Posted By Dan Greenfield on Mar 20, 2024 | 8 comments

Scott and Dan hit up the comics racks from 45 years ago…

This week for RETRO HOT PICKS, Scott Tipton and I are selecting comics that came out the week of March 20, 1979.

Last time for RETRO HOT PICKS, it was the week of March 13, 1972. Click here to check it out.

(Keep in mind that comics came out on multiple days, so these are technically the comics that went on sale between March 17 and March 23.)

So, let’s set the scene: This week saw perhaps President Carter’s greatest achievement in office: approval of the Israel-Egypt Peace Treaty by the respective nations. The deal, which was brokered at Camp David the previous fall, included mutual recognition and normalization of relations; an end to the state of war that had existed since the 1948 Arab–Israeli War; and the withdrawal by Israel from the Sinai Peninsula, which the nation had captured during the Six-Day War in 1967.

On March 21-22, the Egyptian and Israeli parliaments authorized their respective heads of state — President Anwar Sadat and Prime Minister Menachem Begin — to sign the treaty. In a statement, Carter said that the improved relations between the two countries “will strengthen even more our relations with these two partners in peace and help move toward a stable, cooperative, and peaceful future for all the peoples of the Middle East.”

The deal was signed the following week in a much ballyhooed ceremony on the White House lawn that was highlighted by a triple handshake between Sadat, Carter and Begin. Begin and Sadat had been awarded the 1978 Nobel Peace Prize for their efforts, but as we know all too painfully, there is no such thing as lasting peace in the Middle East.

American cinemas featured that typical late-’70s mix of fanciful and grim: The top-grossing film of the week was the newly released The China Syndrome, starring Jack Lemmon, Jane Fonda and Michael Douglas, about the terrifying threat of a nuclear power plant disaster. It presaged the real-life Three Mile Island partial meltdown later in the month, giving greater weight to the movie and greater urgency to the debate over nuclear power.

Labor drama Norma Rae was also on screens, along with The Deer Hunter — one of those great movies you only need to see once. Meanwhile, Superman: The Movie was still flying high, with other choices including Milos Forman’s wonderfully moving and soulful Hair, starring Treat Williams; the Gabe Kaplan basketball comedy Fast Break (which I watched a thousand times when it hit cable); the low-budget Star Wars ripoff Starcrash, with the inimitable Marjoe Gortner and 13th Dimension favorite Caroline Munro; and, The Warriors, a fantastic movie that I didn’t see until adulthood because I was so scared by the fear-mongering news reports that surrounded its February release.

The top-rated TV shows were, in order, Three’s Company, Mork & Mindy, Laverne & Shirley, 60 Minutes and Happy Days. Personally, I was getting fired up for ABC’s annual showing of The Ten Commandments.

Disco remained the king of the Billboard 100: Topping the chart was the Bee Gees’ Tragedy (not one of my faves) but the runner-up is one of the greatest songs of the era: Gloria Gaynor’s spectacular anthem of defiance, I Will Survive. If you don’t like this song, I pity you for your cold, dead heart. You could also Shake Your Groove Thing with Peaches & Herb (No. 5) and howl at the idiotic campiness of Rod Stewart’s Do Ya Think I’m Sexy? (No. 6). That said, the ’80s were right around the corner: Dire Straits’ first single, Sultans of Swing, was at No. 7.

The albums chart tracked closely with the singles chart, with the Bee Gees’ Spirits Having Flown at No. 1, Dire Straits’ self-titled debut at No. 3, Rod Stewart’s Blondes Have More Fun at No. 4, and Gloria Gaynor’s Love Tracks at No. 5. (The Doobie Brothers’ What a Fool Believes, off their No. 2 LP Minute by Minute, was also a hit.)

Yeah, OK, Rod. Maintain.

—

Dan Greenfield, editor, 13th Dimension

The Brave and the Bold #151, DC. Our pal Jim Beard — who has a new book coming out about The Brave and the Bold — slagged this issue on Facebook recently. Could not disagree more, Bunky! First, Batman/Flash team-ups were always enjoyable, even if a little incongruous. And how can you not love Bruce Wayne going to a disco — wearing John Travolta’s outfit, no less! Bruce Wayne used to have a personality and in 1979, going to the hottest disco in town would very much play into his playboy persona. Plus, Bruce and Barry socializing! Fun! Fun! Fun!

Scott adds: First off, if you ever see this comic, buy it: It has the only scene ever created of Bruce Wayne disco dancing. Secondly, if you wanted me to buy a comic, all you had to do was put the Cosmic Treadmill on the cover.

—

Vampirella #78, Warren. At 12 years of age, I would not have had the courage to buy this. But I would have wanted to.

—

Happy Days #2, Gold Key. The publisher was still churning out TV adaptations. What’s surprising is that it took this long for them to do Happy Days, considering it had been a hit for years and had already jumped the shark about a year and a half earlier.

—

Wonder Woman #256, DC. I recently bought this issue. Why? Because if the Royal Flush Gang shows up somewhere, so do I.

—

Super Friends #21, DC. Tip of the pencil to the late, great Ramona Fradon, inked here by Bob Smith.

—

The X-Men #122, Marvel. Great cover by Dave Cockrum. I think this was the first X-Men cover I ever saw. I had no idea who the characters were, and I was really confused.

—

The Avengers #184, Marvel. Excellent team roster around this time, with Carol Danvers really spicing up the team dynamics.

Dan adds: John Byrne pencilling two big team titles in one month — X-Men and Avengers. Who does he think he is — George Perez (who did this Avengers cover)?

—

The Incredible Hulk #236, Marvel. My childhood introduction to Machine Man! I always felt like he should have been a bigger deal.

—

Action Comics #496, DC. The Kandorian perspective here is unexpectedly unsettling.

—

MORE

— RETRO HOT PICKS! On Sale The Week of March 13 — in 1972! Click here.

— RETRO HOT PICKS! On Sale The Week of March 6 — in 1989! Click here.

—

Primary comics sources: Mike’s Amazing World of Comics, the Grand Comics Database.