Despite dedicating an extra long review to Fantastic Four #1, there’s still one thing I didn’t talk about: what was on the market when it came out.
To make things relatively simple, I will be approaching this by looking at the cover date; it’s entirely possible that not ALL these comics would have been on a rack next to each other.
MARVEL
The same month, Marvel put out 12 books. For obvious reasons, Fantastic Four was the only superhero title. Let’s start with the anthologies that WILL become superhero comics.
From Lee & Kirby we have Strange Tales #90, with the monster Orrgo.
In addition to the fairly typical monster story from the cover, it also has a Lee&Ditko sci-fi backup.
It’s about a guy who invents an immortality serum tat can’t be replicated.
Hundreds of years later, Earth becomes so overpopulated that EVERYONE decides to leave it for a bigger place.
However the immortality serum wasn’t permanent, so the protagonist stays on Earth to repopulate it with the only woman who stayed.
The protagonist kinds of look like Peter Parker, doesn’t he?
Cute. Just don’t think too hard about the thousand ways this won’t work.
Other monster stories include Tales of Suspense #23 and Tales to Astonish #25.
I always confuse which superhero went to star on which “Tales” book.
We also have Amazing Adventures #6; that’s the book where Doctor Druid first appeared, but he’s already gone by this point.
Completing the monster books is Journey Into Mystery #74.
Hmmm, there sure were a lot of orange monsters on the covers that month.
The other genre with multiple books was westerns.
There were Kid Colt Outlaw #101 and Gunsmoke Western #67…also starring Kid Colt.
There were no less than four romance comics: “Millie the Model”, “Teen-Age Romance”, “Love Romances” and “Linda Carter, Student Nurse”.
To recap, the November 1961 cover date books from Marvel are:
-1 superhero book
-2 western book
-4 romance books
-5 monster books
I could not find sales figures for Fantastic Four #1.
In 1961, “Tales to Astonish” and “Tales of Suspense” were each selling around 184,000 copies and Rawhide Kid (which wasn’t published in November) sold 150,000.
While those sound like a lot in today’s market, it’s not that high: the two “Tales” would be the 40th and 41st best selling book and Rawhide Kid would be the 47th: Superman sold 820,000 copies that year.
By contrast, in 1962 the best selling Marvel book was “Modelling with Millie” at 143,000 copies, the 44th best selling book of the year.
Credit for this data goes to www.comichron.com
DC COMICS
DC Comics had A LOT more books out with a November 1961 cover date.
28 books against Marvel’s 12.
Superman had 3 books, all of which I’ve already covered: Action Comics #282, Superman #149 and Lois Lane #29.
But there was also World’s Finest #121.
It’s a wild fever dream of a story.
It’s not that much of an outlier when Detective Comics #297 came out the same month.
There was also a Legion story, with Adventure Comics #290.
In the Fantastic Four review I mentioned that Johnny Storm FELT like a teenager, way more than the teenagers shown in other books. I stand by it.
Justice League of America, the book that supposedly inspired the creation of the Fantastic Four, was in its 7th issue. The book was selling around 335,000 copies in 1961, making it the 13th best selling book and the highest selling DC book that did not star Superman/Superboy or Batman.
Wonder Woman #126 was also out. The book was selling 230,000 copies, making it the 29th best seller.
Completing the superhero books were Flash, Atom (on Showcase) and Adam Strange (on Mystery In Space).
DC didn’t do “monster books” like Marvel, but its sci-fi anthologies were the closest thing.
In November 1961 there were “My Greatest Adventure”, “Tales of the Unexpected”, “Strange Adventures”, “House of Mystery” and “House of Secrets”.
Most of these will become superhero books at some point; arguably “Tales of the Unexpected” already might be considered as such, since it stars Space Ranger.
Romance comics were also big at DC.
There were “Secret Hearts”, “Falling in Love”, “Girls’ Love Stories”, “Girls’ Romance” and “Heart Throbs”.
Arguably the only historical impact of these is the John Romita Senior artwork.
I’m shocked there are no western comics. But there are 4 war comics: “Blackhawks” (arguably), “GI Combat”, “Our Army At War” and “Star-Spangled War Stories”.
These have WILDLY different tones.
And finally, another category of books that Marvel didn’t have: comedy and kids books, represented by “The Adventures of Bob Hope”, “The Fox and the Crow” and “Sugar and Spike”.
To recap, in November 1961 DC Comics published:
-11 superhero books
-5 sci-fi books
-5 romance books
-4 war books
-3 comedy/kids books
This means that DC published nearly as many superhero comics as Marvel had books across all its genres. Your mileage may vary, but aside from Superman #149 I would not classify any of them at the same level of Fantastic Four #1, despite the latter’s growing pains.
Since I have mentioned sales figures from comichron.com, I should mention two outliers from Dell Comics.
In 1961, Tarzan sold 509,000 copies: outselling all DC books except Superman, Superboy (not out in November), Jimmy Olsen and Lois Lane.
Yes, it outsold Batman by 24,000 copies.
The other outlier from Dell was Uncle Scrooge: that was the highest selling comic book of 1961, outselling Superman by 33,000 copies.
Those sales numbers are for November 1961, as opposed to the whole year, right?
They are the average copies sold per issue that year.
It really is amazing to see so many genres besides superheroes, which are now practically synonymous with comic books, especially from the Big Two.