Mary Marvel
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Mary Marvel is the title of a series of comic publications that have been published since 1942 by the US publishers Fawcett Comics (1942–1953) and DC Comics (since 1972).
The comics in the series, which go back to the writer Otto Binder , are a spin-off of the comics around the magical superhero Captain Marvel and, like these, are predominantly in the genre of science fiction or fantasy comics.
Release dates
The character Mary Marvel was first featured in 1942 in the comic book Captain Marvel Adventures # 18, which appeared in December 1942 in the program of the Fawcett Comics publisher. After enjoying great popularity there, she was placed at the center of an ongoing series of own stories within the Wow Comics series. As the most popular feature of the Wow Comics , which told several stories about different characters in each issue, Mary Marvel received its own comic series of the same name from December 1945, the Captain Marvel Comics , which appeared until 1948. In addition, other stories appeared around the character in the Marvel Family series , which ran until 1954.
Since the publisher DC Comics acquired the rights to Captain Marvel and all of its offshoot characters in 1972, including Mary Marvel, it has been publishing more stories about the character in loose succession. So the One Shot Supergirl Plus Mary Marvel , in which Mary Marvel experiences an adventure with the much better known Heroine Supergirl . There are also appearances as one of several main characters in series such as Shazam! (1972–1978) and The Power of Shazam! (1995-1999).
Among the illustrators who illustrated the adventures of Mary Marvel, apart from Swayze, Otto Binder's brother Jack Binder and Jerry Ordway stand out.
Appearance of the main character
The optical design for the eponymous heroine of the Mary Marvel stories, which has essentially been retained to this day by all artists who work on the figure, goes back to the American draftsman Marc Swayze , who made it based on suggestions from the figure's intellectual father , Otto Binder, developed for Captain Marvel Comics # 18 in 1942 . Swayze gave the character the features of the then extremely successful actress Judy Garland . As an obligatory superhero costume, Swayze gave the heroine a red blouse with a yellow lightning bolt emblem, a white cape and a red skirt. The character's costume was practically identical to that of Captain Marvel. The only differences were the clothing typical of the sexes (trousers and skirts).
In order to visually differentiate Mary Marvel from her role model, the figure was given a white superhero uniform with yellow flash in contrast to the red costume of the captain from 1943. The white clothing (top and skirt) remained for decades afterwards, but was last replaced by darker, black and gray costumes in the early 2000s.
Web links
- Toonopedia about Mary Marvel
literature
- Don LoCicero: Superheroes and Gods. A comparative Study from Babylonia to Batman , America Chapter, Jefferson 2007