BAB Firsts - Marvel and DC: Side-by-Side in 1970

This post was originally published on February 2 2011

 1970

Doug: Welcome, everyone, to a 16-part (yep, the longest to date!) series that will take a year-by-year look at what the Big Two were doing throughout the Bronze Age. Using the books you see in the logo above (read our reviews of the Marvel Chronicle and DC Comics: Year-by-Year) Karen and I will not only be reporting on the various goings-on both in the publishing and four-color worlds, but you just know we'll be adding a two-cent comment here and there. So buckle in and enjoy the ride -- we're anticipating some revelations, epiphanies, and downright expose's along the way! And a note: all information used in this series will derive from the two books exclusively; however, images we post may be from other sources.

Doug: I don't think comics historians mark the year 1970 as the beginning of a new age of comics for no reason at all. I was surprised when I began to pen my portion of this first installment at just how many watershed or almost-watershed events took place as the '60's gave way to the '70's. For example, at the House of Ideas the X-Men received their cancellation notice and Captain Stacy lost his life at the tentacles of Dr. Octopus. The Distinguished Competition may have pulled the biggest coup, though, with the acquisition of the talents of the King of Comics, and as the critically-acclaimed series "Hard Traveling Heroes" debuted in the pages of Green Lantern #76. Let's take a closer look at the year 1970, when the Kent State shootings took place, cigarette ads were banned on American television, Elvis visited Tricky Dick in the White House, Jimi Hendrix died, and the north tower of the World Trade Center was completed.
Doug: The first quarter of 1970 was a bit of a ho-hum at Marvel. Outside of the aforementioned cancellation of our Merry Mutants, about the biggest things going were a balked wedding between Bruce Banner and Betty Ross (Incredible Hulk #124), and the introduction of Sunfire in X-Men #64 (which, by the way, features Don Heck pencils so heavily under the influence of Tom Palmer's Adamsian inks that I actually liked it!). DC Comics countered with a little relevancy in Teen Titans #25, as our heroes have a hand in a fatality that will eventually drive them out of their colorful costumes, and the acquisition of the license to produce comics based on the Hot Wheels line of toy cars.

Karen: I always wonder what might have been if X-Men had not been canceled -or consigned to reprint-land. The book had actually improved so much, with the Thomas-Adams era. Of course, if those two had stayed on and the title had continued, we might never have seen the all-new, all-different team!

Doug: I agree -- it's one of those wonderful "what if?" questions. Funny, isn't it, that you could probably argue that the Avengers was Marvel's premier team book in 1970; I say that only from the standpoint that the FF were in a state of decline (OK, maybe "in stasis" is better...) creatively. And if I believe all the publicity, solicitations, etc., the Avengers is again Marvel's premier team book. But what a ride the X-Men had in the intervening 30+ years!

Doug: Someone at Marvel must have been pacing us, because the period from April-June offered up only a brief return to publication of Captain Marvel (2 issues, then kaput again for another two years), and the introductions of Richard Fisk (Amazing Spider-Man #83) and Arkon (Avengers #75). However, across the street DC dropped the bomb with the previously mentioned Green Lantern #76 by the all-star creative team of Dennis O'Neil and Neal Adams. Launching a new era for DC, the elder company now worked very hard to emulate what Stan Lee had been doing for years at Marvel -- bring some real-life situations, causes, and politics to the four-color world. As an extension, in Teen Titans #26 the young heroes threw away their colorful costumes and entered a world of crime-fighting as civilians. And the second quarter didn't just fade into summer -- no, instead DC greeted the end of the school year with the introduction of Man-Bat in Detective Comics #400 (again by O'Neil and Adams).

Karen: Things were definitely starting to change at stodgy DC. The arrival of pros like Adams gave DC much needed fresh blood. Of course in a few years, we would see many of Marvel's young talents cross over to DC and bring their newer style with them. It was a necessary change for them; they had become seen as "the establishment" and had lost much of their appeal, at least to older readers.

Doug: I think DC's continued power in the hands of its editors, as opposed to its creators, only softened their status quo. While we did see some "Marvelizing", overall (at least in my opinion) DC still lagged waaaaay behind Marvel in terms of top art talent and dynamic writing.

Doug: July brought us the 100th anniversary issue of the Fantastic Four, the first comic from the Marvel Age to reach that lofty plateau completely on its own. The end of the summer brought back the split books, as Amazing Adventures #1 (the Inhumans and the Black Widow) and Astonishing Tales #1 (Ka-Zar and Dr. Doom) hit the stands. But ominous clouds were brewing, as (gasp!) the final Jack Kirby-penciled FF and Thor (#101 and #179, respectively) stories went on sale. After that, it would be six years before the King returned to the House of Ideas. But Marvel's loss was DC's gain, as we'll see later. July saw DC introduce The Unknown Soldier in Star-Spangled War Stories #151 by the immortal Joe Kubert.

Karen: By this time much of Kirby's magic seemed to have dissipated. His frustrations with Marvel and Stan Lee are now well-known. I don't think it's any surprise to state that his work during this time period at Marvel was pretty uninspired. For that matter, much of Lee's writing -as we've discussed recently -also seemed to be slipping. It was time for a new generation of creative talents.

Doug: Quarter #3, otherwise known as autumn, is generally depressing to young comics readers, as the school desk beckons. Apparently neither Marvel or DC felt all that inspired, as Westerns brought about the only news -- the introduction of Red Wolf (created by Roy Thomas and John Buscema) in Avengers #80 and DC's return to the genre with All-Star Western #1.

Doug: As the temperatures dropped, the spinner racks must have been heating up. Talk about going out with a bang! Marvel staged perhaps one of the biggest marketing coups of the coming decade when it licensed Conan the Barbarian and introduced him to comics readers in October in the pages of Conan the Barbarian #1 by Roy Thomas and Barry Smith. The sword-and-sorcery genre continues to the present, and although Marvel no longer holds the license, Conan and his cast are alive and well 40 years later. November saw the death of Captain Stacy in Amazing Spider-Man #90. But it was DC that made perhaps the biggest noise in the comic book industry when Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen #133 was published with Jack Kirby credited as the writer and artist. This was Kirby's entry point for his return to DC after decades at Marvel, and the launch pad for what would become his "Fourth World" saga. The next issue of Jimmy Olsen saw the introduction of Darkseid, and the wheels were set in motion for major changes at the Big Two!

Karen: I don't think Marvel knew what they had with Conan; from what I've read, the fans didn't quite know what to make of it either, and it took some time to become the mega-hit it was destined to be. But it's hard to think of Marvel in the 70s and not think of Conan. He was everywhere, particularly on the merchandise that was flowing out of the House of Ideas by the mid-70s. DC certainly didn't recognize what they had with Kirby's Fourth World. It would take another generation for that flower to blossom!