The Daily Superman Newspaper Strip XIV

Sorry that there was no post yesterday, to rectify that, today's newspaper comic strip is a gigantic double-sized post! Not six installments, but a whopping twelve Superman dailies! Enjoy installments #85-96 below!

Enjoy the conclusion to the "Skyscraper of Death" story arc and the beginning of an all-new epic, "The Most Deadly Weapon!"

The Daily Superman Newspaper Strip XIII

Continuing a look at where you can get the fine hardcover collections of Superman's Newspaper comic strip from yesterday, I have links for the pre-order of the first volume of the Atomic Age Sunday collection, as well as links for the already released Silver Age collections of the daily strip.

The first volume of the Atomic Age full color Sunday strips is set to go on sale on June 2, 2015. You can pre-order SUPERMAN: The Atomic Age Sundays vol. 1 (1949-1953) already from Amazon for $44. This IDW hardcover collection picks up the Sunday strips where their final Golden Age Sunday collection left off in 1949.

SUPERMAN: The Atomic Age 1949-1953

IDW has already released all of Superman's daily newspaper exploits starting in 1959 and going until the strip ended in 1966. These strips have been collected in their entirety and split up over 3 hardcover volumes.
You can get the first volume of this hardcover for as low as $11.95 + shipping!

SUPERMAN: The Silver Age Dailies 1959-1961

The second volume picks up where the first volume left off in 1961 and follows the strip into 1963. This second volume collections is available starting as low as $23.78 + shipping.

SUPERMAN: The Silver Age Dailies 1961-1963

And the third and final volume picks up where the second volume left off in 1963 and follows the series through its conclusion in April 1966. It is available starting at $30.99 + shipping and handling.

SUPERMAN: The Silver Age Dailies 1963-1966

And now the real reason you're here, more Golden Age Superman Newspaper Comic Strip Goodness! Enjoy installments #79-84 below!

The Daily Superman Newspaper Comic Strip XII

I've kind of wrapped up the history of Superman's Newspaper strip, at least for now, so today's info section is instead going to be links for places you can track down these hardcover collections I've been rambling about, at as cheap of price as possible. After doing some searching at a number of sites, it looks like generally Amazon is the best way to go for getting these hardcover collections of Superman's Newspaper strips at a hearty discount. And the best part about going through Amazon is, the awesome Two True Freaks Network that I've mentioned so many times gets a kickback. It doesn't cost you anything and goes a long way to keeping that fine network of podcasts up and running. All of the links post below have already been routed through the Two True Freaks referral link, so all you have to do is click and buy!

Sterling Publishing's SUPERMAN: The Dailies, reprinting the strips from 1939 through 1942, you can get it on Amazon for as low as $5 + shipping!!! Hundreds of pages of Golden Age Superman goodness cheap!

SUPERMAN: The Dailies 1939-1942 Hardcover

Sterling Publishing's SUPERMAN: Sunday Classics 1939-1943 reprints the Sunday Full Color comic strips from 1939-1943! You can get this fine hardcover collection starting as low as $7 + shipping!

SUPERMAN: Sunday Classics 1939-1943

The next collection published in line would be IDW's continuation of the full-color Sunday strips in their hardcover SUPERMAN: The Golden Age Sundays 1943-1946. This collection picks up where the Sterling collection left off and continues the series into 1946. This is a newer collection that was released with a $50 price tag, but you can find it on Amazon for as low as $17.90 + shipping!

SUPERMAN: The Golden Age Sundays 1943-1946

And the final hardcover collection that I'll be linking into this post (the final 4 hardcover collections will be listed tomorrow) is IDW's final Golden Age Sunday collection, SUPERMAN: The Golden Age Sundays 1946-1949. This full color collection picks up where the last volume left off in 1946 and brings the series into 1949.

SUPERMAN: The Golden Age Sundays 1946-1949

And now, without further delay, the real reason you came here, the next six installments (#73-78) of Superman's Daily Newspaper exploits!

The Daily Superman Newspaper Comic Strip XI

Today marks the beginning of another exciting story adventure of the Superman Daily Newspaper Comic Strip! The Skyscraper of Death by Superman's creators Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster. Enjoy the next six installments (#67-72) of Superman's exploits!

Come back tomorrow for six new daily strips, as well as a post directing you to where you can find all of the great hardcover collections of Superman's newspaper comic strips that I've talked about the past 2 weeks.

King-Size Comics Giant-Size Fun Episode 011 Superman Talk

Do you like over-sized comics? Comics with extended page counts like DC’s 80 Page Giants, 100 Page Super Spectaculars, and Dollar Comic Giants or Marvel’s King-Size Annuals, Giant-Size Specials, and Double-Sized Issues? How about the physically larger Treasury Comics? Then welcome to the King-Size Comics Giant-Size Fun Podcast, join me your host, Kyle Benning, on a one man mission to brave the elements and review over-sized comics in my car during my lunch hour.

Due to time constraints and a hectic work schedule, this is a short episode of me just rambling a bit about Superman's early publishing history, the rise of Superman on the small screen, and briefly discussing the history of Superman's newspaper comic strip that I've discussed in the daily blog posts. 

You can subscribe to the podcast via iTunes, or download directly here: King-Size Comics Giant-Size Fun Episode 011

As always, you can leave feedback via an iTunes review, here at the blog, over at our new Facebook Page (https://www.facebook.com/ComicsRetroReview), or email me directly at kylebenning41@yahoo.com

Thanks for listening, and join me sometime later this week (hopefully) for my discussion of 2010's Justice Society of America 80 Page Giant.

The Daily Superman Newspaper Comic Strip X

Now last time I talked about how Superman's Daily Newspaper comic strip came to an end in the first half of 1966. But as always, you can't hold the Man of Steel down for long. Thirteen years later Superman would once again have a newspaper comic strip presence. On April 3rd, 1978, the Sunday and Daily Newspaper strip The World's Greatest Superheroes launched. It would feature a format that starred a number of DC heroes including Aquaman, Batman, Black Lightning, Black Canary, Wonder Woman, Flash, Green Lantern, Superman, and more. That is until the format changed in October of the next year, when the title changed to The World's Greatest Superheroes Present: Superman. As the title implies, instead of focusing on a number of characters, the series focused on the Last Son of Krypton himself, Superman. The series incorporated Sundays and Daily strips to carry out one continuous story arc. This is similar to other strips of the time, like the Conan the Barbarian Newspaper comic strip that used a combination of the daily strips and larger, full color Sunday strips, to forward one continuous, cohesive story. For historical context, Superman at this time would have a number of monthly comics on the shelves, including Action Comics, Superman, DC Comics Presents, World's Finest Comics, and Superman Family. Superman was definitely enjoying a high demand of popularity in the late 70's as he hit the 40 year mark as a mainstay in American literature. The title would continue to focus on Superman until it ended, but it would undergo a format and name change in 1982. In August of 82, the series dropped the World's Greatest Superheroes tag and simply be called Superman. It would continue to feature the one cohesive storyline between daily and Sunday strips until January 1983 until the strip split. The daily strip kept the Superman title, while the Sunday strip became its own entity, with a storyline reserved to Sunday strips only, under the new name The Superman Sunday Special. Both strips wrapped up early in February 1985, putting the final end on Superman's presence in the newspaper comic strips.

This 1970's and 1980's revival of the Superman newspaper comic strip featured a host of DC creator mainstays. Writers on the strips included Martin Pasko, Paul Levitz, Gerry Conway, Mike W. Barr, Paul Kupperberg, and Bob Rozakis. Artists on the strip include George Tuska, Vince Colleta, Bob Smith, Sal Trapani, and Frank McLaughlin.

The Daily Newspaper Strip IX

The last time I discussed the hardcover collections of the Superman Newspaper Comic Strip, I talked about the solicited but yet to be released IDW Atomic Age Sunday collections. This time I'll be talking about the Silver Age Daily strips. Only time will tell if or when IDW will release volumes collecting the rest of the Superman Dailies post 1943 in the Golden Age and through the Atomic Age, but they have already finished their Silver Age Daily Strip collections. IDW has released three volumes collecting the Silver Age Daily Newspaper comic strips, the first of their Silver Age daily collections starts in 1959 and their final daily collections includes the finale of the series in 1966.

These strips take a little different approach than the Golden Age strips that have been collected thus far, as they often times happen to be redrawn or reworked adaptions of stories appearing in the comic books. Where as the strips that we've seen so far from the Golden Age are new, supplemental material to add to Superman's exploits from the pages of Action Comics (and soon to be Superman and World's Finest Comics). I've mentioned it before in episodes of the podcast, about DC's "House Style" of laying out a page for Silver Age Superhero comics. Often times the page layout consists of 6 square panels, that panel design certainly would be conducive for reworking into newspaper comic strips. There were still original stories, and since I just have the first volume of the Silver Age Daily strips, I can't comment on whether this trend of adapting or reworking stories from the comic books continued until the series ended in 1966. We'll have to take a deeper look and cross that bridge when we get there. This first volume of the Silver Age Dailies is the only volume I have picked up yet from IDW, but man do I love the production value on that collection. They've ditched the dust jacket design that the Hardcovers from Sterling Publishing came with in favor of fully colored printed hard covers that look great.


The first volume is SUPERMAN: The Silver Age Dailies 1959-1961. In this volume Superman co-creator Jerry Siegel reworks and adapts stories originally written by himself, Otto Binder, Robert Bender, and Jerry Coleman with art on the strips provided by Curt Swan, Wayne Boring, and Stan Kaye.

The second volume, SUPERMAN: The Silver Age Dailies 1961-1963 is once again written or adapted by Siegel with art by Wayne Boring and Stan Kaye.

The third and final volume of Silver Age Dailies, that includes the newspaper strip's April 1966 conclusion is SUPERMAN: The Silver Age Dailies 1963-1966, and was just released the week of Christmas 2014. Siegel and Boring adapt the stories presented in this final volume, that based on the solicits, were also stories originally published in the comic books.

And now, without further delay, enjoy the next six installments (#55-60) of Superman's Daily Newspaper adventures from the Golden Age! This kicks off a new story line, the Jewel Smugglers!

The Daily Superman Newspaper Strip VIII

Unfortunately I wasn't able to get a post out yesterday with the next 6 installments of the Daily Superman Newspaper comic strip, but never fear, that just means a DOUBLE-SIZED POST TODAY!!! After all, this blog and podcast are both focused on over-sized issues and extra page counts anyway, so without further delay, enjoy not 6 but the next 12 installments of Superman's daily comic strip (#43-54)!!! And that wraps the "Comeback of Larry Trent" story arc.

 Come back tomorrow for the next 6 installments of Superman's Daily Newspaper Comic Strip, which kicks off a new story line!

The Daily Superman Newspaper Strip VII

The next installment of the Daily Superman Newspaper Comic Strip featuring strips #37-42!

The Daily Newspaper Comic Strip VI

It's hump day, were half way through the work week! And it's new comic day! So instead of boring you with some history on the strip, let's just give you what you really came for! The next six installments (#31-36) of the Daily Superman Newspaper Comic Strip! The serialized strip starts off with a new storyline, the Comeback of Larry Trent!

The Daily Superman Newspaper Strip V

Today, once again, I'll be talking about more hardcover collections of the Superman Newspaper strip, as I continue my look at the IDW Collections. Following the Golden Age is the lesser discussed "Atomic Age" of comics. It represents that period of time between the Golden Age (which many comic scholars point towards ending in 1949 or 1950) and the Silver Age of Comics, which began with the first appearance of Barry Allen in the pages of Showcase #4 in 1956. One thing that is important to remember about this era, is just what little minority of comic books (and subsequently newspaper comic strips) were devoted to the Superhero comic genre. While brightly clad heroes had flourished in the early and mid 1940's, once World War II ended superheroes lost popularity in favor of other comic genres like Westerns, Crime, and Horror Comics. Characters weren't the only casualty of the changing comic scene, whole companies went out of business as scant few superheroes (including Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Green Arrow, and Aquaman) remained popular enough with readers for continuous publishing. 

IDW has solicited a collection of the full color Superman Sunday strips from the Atomic Age. SUPERMAN: The Atomic Age Sundays 1949-1953, will pick up where their last Golden Age Sunday book left off in 1949 and follow the full color Sunday Superman strips through 1953. I would suspect that there will be another volume to follow, which will be solicited later, to get the series up to the Silver Age. Speaking of the Silver Age, IDW has already released a number of hardcover collections of the Daily Superman Newspaper Strip from the Silver Age, but for information on those, you'll need to come back tomorrow. 

And now without further ado, the real reason you came here today, the next 6 installments (#25-30) of Superman's daily newspaper comic strip.

Come back tomorrow for another daily installment of Superman's Newspaper comic strip exploits from the Golden Age, plus another episode of the King-Size Comics Giant-Size Fun Podcast!