Comics Feature was an American magazine of news, criticism, and commentary pertaining to comic books, comic strips, and animation. Published by New Media Publishing, it produced 57 issues (and a number of specials) between 1980 and 1987.
After dabbling in publishing for a few years, brothers Hal and Jack Schuster, co-owners of the distributor New Media/Irjax, founded New Media Publishing (NMP) in 1980.[3][4] NMP's first publication, launched in March 1980, was the professionally produced hobbyistfanzineComics Feature.[5]
NMP's line of publications was overseen by editorial director Peter B. Gillis; Comics Feature's first editors were Dean Mullaney[6] and Carol Kalish.[7] Mullaney soon left the editor job to focus full-time on his publishing house, Eclipse Enterprises.[8] Peter B. Gillis left NMP in June 1981,[9] with Richard Howell replacing him as editorial director.[9] Howell joined his partner Carol Kalish as co-editor of Comics Feature in late 1981.[10][11][12] Howell and Kalish didn't last long, however, as they both left for positions at Marvel Comics by the conclusion of 1982.[13] Despite the turmoil, Comics Feature was nominated for Favourite Fan Publication in the 1981 Eagle Awards, losing to The Comics Journal in a close vote.[14]
After Kalish and Howell's departure, the editorial reins of Comics Feature passed to Robert Lewis.[15] NMP Published Hal Schuster became editor in 1986,[16] staying in that position through the magazine's final issue.
In the summer of 1987, Marvel Comics sued the Schuster brothers for copyright and trademark infringement, claiming they had improperly used Marvel artwork in various issues of another NMP magazine.[17] The Marvel lawsuit appears to have put the various Schuster Brother operations out of business, as they stopped publishing after that point; Comics Feature was one of the casualties.
Publishing details
Comics Feature started out as a monthly, with some exceptions where the magazine skipped a month. In 1981 and 1982 it was published roughly on a bimonthly basis. 1983 only saw three issues of Comics Feature published, but the magazine returned to a bimonthly schedule in 1984 and 1985. Comics Feature returned to a monthly schedule in 1986 and 1987.
In total, Comics Feature published 57 issues from March 1980 to July 1987.
In addition, NMP published the following Comics Feature specials:
Comics Feature: The Fandom Zone (1 issue, 1980) — edited by Don and Maggie Thompson
The magazine's regular content included industry news, comics creator interviews, histories of Silver Age characters and comic book companies, and reviews of current titles. Regular columns included Don & Maggie Thompson's The Fandom Zone (1980–1982), Looking Back at the Golden Age (written by Roy Thomas in 1986–1987), Saturday Morning Season (about animated television shows), and How to Write Comics, a column by Stan Lee that ran in 1985–1986.
There were also regular stories on the animation business, role-playing games, and comics collecting/investing (written by Mike Benton). Ron Goulart wrote about science fiction comic strips. Comics Feature primarily focused on the two major mainstream publishing companies of the time, Marvel Comics and DC Comics, with more covers devoted to Marvel properties. (The magazine was also not above reporting on other NMP publications.)
Each issue featured at least one major interview, often with some of the industry's most popular creators. Noteworthy interviews included Julius Schwartz in issue #30; Stan Lee in issues #33, #44, and #50; Jack Kirby in issues #34, #44, and #50; Jim Steranko in issue #50; the Adventures of Superman TV series cast in issue #57; and Bugs Bunny in issue #45!
Galactus is a fictional character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. Formerly a mortal man, Galactus is a cosmic entity who originally consumed planets to sustain his life force, and serves a functional role in the upkeep of the primary Marvel continuity. Galactus was created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby and first appeared in the comic book Fantastic Four #48, published in March 1966.
The All-Star Squadron is a DC Comics superhero team that debuted in Justice League of America #193 and was created by Roy Thomas, Rich Buckler and Jerry Ordway. Although the team was introduced in the 1980s, its self-titled series took place in the 1940s, retroactively inserting their narratives into the fictional history of the DC Comics superheroes. The team included many of DC's Golden Age era characters, new characters, and other World War II superheroes that DC did not own during the 1940s but later acquired. The name "All-Star Squadron" was creator Roy Thomas' reference to All Star Comics, the series that introduced the Justice Society of America, the first comic book superhero team.
Gerard Francis Conway is an American comic book writer, comic book editor, screenwriter, television writer, and television producer. He is known for co-creating the Marvel Comics vigilante antihero the Punisher and scripting the death of the character Gwen Stacy during his long run on The Amazing Spider-Man. At DC Comics, he is known for co-creating the superhero Firestorm, the creation of the character Jason Todd and the villain Killer Croc, and for writing the Justice League of America for eight years. Conway wrote the first major, modern-day intercompany crossover, Superman vs. the Amazing Spider-Man.
John Buscema was an American comic book artist and one of the mainstays of Marvel Comics during its 1960s and 1970s ascendancy into an industry leader and its subsequent expansion to a major pop-culture conglomerate. His younger brother Sal Buscema is also a comic book artist.
Epic Illustrated was a comics anthology in magazine format published in the United States by Marvel Comics. Similar to the US-licensed comic book magazine Heavy Metal, it allowed explicit content to be featured, unlike the traditional American comic books of that time bound by the restrictive Comics Code Authority, as well as offering its writers and artists ownership rights and royalties in place of the industry-standard work for hire contracts. The series lasted 34 issues from Spring 1980–February 1986.
Peter B. Gillis is an American comic book writer best known for his work at Marvel Comics and First Comics in the mid-1980s, including the series Strikeforce: Morituri and the digitally drawn comic series Shatter.
Atlas Comics is the 1950s comic-book publishing label that evolved into Marvel Comics. Magazine and paperback novel publisher Martin Goodman, whose business strategy involved having a multitude of corporate entities, used Atlas as the umbrella name for his comic-book division during this time. Atlas evolved out of Goodman's 1940s comic-book division, Timely Comics, and was located on the 14th floor of the Empire State Building. This company is distinct from the 1970s comic-book company, also founded by Goodman, that is known as Atlas/Seaboard Comics.
Marvel Super-Heroes is the name of several comic book series and specials published by Marvel Comics.
Fandral the Dashing is a fictional character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. He is a charter member of the Warriors Three, a trio of Asgardian adventurers consisting of Fandral, Hogun the Grim, and Volstagg the Valiant. They are members of the supporting cast in Marvel's Thor comics and usually provide comic relief and side-adventures.
Comic BomBom was a monthly Japanese manga magazine published by Kodansha and targeted at elementary school boys. Each issue had 700+ pages, with 80 of them being full-color advertisements. Similar to its rival CoroCoro Comic, it featured tie-ins with game makers and toy makers but toward the end of its run had less of that.
Carol Kalish was an American writer, editor, comic book retailer, and sales manager. She worked as Direct Sales Manager and Vice President of New Product Development at Marvel Comics from 1981 to 1991. She is credited with pioneering the American comics direct market when it was in its adolescence, in part through a program wherein Marvel helped pay for comic book stores to acquire cash registers.
New Media Distribution/Irjax Enterprises was a comic book distributor and publisher active from the mid-1970s to the mid-1980s. In 1978, the company's legal actions again the dominant distributor of the era, Sea Gate Distributors, widened the field for the direct market to expand. In 1982, when Irjax's distribution arm went out of business, its processing centers and warehouses formed the basis for Diamond Comics Distributors, the now-dominant comics distributor. The company's publishing arm, New Media, continued in the business until 1995. New Media mainly published periodicals for comics/fantasy/science fiction enthusiasts, including the long-running critical journal Comics Feature. Editors and writers with New Media included Carol Kalish, Richard Howell, Peter B. Gillis, Kurt Busiek, Don and Maggie Thompson, James Van Hise, Peter Sanderson, Max Allan Collins, Ron Goulart, Will Jacobs and Gerard Jones, Steve Perrin, and Roy Thomas.
Spider-Man Comics Weekly was a Marvel UK publication which primarily published black-and-white reprints of American Marvel four-color Spider-Man stories. Marvel UK's second-ever title, Spider-Man Comics Weekly debuted in 1973, initially publishing "classic" 1960s Spider-Man stories.
Richard Howell is an American comics artist best known as the co-founder and editor of Claypool Comics.
Speakeasy was a British magazine of news and criticism pertaining to comic books, comic strips and graphic novels. It published many interviews with both British and American comics creators.
Martin Lock is a British comic book critic, writer, and publisher. As publisher of the fanzines BEM and Fantasy Advertiser, and then publisher of Harrier Comics, he was an important figure in British comics fandom in the 1970s and 1980s.
James Van Hise is an American popular culture historian and comic book author. He had a long connection with the popular fanzine Rocket's Blast Comicollector (RBCC), and was its editor/publisher from 1974 to 1983. He also had a lengthy association with Hal Schuster, owner of New Media Publishing and Pioneer Books. Van Hise is the author of more than ten books, many of them published by Pioneer Books.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
