What is the Last Bronze Age Fantastic Four? 1 1

[WernerVonDoom]

I've heard many opinions on the end of the Bronze Age over the years. What do you think?

[Lazyboy]

Well, you can scratch most of those off the list, because the Byrne run is 100% Copper.

[WernerVonDoom]

On 7/11/2022 at 7:15 PM, Lazyboy said:

Well, you can scratch most of those off the list, because the Byrne run is 100% Copper.

Well, I agree, but I've heard many people say Bronze goes through the mid-80s. So just giving them a fair shake.

[PopKulture]

The various “ages” of comics don’t always translate so well, month to month, within a publisher and without. Green Lantern 76 is obviously Bronze, but wouldn’t you wait a few months to call “Kryptonite Nevermore” in Superman 233 the first bronze Superman? Conan 1 has an October 1970 cover date, but nothing in that month’s Thor felt bronze. One could argue you’d have to wait almost a year for Neal Adam’s run in Avengers 93 as the first bronze Avengers. The lines are definitely blurry.

As someone who collects 1950’s Dells, I can assure you nothing changed in Mickey Mouse or Looney Tunes as a result of Showcase 4. The poor souls over at Dell hadn’t gotten the memo that the Silver Age had begun! 
 

The last issue before the Byrne run seems appropriate enough as the last bronze FF, but that makes me wonder what people would consider the first bronze FF?  
 

 

[seanfingh]

For me - the last Bronze issue is FF 208.  Them bringing HERBIE in was such a hard stop for me as a kid.  I know it doesn't really have anything to do with ages or decades or whatever, but that is it for me.

[shadroch]

For simplicity's sake, I use price increases as the defining point. It isn't perfect as some 50 cent books are far more Copper in content than Bronze.  If I were only looking at the FF, I suppose I'd go with Byne's first issue marking the change.  The Copper Age doesn't start with any one defining moment, imo. It just was.

[MattTheDuck]

This is somewhat off-topic - or at least tangential to the OP's question - but one of the things I think about in the Silver/Bronze transition is the use of "word balloons" on covers (at least in Marvel books, which is all I collect).  Almost all the Silver Age covers are a depiction of something that happens in the issue or a kind of summary drawing of a battle or situation in the book.  There is also typically the title of the issue, and sometimes one or more other blurbs of further info about either the story or how great Marvel is.  Interestingly, FF #1, AF #15 and ASM #1 all include word balloons, but then they were only rarely used for almost decade.

This changes in the Bronze Age, so that covers frequently have word balloons with character dialogue.  The first sustained use of word balloons starts with ASM #86 (July 1970), FF 98 (May 1970), Avengers 73 (Feb 1970), Thor (Mar 1970 - although Thor uses this less than the other titles for quite a while).  Also, there's a lot more "death" hyperbole on the covers - "we'll fight 'til we're dead" or "I've killed the FF" - where in the Silver Age it was things like "Attacked by the Frightful Four."

Hardly provides a perfect dividing line, but someone changed their mind about what would cause someone to take a comic off the rack based on the cover.

 

[FlyingDonut]

On 7/12/2022 at 9:03 AM, PopKulture said:

The various “ages” of comics don’t always translate so well, month to month, within a publisher and without. Green Lantern 76 is obviously Bronze, but wouldn’t you wait a few months to call “Kryptonite Nevermore” in Superman 233 the first bronze Superman? Conan 1 has an October 1970 cover date, but nothing in that month’s Thor felt bronze. One could argue you’d have to wait almost a year for Neal Adam’s run in Avengers 93 as the first bronze Avengers. The lines are definitely blurry.

As someone who collects 1950’s Dells, I can assure you nothing changed in Mickey Mouse or Looney Tunes as a result of Showcase 4. The poor souls over at Dell hadn’t gotten the memo that the Silver Age had begun! 
 

The last issue before the Byrne run seems appropriate enough as the last bronze FF, but that makes me wonder what people would consider the first bronze FF?  
 

 

117. Of this I shall accept no discussion.

[PopKulture]

On 7/12/2022 at 11:17 PM, FlyingDonut said:

117. Of this I shall accept no discussion.

I thought about 116 - a giant-sized issue that packs a punch - but that is still wrapping up the Over-Mind saga which stretched for several issues, is it not?  

[MattTheDuck]

On 7/12/2022 at 10:12 PM, PopKulture said:

I thought about 116 - a giant-sized issue that packs a punch - but that is still wrapping up the Over-Mind saga which stretched for several issues, is it not?  

Yep - great issue.  Sue proves her worth by shaming the greatest supervillain in comics.

 

[Jeffro.]

On 7/11/2022 at 10:23 PM, WernerVonDoom said:

On 7/11/2022 at 10:15 PM, Lazyboy said:

Well, you can scratch most of those off the list, because the Byrne run is 100% Copper.

Well, I agree, but I've heard many people say Bronze goes through the mid-80s. So just giving them a fair shake.

Revisionist nonsense

[KirbyJack]

I think the reason that there's no consensus on this is because none of the criteria we use for the other ages applies consistently to Bronze. Also, it's hard enough to fix a starting point; but a definitive end? Good luck.

Don't make yourselves crazy, people! Just go with the default "Bronze is the 1970s" and find some peace in your lives! Of course it doesn't hold up to scrutiny, but neither does anything else!

Edited July 13, 2022 by KirbyJack

[NP_Gresham]

For me, the Bronze ended with the 35 cent variants

Arbitrary yes, but after the Silver everything was ‘modern’ when I was growing up.

[sfcityduck]

This thread makes no sense to me.  Comic "ages" don't pertain to titles. They pertain to the industry as a whole. The "Golden Age" began with Action 1. It didn't begin with a different issue for every title. And the options offered in the poll above (last issue in 198x year) show how arbitrary they are.

A valid question is: Why have "Ages" at all? The well-known answer is: (1) Because of a tradition started by the collecting community in the 1960s (although there were collectors and pros discussing the "Golden Age" of comics as early as the late 1940s), (2) Because dealers have found the "Ages" to be a convenient short hand that helps them sell books, and (3) because collectors have developed an "Ages" OCD. So let's just assume "Ages" are worth having. So then the question becomes: When does the Copper Age begin? 

The answer to that question hinges on what the point of the "Age" in question is.  The term "Golden Age" as understood by the members of early fandom who came up with it was to denote the "Golden Age of superhero comics" when the whole superhero concept came into being and took the industry by storm. That started with Action Comics 1.  The term "Silver Age" as understood by the members of early fandom who came up with it was to denote the "Silver Age of superhero comics" when Golden Age heroes who had fallen out of print started to be revived by D.C. kicking off a new era of superhero comics. That revival commenced with Showcase 4. Certainly, there were a number of earlier attempts at other superhero revivals in the 1950s (the Atlas revival of Captain America, Human Torch, and Subby maybe being the most notable) and even DC had examples of the creation of new "superheroes" that predated Showcase 4 (Martian Manhunter and Phantom Stranger for example), but the Silver Age focused on revivals of classic DC characters in the minds of the collectors penning that term in the very early 1960s. So Showcase 4 was the book.

Then Marvel came along. Some folks talk of the "Marvel Age" which began with FF 1. But that term is really used mostly as hype by Marvel itself, not by comic collectors and scholars. FF 1 is rightly seen as just being another example of post-Showcase 4 revival of superheroes (explicitly reviving GA Human Torch and a few issues later Subby, and implicitly reviving the "plastic" and "invisible" hero archetypes).

Which brings us to the Bronze Age. The Bronze Age does not key off of superhero comics at all. There was no industry shaking superhero comic development for which there is a consensus view that it kicked off that "Age." Instead, the Bronze Age is a confused term that is most often tied to industry developments. These included (1) a changing of the guard at the companies with old pros retiring and new younger creators ascending to power and the corresponding change in comic subject matter, (2) changes in distribution that led to a proliferation of new comic titles, (3) the revival of non-superhero genres like horror, monsters, barbarians, etc., (4) title implosions and explosions, and (5) the beginning of the rise of the direct market and comic book stores. The beginning of the Bronze Age is a pastiche of factors and, as a result, collectors tend to look at a number of different comics as symbolizing the "beginning." The reality, however, is that most of us don't really care what the first "Bronze Age" comic was, we just accept it happened sometime around 1970. Because the "Bronze Age" is not defined by any particular development in superhero comics, unlike the GA and SA, there's just no need to have a single book be the symbolic beginning. It's a Zeitgeist, not a comic which started the "Bronze Age."

Back in the 80s, the notion of the "Copper Age" started to arise. At the time, we viewed it as having to do with the emerging primacy of independent publishing and the direct market. Since then, folks have tried to tie the Bronze Age to story developments in superhero comics, focusing on Secret Wars and Crisis, etc. As a result, there's a lot of confusion. Me, I come down on the side that the Bronze Age, like the Copper Age, is defined by industry factors, most notably the solidifying of the direct market as the key market for comics and the rise of publishers outside of the big 2.  I view Love and Rockets 1 (1981), Dazzler 1 (1981), Comico Primer 1 (1982),  Albedo 0 (1983), Ronin 1 (1983), and Teenage Mutant Turtles 1 (1984) as all strong candidates to be "Copper Age" comics. 1985 is just too late in the game, being even past Secret Wars. Whatever date you pick, it is again about the zeitgeist not about some development in a particular issue of a title.

My takeaway from all of this is that "ages" is a dumb concept that should be abandoned. Far better to just discuss decades. 

Edited July 13, 2022 by sfcityduck

[KirbyJack]

I largely agree. If you use the previous Age’s criteria, the Bronze Age would probably start with Giant Size X-Men 1. 

[shadroch]

On 7/12/2022 at 9:17 PM, FlyingDonut said:

117. Of this I shall accept no discussion.

So what was the last Silver Age FF? It seems like you want to skip Bronze and go straight from Silver to Copper.

I use 116 as the end of Silver, but you use 117 as the end of bronze? 

[shadroch]

On 7/13/2022 at 7:45 AM, KirbyJack said:

I largely agree. If you use the previous Age’s criteria, the Bronze Age would probably start with Giant Size X-Men 1. 

Why not Hulk 180/181?

I'm sorry but your criteria would put Starlins Captain Marvel run, The Avengers-Defenders War, MOKF, and TOD in the Silver Age. 

[sfcityduck]

On 7/13/2022 at 8:07 AM, shadroch said:

Why not Hulk 180/181?

I'm sorry but your criteria would put Starlins Captain Marvel run, The Avengers-Defenders War, MOKF, and TOD in the Silver Age. 

Hulk 180 was not the revival of a  prior character (what started the prior Silver Age).  But GS X-Men was the revival of a prior superhero group - a starting point that echoes the criteria for the start of the SA (and led to other group revamps like the New Teen Titans, West Coast Avengers, etc. and a general proliferation in group books). 

Having said that, I agree that's a bad criteria for the start of the Bronze Age. But KirbyJack's point is a good one that if you want to define an age by a superhero event similar to the SA, GSX 1 makes sense.

Again, far better just to talk about decades. This "ages" thing doesn't really make much sense for anything but a narrow band of comics (superhero comics) and only for a narrow range of time and publishers.

[MattTheDuck]

So 1940s - Golden Age

1950s - Atomic Age

1960s - Silver Age

1970s - Bronze Age

1980s - Copper Age

1990s - Age of Atonement

2000s - Age of Drek

2010s - Age of Enlightenment

2020s - Age of Duck

[sfcityduck]

On 7/13/2022 at 9:53 AM, MattTheDuck said:

So 1940s - Golden Age

1950s - Atomic Age

1960s - Silver Age

1970s - Bronze Age

1980s - Copper Age

1990s - Age of Atonement

2000s - Age of Drek

2010s - Age of Enlightenment

2020s - Age of Duck

This chart works great if you make two changes: (1) start with 1930s and (2) get rid of everything to the right of the decade. I kinda like "Age of Duck" though.

Edited July 13, 2022 by sfcityduck