Favorite comic book ads

[Hepcat]

I loved this add.  Though it gave me a completely WARPED view at what women wanted in a man.  I learned later that socking another grown man in the jaw while wearing boy shorts on the beach was NOT the way to a girl's heart. 

I'd say it's about time you filled us in on the rest of your story.

[Hepcat]

Here's a scan of the ad for the Aurora Tarzan kit from the back cover of the DC comics that were on newstands in September 1967:

[Mike Scott]

"Me, Tarzan, getting light-headed from model glue! Me kinda like! Not stop smiling!"

[Hepcat]

Here's a scan of a back cover ad from DC comics that were on sale in the early fall of 1965:

[The Batman]

'LOVE this topic and all the pics.
It's simply amazing that an one time someone could profit from a $1.49 sale (plus postage and handling). CHEERS! 

Super cool topic!

[marsattacks666]

'LOVE this topic and all the pics.
It's simply amazing that an one time someone could profit from a $1.49 sale (plus postage and handling). CHEERS! 

Super cool topic!

[Hepcat]

Here's a scan of a back cover ad from the DC comics that were on sale in the spring of 1966:

[Therin of Andor]

Comic ads by Ian McLean by Ian McLean, on Flickr

I created this from memory.

[Hepcat]

I've tracked down the respective months when the DC comics with these fabulous Aurora monster model ads hit the newsstands:

September 1963



January 1964



September 1964



December 1964



August 1965



It's no wonder the Aurora monster model kits were a smash hit with youngsters! Combined with the fabulous box art by James Bama, young fellows didn't stand a chance of resisting these kits on store shelves.

[Wicked Lester]

I find it very cool and interesting that when someone is selling X comic that the ads on the back are of more value than X comic itself.
These are really awesome to put in a frame for wall art. Ive done that myself.

WL

[Haunted hearse]

This one for the Aurora Monster Scenes line of model kits. Vampirella was anatomically correct with visible camel toe. Mothers were appalled but young boys were enthralled.

Has anybody noticed how different Aurora's Vampirella character was, from her character was in her magazine?

[Hepcat]

We have a whole thread on that very subject:

http://www.universalmonsterarmy.com/forum/index.php?topic=30550.0

[ChristineBCW]

Hep, thanks for that link. 

One thing I've enjoy about Hubby is that he remembered what concepts were attracting to him as a child - not just a boy, but apparently children at certain ages.

For example, the Gross-Out Word Choice for foods... calling red beans & rice by "spider-bellies & gooey eggs".  If I asked if they wanted Red Beans & Rice (which they always devoured), they'd sneer and shake their head, disinterested to say the least.

But when Hubby asked if they wouldn't like "spider bellies and gooey eggs", they were ALL excited for that dish. 

He understood cauliflowers were clouds and brocolli was 'buttered trees' and the kids could be monsters only if they ate those.  So they naturally gobbled them, each and every time.  I sat back in amazement.  "How do you know this?"  He remembered it from his days as kid - sometimes, that's only a week ago, so, well...

Looking at these ads reminds me of the powerful effect that fantasies - gore and goo and gross-outs - can be powerful agents for children.  That thread on Vampirella seems to have a few accurate notices of that, but one thing that isn't mentioned - a finely honed body-structure might be too brittle, so she needed those "hips & legs of a horse"... actually, no horse's anatomy looks like those.  Those are hog hinds and legs.   Perhaps the writer was being kind when he used "horse".  ha ha

[Hepcat]

"How do you know this?"  He remembered it from his days as kid - sometimes, that's only a week ago, so, well....

What puzzles me is that so many adults completely forget what it was like to be a kid and what was appealing to them when they themselves were kids.

[ChristineBCW]

Yes.  Personally, I had great reasons - I was a 'late' child in the, uh, production and was raised around my parents and their pals - always adults who praised and lauded articulation, vocabulary, gadgety skills, etc.  Package that with Every Child's Desire to be older, do older things, and well... stilted childhoods don't need to be bad but they can be sterile and devoid.

As parent of now-former Elem students and still a weekly volunteer at that Elem, I see so many 30-ish parents that seem to have slammed those memories away.   They become something between Thoughtless and Inconsiderate.  And stunningly uncreative - ANTI-creative, sometimes. 

We do well when demonstrations over time pay off and see those folks have considered thoughts ("What if - ?") and display some memory dredgings.  But I hear so many tales of broken childhoods and hordes of 'things' instead of good family tales, and all they see now are 'things' and almost acidly avoid filling their kids' lives with Things instead of themselves.  Good.  BUT WHAT ABOUT GOOD FAMILY TIMES, then?  That's something they don't always know how to construct.  "I've never seen it so I can't imagine how to do it" - this is that Thoughtlessness. 

Well, I know this era of society is different from the Babyboomers.  There were "things galore" then, too - just look at these comic ads.  But Aurora and Revelle etc models didn't require an adult's budget.  Nor did comics at 10-12 cents a piece, where $2-3 worth could fill the neighborhood kids' afternoons for a week. 

There aren't cereal-box baseball cards.  Now, they're expensive and - like comics - are only to be treasured, not traded, not passed around from one hip-pocket to another, not tacked into bicycle spokes.

The TV shows - a constant railing exercise for me - are so anti-child-centric, or else kids' networks (like Disney) have 17-20 minutes of product advertising in a 30-min period.  NO. 

Well... this is why God invented boxsets and media-players.  I'm pretty sure of that.