The Joy of Stumbling Onto a Great Bronze Age MEGO Ad

This’ll make your day. It made mine…

UPDATED 1/6/24: Diggin’ in the vault time — when we go deep into the recesses of the shadowy subterranean 13th Dimension headquarters for great columns that deserve another look. Just for kicks! This one first ran in January 2022. Right on! — Dan

One of my favorite things about reading old comics is stumbling upon an ad that immediately lights you up. For some people, I suppose, it’s Sea Monkeys or Count Dante. Or maybe it’s the Polaris Nuclear Sub or the 100 Pc. Toy Soldier Set.

I dig those too but for me there is nothing like an unexpected house ad or, perhaps even better, a Mego ad.

For instance, the other day I was reading 1974’s The Brave and the Bold #113…

… and got to a reprint of the first Silver Age Hawkman story:

So I flip the page, and there’s THIS:

I actually gasped. Not because I’d never seen it before — I have, of course — but because it was so exciting to see it when I didn’t expect to. It was like being transported back 48 years and transformed into a 7-year-old.

And that, almost as much as any story, is what makes reading back issues so intoxicating.

Here’s the next page, by the way. Much more standard fare, but still a hoot:

Dig it.

MORE

— Dig These 13 Groovy Classic MEGO Catalogue Pages. Click here.

— 13 Groovy HEROES WORLD Catalog Pages — RANKED. Click here.

Author: Dan Greenfield

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5 Comments

  1. I’m with you. One of the best parts of rereading these old books is the time capsule in the ads. Even back then, the house ads with covers of other comics I didn’t have had me salivating. It’s been fun as an adult to go and try to find those books I coveted so much back then. And nothing made me want to eat Hostess fruit pies like knowing my favorite superheroes ate them.

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  2. It is fun to see the old ads. I actually ordered the 100 piece toy soldier set. They were actually two-dimensional and about an inch high. Anyone else have them?

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    • I remember having an army of tanks. They were cheaply constructed in two halves with a rubber band to hold them together until they “exploded”.

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  3. I remember taking that issue of BnB with me on a family camping trip

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  4. Wow! I remember those! And I have that issue somewhere! I remember the Hawkman and Viking Prince stories, and the features but I don’t recall the lead team-up! Oh well, 40+ years!

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