Quote from: Tuxedo Mark on September 30, 2017, 06:46:39 PM

Quote from: ASS-P on September 29, 2017, 12:53:42 PM
Sixteen-year-olds are not allowed to play the lottery!

How do you know Archie's not 18 in this story?

Because he's still in high school? Nothing has changed in that respect. I guess the Archieverse just has different laws regarding playing the lottery.

Quote from: ASS-P on September 30, 2017, 07:46:05 AM
Okay - HOW MANY FLIPPING VERSIONS, ALREADY, HAVE their been of the " serious " super-heroes published by ACP have there been? I was tending to call them " the MLJ heroes, yes, evem[size=78%] including the ones who originated after the MLJ name was given up, but I saw a Wikipedia entry saying " Red Circle " was the prefered generic phrase. Which one?[/size]

The MLJ era = 1939-1948 (Pep, Zip, Top-Notch, Blue Ribbon, Jackpot. Black Hood and Shield are the last holdouts in Laugh and Pep after 1946.

"Archie Adventure Series" era = 1959-1964 Adventures of the Fly #1-30, Double Life of Pvt. Strong #1-2, Adventures of the Jaguar #1-15, The Shadow #1-3. Jaguar, Fly, and Fly-Girl also appear briefly as a regular short feature of both Laugh and Pep.

Mighty Comics Group era = 1965-1967 The Shadow #4-8, Fly-Man #31-39, The Mighty Crusaders #1-7, Mighty Comics Presents #40-50.

Red Circle (1) imprint = 1972-1974 Horror/mystery stories, no supers. Chilling Tales of Sorcery, Madhouse.

Red Circle (2) era = 1983-1985 Brief revival years of The Mighty Crusaders #1-13, plus several other heroes in their own titles. All short-lived. Final year dispenses with Red Circle imprint (originally direct-sales only) in favor of "Archie Adventure Series" corner box and newsstand distribution again.

*Spectrum Comics* (circa 1989-1990)  Intended "edgy" ACP superhero imprint which would have rebooted The Fly and The Hangman; others in various stages of treatment. Cancelled after over a year in development plus advance publicity in The Comics Buyers' Guide, when Michael Silberkleit finally sees Kelley Jones' pencilled pages for The Hangman #1, is utterly revolted, and pulls the plug on the entire project.

Impact! Comics era = 1991-1992 (licensed by DC Comics) Numerous titles, rebooted heroes. Lighter tone than current DC mainstream titles, for an intended audience a few years younger (not unlike Marvel's "Ultimate" universe, a decade later).

Red Circle (3) era = 2009-2010 (licensed by DC Comics) The Shield, The Web, Hangman, Mighty Crusaders

Red Circle (4) era = 2012-2014 Back at Archie Comics: New Crusaders: Rise of the Heroes #1-6; The Fox #1-5

Dark Circle era = 2015-2017  Black Hood, The Fox, Hangman, The Shield, The Mighty Crusaders #1 (Dec. 2017)

Just for fun, let's see if anyone knows the answer to this.


Question 1)  Other than ARCHIE, what is the name of the longest-running (according to total number of issues) ongoing title which Archie Comic Publications has had in its entire history?

Question 2)  How many years did that title run (+/- 6 months)?

Question 3)  How many issues of that title were published before it was cancelled?



Important Note:  Any title that was cancelled, but then restarted again immediately with a new #1 issue is ineligible for inclusion by adding up the number or issues in more than one volume of the title. This leaves out such obvious contenders as JUGHEAD and BETTY AND VERONICA. Good luck! If no one gets it, I'll reveal the answer next week.

Quote from: ASS-P on September 29, 2017, 02:09:37 PM
...I bought the Spidey one, and I migh t very well buy this'n...

So what are the contents, generally speaking? I thought it would probably be reprints of Marvel's kids' line of comics from the last couple of decades or so, but didn't actually see one to flip through it.

Sorry to hear. You gotta watch the sugar and sodium intake, get some exercise (lose weight if that's a factor), and lower your blood pressure if you can. Of course you probably have meds, but diet and exercise are a big help in controlling your diabetes, and it's really all you can do for yourself. Some people are just more genetically at risk, but what can you do? You just have to learn to adapt your lifestyle. It is what it is.

Quote from: Tytalus on September 29, 2017, 03:01:52 PM
Hi everone,
I'm writing a Riverdale fanfiction and am looking for some iconic locations for characters to sneak off to and make out. Whether the old comics or the current generation I don't mind. I'd love to know if there are there any?
Thanks.

Very few, actually. Archie Comics characters rarely attempt to "make out". They kiss (with great enthusiasm, I might add) accompanied by orbiting hearts around their heads, or heart-shaped irises in their eyes. A particularly enthusiastic kiss might be accompanied by a sound effect like *SMERP!!* Most of these kisses take place spontaneously, rather than surreptitiously and sneakily, or in some private secluded spot. The most common semi-private place that an extended kissing session might take place is on the couch in the family living room, after the parents have gone to bed or are out for the evening (it helps that most of the characters have no siblings living at home with them).

Quote from: Tytalus on September 29, 2017, 03:05:23 PM
Hi everyone. I'm writing a fanfiction and am here to ask some universe/content questions.

1 Question - how do I edit my profile?

In the upper left corner under Hello Tytalus (if you are logged in), you'll see a menu bar:

Home - Forum - Help - Search - Media - Profile - My Messages - Calendar - Links - Shop - Members - Logout

If you hover your cursor over Profile, you'll see a dropdown menu that includes Forum Profile, which is where you can edit it.

Quote from: ASS-P on September 29, 2017, 01:31:18 PM
...What you said, regarding   the different " 6Ts "...Myself, I tend to see it as " the 1960s " early on...then " Sixties " (maaaan ) once we get to fifty-years-ago this year or so.
  The thing is, I sorta recall, as someone whose parents had our area's local paper wbich carried Archie home-delivered when Montana was alive and (already a comic fan) read it there...I think the strip, at the turn of the Seventies, tended to feature frequently featued jokes from an " older generation " perspective that rather PUT DOWN things associated with " the younger generation "!   As did many newspaper strips then, aimed at the older folks who bought the newspaper (and the feature editors at thd papers who keep the gates)

It wasn't JUST the comic strip Archie which was conservative though... regardless of whether the conservatism is attributable to Bob Montana (who graduated from high school in 1940, after all, and lived in a small rural town in southern New Hampshire for the entire time he worked on the strip), or to newspaper or syndicate editors. You are absolutely correct about Doonesbury being the comic strip to break the monopoly of conservatism in newspaper strips.

Archie Comic Publications, up until very recently was positioned as an "arch"-conservative publisher of comic books for nearly all of its history. But that was particularly true up through at least the mid-1960s, and it's fair enough to say it applies to all of the Sixties, and to a lesser degree for the next four decades beyond that. There are numerous examples to be found in the stories of commentaries regarding the company's viewpoint on contemporary music (true up until the time when The Archies became a moneymaker for the company), "modern art" and "pop art", and beatniks and hippies and countercultural types of every stripe. There were absolutely no black characters (or indeed ANY non-Caucasian characters) appearing in Archie Comics stories until the company was compelled to incorporate Valerie (an invention of Hanna-Barbera Studios' writer/animators) into its changed-direction JOSIE AND THE PUSSYCATS comic. In his book Twelve Cent Archie, Bart Beaty is quick to point to many specific examples of stories which mock nontraditional ideas and the people behind them as charlatans and phonies.

MIRACULOUS: Tales of Ladybug & Cat Noir (Season 1, 26 episodes) - What a great show. It's one of the most unusual spins on a superhero series I've ever seen (and I've seen a lot of them). A pretty girlie take on a superhero, because it's cartoony, and a high school rom-com, or maybe that should be "magical girl" + "henshin hero" instead of superheroes... or maybe it doesn't matter since the series is set in the city of Paris. Ordinary (or is she?) Parisian 15 year-old Marinette Dupin-Cheng is chosen to be the wearer of the miraculous, which grants her the magical powers of Ladybug (no sillier than being bitten by a radioactive spider, I guess). She's goofy, clumsy and tongue-tied whenever she's in the presence of her schoolgirl crush, Adrien Agreste, son of a famous and wealthy fashion designer (and himself a teenage male model)... who is also secretly her crimefighting partner, Cat Noir, unbeknownst to her. And Cat Noir has a mad crush on Ladybug, but of course, he doesn't know she's really Marinette either. There are some strong hints that the master villain of the series, Hawkmoth, may be Adrien's father (and neither hero knows that either... but does Hawkmoth know who they are?). Hawkmoth never confronts them personally, but remains safe within his secret lair until whenever he senses dark emotions of frustration, anger, and hurt and in people, and he absorbs and transforms those emotions into a dark force (because he too is the possessor of a miraculous) which allows him to imbue an ordinary white butterfly with evil power, changing it into a black "akuma" and sending it out to "evilize" a normal person in emotional turmoil (by bonding with some object in that person's possession, transforming them along with its power into a proxy supervillain) that Hawkmoth promises the power to gain revenge to, in exchange for them agreeing to bring back to him Ladybug and Cat Noir's miraculouses, their magical power objects that are said to represent the powers of creation and destruction, and together are said to be the most powerful of several known miraculouses, that have been in existence for thousands of years, and have been passed down worldwide over the centuries to different chosen ones in many different times and countries. When transformed, the heroes gain both the usual enhanced speed, strength, stamina, agility and durability, and also a signature weapon (Ladybug = magical compact/yo-yo; Cat Noir = magical battle staff)  and a special "finishing move" power. Cat Noir's is "Catastrophe!", an ability to summon dark force into the palm of his hand to disintegrate any solid object (one-time only), and Ladybug's is "Lucky Charm!", a randomly-changed object that comes with no instructions ("What am I supposed to do with this?"), but which also includes Ladybug-vision (she sees red-and-black-spotted objects when she looks all around her that clue her into what she needs to combine the seemingly-ordinary Lucky Charm with to win the day and defeat the villain). Ladybug never knows what to expect when she shouts "Lucky Charm!" -- some of the Lucky Charms have been: a spray-paint can, bath towel, Ladybug costume, another yo-yo, a cardboard box, a spoon (all of them red, with black polka-dots). After they've chosen to use their special power, they have only 5 minutes remaining before they'll transform back to their normal selves. There's a rhythm to the ritualized repetition of certain tropes and expected actions, so that you actually look forward to seeing them in each episode. So well thought-out, funny, action-packed, and having some real emotional truth at its core. Usually I'm not a big fan of CGI-style toons, but in this one the characters are so well-designed, and their body language and facial expressions rendered with a lot of care. They're well-animated and can be graceful or goofy in their movements, according to what the situation calls for. I love it.

09-27-17:
THANOS #11
WONDER WOMAN #31
ACTION COMICS #988
DETECTIVE COMICS #965
BATMAN/THE SHADOW #6 (of 6)
BATMAN IN NOIR ALLEY (one-shot)
KAMANDI CHALLENGE #9 (of 12)
SCOOBY DOO TEAM UP #30
LOONEY TUNES #239
MIGHTY MOUSE #4 (of 5)

Still wondering when my last issue of ARCHIE'S FUNHOUSE DOUBLE DIGEST #28 will arrive to complete my subscription to that title... 

Quote from: irishmoxie on September 26, 2017, 06:58:55 PM

Quote from: DeCarlo Rules on September 23, 2017, 04:58:59 AM
MONSTER HIGH feature DVDs:
   New Ghoul @ School*****
   Fright On! ****
   Why Do Ghouls Fall in Love? ****
   Escape From Skull Shores ***
   Friday Night Frights ***
   Ghouls Rule! ****
   Scaris: City of Frights ***
   13 Wishes ***
   Frights, Camera, Action! ****
   Freaky Fusion *
   Haunted ***
   Boo York, Boo York *****
   Great Scarrier Reef **

EVER AFTER HIGH Specials:
   Legacy Day****
   True Hearts Day****
   Spring Unsprung****
   Way Too Wonderland****

A lot of these are on Netflix. Which one of these do you recommend?

The list above is in their original order of release. I've rated them all from 1 to 5 stars, depending on how much I liked them.

You should definitely watch the first of each series (in red), as those are both the shortest of both series (at 23 minutes), and they are definitely designed as "introductory" features that introduce the main characters and basic premises of the series.

Other things you should know:
The Monster High features all focus on some different theme, and each features a slightly different cast that they focus on. Generally speaking, one or two characters tend to take the lead parts, with some new character(s) also being introduced in that feature. The first two MH features, and all of the Ever After High features, are traditional-style flat (2D) animation, while the MH features from Why Do Ghouls Fall in Love? on are all CGI animation. The characters tend to look a little different in one style to the other, and the same is true of both their appearance as dolls and the packaging art. I have a definite preference for the 2D animated characters' look.

You might want to check out Mattel's YouTube channel to sample either of the short webisodes (about 3 minutes long, +/-). Just search for Monster High Volume 1 or Ever After High Volume 1. The first couple of Ever After High specials are compiled from shorter webisodes making up a continued story arc, so you can sample those for free.

Boo York, Boo York is a musical and a love story. Out of all the CGI-animated MH features, it tends to work the best, because the music keeps the story moving along at a good pace.

MONSTER HIGH feature DVDs:
   New Ghoul @ School
   Fright On!
   Why Do Ghouls Fall in Love?
   Escape From Skull Shores
   Friday Night Frights
   Ghouls Rule!
   Scaris: City of Frights
   13 Wishes
   Frights, Camera, Action!
   Freaky Fusion
   Haunted
   Boo York, Boo York
   Great Scarrier Reef

EVER AFTER HIGH Specials:
   Legacy Day
   True Hearts Day
   Spring Unsprung
   Way Too Wonderland

Quote from: Captain Jetpack on September 22, 2017, 07:31:47 AM
that IDW & Archie would come out with more Golden Age collection of their newspaper strips.
3 ain't enough.

I was curious about why they didn't just continue from where they left off with the first volume, in the late 1940s. I was amazed at how quickly Montana mastered the difficult balance between an ongoing continuity while still providing the requisite gag-a-day, certainly no easy task.

I enjoyed the later volumes from the so-called "Swingin' Sixties" less than the 1940s one, because by that time, the strip had dropped all pretense at any attempt to carrying on a running plotline. I also think IDW did itself a disservice by subtitling those volumes as they did, as all that tended to do was point out how hopelessly UN-Swingin' that particular comic strip was in comparison to its times. Those volumes were all right, but pale by comparison to the first one from the 40s. Perhaps the title "The Swingin' Sixties" on those two hardcovers set up some expectation in my mind that the strip would feel very contemporary to the trends of its time, which I'm sorry to say couldn't be further from the case. It's a misnomer to begin with, as when the phrase is used, it's generally referring only to the mid-to-late 1960s period (post-Beatles, but pre-Woodstock) in America, and the strips barely get as far as 1964 in the second of the two volumes, and really don't reflect the changes in youth culture -or the culture at large- much at all (certainly less than the comic books do). I do however recommend the color volume of "Archie's Sunday Finest" strips, which while unfortunately more of a "best of" collection than a complete one, and also having no continuity from week to week, is still quite good.

The greater irony there was that we can't get a chronological hardcover collection of 1960s Archie comic BOOK stories for love of money. 

Sales might have been low by comparison to other Library of American Comics strip collections, and/or the difficulty and expense of locating all the necessary strips in good enough condition for reproduction, or a combination of those two factors.

Not an Archie Comic. Andy Hardy, actually -- from DELL FOUR COLOR #480 (July 1953).



There's an apocryphal story that says that John Goldwater was inspired by seeing a long line of teenagers queued-up to get tickets for an Andy Hardy movie, which in turn inspired Goldwater with the idea that he ought to publish some teenage humor comics. Some speculate that the film in question might have been Life Begins for Andy Hardy, which was released on August 15, 1941. That would fit the production lead time for PEP COMICS #22 (cover-dated December, 1941), which would have been on the stands sometime in October of that year. There's one big problem with that theory, however... in his first appearance, Archie -- and Betty and Jughead, who all appeared in that first story -- weren't teenagers. They were about 12 years old. MLJ Magazines DID have a teenage humor character prior to Archie Andrews, though... Wilbur Wilkin. Wilbur first appeared in ZIP COMICS #18 (cover-dated September 1941), which would have been on the stands sometime in July 1941. Too early to be inspired by THAT particular Andy Hardy picture, but Goldwater could have been inspired by an earlier film, like Andy Hardy's Private Secretary, which had been released in February 1941, enough time to get a writer and artist working on cobbling together a story about hapless teenager Wilbur.

Translating the idea of a popular movie genre into a comic book wasn't any particular stroke of genius, either. The concept of the humorous antics of teenagers in comics goes back as far as The Love Life of Harold Teen, a newspaper comic strip (later shortened to just Harold Teen) that first appeared on Sunday, May 4, 1919 in The Chicago Tribune (later famed as the home paper of Dick Tracy). "Harold Teen" could truly be said to be on the cutting edge, in the sense that the very concept of the teenager (and coining of the word itself), as a distinct social group with its own independent ways and fads and foibles, was only just beginning to be recognized by adult society after the first World War, as the nineteen-teens turned into the nineteen-twenties. Henry Ford had given them the mobility to congregate in small groups free of parental supervision, at just about the same time that the idea of a parental gratuity called an "allowance" was taking hold.

09-20-17:
BUG: THE ADVENTURES OF FORAGER #4 (of 6)
FUTURE QUEST PRESENTS SPACE GHOST #2 (of ?)
WONDER WOMAN '77/BIONIC WOMAN #6 (of 6)
WONDER WOMAN/CONAN #1 (of 6)
ACTION COMICS #987
DARK NIGHTS: METAL #2 (of 6)
DARK NIGHTS: BATMAN THE RED DEATH #1 (one-shot)
BATMAN: BATMAN DAY 2017 SPECIAL EDITION #1
HARLEY QUINN: BATMAN DAY 2017 SPECIAL EDITION #1
DC SUPER HERO GIRLS: BATMAN DAY 2017 SPECIAL EDITION #1
RICK & MORTY: POCKET LIKE YOU STOLE IT #3 (of 5)
BLACK HAMMER #13
MICRONAUTS: WRATH OF KARZA #5 (of 5)
STREET FIGHTER VS DARKSTALKERS #5 (of 8 )
KAIJUMAX: SEASON 3 #3 (of 6)
BLOOD BOWL: MORE GUTS, MORE GLORY #4 (of 4)
WOLFENSTEIN #1 (of 2)
INFINI-T FORCE GN VOL 01: ARC TO THE FUTURE
DRAGONS RIOTING GN VOL 01-07