Marvel Comics Super Special was a 41-issue series of one-shot comic-magazines published by Marvel Comics from 1977 to 1986. They were cover-priced $1.50 to $2.50, while regular color comics were priced 30 cents to 60 cents, Beginning with issue #5, the series' title in the its postal indicia was shortened to Marvel Super Special. Covers featured the title or a variation, including Marvel Super Special, Marvel Super Special magazine, and Marvel Weirdworld Super Special in small type, accompanied by large logos of its respective features.
These included, primarily, film and TV series adaptations, but also original and licensed Marvel characters, and music-related biographies and fictional adventures.
Issue #7 was withdrawn after completion, and never published. Issue #8 was published in two editorially identical editions, one magazine-sized, one tabloid-sized.
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The premiere issue, dated simply 1977, featured the rock band Kiss in a 40-page fictional adventure written by Steve Gerber, penciled by Alan Weiss, John Buscema, Rich Buckler, and Sal Buscema, which saw the quartet battling Marvel supervillains Mephisto and Doctor Doom. Kiss reappeared in an occult adventure in issue #5 (1978). That issue, the series' title in the its postal indicia was shortened to Marvel Super Special.[1]
Marvel's licensed pulp fiction character, Robert E. Howard's Conan the Barbarian, which was concurrently appearing in a long-running color comic book, starred in issues #2 (1977) and #9 (1978), with adaptations of the Arnold Schwarzenegger movies Conan the Barbarian and Conan the Destroyer published as issues #21 (1982) and #35 (Dec. 1984), respectively. An adaptation of the movie starring Marvel's original spin-off character, Red Sonja, appeared as issue #38 (1985). The other Marvel properties to be featured were the character Star-Lord in #10 (Winter 1979), the feature Weirdworld in #11-13 (Spring - Fall 1979), and Howard the Duck in #41 (Nov. 1986), the final issue.[1]
Except for a biography of The Beatles in issue #4 (1978), the remainder adapted fantasy, science-fiction, and adventure films of the day, including Blade Runner, Dragonslayer, and two Star Wars, two Indiana Jones, and two James Bond movies, and such other films as Jaws 2 and the children's musical comedy The Muppets Take Manhattan.
The sole TV series adaptation was of Battlestar Galactica in issue #8 (1978), which was published in two editorially identical editions, one magazine-sized, one tabloid-sized.[1] This special was partially redrawn and expanded into three issues when Battlestar Galactica became a monthly comic book.
Each issue also included text features and other additional material.
Marvel Super Special #7, an adaptation of the film Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, was never published in the U.S. "because the book was late and the movie proved to be a commercial failure," according to a contemporaneous news account, which added, without substantiation, that, "Reportedly, Marvel's adaptation was published in Japan"[2]. A French translation was published by Arédit-Artima under two covers, one for the French market and one for the French-speaking Canadian market[3]. A Dutch version with yet another different cover was published and for many years afterwards would pop up in bargain bins. It can still easily be found at collector's conventions.
Penciler George Pérez, who with inker Jim Mooney supplied art for that issue, recalled that Marvel had
"...nearly zero cooperation from the Robert Stigwood company [which produced the film] and we didn't realize that the [movie] script was still in so much flux that things we were putting in the comic were not going to appear in the movie and things we didn't know about were going to be added to the movie. The plot was so convoluted and cheesy — even on the printed page — and after a while we realized it was not really going anywhere. They said they were going to have all these superstars appear at the end of the film and, of course, in the end they couldn't get them — not that we could have used them anyway, because we didn't have the licenses to use their likenesses. Also, I was paired with a very incompatible inker because the book was running so late. I was doing a terrible job on it, Jim Mooney was a terrible fit for me — though he did the best he could — [and] it was just one disaster after another. It was one of the nadirs of my career. I was so grateful that the book never got an American release. I've yet to see a copy of Sgt. Pepper."[4]
Pérez said Bob Larkin had done the cover art.[5]