Official Marvel Index

The Official Marvel Index is a series of comic books released by Marvel Comics which featured synopses of several Marvel series. The books were largely compiled by George Olshevsky (who was for fourteen years the sole owner of a complete collection of Marvel superhero comics dating from Marvel Comics #1, published in 1939), and featured detailed information on each issue in a particular series, including writer and artist credits, characters who appeared in the issue, and a story synopsis. A similar series of indices was published for DC Comics.

Contents

Publication history

The Official Marvel Index was preceded by the Marvel Comics Index (also compiled by Olshevsky) and distributed by Pacific Comics Distributors sporadically from 1976-1982. These books were magazine-sized as opposed to comic-sized.

The first Official Marvel Index titles were published in 1985, and produced regularly through August 1988. A second series of two titles was published in 1994–1995.

In 2008, Marvel announced that a new Marvel Index series would commence publication in 2009.[1] Titled Official Index to the Marvel Universe, the first issue was published in January 2009, with a monthly release schedule. The new series focuses primarily on Marvel's most prominent characters. The first volume ran 14 issues and focused on Spider-Man, Iron Man and the X-Men. The second volume began in May 2010 and focuses on the Avengers, Captain America (including Golden Age issues) and Thor (including Journey into Mystery, where Thor premiered). A third started in August 2011, focusing on Wolverine, The Punisher, and Ghost Rider. Each featured title is later collected separately into a digest-sized trade paperback with additional issues not featured in the monthly book.

The Marvel Comics Index

Published by Pacific Comics Distributors, 1976–1982.

The following books were listed in issue #9B, but were never released:

The Official Marvel Index

Published by Marvel Comics, 1985–1988 and 1994–1995.

Volume One

Volume Two

Official Index to the Marvel Universe

Published by Marvel Comics, 2009–present.

Volume 1

Volume 2

(The Thor portion of this index concludes in issue 12 while Avengers and Captain America indexes continue)

(The Captain America portion of this index concludes in issue 14)

Volume 3

Trade paperbacks

See also

References

  1. ^ "Diamond Retailer Summit News Round-up," The Beat (Sept. 10, 2008). [dead link]