Tales From the Grey Side: Counting Comics

The totals so far are -

DC = 7929

Marvel = 433

Others = 69

Timber Wolf

1 - 5

Timber Wolf, Brinn Londo, is a member of the Legion of Super-Heroes in the 30th Century. He was born on the planet Zuun, where his father Mar Londo experimented on him. This gave him enhanced werewolf-like abilities, but also made him prone to beastial savagery. Timber Wolf was created by Edmond Hamilton and John Forte, first appearing in Adventure Comics #327. (1964) In this story he goes back to the 20th Century to look for a cure to his deterioration into feral savagery.

Peter Cannon: Thunderbolt

1 - 12

Peter Cannon is a super-hero known as Thunderbolt. Raised by Himalayan monks as an orphan, he trained to achieve physical and mental perfection. They entrusted him with the secrets in their ancient scrolls, enabling him to perform incredible feats. Peter Cannon was created by Pete Morisi, first appearing in the Charlton Comics publication Thunderbolt #1. (1966)

Ozymandias of Watchmen continuity is created by Alan Moore as an homage to Cannon. The rights to Thunderbolt reverted to his creator's estate upon Morisi's death in 2003. His rights were taken by the publication company Dynamite Entertainment.

Guy Gardner: Reborn

How the heck did manage to only have book 3 of this set?? Fear not, I recently ordered the 1st two.

Guy Gardner (1992 - 96)

0 - 33, 36 - 37

Annual

1, 2

I'm not sure why he lost the Green Lantern ring, probably due to quotas on how many Earthling Lanterns there can be in the Corps at one time or something. I know he gets a Yellow power ring from the Weaponeers of Qward I think and then mid-series Parallax affects his ring power so he has to use a power suit built by Blue Beetle for a while. He then ventures to the Amazon to drink some 'warrior water' that activates alien DNA that had been implanted in him by the Vuldarians! Later his human DNA overwrites the alien and he loses that power. Guy Gardner was created by John Broome and Gil Kane, and first appeared in Green Lantern (Vol 2) #59 (1968).

Amalgam

Spider-Boy

Legends of the Dark Claw

Amazon

Bullets and Bracelets

Bruce Wayne Agent of Shield

JLX

X-Patrol

Magneto and the Magnetic Men

Speed Demon

Assassins

Doctor StrangeFate

Super Soldier

Bat-Thing

Iron Lantern

Dark Claw Adventures

Generation Hex

The Exciting X-Patrol

Super Soldier: Man of War

Spider-Boy: Team-Up

Challengers of the Fantastic

Lobo The Duck

Thorion of the New Asgods

JLX Unleashed

The Magnetic Men featuring Magneto

Amalgam Comics was a publishing imprint shared by DC Comics and Marvel Comics, in which the two comic book publishers merged their characters into new ones. These characters first appeared in a series of twelve comic books which were published in 1996, between the third and fourth issues of the DC vs. Marvel miniseries. A second set of twelve comic books followed one year later. The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe: Alternate Universes 2005 designated the Amalgam Universe as Earth-9602. DC Comics has not identified the Amalgam Universe in its Multiverse.

DC Versus Marvel

1 - 4

This mini-series was the lead up to the Amalgam, in it two godly brothers who personify the DC and Marvel Universes become aware of the other's existence, and challenge one another to a series of duels involving each universe's respective superheroes. The losing universe would cease to exist. The story had an "out of universe" component in that the outcomes of primary battles were determined by readers voting. I thought voting for Brexit and Trump was bad but some crazy people voted for Storm to beat Wonder Woman!!! Crazy!

All-Access (1996)

DC/Marvel

1 - 4

This also tied in with the Amalgam and DC Vs Marvel storylines and features Access who can travel between the Marvel and DC universes and is the only character jointly owned by both companies.

Tangent (1998)

Flash

Metal Men

Doom Patrol

Nightwing

The Joker

Green Lantern

The Atom

Nightwing Night Force

JLA

The Joker's Wild

Superman

Tangent Comics was a DC Comics imprint created in 1997–1998, developed from ideas created by Dan Jurgens. The line, formed from various one-shots, focused on creating all-new characters using established DC names, such as the Joker, Superman, and the Flash. Contrasting the Tangent Universe with the DC Universe, Jurgens commented: “The Tangent Universe tells the story of an Earth greatly influenced by the presence of super-powered beings. While the DCU Earth is essentially the same as our own, no more advanced in terms of technology or communications despite the existence of those qualities within the super-powered community, Earth Tangent is greatly influenced by all of that. Earth Tangent's economic, geographic and political landscapes are defined by the superhero community, whereas in the DCU those aspects exist unaffected by the superhero community.” I thought I'd got all of these titles but looking at the Wiki page I think I'm missing a few which is annoying.

Girl Frenzy

Tomorrow Woman #1

Lois Lane #1

The Secret #1

Batgirl #1

The Ravens #1

GirlFrenzy! was a 1998 Fifth-Week Event consisting of seven one-shot specials focusing on the female heroes of the DC Universe. Each issue was tangentially connected to a parent title, but were otherwise unrelated to one another.

Freak Force (1993 - 95)

1 - 18

Freak Force is a team of superhuman bounty hunters operating out of Chicago, Illinois. They originated in the Savage Dragon, but subsequently went on to star in their own series. All the characters were created by Erik Larsen, many during his adolescence. The team consisted of Horridus, Rapture, Barbaric, Dart, Superpatriot, Ricochet, Mighty Man and Star (not pictured in this cover as he joined later I believe). These 18 issues are the full run.

Freak Force (1997)

1 - 3

This mini-series came out after the full run, Star joined the team at this point. The team joined the S.O.S at this point a government team that filled the gap after Youngblood was killed during the Mars Attacks! event. (In real life Liefeld was booted out of Image by the other creators at this time!!)

Superpatriot (1993)

1 - 4

Johnny Armstrong, was a soldier in World War II. He was captured by the Germans and used as a guinea pig for scientific experiments which gained him superhuman powers. He destroyed the base at which he was being kept so the Nazis could not replicate the process on their troops and donned an American flag-styled costume to become SuperPatriot. In the 90's he was terribly wounded by the Vicious Circle with his limbs eaten by Mako a shark man. Cyberdata, a corporation of subversive scientists, took his body and transformed him into a powerful cyborg.

The Deadly Duo (1994)

1 - 3

Kill-Cat and Kid Avenger were a fun pairing, well worth reading for a laugh. Kill-Cat is a bit of an egomaniac who believes his own hype and Kid Avenger came from the distant future to be a hero in his favourite decade, the 70's..... he arrived 20 years too late!!

The Deadly Duo

1 - 4

The Pact (1994)

1 - 3

I can't find any info online about these guys but Image just seemed to bring out a million books at this time to see if anything stuck. This team certainly didn't, but I think the name was good enough that they later used it for another team-up. The original team were Handgunn, Blacklight, Slam and Cutlass. The re-boot team were Firebreather, Shadowhawk, Invincible and Zephyr.

Flex Mentallo (1996)

1 - 4

This guy came from the pages of Doom Patrol and the crazy mind of Grant Morrison. His origin is kind of a parody of the Charles Atlas muscle program ads from the old comic books but with an extra dimension where he has muscle mastery where he can alter reality with a flex of his muscles! Charles Atlas company president Jeffrey C. Hogue was unhappy with its likeness being used this way, and filed a trademark infringement suit against DC Comics. DC submitted a motion for summary dismissal, which was granted on the basis of fair use using the parody defense

WildC.A.T.S

0 - 3, 5 - 19

This is the Image book launched by Jim Lee and Brandon Choi that kicked off with the launch of Image. The comic book's premise revolved around the centuries-long war between aliens called Kherubim and Daemonites. Initial members were Maul, Spartan, Voodoo, Grifter, Zealot & Warblade I think.

WildC.A.T.S Sourcebook

1, 2

WildC.A.T.S Special #1

WildC.A.T.S Adventures

1 - 4

A WildC.A.T.s TV series was created in 1994. It had only thirteen episodes and a more family-friendly storyline. As a result, there were numerous changes from the source material, such as Voodoo being an adolescent rather than an ex-stripper and Lord Emp being an ordinary human.

Supreme

1, 2, 4, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 21, 22, 23, 24, 26, 27, 28, 38, 56

Annual # 1

Created by Rob Liefeld, the character had a 56-issue comic book series, a six-issue miniseries, and a revival in 2012 consisting of six issues. Supreme was originally a violent, egotistical Superman archetype, he was retooled by Alan Moore as a tribute to Mort Weisinger's Silver Age Superman. Moore's run was collected in two trade paperbacks, Supreme: The Story of the Year and Supreme: The Return. Moore's work on the series earned him a Eisner Award for Best Writer in 1997.

The Legend of Supreme

1, 3

Supreme: Glory Days #2

Kid Supreme

2, 3

Troll

Troll II

Extreme Super Christmas Special

Troll: Once a Hero

Troll: Halloween Special

Bartholemew J. Troll is a fictional character created by Rob Liefeld. Troll was born a member of his race of the same name. Though he appears with grey hair and the rest of his body hairless, his true appearance is, in fact, a short-haired blue creature.

Vanguard (1996)

1 - 4

Cover Vanguard Vol.2 Strange Visitors #1

Created by Gary Carlson and Erik Larsen this guy appeared in a lot of Larsen's Image books like Savage Dragon and Freak Force, he lived in a spaceship in Earth's orbit keeping an eye on things on Earth and making sure no aliens zapped down and gave us any crap.... or something like that!!

Vanguard (1993)

1 - 6

Shadowhawk

3, 4

Shadowhawk II

1 - 3

Shadowhawk III

1 - 4

Shadowhawk

12 - 18

Created by Jim Valentino, this book had some GREAT covers but isn't too memorable to me, I seem to recall he broke villains backs and that there were more than one of them with someone taking up the mantle from their predecessor.

Shadowhawk Special #1

The New Shadowhawk #1

Grifter and The Mask

1, 2

Cyber Force #1

Wildstar #3

Backlash #8

Scarab (1993 - 94)

1 - 8

An interesting Vertigo title here. Louis Sendak is a 78-year-old man and a retired superhero. A green door in his house leads to an other-worldly labyrinth to which his father would often go during Louis' childhood to collect strange, alien items. One of these items was the Scarabaeus, which latched on to Louis in 1941 and transformed him, giving him superpowers which he used to become the superhero Scarab.

Terminal City (1996 - 97)

1 - 6, 9

Missing 2 issues of this, I'm not sure how but it was nothing really that interesting story wise so I'm in no rush to plug the gap, selling it is more likely I think.

Weird War Tales (1997)

1 - 4