Bronze Age SHAZAM! Series to Get Second Hardcover Collection

Looks like DC will be able to finish out the series…

Back in July, DC released Shazam! The World’s Mightiest Mortal Vol. 1 — a hardcover collecting the first 18 issues of Captain Marvel’s 1970s series:

Cover by Michael Cho

Naturally, the book — featuring stories from Issues #1-18 by Denny O’Neil, the Big Red Cheese’s co-creator C.C. Beck, Elliot S! Maggin, E. Nelson Bridwell and Bob Oksner, among others — was released thanks to the movie Shazam! and renewed interest in the World’s Mightiest Mortal.

Still, you had to hope sales would be strong enough to guarantee a second volume that would complete the 35-issue series.

Looks like that’s the case, because the Shazam! The World’s Mightiest Mortal Vol. 2 hardcover is slated for release in the spring of 2020, according to a listing on Amazon.

Dig the description — along with placeholder art:

SHAZAM! THE WORLD’S MIGHTIEST MORTAL VOL. 2

The 1970s adventures of Shazam — now the star of his very own movie — are collected in color for the first time!

In 1973, DC brought back one of comics’ most popular heroes: Captain Marvel, also known as Shazam!, whose Golden Age adventures sold in the millions of copies. These new adventures combined the cartoony art of C.C. Beck, the original artist from the 1940s, with the modern, tongue-in-cheek sensibility of writers including Elliot S. Maggin and E. Nelson Bridwell.

Collects Shazam! #19-35.

A couple quick thoughts:

— DC has yet to solicit this book, so until that happens, nothing is official. Still, obviously this is a good sign.

— I’m especially pleased that Cap’s modernized issues — illustrated by the likes of Don Newton and Alan Weiss — are included, too. It’d be interesting if DC also eventually collected Captain Marvel’s adventures in World’s Finest that followed these. (Perhaps augmented by guest appearances elsewhere, like the classic DC Comics Presents #33 and #34.)

MORE

— Jerry Ordway’s POWER OF SHAZAM! Series to Get Hardcover Release. Click here.

— SHAZAM! 13 Things to Love About the Original CAPTAIN MARVEL. Click here.

Author: Dan Greenfield

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5 Comments

  1. The classic DC Comics Presents stories were included in the Superman vs. Shazam! trade paperback from several years back!

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  2. But will they be able to include the Isis-Captain Marvel teamup that the Showcase Presents left out (probably due to licensing issues)? I’m betting not.

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  3. A follow-up collection featuring the E. Nelson Bridwell-Don Newton stories from World’s Finest is a definite must!

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  4. I am very excited to see that this may be happening! They got the artist wrong in their little writeup (by this point in the series the majority of the stories were drawn by Kurt Schaffenberger) and in the first volume they inconceivably did not give Bob Oksner a bio, but the appearance of these stories in color, most for the first time since the 1970’s it important. The complete collection shows the good and the bad, but there was definite quality in the good stories, worthy of reading by the folks interested in the history of the character, and particularly the people whose only familiarity is the New 52 and motion picture version, named “Shazam.”

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