For comics fans of a certain vintage, the Heroes World Catalog was it. — TV has A Charlie Brown Christmas, It’s a Wonderful Life and A Christmas Story — reruns that are holiday traditions. At 13th Dimension, we’ve got the SUPER-STAR HOLIDAY SPECIAL — a series of timeless remembrances by some of the best in the comics biz, including Kelley Jones, Annie Nocenti, Ron Marz and MORE! Click here to check ’em out! Here’s columnist Rob Kelly — he of our REEL RETRO CINEMA column — on the vicarious thrill of the Heroes World Catalog and its publishing brethren: — By ROB KELLY Growing up, I always had a pretty good Christmas; Santa usually brought me the stuff I wanted (a Kenner Death Star and a 12-inch Mego Hulk doll? Sweet!) so I have nothing but fond memories of that time of year. But when I do think of those times, the most prominent memory is of a gift that probably cost my parents the least. That’s because one year, amid all the superhero and Star Wars toys that represented my usual holiday haul, my parents got me a Heroes World Catalog. For the uninitiated, Heroes World was a mail-order company located in Northern New Jersey that carried all manner of mouth-watering merchandise: toys, comics, posters, school supplies, t-shirts, bed sheets, stickers, magazines; pretty much anything that could have a licensed character slapped on it, Heroes World carried. (They also had retail outlets and sister catalogs.) DC and Marvel comics ran ads for stuff like this in their comics, but those ads were a single page here and there; this catalog was 30-plus pages of item after item with characters interacting in a way they never would or could in the comics: DC, Marvel, the Universal Monsters, Kiss, Tarzan, characters from Star Wars, Star Trek, Planet of the Apes: They were all here, just a mail-in order form away. To this point, I had no idea all this stuff existed, so seeing page after page was akin to when The Wizard of Oz goes from black-and-white to color: Despite all the other really cool presents I got, I distinctly remember spending most of that X-Mas morning just drinking it all in, reading it as if it were one of my comic books. In fact, because the catalogs were mostly...
The artist collaborated with Stan Lee for one of the Marvel legend’s final works… — Now, this is cool. Shag, the LA-based artist with the swingin’, mid-century style, is releasing a new print that pays tribute to Spider-Man’s Silver Age roots — and his co-creator, Stan Lee. The limited-edition $599 silkscreen print — wonderfully named Life is a Great Big Bang Up after the lyrics from the 1967 cartoon — features Spidey rescuing a woman (Mary Jane?) from the clutches of six sinister villains — the Green Goblin, Doc Ock, the Vulture, Mysterio, the Sandman, and the Rhino. Check it out: Now dig two cameos: Gwen Stacy on the lower left and Lee himself on the upper right. According to Shag’s website, the print was a collaboration between the artist and Lee: “Stan oversaw, gave input to and approved the final product, but unfortunately left this world too soon to sign the print edition as he originally intended,” the site reads. “The Shag store is releasing this print, one of Stan’s final pieces of creative output, as tribute to this giant of comics and pop culture. As is tradition, Stan even asked to make a cameo appearance in the print!” The print will debut at the Shag Store’s third-anniversary event on Saturday (12/8) in West Hollywood. The price will go up the following day. (Click here and here for more info.) P.S. Thanks to buddy David Hyde for pointing this one out on Twitter. Go follow him! — MORE — 13 GREAT THINGS About the SPIDER-MAN 1967 Cartoon. Click here. — Dig DAVID MACK’s Marvelous Tribute to STAN LEE. Click...
For comics fans of a certain vintage, the Heroes World Catalog was it.
The artist collaborated with Stan Lee for one of the Marvel legend’s final works…
