snell's Actual Firsts

Yesterday I set a new standard for lazy posts by showing a bunch of covers from the 1st new issues of various Marvel comics that I bought on my own.

Well, it's still a lazy weekend, so let's see if I can continue the trend.

Today, we're going to look at the first issues that I actually read of these titles.

Let's start, as always, with:

Reed & Sue breaking up? Thing vs. Sub-Mariner? Medusa as a member of the FF? Holy heck!! As with most of these, I don't remember exactly where or how I got this comic.

There is a story behind this next one...For a family vacation in Florida, we took a long, long car drive form Michigan, with me jammed into the back of a crappy wood-paneled station wagon, with a Kool-Aid backpack full of comics & books to read to keep me out of trouble. And the only one of those books or comics I remember?

I read THE LIVING HELL out of this comic book. I read it so much the cover came off, and then I read it some more. I had no idea who Gwen Stacy was, or who the Green Goblin was, or what the hell was going on. I wasn't old or experienced enough to understand the impact of a major character being permanently killed, or to get pissed at Gerry Conway. All I know is, this was one heckuva read.

I'll always be a Fantastic Four guy at heart, but Amazing Spider-Man #122 may be the one book most responsible for my being hooked on comics.

And then there's this:

Uhhh...a "Demon-Druid" forcing Cap to fight a bunch of SpongeBob Squarepants rejects?  No wonder it took me so long to get into Captain America...

Speaking of not terribly memorable...

Toad-Men? The Shaper? An all-obscure fest!!

And then there's the Avengers:

Not, not this actual issue, but a coverless copy of Marvel Triple Action #10 (1973), that reprinted The Old Order Changeth.

I wrote about that issue more extensively here, but I'd like to reiterate that this issue kind of proves that "continuity" isn't necessarily off-putting to new readers: "As a 10-year-old I got thrown into the deep end of an Avengers story that referenced at least 20 other comic books and didn't try to hold my hand by dumbing everything down for newbies. I still enjoyed it, and wanted to read more."

As for the first non-reprint issue of Avengers I read?

Good old Klaw! And right in the middle of the Celestial Madonna saga...

Here's another one from Zayres' famous 10¢ bins:

Man, that was a lame issue...

My first exposure to All-New, All-Different?

Boy, that was a crazy good issue. I think I'm going to look at that comic in some depth, at a later date. For now, just enjoy this:

As for Daredevil, it was one of two issues, and my memory can't untangle which I owned first:

[SPOILER ALERT: Circus spelld sideways is NOT death!]

Five super-villains? What, are they the Emissaries Of Evil??

And for our obligatory "heads of cast looking down upon action" 70s cover:

Proof, again, that there is no comic so convoluted that a 10 year old's brain can't decipher it and want more...