DC vs Marvel: Who won the 70s?

[tib2d2]

I love hearing about comics from decades ago, and how each of the major houses handled their stories and characters. I feel decades are great for defining times in comics.

So between DC and Marvel, who "won the 1970s"? Who put out the best material, characters, stories in the 70s?

Chris Claremont's X-men stands out big time for Marvel, but then there's Len Wein's Justice league and Denny o'neil's batman revival. Hard to chose!

[MyriVerse]

It's really not hard to choose. The vast majority of Marvel stuff was great. Not just X-Men, but Avengers, Spidey, Iron Man, the horror books, Conan, plus things like Warlock, Dr. Strange, Defenders. And Frank Miller was starting on Daredevil for the last half of 79. All top notch.

[ed2962]

Marvel definitely won the popularity contest in the 70's. They were selling more comics and had a solid presence in pop culture.

[mathew101281]

Marvel definitely won the popularity contest in the 70's. They were selling more comics and had a solid presence in pop culture.

Plus DC kind of imploded towards the end of that decade.

[Powerboy]

Marvel, easily. Maybe I was just the right age but Marvel was adapting to the fact that it's main reading audience was growing up and not being replaced by as many younger kids. DC wasn't, at least not on the occasions I gave DC another shot, such as when Superman the Movie came out.

I later found out DC had started adapting but it was too late for me. I didn't know because I wasn't reading them anymore. They waited too long. It took the Crisis to get my attention. Getting readership back was probably the big reason for the COIE.

But that was the eighties. Marvel dominated the seventies.

[DrNewGod]

For the 1970s: Marvel. The 80s version of the this question is a lot harder. The 70s? Not even a contest.

I will note that Batman had finally found himself again, but all alone, he wasn't enough.

[Jim Kelly]

Market forces favoured Marvel and they screwed over National Periodicals. So from the standpoint of the sales game, they won. But that didn't make them the better company. I loved D.C. and always will--they had the better comics from my standpoint. And look, the idea of a "Marvel Zombie" was coined back then because it didn't matter what happened at Marvel or what other publishers did--the Marvel consumers were brand loyal to the extreme. Jack Kirby can leave Marvel and go over to National and the Zombies don't buy his comics. Stan Lee can quit writing and leave the creative work to others and they still will buy the books. Writers and artists that were at National can come over to Marvel and now they're golden--creatives moving in the other direction to National and other companies like Charlton couldn't bring their followers with them. Martin Goodman can be cheated out of the company that he built and go on to create another company to get revenge on the Marvel boys that did him wrong and nobody buys his new Atlas Comics.

[DrNewGod]

Market forces favoured Marvel and they screwed over National Periodicals. So from the standpoint of the sales game, they won. But that didn't make them the better company. I loved D.C. and always will--they had the better comics from my standpoint. And look, the idea of a "Marvel Zombie" was coined back then because it didn't matter what happened at Marvel or what other publishers did--the Marvel consumers were brand loyal to the extreme. Jack Kirby can leave Marvel and go over to National and the Zombies don't buy his comics. Stan Lee can quit writing and leave the creative work to others and they still will buy the books. Writers and artists that were at National can come over to Marvel and now they're golden--creatives moving in the other direction to National and other companies like Charlton couldn't bring their followers with them. Martin Goodman can be cheated out of the company that he built and go on to create another company to get revenge on the Marvel boys that did him wrong and nobody buys his new Atlas Comics.

As so often, you're a fount of info Jim. I didn't know the thing about Goodman.

[Scott Taylor]

In comics, Stan Lee was Marvel, Marvel was Stan Lee and anything Marvel was an automatic look. The FF had owned the 1960s, and Spider-Man owned the 1970s. Meanwhile DC was interesting during the decade but still very much sticking with what worked while Marvel was perceived as taking risks and moving forward culturally. Mostly due to marketing again of Lee. And hey - Byrne/Claremont was born. So Marvel basically became a comic juggernaut and DC became known as the other company during this decade. Some of the best Batman comics ever occurred in the 1970s, but it basically was ignored at the time thanks to the Adam West show. DC has always known how to do media well, it seems.

So on that note - in the 1970s DC had way better media than Marvel - Superfriends, Wonder Woman, Shazam, Isis - culminating with the Superman movies. Marvel had Incredible Hulk and Spidey Super Stories on Electric Company (which, lets face it, was bad) and their decade culminated in that horrible live action Spider-Man. Marvel destroyed itself in media for the foreseeable future while DC went on to make other Superman movies, a Supergirl movie, a Superboy series, Batman 1989, a couple of Superman live action dramas and so on.

The reason we have so many great DC TV shows today and Marvel TV shows keep getting canceled hearkens directly back to the 1970s. And the reason Marvel still outsells DC in comics and probably always will hearkens directly back to the 1970s.

So who won? For me its DC in media, because honestly that Superman movie with Christopher Reeves running across the street opening his suit jacket to reveal the S-symbol won the decade. Comics it was Marvel for sure.

[Surf]

Plus DC kind of imploded towards the end of that decade.

This, there was no 'Marvel' Implosion, even though we got Starfire out of it.

[Jim Kelly]

In comics, Stan Lee was Marvel, Marvel was Stan Lee and anything Marvel was an automatic look. The FF had owned the 1960s, and Spider-Man owned the 1970s. Meanwhile DC was interesting during the decade but still very much sticking with what worked while Marvel was perceived as taking risks and moving forward culturally. Mostly due to marketing again of Lee. And hey - Byrne/Claremont was born. So Marvel basically became a comic juggernaut and DC became known as the other company during this decade. Some of the best Batman comics ever occurred in the 1970s, but it basically was ignored at the time thanks to the Adam West show. DC has always known how to do media well, it seems.

But to reiterate a point I made earlier, Stan Lee left most of the writing to others very early on in the 1970s--he wasn't even an editor in chief--that was Roy Thomas. I remember this well, because I became interested in Marvel and wanted to check out their books only to find that Stan Lee was no longer writing any of the F.F., Spidey, Thor, Avengers. Lee was the publisher, replacing Goodman, and he wrote books and did comic strips--Spider-Man and Vera Valiant--but he rarely wrote any comics for Marvel. What you did get in every comic book was "Stan Lee Presents." Which at first seemed nice, but the more I thought about it that seemed wrong. The actual creators were being overshadowed by this Walt Disney of Marvel who got all the credit. This was a matter that came up much later when Dave Cockrum was denied credit on the X-Men movie--and I talked to him about that on the message boards, asking him if it was Stan Lee Presents that got the credit--yup, he said.

One thing that actually helped Marvel especially toward the second half of the 1970s was their licensing deals where they got to use big properties. Obviously, early in the decade they did Conan but that wasn't a well-know property when they licensed it. Later they got the Burroughs characters, Star Wars, Planet of the Apes, Logan's Run, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Kiss, etc. This was something that Dell, Gold Key and National Comics had succeeded in doing in the earlier decades. So Marvel was copying their playbook. It's ironic how Marvel in the 1960s was the iconoclastic publisher that attracted the non-conformist youth, but in the 1970s they did everything to make themselves over in the image of the establishment publishers.

One thing they did do that I liked--besides Conan the Barbarian and Howard the Duck--was all those Marvel Classics Comics--but that was an idea they got from Classics Illustrated.

[DrNewGod]

One thing that actually helped Marvel especially toward the second half of the 1970s was their licensing deals where they got to use big properties. Obviously, early in the decade they did Conan but that wasn't a well-know property when they licensed it. Later they got the Burroughs characters, Star Wars, Planet of the Apes, Logan's Run, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Kiss, etc. This was something that Dell, Gold Key and National Comics had succeeded in doing in the earlier decades. So Marvel was copying their playbook. It's ironic how Marvel in the 1960s was the iconoclastic publisher that attracted the non-conformist youth, but in the 1970s they did everything to make themselves over in the image of the establishment publishers.

One thing they did do that I liked--besides Conan the Barbarian and Howard the Duck--was all those Marvel Classics Comics--but that was an idea they got from Classics Illustrated.

I also remember their Marvel's film adaptation comics. My folks wouldn't let me anywhere near the theatre when The Island of Dr. Moreau came out. I had to get it through the comic.

Image.jpg

Awesome Gil Kane, BTW. When I read some of the 1950s anthologies, I wonder if some of the remaining classic artists miss the chance to do wide-ranging genres that was available back in the day.

[Scott Taylor]

But to reiterate a point I made earlier, Stan Lee left most of the writing to others very early on in the 1970s--he wasn't even an editor in chief--that was Roy Thomas. I remember this well, because I became interested in Marvel and wanted to check out their books only to find that Stan Lee was no longer writing any of the F.F., Spidey, Thor, Avengers. Lee was the publisher, replacing Goodman, and he wrote books and did comic strips--Spider-Man and Vera Valiant--but he rarely wrote any comics for Marvel. What you did get in every comic book was "Stan Lee Presents." Which at first seemed nice, but the more I thought about it that seemed wrong. The actual creators were being overshadowed by this Walt Disney of Marvel who got all the credit. This was a matter that came up much later when Dave Cockrum was denied credit on the X-Men movie--and I talked to him about that on the message boards, asking him if it was Stan Lee Presents that got the credit--yup, he said.

One thing that actually helped Marvel especially toward the second half of the 1970s was their licensing deals where they got to use big properties. Obviously, early in the decade they did Conan but that wasn't a well-know property when they licensed it. Later they got the Burroughs characters, Star Wars, Planet of the Apes, Logan's Run, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Kiss, etc. This was something that Dell, Gold Key and National Comics had succeeded in doing in the earlier decades. So Marvel was copying their playbook. It's ironic how Marvel in the 1960s was the iconoclastic publisher that attracted the non-conformist youth, but in the 1970s they did everything to make themselves over in the image of the establishment publishers.

One thing they did do that I liked--besides Conan the Barbarian and Howard the Duck--was all those Marvel Classics Comics--but that was an idea they got from Classics Illustrated.

Yes, agree. Marvel at the time, for a reader at the time, was all about Lee though. Looking back on it now, I see all those shenanigans you are talking about.

[GOLGO 13]

70's Punisher, Ghost Rider, Ms. Marvel (stop laughing...well, ok put that costume was on point), Tomb of Dracula, Moonknight, Son of Satan, Conan the Barbarian, New Xmen, Defenders. Deathlok.

Marvel's 70's was gritty AF!

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Marvel closed out the 70’s with “Demon in a Bottle” in Iron Man, for my money, one of THE most important and relevant storylines of all time.