So here’s a comic I’ve been trying to track down for a while.

§ May 27th, 2013 § Filed under collecting, pal plugging, swamp thing § 10 Comments

I talked before about how I’m not really looking for any more old comics for my collection, outside of an issue of Dog Boy or two, or ’60s and ’70s fanzines. I mean, sure, if something cool comes along I might snap it up for myself, but by and large there’s not a whole lot of specific back issues I’m actively looking for. This comic I acquired a few months back, for example, was the big one, a comic I’d spent years trying to find.

But there is this one comic that I’d been half-interested in buying, one featuring the debut of a character that’s appeared on and off over the decades, that I’d never seen in the shop in all the time I’ve worked here. I’ve always liked its quite striking cover, however, since I first saw it in a long-ago issue of Amazing Heroes, and decided then I’d buy a copy should I ever get the opportunity.

And then, this weekend, there it was in a collection (the same collection where I found the comic with this page, in fact):


Showcase #79, December 1968, featuring the debut of Dolphin as written and illustrated by her creator, J. Scott Pike.

Now I suppose I could have gone online and bought a copy from someone, but it’s not something I was absolutely going crazy from not owning…I just figured that sooner or later, a copy would come by the shop, and hopefully it would be in halfway decent shape (i.e. Dolphin didn’t have a mustache drawn on her). As it turns out, it was far more “later” than “sooner,” but, hey, good enough. And now I own a copy of this comic, and the cover looks just as great in real life as it did in that magazine article and on comic cover gallery websites.

Also in the comic is a reprint of the first appearance of Aqualad, and a one-page text piece explaining the idea of fanzines as well as promoting a couple…which is certainly an added bonus for me, given my appreciation for ‘zines.

In conclusion: just what I needed, another comic…but it is always nice to finally find that one elusive item you’ve been searching for, the long itch that finally gets scratched.

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10 Responses to “So here’s a comic I’ve been trying to track down for a while.”

  • Ron Hogan says:

    I ran across a copy of that in the late ’80s, when a friend of my stepfather’s let me look through his old comics to see if he had anything valuable in them. I seem to recall this and a copy of the issue of Bat Lash where he fights Sergio Aragones were the two rarest items in the collection.

  • Tom the Dog says:

    Unrelated heads up: Don’t know if you’re into Arrested Development, but if you want to remain a completist on MST3K you’ll want to check out episode 5 of the new season. Joel Hodgson and Trace Beaulieu make a brief cameo, MST3K-style.

  • I’ve had this one for a long time; I even kept it when I sold most of my original collection. It was one of the first back issues I ever bought from a mail-order comics dealer. The cover caught my eye, too- I’d be interested in if it sold more than some of the other issues of Showcase from around this time.

  • Pal Cully says:

    (Totally unrelated)
    Are you ever going to delve into Peter David’s New Universe work?

  • Lawrence Fechtenberger says:

    Johnny Bacardi: It is highly unlikely that this issue sold more than others around its time, given that it did not lead to a series, unlike nearly every issue that immediately preceded it and followed it (the previous six issues had introduced the Creeper, Anthro, the Hawk and the Dove, Bat Lash, and Angel & the Ape; the next two re-introduced the Phantom Stranger and Dobie Gillis, the latter altered into “Windy & Willy”). The fact that Dolphin did not appear again for a full TEN YEARS–and then only for a single panel appearance in SHOWCASE #100–is also a strong indication that this issue did not sell well.

  • Tristan says:

    But what does she DO?

  • Mikester says:

    Tristan – She breathes underwater and is mysterious.

  • Chance says:

    That’s a sweet retro logo, he admired unironically.

  • Snark Shark says:

    “She breathes underwater and is mysterious.”

    and yet they never let her join the Legion of Substitute Heroes?