The Marvel Horror of the 1970s Anthology Omnibus is the #47 Most-Wanted Marvel Omnibus of 2017 on Tigereyes’s Secret Ballot.
What exactly is that? As it turns out, not even voters may entirely agree! Below I’ve examined all of the possible contents, including heroes, monsters, and imaginative anthologies. Visit the Marvel Masterworks Message Board to view the original posting of results by Tigereyes.
What Is It? After Fredric Wertham’s Seduction of the Innocent partially took aim at the the legitimately ooky horror comics of the early 50s, The Comic Code altogether outlawed scary monsters in floppy books. While you could publish a comic without the Code, it might not be carried by distributors or stores.
In 1971, The Code loosened up a bit, allowing “vampires, ghouls, and werewolves… when handled in the classic tradition such as Frankenstein, Dracula, and other high calibre literary works written by Edgar Allan Poe, Saki, Conan Doyle and other respected authors whose works are read in schools around the world.”
At the time Marvel was experiencing a resurgence of interest in magazines and pulpy black & white comics, and this horror material made the perfect accompaniment to their blossoming line of Conan comics and Kung Fu books.
Past Ranking: Marvel Horror was #42 in 2016, both #29 (heroes) and #42 (monsters) in 2015, and #32 in 2014.
The Details: Heroes, Monsters, & Anthologies
There are three lines of thinking about what this omnibus would contain, and I don’t think voters have been clear enough that even Tigereyes is sure which of the two they’re seeking.
The first pair of possibilities are Marvel’s supernatural superheroes and signature monsters, as previously collected in black and white by Marvel Horror Essentials Volume 1 and Volume 2.
The final option is a broader collection of Marvel’s various horror anthology books, which would be multiple volumes but could probably also encompass the signature monsters. [Read more…] about Marvel Horror of the 1970s – The #47 Most-Wanted Marvel Omnibus of 2017