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CAPTAIN MARVEL
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Captain Marvel is a fictional comic book superhero, originally published by Fawcett Comics and later by DC Comics. Created in 1939 by artist C. C. Beck and writer Bill Parker, the character first appeared in Whiz Comics #2 (February 1940). With a
premise that taps adolescent fantasy, Captain Marvel is the alter ego of Billy Batson, a youth who works as a radio news reporter and was chosen to be a champion of good by the wizard Shazam. Whenever Billy speaks the wizard's name, he is instantly struck by a magic lightning bolt that transforms him into an adult superhero empowered with the abilities of six legendary figures.[1] Several friends and family members, most notably Marvel Family cohorts Mary Marvel and Captain Marvel Jr., can share Billy's power and become "Marvels" themselves.
Whiz Comics #2 (February 1940), the first appearance of Captain Marvel. Cover art by C. C. Beck.
LAST ISSUE 1953
Hailed as "The World's Mightiest Mortal" in his adventures, Captain Marvel was nicknamed "The Big Red Cheese" by arch-villain Doctor Sivana, an epithet later adopted by Captain Marvel's fans. Based on sales, Captain Marvel was the most popular superhero of the 1940s, as his Captain Marvel Adventures comic book series sold more copies than Superman and other competing superhero books during the mid-1940s.[2][3] Captain Marvel was also the first comic book superhero to be adapted to film, in a 1941 Republic Pictures serial (The Adventures of Captain Marvel).
Fawcett ceased publishing Captain Marvel-related comics in 1953, due in part to a copyright infringement suit from DC Comics alleging that Captain Marvel was an illegal infringement of Superman. In 1972, DC licensed the Marvel Family characters and returned them to publication, acquiring all rights to the characters by 1991.[4] DC has since integrated Captain Marvel and the Marvel Family into their DC Universe, and have attempted to revive the property several times. However, Captain Marvel has not regained widespread appeal with new generations, although a Shazam! live-action Saturday morning television series featuring the character ran for three seasons on CBS in the 1970s.
Because Marvel Comics trademarked their Captain Marvel comic book during the interim between the original Captain Marvel's Fawcett years and DC years, DC Comics is unable to promote and market their Captain Marvel/Marvel Family properties under that name. Since 1972, DC has instead used the trademark Shazam! as the title of their comic books and thus the name under which they market and promote the character. Consequently, Captain Marvel himself is sometimes erroneously referred to as Shazam.
After the success of National Comics' new superhero characters Superman and Batman, Fawcett Publications decided in 1939 to start its own comics division. Fawcett recruited writer Bill Parker to create several hero characters for the first title in their line, tentatively titled Flash Comics. Besides penning stories featuring Ibis the Invincible, Spy Smasher, Golden Arrow, Lance O'Casey, Scoop Smith and Dan Dare for the new book, Parker also wrote a story about a team of six superheroes, each possessing a special power granted to them by a mythological figure. Fawcett Comics' executive director Ralph Daigh decided it would be best to combine the team of six into one hero who would embody all six powers. Parker responded by creating a character he called "Captain Thunder."[5] Staff artist Clarence Charles "C. C." Beck was recruited to design and illustrate Parker's story, rendering it in a direct, somewhat cartoony style that became his trademark.
The first issue of the comic book, printed as both Flash Comics #1 and Thrill Comics #1, had a low-print run in the fall of 1939 as an ashcan copy created for advertising purposes. Shortly after its printing, however, Fawcett found it could not trademark "Captain Thunder," "Flash Comics," or "Thrill Comics," because all three names were already in use. Consequently, the book was renamed Whiz Comics, and Fawcett artist Pete Costanza suggested changing Captain Thunder's name to "Captain Marvelous", which the editors shortened to "Captain Marvel." The word balloons in the story were re-lettered to label the hero of the main story as "Captain Marvel." Whiz Comics #2, dated February 1940, was published in late 1939. Since it was the first of that title to actually be published, the issue is sometimes referred to as Whiz Comics #1, despite the issue number printed on it.
MORE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captain_Marvel_(DC_Comics)
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In 1940, two years after Superman's debut, the comic book scene was dominated by the genre that character had founded. Fawcett Publications, a magazine publisher whose stable included True Confession and …
Writer Bill Parker and artist Charles Clarence ("C.C.") Beck (the team behind Spy Smasher, Ibis the Invincible and other early Fawcett characters) crafted a story of homeless newsboy Billy Batson, who (foolishly, by modern standards) followed a mysterious stranger into an abandoned subway tunnel. There, Billy met an aged wizard named Shazam, who gave Billy a special power: Whenever he said the wizard's name (which was an acronym for Solomon, Hercules, Atlas, Zeus, Achilles, and Mercury), Billy would be transformed into the World's Mightiest Mortal, Captain Marvel.
The character was an instant hit, possibly because of the lighthearted touch Beck, along with writer Otto Binder (which rhymes with "cinder", not "kinder"), who wrote the majority of his stories, brought to him. More likely, however, this was because it addressed a desire shared by all children — the ability to make themselves bigger and stronger and able to deal with the frustrations of their lives in a physical, viscerally satisfying way, and yet be their regular selves when the power is not needed.
1941 was a banner year for Captain Marvel. He got his own title. He starred in the very first movie about a comic book superhero — a 12-chapter Republic serial starring Tom Tyler, also known for his portrayal of The Phantom. And DC Comics, Superman's publisher, launched a lawsuit accusing Fawcett of having patterned Captain Marvel a little too closely on their character.
As the legal proceedings proceeded, Fawcett expanded the Captain Marvel franchise — one of the most successful in comics — by adding Captain Marvel Jr. and Mary Marvel to their lineup. All three Marvels, plus three Lieutenant Marvels and the elderly Uncle Dudley Marvel, joined forces in Fawcett's Marvel Family title. Marvel-mania reached a point where, in 1942, Hoppy the Marvel Bunny, a funny animal who wore an outfit identical to Captain Marvel's, became the lead feature of the monthly Fawcett's Funny Animals.
MORE: http://www.toonopedia.com/capmarv1.htm
Whiz Comics, which had been a top seller for Fawcett Comics from its first appearance in 1940, went out with a whimper, not a bang--not even a Whizbang*--in 1953. After more than a decade, a protracted lawsuit from DC Comics claiming Captain Marvel was a copy of Superman, and low sales in the comic book industry in general, Fawcett got out of the comic book business. Whiz Comics #155, with its lead Captain Marvel story drawn by Kurt Schaffenberger, was the last issue.
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http://goldenagecomics.org/wordpress/2008/12/22/my-10-favorite-golden-age-christmas-covers/
Captain Marvel Goes to War
Did you know that in 1943, Captain Marvel was used by the Navy to encourage spirits and keep the flame of patriotism alive during World War II? As a matter of fact, it wasn't uncommon at all during the War for different ranks and branches of the military to adopt different characters that would inspire them towards their cause. And Captain Marvel was a perfect example of one such character. Really, who better to fight Nazis that the World's Mightiest Mortal?
We see an example of this on the cover of Captain Marvel Adventures #27. Featuring an image of Captain Marvel hurling a missile of some sort towards the enemy, he is set against a bold navy blue circle with a proud white star in the center. The cover also announces to the readership that the image was the insignia that had recently been adopted, and would be worn, by a naval air squadron.
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Used by permission. ©2010 Gemstone Publishing, Inc. and/or Diamond International Galleries except where noted.
All other material ©2008 respective copyright holders. All rights reserved
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The Marvel Family is a group of fictional characters, a team of superheroes in the Fawcett Comics and DC Comics universes. Created in 1942 by writer Otto Binder and Fawcett artists C. C. Beck, Mac Raboy, Ed Herron and Marc Swayze, the team is an extension of Fawcett's Captain Marvel franchise, and includes Marvel's sister Mary Marvel, their friend Captain Marvel, Jr., and, at various times, a number of other characters as well.
Because Marvel Comics trademarked their own Captain Marvel comic book during the interim between the demise of the Fawcett Comics Captain Marvel comics in 1953 and DC's revival in 1972, DC Comics is today unable to promote and market their Captain Marvel/Marvel Family properties under those names. Since 1972, DC has instead used the trademark Shazam! for their comic book titles with the Marvel Family characters, and the name under which they market and promote the characters. When referring to the Marvel Family on comic book covers or various merchandise, they are by this legal necessity called the "Shazam Family".
MORE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvel_Family
The Real Captain Marvel
And the Wonderful Golden Age of Comics
by C. C. Beck
Edited by P. C. Hamerlinck
PART I. THE REAL CAPTAIN MARVEL
Many books and articles about the Golden Age of Comic Books have been published in recent years, written by people who were children in the 1930s and '40s or who were born after the Golden Age had ended. Almost without exception, the writers of these books and articles have dwelt at great length on the exploits of the great super-heroes of the period, starting, of course, with Superman, and then going on to Batman, Plastic Man, Sandman, Hawkman, Bulletman, Hangman, The Arrow, The Hawk, The Claw, The Green Giant, The Blue Beetle, The White Streak, and many others now long forgotten.
In Richard O'Brien's The Golden Age of Comic Books (Ballantine, 1977), there are forty color reproductions of comic book covers, 39 of them showing costumed characters leaping, flying, fighting, destroying, glaring, snarling, or doing superhuman feats, and one showing a pleasant-faced young fellow standing with one hand on the shoulder of a young boy and smiling cheerfully at the reader (Whiz Comics #22, 1941).
The pleasant-looking young fellow is, of course, Captain Marvel, the biggest-selling comic character of the Golden Age, and the boy is Billy Batson, boy radio reporter whose accounts of Captain Marvel's adventures were given in his newscasts over radio station WHIZ.
MORE: http://twomorrows.com/alterego/articles/03beck.html
In 1941, the World's Mightiest Mortal was featured in an action-packed 12-chapter serial, The Adventures of Captain Marvel. Republic was known for many low-budget productions, and was able to tap into many resources and talent to stage exciting drama and create surprisingly effective special effects for its time. Many afficianados regard it as one of the best chapter plays of the genre. Though Tom Tyler had the featured role, his dialogue is minimal, and spends most of his time leaping about and laughing at the bullets of the villain's henchmen. Frank Coughlin Jr., as Billy Batson, drives most of the story.
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Frank Coghlan Jr., Billy Batson in classic 'Captain Marvel' serials, dies at 93
Dennis McLellan has written an obituary for one of the key figures in the early cinematic life of comic-book heroes. Frank Coghlan Jr. had a long and colorful career in Hollywood but is best known for uttering the magic word, "Shazam!" Here's an early look at the obituary that will be running Thursday in the Los Angeles Times.
Frank Coghlan Jr., a silent-movie child actor who later played young Billy Batson, who transformed into Captain Marvel by uttering the magical word “Shazam!” in the landmark 1941 serial “Adventures of Captain Marvel,” has died. He was 93.
Coghlan died in his sleep Sept. 7 at his home in an assisted-living facility in Saugus, said his son, Pat.
1946
CAPTAIN MARVEL ON TV 1974
MARVEL COMICS
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SUPERMAN VS. CAPTAIN MARVEL
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MORTAL COMBAT VS. DC
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