Novel Ideas: 1978 Marvel Novel Series from Pocket Books
Saturday, November 8, 2008

During 1978/79, Marvel Comics weren't just ruling the spinner-racks,
but they were doing fairly well on television, as well. The Incredible
Hulk starring
Bill Bixby and
Lou Ferrigno was doing well, and they were trying hard to spin the really bad Spider-Man series (starring
Nicholas Hammond)
into a hit. There were numerous TV specials featuring Marvel
characters, as well (for more info on Marvel's TV success, check out
the most excellent
Comics In Crisis
blog--and tell 'em Ol' Groove sent ya!). With things going so well, and
Marvel's having become a household name thanks to the TV shows, the
powers-that-were at Marvel decided to branch out into the prose novel
market. They struck a deal with
Simon & Schuster,
who'd already been publishing Stan Lee's Origins books (more on those
next month), to publish brand new prose novels starring various Marvel
super-heroes. In 1977, Simon & Schuster's Pocket Books imprint had
started reprinting classic Marvel comics like the Fantastic Four,
Spidey, etc., and they were proving to be successful, so things just
seemed to fall into place for the novels series quite easily. 'Twas
meant to be!
(excerpt)
The first one, starring Spidey, was pretty cool. Written by Wein and
Wolfman (both of whom had recently written/edited Amazing Spider-Man),
the story involved Spidey having to solve mysterious crimes that
eventually led to Doctor Octopus being the villainous mastermind. Can't
tell you much about Stalker from the Stars. I never did get to finish
reading it! I was reading it (during a break) in my Honors English
class and the teacher asked if she could see it. I thought it was cool,
she wanted to read it maybe. I never saw that book again! What a
bummer, huh? My faves were (naturally) #10 starring the Avengers
(by then-current writer David Micheline) featuring Eskimos and Kang the
Conqueror, and #9 with its mix of superhero short stories featuring the
Avengers (by Jim Shooter), Daredevil
(by Kyle Christopher), the X-Men (by Jo Duffy), and the Hulk (by Len
Wein). Cool trivia: the Avengers story, "This Evil Undying" was adapted
into comicbook form and appeared in Avengers #201 (adapted by
Michelinie--complete with George Perez art!) re-titled, "The Evil
Reborn", while the Hulk story was an adaptation of an earlier Wein
story from the Incredible Hulk #s 197-198. Oh, both the comics and the
short story guest-starred the Man-Thing, though Manny didn't get any
love on the cover of the paperback. Trippy, ain't it?
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