Saturday, July 5, 2014

The Last Hurrah: Charlton's final days: part seven

We come to the final round of issues to be sent out over the Derby presses.
A mere three titles were published this month, cover dated February 1986.
What began as a major relaunch of the comics division, with lofty goals quickly floundered and ground to a halt after just six months.
Despite Charlton's move to a better paperstock and their embracing of the direct sales market, they were just too ill equipped to sustain any marketability.
The higher grade paper actually worked against them, as the aging Charlton presses just couldn't handle the requirements needed to suitably print the pages without the inks saturating the paper and, indeed, this caused an enormous amount of creases and folds on the pages.

Couple this with Charlton's unwillingness to move forward with new stories and titles, instead of retreading books that were outmoded for the new age of comics fans, and the sales just didn't happen for them.
It was a quick and lofty experiment that came and went so fast that by the time it was over many fans were left scratching their heads ,or in most cases only learning that Charlton was back after they were gone again.
The final issue to roll of the presses was PROFESSOR COFFIN #21, bringing to a close Charlton's 42 year run of underdog comics publishing.
The final three issues:
IRON CORPORAL #25. Cover reprint of Army War Heroes #27, with interior reprints from Army War Heroes #'s 28 & 29, and Fightin' Navy #82.




PUNCHY AND THE BLACK CROW #12,  reprinting Zoo Funnies (second series) #7.





And finally, PROFESSOR COFFIN #21, reprinting Midnight Tales #3.




And then, it was over.
Or was it? In the next installment, Charlton heroes get a smal and very brief reprieve before getting sold off the DC.



3 comments:

  1. Nice touch up on Iron Corporal #25 changing the lieutenant from Army War Heroes #27 into a corporal.

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  2. I have really enjoyed this trip down memory lane. I was haunting the racks when these final issues came out. I didn't get them all, but I gathered up several and have gotten several more since. They have a nostalgic charm, given that they were the last gasp.

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    Replies
    1. it's been a fun, if bittersweet, series of features, I think the reason I dragged it out for so long was that it was like watching Charlton bite the dust all over again.

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