Marvel Firsts: The 1970s.

I haven’t posted in a while and I thought a brief Reading/Watching update was in order.

Every comic book fan has his or her favorite era. For me, it’s the comics–particularly Marvel Comics–of the early-to-mid 1970s. It was an important time for Marvel. For a couple of reasons, they were suddenly able to expand their line and they did so with gusto, producing a wave of new titles. Some would be classics. Others noble failures and some outright bad stuff.

A lot of the good stuff is represented in the trade paperback Marvel Firsts: The 1970s. It’s the first of three volumes covering the new characters that debuted from Marvel during the first half of the decade.

Some of the firsts reprinted in the books include Ghost Rider, The Defenders, Tomb of Dracula, Hero for Hire, Gunhawks and Monster of Frankenstein. I was surprised to find of trio of stories I had never read, including the origin of Outlaw Kid, the first appearance of WWII title Combat Kelly and the Deadly Dozen and Shanna the She-Devil (which suffered from horrible writing).

Marvel has also published a volume devoted to the 60s and the introductions of their big guns. I have it ordered and I’ll let you know what I think about it when it arrives.

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A quick recap of recent TV viewing:

I’m enjoying Alcatraz. The set-up has been good and the actors are appealing, particularly Jorge Garcia. I knew going in that the series would be the returned-convict-of-the-week. I can live with that as long as producers keep the central mystery interesting. Still, my patience isn’t limitless and I hope for some answers sooner rather than later.

I’m also enjoying The River. I’m pleasantly surprised that a network horror show can conjure up some genuine chills and scary imagery. I don’t know if the journey will prove to be ultimately satisfying, but the individual episodes have been a hoot, as we say back home.

Once Upon A Time continues to entertain, and we really like Smash, to my astonishment. Great writing and acting. It’s sort of like Glee for grownups.