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The Man Called Nova

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My first encounter with Nova was in 1977 when I was 9 years old. My older sister (she would have been 12 at the time) and her friends were holding a small sale on the green outside our house in aid of Cancer Research, and one of the items that had been donated by friends and neighbours was Nova #5: I had a few UK reprints of Marvel comics, but maybe only one or two other US comics, or maybe not - my memory of those days is unsurprisingly hazy - so it's entirely possible that this was the first time I'd seen a US Marvel comic. The UK reprints had only contained black and white art, but here was this weirdly small comic, but with full colour throughout! And how could I resist that striking Jack Kirby cover! Luckily, I saw it before it went on sale, and paid my sister the handsome sum of 5 pence for it. I read it numerous times (to destruction, eventually), poring over its entertaining tale of Richard Rider - Nova - his battle against Tyrannus and the awesome Earth-Shaker in Centr...
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John Byrne's Alpha Flight

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"Once upon a time I received the highest royalty check ever paid. Well, up to that time, anyway." stated John Byrne on his forum a few years ago. "It was for Alpha Flight #1, which sold slightly over 500,000 copies, which was also the highest any book had sold in a couple of decades. The royalty was $29995, which I only remember because Marvel's accounting department cut the check for $2995. They'd never seen a number that big!" Such was the popularity of this diverse, dysfunctional team of Canadian superheroes in the 1980's, that after the huge sales of that double-sized first issue, it remained a top 5 seller for the next couple of years - at least as long as John Byrne was at the helm. Byrne first had the idea for a team of Canadian heroes whilst at college. Although born in the UK, Byrne's family had moved to Canada when he was 8 years old, and he'd lived there ever since. The first member of this nascent team was "Sentinel." He...
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Secret Wars

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Secret Wars (1984) was the first big crossover event to affect an entire comic universe, beating DC Comics' Crisis On Infinite Earths by a year. Whereas Crisis was born out of a desire to simplify the DC Universe, Secret Wars was created - initially at least - to sell toys. In 1983, Mattel approached Marvel to create a comic series that would feature a large cast of Marvel characters, so they could launch a new toy line off the back of it. They'd already had a huge hit with their Masters of the Universe toys, but since their rivals in the toy industry, Kenner, had licensed DC's characters for a toy line, Mattel decided it would be a good idea to license Marvel's characters. Initially, series editor Tom DeFalco was reluctant to launch a stand-alone series, and when he finally came round to the idea, he wanted it to be called simply, "Marvel Super Heroes." However, Mattel's marketing department had decided that the words, "secret" and "wars...
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Avengers #200 - What The Hell Were They Thinking?

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A while ago, I re-read Avengers #100 to #200, which features some truly classic Avengers tales from Steve Englehart, Jim Shooter, David Michelinie, John Byrne and George Perez among others. But the giant anniversary issue that caps that run is one of the most egregious moments in Marvel history. This is the tale of how it came about... Ms. Marvel's solo book had been cancelled in 1979, with #23, and since then she'd been appearing in The Avengers as their newest recruit. Which was fine while Jim Shooter was writing the book - he had recently been made Editor-in-Chief, so he could do what he liked. But by 1980, David Michelinie had taken over as writer on The Avengers, and Chris Claremont, who had written Ms. Marvel's solo title, felt some proprietorship over the character; he wanted her in the X-Men. This led to some bad blood between them. For the 200th issue of Avengers, Michelinie wanted to expand on the idea that the alien race, the Kree, had reached an evolutionary dea...
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