SMASH, BANG, WALLOP, WHAT A COMIC MAG...

The 1st issue of Smash! (February 1966)

It lasted in total for 257 issues - and there would've been more if not for a publishing strike lasting for several weeks in 1970.

It outlived its sister titles WHAM! (187 issues), POW! (86 issues), FANTASTIC (89 issues) and TERRIFIC (43 issues), essentially becoming a "best of" repository for all of them - but only for about 6 months. Then it was out with the old and in with the new, and what would've been number 163 became the first issue of the "NEW" SMASH!, devoid of MARVEL COMICS reprints and more in line with the traditional British boys' comics like VALIANT and LION. (It's the 42nd anniversary of that relaunch on the 8th of this month, if I'm not very much mistaken.)  

SMASH! was an interesting comic, and the one in which I was first introduced to the FANTASTIC FOUR. When ODHAMS PRESS first reprinted the origin of the FF, they did so in WHAM! and SMASH simultaneously - curiously (and wrongly) claiming exclusivity for each title at the end of the first episode of the two-part tale. Want to read the conclusion of the Marvel quartet's debut adventure? You could only do so in the next issue of WHAM! - according to WHAM!, that is. If, however, you were reading SMASH!, it was claiming sole publishing rights for the next part of the story. An intentional two-pronged promotion of the good ol' FF to double their readership potential? Or an emergency measure necessitated by the non-arrival of a regular strip for SMASH!? I guess only ALF, BART and COS know for certain - I sure don't.



Art by Jack Kirby & Vince Colletta



When I later discovered that REED, BEN, SUSAN and JOHNNY were regularly appearing in WHAM! ("THE COMIC WITH THE FANTASTIC FOUR!"), I started buying that title too in order to feed my infatuation with the INVISIBLE GIRL, but I continued to buy SMASH! as well. Then POW! (after WHAM! was merged with it) and also FANTASTIC and TERRIFIC. It's ironic that SMASH!, having been the first "POWER" periodical I read - and the one in which I first encountered Marvel's most famous family - was also the last title standing, as well as the comic in which the FF made their home for the last few months of their Odhams Press existence.

   

The 1st revamped issue (March 1969)

 As mentioned, the title was relaunched - in March 1969 - in a completely different format, featuring some stories originally intended for a comic called BLACKJACK, which was never published. (CURSITOR DOOM, and - eventually - THE PILLATER PERIL being but a couple of examples.) It lasted for 95 issues before being merged with VALIANT on 27th March, 1971 (issue dated 3rd April).

 

The Codemaster cards & envelope

All things come to an end, alas - but SMASH! did not die with the last issue of its regular comic. Stay tuned.