No-Frills Comics Subscriptions

December 1983

Star Wars: Return of the Jedi #3

This has got to be the most bland subscription ad I’ve ever seen! No characters, no fancy graphics, not even an interesting font! Come on, Marvel – you can do so much better than this!

However, one thing that caught my eye on this page was “Blip” – I’d never heard of that title before. Upon looking it up, apparently since kids at this time were spending more of their money on video games and less on comic books, Marvel decided to try cashing in on the video game craze by publishing a magazine about it! It only lasted 7 issues, but it looks amazingly geeky, and I’d love to get my hands on it!

Mighty Marvel Money Saver!

August 1979

Shogun Warriors #7

In honor of the release of Captain Marvel (I know, I’m a week late – but go see it! It’s awesome!), here’s another classic Marvel captain: Captain America! Here he’s offering you a Mighty Marvel Flying Shield (aka, a frisbee) for free when you subscribe to at least three titles!

Am I the only one who finds Cap’s use of “hip lingo” a little out of character? If they really felt the need to use that dialog, I think it would’ve gone better with Spider-Man.

You Can Subscribe… Just Not to This

January 1978

The Secret Society of Super-Villains #12

Yes, you can subscribe to your favorite DC comics! …But just not this one. At first I thought I must’ve just missed it in the listing, but no – Power Girl, the title that Superman himself is showing off here, is not on the list of available titles!

This ad appeared not long before the “DC implosion,” where they canceled about 40% of their titles. In fact, here Amazing World of DC Comics is advertising issue #16 – well, #17 was the last ever published!

Also, this is the first time I’m noticing a subscription price that’s actually higher than the cover price!

 

Do you enjoy reading Comic Book Ads? If so, please consider supporting me by clicking here for my Amazon link – I’ll get a percentage from everything you order! Thanks!

Grin and (Care) Bear It!

May 1986

Masters Of The Universe #1

It’s the Care Bears – here to offer you a deal on all of your favorite cartoon tie-in comics! Star Comics was a division of Marvel that was used mostly for cartoon-related comics and other titles that would appeal to young children.

OK, I know subscription pages generally aren’t very interesting, but just (Care) bear with me – I’m almost finished with each of the comics I’ve been posting from, and soon I’ll have a whole new batch!

 

Do you enjoy reading Comic Book Ads? If so, please consider supporting me by clicking here for my Amazon link – I’ll get a percentage from everything you order! Thanks!

Heroes Return… To Your Mailbox!

January 1998

Thunderbolts #10

It’s another subscription page – this time from 1998. This one seemed to have far fewer titles than other subscription pages, but upon comparing it to one from 1997, I guess they’re actually pretty close.

X-Men aren’t quite as dominant in this one as they were in the previous year, and the number of Star Trek titles has been cut in half – and speaking of cutting Star Trek in half, here they have “Star Trek: Star Fleet Academy” listed as one of the titles – all good Trekkies should know that Starfleet is one word!

So at this point, we’ve got subscription prices ranging from $1.66 to $1.83 per issue (or $1.25 for Marvel Vision) at a time when cover price for comics was $1.99. While saving any money is always a good thing, that’s only a discount of 8% to 16%. Without doing any official research on this, I’d say that this is probably a low point (or close to it) for subscription savings.

 

Do you enjoy reading Comic Book Ads? If so, please consider supporting me by clicking here for my Amazon link – I’ll get a percentage from everything you order! Thanks!

Christmas Star

March 1988

Visionaries #3

Sorry to do two ’80s ads in a row, but I wanted to do the Christmas ads during the Christmas season, and these are what I had available.

Wow, prices sure jumped in the course of only a few years! In last week’s ad from 1985, cover price was 60¢ per issue and the subscription price was 42¢. Only three years later, We’ve got a cover price of $1.00 and subscription price of 75¢!

Well, it’s still a bargain compared to prices these days…

Iron Santa!

March 1985

G.I. Joe #33

Hello, loyal comic book ad enthusiasts! Sorry I missed last week – I was busy with Christmas stuff. But you know who else is busy with Christmas stuff? Iron Man! Yes, he’s bringing folksy, outdated, generic toys to all the girls and boys! …Or maybe he’s just trying to get you to buy comics.

Only 42¢ per copy?! What I wouldn’t give for that price (or even the full cover price of 60¢) these days! Why/when/how did comics get so expensive? Most new issues I buy are $3.99 each! Oh, well – maybe if I’m lucky I’ll find some comics under the tree this year!

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to everyone out there!

 

Do you enjoy reading Comic Book Ads? If so, please consider supporting me by clicking here for my Amazon link – I’ll get a percentage from everything you order! Thanks!

Subscriber-Man, Subscriber-Man, Does Whatever a Subscriber Can!

February 1995

X-Force #43

It’s the ’90s, and X-Men are in full swing! Despite the fact that Spider-Man is the one pictured in the ad, he’s only got six titles, while X-Men and all their various spinoffs have a whopping 13!

 

Do you enjoy reading Comic Book Ads? If so, please consider supporting me by clicking here for my Amazon link – I’ll get a percentage of everything you order! Thanks!

Na-Na Na-Na Na-Na Na SUBSCRIPTION!

February 1976

Claw The Unconquered #5

I have a new buddy who’s a huge fan of Batman, so in honor of this new friendship, here’s the ad with Batman most prominently featured (out of all the ones I have scanned, anyway). Surprisingly, this seems to be Robin’s first appearance in my blog, so let’s give a big Comic Book Ads welcome to Robin!

“HI, ROBIN!!!”

Something I find interesting about this is that you get $3.00 worth of comics, but it doesn’t actually specify how many issues that equals. I’m assuming it would be a year’s worth, but just think it’s odd that they don’t mention it.

My Subscription-Sense Is Tingling!

January 1997

Deadpool #1

Much like the Columbia House ad featured in an earlier post, I think that ads for comic subscriptions are like snapshots in time, showing you a little glimpse of what was going on at the time. Here’s a Marvel subscription page from 1997.

I like the statement “YES, YOU CAN PHOTOCOPY THIS AD!” – I guess they finally realized that people don’t want to mangle their comic books just to redeem an offer!