title seems to commonly suffer from cover wrap issues. Good luck, enjoy and I can't wait to see the results! -bc