Don’t Miss Marvel’s Golden Age Captain America Vol. 1 HC

Captain America's Golden Age adventures have never looked so good. Marvel Comics' newest addition to its line of Golden Age Masterworks, Marvel Masterworks: Golden Age Captain America Vol. 1 (JAN051883), hits stores March 23, 2005. This 264-page hardcover reprints Captain America Comics #1-#4, circa 1941 -- including all backup stories, house ads, and text features. It boasts crisp reproduction and a color palette faithful in every way to the original -- production values that will be applied to all future Golden Age volumes.

"Reprinting Golden Age material is quite a different process from our Silver Age reprints where film or stats of the originals exist," details editor Mark Beazley. "Although the main Captain America stories that we're reprinting in the Marvel Masterworks: Golden Age Captain America Vol. 1 had been previously reconstructed for the Captain America: The Classic Years TPBs, those reprints didn't collect the text stories, house ads, or back-up stories contained in Captain America Comics #1-4, nor did they try to accurately match the original coloring.

"When we encounter instances where no original art of film is available with our Silver Age Masterworks, we dig up a printed copy of the book and have the pages reconstructed using hi-res scans or color photocopies," Beazley continues. "Unfortunately Marvel's archives don't go back to its earliest days of publishing and it's extremely difficult to find someone willing to scan or photocopy their comic that's likely worth thousands of dollars. Thankfully Steve Geppi of Diamond Comics was kind enough to provide color copies of Captain America Comics #4, and a call for help on the Marvel Masterworks Message board (www.marvelmasterworks.freeservers.com) put us in touch with fan Harry Mendryk who graciously scanned his copy of Captain America Comics #2. That allowed freelancer Matt Moring to reconstruct those pages for us.

"Our only available resource for some of the stories from Captain America Comics #3 was microfiche that had originally been intended as an archival reproduction for libraries. They photographed a printed copy of the book and put each full issue on one sheet of fiche. So on these sheets of microfiche each individual page measures about 5/16 of an inch wide by 7/16 of an inch tall. What we're doing is having these scanned at an incredibly high resolution to get it to a usable size and then we have freelancers who work their computer magic to reconstruct the line art as it originally appeared. Jamison Services and All Thumbs Creative have done a fantastic job restoring these pages to their original state as you can see in the samples we've provided. I don't think the cover to Captain America Comics #1 has looked this good since it originally printed."

"We heard from plenty of retailers and a few fans regarding the last volume of Golden Age Masterworks, and we took what everyone had to say to heart. To put it simply, we listened and fixed the problem. We think everyone will be happy with the results on the entire program, " said Marvel's Director of Sales David Gabriel.

Retailers are advised that the Marvel Milestones Iron Man contains the full first appearance of Captain America (along with Iron Man and Ant Man) all for $3.99, just right to get new readers to try out some classic material.

See below for complete ordering information for these titles and use Diamond Daily's Shopping List links or visit Reorders Online to confirm copies your store!

Order Now!
Reorders Online: Click here!
By Email: Click here!
By Phone: 800-45-COMIC
By Fax: 800-329-2878 or 410-560-3875