In 1968 cinema goers were shocked, horrified and thoroughly entertained by the release of the film Planet of the Apes. So popular was the idea that it spawned no less than four sequels of which the last was actually pretty bad. My first experience of the franchise was the TV series launched in 1974 and became regular Saturday feature for a lot of families though interest did decline after a while.
It was inevitable that a comic would come along and Marvel made two attempts. The first launched in August 1974 was aimed at the adult readers market in a black & white magazine format that was popular at the time and allowed writers to avoid the restrictive Comics Code.
This issue contained two continuing stories Spawn of the Mutant Pit plus an adaptation of the main movie. The former story was an interesting exploration of the possibilities of the world of the apes.
Planet of the Apes lasted for 29 issues until 1977. In 1975 a bi-monthly four colour title was issued for the main comics market called Adventures on Planet of the Apes. It lasted for just 11 issues. However in the UK Marvel ran a weekly comic Planet of the Apes which ran for 123 issues which was so popular they ran out of original material and even put ape heads on character in Killraven to fill the gap.
Of course it's all been revamped now for better or for worse and I did pick up some of the more esoteric crossovers published by Boom! Studios with Star Trek and Green Lantern which were fun if you come across them.
No comments:
Post a Comment