MARVEL ROMANCE REDUX "I Was a Beach Blanket Barbarian!"

Five years after DC did the snarky Truer than True Romance trade paperback...

..which took old romance comics and rewrote them,.Marvel did a mini-series based on the same concept...except it was written entirely by males!
(The DC book was rewritten by a female writer.)
Here's what they did with yesterday's tale.with an interesting combination of both the Jack Kirby/Vince Colletta original and the John Romita Sr-modified/updated version..

Re-written by John Lustig, who had experience doing similar re-writes of Charlton's First Kiss series as Last Kiss.
You can check them out HERE!

Next Week...

We Don't Yet Know What We'll Present, But We DO Know...

You'll Cry Your Eyes Out If You Miss It!

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Marvel Romance Redux

TEEN-AGE ROMANCE / OUR LOVE STORY "Summer Must End!"

We're only at the middle of August, not quite at the end of Summer......

Cover art by Jack Kirby and George Klein

...but this tale by Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, and Vince Colletta just screamed to be told (and not for the reason you think)!

PSST!

Wanna know a secret?

This story, which we're presenting from Atlas' Teen-Age Romance #84 (1961) later appeared in Marvel's Our Love Story #9 (1971) in an extremely-modified form!

The art in Our Love Story was retouched by art director John Romita Sr to "update" the hairstyles and some of the fashions, including the swimsuits...

"Why did they do that?" you may ask...

With sales falling on most non-superhero genres in the late 1960s (including Western and war as well as romance), this "updated reprinting" became a common practice on romance comics until the genre all-but died out in the late 1970s.

Publishers would do a new 6-12 page lead story and use retouched reprints to fill out the book.

Editors felt that:

a) the plots were relatively timeless.

b) updating the art was cheaper than totally-redrawing the story. 

c) the artists were better-utilized doing stuff that sold better (like superheroes).

d) the audience for romance comics, unlike superhero comics, totally-changed every 5-6 years anyway, and wouldn't notice the "old" plots.
But this wasn't the last time the story would be modified.
As you'll see tomorrow, Marvel could modify more than just the art!

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MY LOVE "A Teen-Ager Can Also Hate!"

A while ago, we ran a classic Atlas romance tale...

...which was reprinted almost a decade later with clothing and hairstyles "updated".

Here's that story from Atlas' Teen-Age Romance #86 (1962) as it appeared in the back of Marvel's My Love #14 (1971)

Scripted by Stan Lee, penciled (and probably plotted) by Jack Kirby, inked by Vince Colletta.

Next Week:

We don't know what we'll publish...yet!
But...

You'll Cry Your Eyes Out if You Miss It!

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Marvel Romance: the Trade Paperback!

Marvel's picked some of the best love comics from the 60s and 70s!

"It Happened at Woodstock," "My Heart Broke in Hollywood," "Love on the Rebound!"

Collects Love Romance #89 and #101-104; My Love #2, #14, #16 and #18-20; Teen-Age Romance #77 and #84, Our Love Story #5; and Patsy Walker #119.

TEEN-AGE ROMANCE "A Teen-Ager Can Also Hate!"

As the song goes; "There's a thin line between love and hate..."

...as Helen is about to discover...when she's forced to do the thing many kids hate most of all!

When we mentioned "the thing many kids hate most of all", of course we were taking about piano lessons!

What did you think we were talking about?

This tale from Atlas/Marvel's Teen-Age Romances #86 (1962) was written by Stan Lee, penciled (and possibly plotted) by Jack Kirby, and inked by Vince Colletta.

(Kirby and Colletta also did the cover.)

The story was reprinted almost a decade later with considerable alterations to "update" the hairstyles and clothing.

We'll bring that version to you later this summer.

BTW, this was the final issue of the title, which was replaced on the schedule by The Incredible Hulk.

Wonder whatever happened to him?

Next week:

The Return of Reach for Happiness...

You'll Cry Your Eyes Out if You Miss It!

(Oh, you've heard that, eh?)

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