Double Double Comics

[stevezodiac]

I picked up this issue from my Mum's last night. I had a few more of these which i sold on ebay. Does anyone have a checklist of the titles and their contents? I think I heard that the contents could also vary for the same issue?
The contents of this number are: Detective 354, Flash 164, Fantastic Four 61 and Strange Adventures 196. Some nice Infantino art.

[Digifiend]

http://themagicrobot.wordpress.com/2008 ... /#comments

The oddest thing of all about these comics is that not all issues had the same four comics inside. It was possible to purchase two copies of Double Double Detective 3 and find different coverless DC issues within. It was even possible to sometimes find a Marvel Comic mixed in with the DCs !!!!!

I have been collecting Double Double Comics for a while. As far as I know, there are 24 in total. They are: Action 1-4, Adventure 1-3, Batman 1-3, Detective 1-3, Jimmy Olsen 1, Justice League 1-2, Lois Lane 1, Strange Adventures 1, Superboy 1-2, Superman 1-3 and World’s Finest 1. The covers are all from original US DC comics. For example, Action 1′s cover is from Action Comics 333, and Detective 3′s cover is from Batman 152. There are some even stranger examples, such as Detective 2′s cover being from Blackhawk 163!

Here’s a full list, I think:

Action nn (1) (price = 1/9, cover = Action 333)
Action 2 (1/9, Teen Titans 4)
Action 3 (2/6, Justice League 56)
Action 4 (10p, Action 336)
Adventure nn (1) (1/9, Adventure 335)
Adventure 2 (2/6, Adventure 358)
Adventure 3 (10p, Adventure 366)
Batman nn (1) – (1/9, Batman 168)
Batman 2 (1/9, Batman 160)
Batman 3 (12 1/2p + 2/6, Batman 170)
Detective nn (1) (1/9, Detective 345)
Detective 2 (1/9, Blackhawk 163)
Detective 3 (12 1/2p + 2/6, Batman 152)
Jimmy Olsen nn (1) (1/9, Jimmy Olsen 87)
Justice League 1 (2/6, Action 328)
Justice League 2 (12 1/2p + 2/6, Justice League 59)
Lois Lane nn (1) (1/9, Lois Lane 60)
Strange Adventures 1 (2/6, Strange Adventures 186)
Superboy nn (1) (1/9, Superboy 124)
Superboy 2 (10p, Superboy 139)
Superman nn (1) (1/9, Action 329)
Superman 2 (1/9, Superman 184)
Superman 3 (12 1/2p + 2/6, Action 335)
World’s Finest 1 (2/6, Superboy 123)

[Lew Stringer]

I think they were packaged by the distributor, Thorpe & Porter, to get rid of returned comics. I remember buying one in the mid-sixties which contained two DC comics and two Marvel. (A Gene Colan Daredevil. Can't remember the others.) They usually only featured DC comics though. All stripped of their covers.

There were similar items in the late 1970s too. I remember seeing a bound collection of five or so Marvel UK weeklies, including covers.

[Digifiend]

Here's the cover that the Detective Double Double Comics #2 cover used.

[paw broon]

I remember these things. They showed up in newsagents and, while I don't have any examples, I always thought they were a means of the distributor making some money from the cover stripped returns. And I've never come across a listing for the contents.
When I was young, they were a good way of reading stories I'd not seen before. I have a suspicion that City Centre Comics in Glasgow had a couple within the last year and they were in a box of Alan Class titles.

[philcom55]

On a related note there were also a series of hardback 'Annuals' produced at roughly the same time (presumably by Thorpe & Porter); these contained a selection of six remaindered titles, including their covers. It's quite surprising how rarely they turn up nowadays as I remember my local Woolworths having piles for sale.



- Phil Rushton

[tony ingram]

There were similar items in the late 1970s too. I remember seeing a bound collection of five or so Marvel UK weeklies, including covers.

The Marvel Collection. There were at least three of these (I own the first and third, with the third actually being labelled as 'The Third Marvel Collection').

[Shaqui]

The Thomson Super Mag/Gold Token comics of the 1960s were doubled into hardback editions but I think these were specially printed as the stock is different (thick and brighter):

http://homepages.tesco.net/~space.patro ... dtoken.htm

[davidandrewsimpson]

I used to have a book that collected the first dozen or so issues of Super DC (late 60s/early 70s UK weekly reprinting and reformatting Superman, Batman, Jimmy Olsen and Lois Lane) in one fat package.

[grumpy old man]

I’ve got JLA 2 and Batman 3 and this thread got me to dig them out again. I’m guessing they came out in 1971 with them having both forms of pricing on the cover (incidentally it’s Decimal Days 40th anniversary next week). Most of the material inside is dated 1966 so their must have been a huge stockpile of unsold issues hanging around.

[tony ingram]

There were similar items in the late 1970s too. I remember seeing a bound collection of five or so Marvel UK weeklies, including covers.

Found them! I wonder what the second one looked like...




Incidentally, the third one-while claiming on the cover that it contains Captain britain-actually doesn't, instead holding several landscape format titles Spider-Man and the Super-Heroes and The Titans). This, coupled with that blurb about 'different collectors items in every volume', makes me suspect that the contents varied from copy to copy, just as the Double-Double comics often did.

[paw broon]

I'd forgotten that there were landscape format British comics so relatively recently and I'm really grateful for you posting that cover. I'm fascinated by all the different formats that have been used for comics and I also remember having landscape, illustrated prose, boys stories from the 1st. world war. What did I do with them, I wonder? Landscape format was so common in Spain, France, Italy, Netherlands, Belgium and Australia up till the 60's - 70's ( the Dutch and Belgian ones mainly because they were reprints of newspaper strips which were text strips as opposed to balloon strips). In fact, in France they are often referred to as "format Italien". Andy Capp and The Perishers were collected in landscape as well as a number of Daily mirror features. Sorry, got carried away. And I realise most of you already know all this. Back over to Double Double Comics.

[Niblet]

My copy of The Third Marvel Collection contains, in the following order;

Super Spider-Man and the Super-Heroes No 174 June 9 1976

No 198 (now titled Super Spider-Man with the Super-Heroes),

No 183

No 209 (Now Super Spider-Man and the Titans)

No 192

No 211

The Titans No 48 Sep 15 1976

...interesting colouring on the FF costumes on the cover.

[tony ingram]

My copy of The Third Marvel Collection contains, in the following order;

Super Spider-Man and the Super-Heroes No 174 June 9 1976

No 198 (now titled Super Spider-Man with the Super-Heroes),

No 183

No 209 (Now Super Spider-Man and the Titans)

No 192

No 211

The Titans No 48 Sep 15 1976

...interesting colouring on the FF costumes on the cover.

I'll check mine later-I know the first three of those are in there, but the others I'm not so sure about.

[tony ingram]

I'd forgotten that there were landscape format British comics so relatively recently and I'm really grateful for you posting that cover. I'm fascinated by all the different formats that have been used for comics and I also remember having landscape, illustrated prose, boys stories from the 1st. world war. What did I do with them, I wonder? Landscape format was so common in Spain, France, Italy, Netherlands, Belgium and Australia up till the 60's - 70's ( the Dutch and Belgian ones mainly because they were reprints of newspaper strips which were text strips as opposed to balloon strips). In fact, in France they are often referred to as "format Italien". Andy Capp and The Perishers were collected in landscape as well as a number of Daily mirror features. Sorry, got carried away. And I realise most of you already know all this. Back over to Double Double Comics.

I loved the Marvel landscape comics, it always felt like you were getting more for your money with two pages reproduced per page. I actually collect The Perishers books, too...