John Byrne's Alpha Flight
"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...