This week we return to another issue of Thunder, which was originally sold as an unnumbered #18 on 13th February 1971! As I recently discovered in Steve Holland's book on Lion comic, Thunder was created simply to merge into Lion and boost sales, which is disapointing as it is my favourite adventure comic. As always, this issue's cover had famous firsts, and this time it's about Dinosaurs!
Undoubtedly Adam Eterno was the most popular strip in the comic, and his adventure got four pages each week - incredibly long considering most comic strips of the time were no longer than two pages. This episode is drawn by Colin Page.
The next strip is Cliff Hanger, although nothing like the more popular version from Buster in the 1980's. I'm not too sure who illustrated this strip.
I love the artwork on Fury's Family, Denis McLoughlin did a fantastic job! I've said it before, but Denis is one of my all time favourite adventure strip artists - the amount of detail in each panel is incredible!
Steel Commando is a strip about a steel soldier in the army, a robot who could (as is proved in this strip) bend tank barrels with his own bare hands, and then pick them up and throw them! This strip continued from Thunder, survived Lion and ended in Valiant.
And finally, the only humour strip in the comic - Sam. This strip is a reprint of Leo Baxendale's Biff, that appeared in Wham, although this one doesn't look like it came from Baxendale.
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| The first birthday of Cor! - with no mention of the occasion. |
So a big thanks to everybody who has made this possible, wether you joined at the start, in 2012 or even if you're new this year!
2 comments:
I think you'll find that's 'bare' hands, George.
It's interesting to be reminded that Thunder was allegedly created merely to merge into Lion. Without knowing all the facts, I can't say for sure, but this seems curious to me.
Here's why. The cost of launching a comic was simply staggering, and took at least a year to get the cost of the launch back, possibly longer. If Thunder sold well, I think IPC would wait for a longer period (to build circulation) before merging it with another comic, not merely 22 issues later.
I can see them creating a comic with an eye on which other title it would be merged with if and when the time came, but spending money on a comic JUST to merge with another one seems a strange and unlikely idea.
I'm really not the person to ask about this. Putting those facts together it does seem very unlikely, and I didn't think it was true at first! Maybe I'll have to do some more research...
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