'The most unusual fighting team' thing was because of the Doom Patrol ('the world's strangest heroes'), which was created at around the same time as the X-men in '63. There were comparisons between them, as you can imagine.
The page where Beast and iceman are being attacked by a sentinel and the newscast is talking about what they can do as they are doing it is just perfect. It almost feels like a modern comic
X-men 94&95 were originally supposed to Giant-size 2! The cover of the reprint you have was Gil Kane/Klaus Janson! I was grabbing this cool 😎 stuff back in 10th grade and really enjoyed many summers reading comics! X-men was just relaunched and a damn great comic and the bimonthly schedule was nuts 🥜 waiting gd 60 daze between issues! Also shoutout to amazing Tom Palmer embellished inks/zip atone affects! I’ve heard Tom colors this X-run,sayyy how about you guys do a shoot interview and ask him? Thanks for the trip down memory lane! Keep reading and making comix!
The "biggest mutant" plot thread was continued in AVENGERS 102-104. It was the lead Sentinel itself, which had experienced a mutation due to exposure to solar radiation after the Sentinels had been in a prolonged orbit around the sun. It's acquired power was teleportation.
These X-Men issues where just extraordinary at the time. Beast. Cyclops and Angel never looked so good. I was a teen in New Zealand when this came out, Changed comics for me, Cheers guys! Love your channel
For the record, this edited reprint of the story from X-Men #57-59 eliminates page 14 from issue #58, and pages 14, 15,19 and panels 3-5 of page 20 of issue #59, reducing what was a 55 page story arc in its original form to a 50 and a half page story. 1975 was also the year in which Marvel began seriously editing their reprints of sixties stories in their normal sized reprint titles, removing whole pages to bring the story down to the new reduced story page count (and increased advertising page count). Later in the seventies, under reprint editor Danny Fingeroth, they got more clever with the editing, relying more on excising specific panels and restructuring pages and relettering dialogue to paper over the gaps. This is also the period when the reproduction of the linework and coloring is not as sharp as in the original sixties publication. (Seriously, compare the repro in an original mid to late 1960's issue of the Avengers, Fantastic Four, or Spider-Man with the reprint of the same issue in Marvel Triple Action, Marvel's Greatest Comics, or Marvel Tales, and you can see an appreciable difference. The reprints from the seventies tend to look worse than the originals.)
Don't know if y'all will see this, but I just finished reading through the original X-Men run and something I think could be a good ep would be #64, first appearance of Sunfire. It's drawn by Don Heck, who was a long time prior X artist in the old style (including some of those backups you mentioned), but inked by Tom Palmer. It's amazing to see how much more modern his pencils look just with Palmer instead of an og Marvel inker like John Verpoorten.
I can't tell you what it was like finding these Adam X-Men comics. These were earth shattering for my young teenage mind. I had been buying comics in the UK since the early 60s. Neil A made a new language. Getting into European, Chinese and Japanese was an easy step.
Amazing review. Got the X-Men Visionaries Neal Adams TPB not long ago, to see they "re-inked" NA's art and ruined it; same as DC did. Will aim for that Giant Size No. 2 now. Thanks!
These are truly beautiful issues. I was lucky enough to score a copy of Giant Size X-men #2 recently, contained within a box of Bronze Age Marvels that a friend of mines husband had been holding onto since his brother passed away. He was nice enough to sell me the last box of his brothers collection for a really fair price, and that box contained this Ish along with a full run of Marvel Premier Iron Fist, Omega the Unknown, and some other great stuff, as well as 50 consecutive issues of Marvel Two In One. Haven’t read them all yet but this X-men was the first thing I read and I dug it so much that I just snagged the X-men Visionaries: Neal Adams TPB so I can see what his whole run was like. It’s a mid 90’s trade so I feared awful recoloring but upon a quick glance it looks they used the old 4 color process, not the garish digital coloring found on the cover.
Regarding the question that comes up around 19:20 concerning the frequency of Giant-Size X-Men -- as I recall, most (maybe all) of the Marvel Giant-Size titles were supposed to be quarterly. They were cranking out Giant-Size titles like crazy initially -- not just GS Spider-Man and FF but also GS Superstars, GS Super-villain Team-up, GS Marvel Triple Action, etc.
@@johnv3623 Ah, interesting. As best I could tell when I paused the video right around 19:25 for a close look, the indicia for Giant-Size X-Men 2 does not say anything about the frequency of publication.
Bought that as a back issue when I first started buying X-Men comics in 1980. Would say it was my first exposure to Adams but had a friend with an old Batman comic with Man-Bat. Thought Adams art at the time was common to see, but over the years I’ve begun to really appreciate the random seeming stories he illustrated. He’s now inspired several generations of artists.
I've had several artists sketch and ink a classic Havok for me at cons but no one was able to get him right. Alex Saviuk got very close but used a modern costume design as reference that just wasn't quite as bold or as striking as Neal's Havok. Nothing beats these early issues.
I had this book when I was a kid for some reason I can’t find it in my collection I lost track of it I did find the British hard cover reprint version which is pretty kool, form the Neal Adams X-men’s run I’m missing three books 58 original copy, 60, 64
Fascinating. I had no idea this book existed. Is the colouring (and the printing of the colour) *exactly the same* as the original comics? If so it implies Marvel kept colour sep negatives or some other permanent record of the seps. Which would be a surprise, that early.
Neal Adams loved drawing comics but towards the end of the 1970s, he just wasn't making enough money as an occasional freelancer, so he started an advertising production company, Continuity Studios. Continuity Comics was just a side gig to keep his hand in and give other artists he liked a place outside of Marvel and DC to ply their craft. It was the advertising side that made serious money, thus the comics side didn't have to be all that successful.
Neal Adams was a primal force.
This is the comic where Cyclops called those dudes "Camel Jockeys" 😮
2:50
'The most unusual fighting team' thing was because of the Doom Patrol ('the world's strangest heroes'), which was created at around the same time as the X-men in '63. There were comparisons between them, as you can imagine.
Yep
Justice league: "world's greatest superheroes"
Avengers: "earth's mightiest heroes"
The page where Beast and iceman are being attacked by a sentinel and the newscast is talking about what they can do as they are doing it is just perfect.
It almost feels like a modern comic
X-men 94&95 were originally supposed to Giant-size 2! The cover of the reprint you have was Gil Kane/Klaus Janson! I was grabbing this cool 😎 stuff back in 10th grade and really enjoyed many summers reading comics! X-men was just relaunched and a damn great comic and the bimonthly schedule was nuts 🥜 waiting gd 60 daze between issues! Also shoutout to amazing Tom Palmer embellished inks/zip atone affects! I’ve heard Tom colors this X-run,sayyy how about you guys do a shoot interview and ask him? Thanks for the trip down memory lane! Keep reading and making comix!
The "biggest mutant" plot thread was continued in AVENGERS 102-104. It was the lead Sentinel itself, which had experienced a mutation due to exposure to solar radiation after the Sentinels had been in a prolonged orbit around the sun. It's acquired power was teleportation.
These X-Men issues where just extraordinary at the time. Beast. Cyclops and Angel never looked so good. I was a teen in New Zealand when this came out, Changed comics for me, Cheers guys! Love your channel
Tom Palmer - genius
You’re right Tom Palmer is amazing when he’s working with Adams, Colon, Buscema or just about anyone!
For the record, this edited reprint of the story from X-Men #57-59 eliminates page 14 from issue #58, and pages 14, 15,19 and panels 3-5 of page 20 of issue #59, reducing what was a 55 page story arc in its original form to a 50 and a half page story.
1975 was also the year in which Marvel began seriously editing their reprints of sixties stories in their normal sized reprint titles, removing whole pages to bring the story down to the new reduced story page count (and increased advertising page count). Later in the seventies, under reprint editor Danny Fingeroth, they got more clever with the editing, relying more on excising specific panels and restructuring pages and relettering dialogue to paper over the gaps.
This is also the period when the reproduction of the linework and coloring is not as sharp as in the original sixties publication. (Seriously, compare the repro in an original mid to late 1960's issue of the Avengers, Fantastic Four, or Spider-Man with the reprint of the same issue in Marvel Triple Action, Marvel's Greatest Comics, or Marvel Tales, and you can see an appreciable difference. The reprints from the seventies tend to look worse than the originals.)
I remember back in the mid 80s, Giant-size X-men #2 was going for alomst as much as #1...
I just picked up a great looking copy on Ebay for $40.00! Thanks, Kayfabe for the heads up!
This is also in the Thomas Adams Gallery Edition X-Men hardcover. I believe it's a reprint of X-Men 57
Don't know if y'all will see this, but I just finished reading through the original X-Men run and something I think could be a good ep would be #64, first appearance of Sunfire. It's drawn by Don Heck, who was a long time prior X artist in the old style (including some of those backups you mentioned), but inked by Tom Palmer. It's amazing to see how much more modern his pencils look just with Palmer instead of an og Marvel inker like John Verpoorten.
Sheer Brilliance & every page is Gorgeously rendered!!!
You asked about backlash against Adams, check out the original letters pages, I remember reading one criticising Adams "bug-eyed" cover.
I can't tell you what it was like finding these Adam X-Men comics. These were earth shattering for my young teenage mind. I had been buying comics in the UK since the early 60s. Neil A made a new language. Getting into European, Chinese and Japanese was an easy step.
Amazing review. Got the X-Men Visionaries Neal Adams TPB not long ago, to see they "re-inked" NA's art and ruined it; same as DC did. Will aim for that Giant Size No. 2 now. Thanks!
The guy at the controls looks a lot like the race car driver in the Yoshiaki Kawajiri segment of that Neo Tokyo Katsuhiro Otomo anime.
These are truly beautiful issues. I was lucky enough to score a copy of Giant Size X-men #2 recently, contained within a box of Bronze Age Marvels that a friend of mines husband had been holding onto since his brother passed away. He was nice enough to sell me the last box of his brothers collection for a really fair price, and that box contained this Ish along with a full run of Marvel Premier Iron Fist, Omega the Unknown, and some other great stuff, as well as 50 consecutive issues of Marvel Two In One. Haven’t read them all yet but this X-men was the first thing I read and I dug it so much that I just snagged the X-men Visionaries: Neal Adams TPB so I can see what his whole run was like. It’s a mid 90’s trade so I feared awful recoloring but upon a quick glance it looks they used the old 4 color process, not the garish digital coloring found on the cover.
My first X-Men comic, still my favorite.
Regarding the question that comes up around 19:20 concerning the frequency of Giant-Size X-Men -- as I recall, most (maybe all) of the Marvel Giant-Size titles were supposed to be quarterly. They were cranking out Giant-Size titles like crazy initially -- not just GS Spider-Man and FF but also GS Superstars, GS Super-villain Team-up, GS Marvel Triple Action, etc.
@@johnv3623 Ah, interesting. As best I could tell when I paused the video right around 19:25 for a close look, the indicia for Giant-Size X-Men 2 does not say anything about the frequency of publication.
Bought that as a back issue when I first started buying X-Men comics in 1980. Would say it was my first exposure to Adams but had a friend with an old Batman comic with Man-Bat. Thought Adams art at the time was common to see, but over the years I’ve begun to really appreciate the random seeming stories he illustrated. He’s now inspired several generations of artists.
I love when you reference the Eides sale, I left with four short boxes this year lol
You all need to go over X-Men annual 9 (mutants in Asgard) and annual 10 ( Mojo vs. X-Babies), the two Art Adams annuals.
I've had several artists sketch and ink a classic Havok for me at cons but no one was able to get him right. Alex Saviuk got very close but used a modern costume design as reference that just wasn't quite as bold or as striking as Neal's Havok. Nothing beats these early issues.
That is the best Havok. That headpiece just begged to be drawn by little artists
I had this book when I was a kid for some reason I can’t find it in my collection I lost track of it I did find the British hard cover reprint version which is pretty kool, form the Neal Adams X-men’s run I’m missing three books 58 original copy, 60, 64
God I love this book. Picked up on a 7-11 rack.
Fascinating. I had no idea this book existed.
Is the colouring (and the printing of the colour) *exactly the same* as the original comics? If so it implies Marvel kept colour sep negatives or some other permanent record of the seps. Which would be a surprise, that early.
Neal Adams loved drawing comics but towards the end of the 1970s, he just wasn't making enough money as an occasional freelancer, so he started an advertising production company, Continuity Studios. Continuity Comics was just a side gig to keep his hand in and give other artists he liked a place outside of Marvel and DC to ply their craft. It was the advertising side that made serious money, thus the comics side didn't have to be all that successful.
Banger!!
neal. adams. if he isnt the GOAT- then i dont know who is..