In 1975, the famous Marvel Comics and DC Comics rivals did what many fans thought they were unthinkable: they collaborated for the first time.
Marvel and DC, even to date, remain the two largest players in the power of the comic strip industry. Marvel has been doing a bank since the 1960s with characters like The Fantastic Four, The X-Men, Spider-Man, The Avengers and The Awesome Slapstick. DC, on the other side, has been lucrative since the 1930s, supervising characters like Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, The Flash, Green Lantern and The Amazing Ambush Bug. The debates on society have produced the superior characters is the source of conflict of infinite Nerd, even more strongly disputed than the discussions “Star Trek against Star Wars”. And given the Marvel and DC protection on their characters, it was a rare event indeed if they crossed.
It happened from time to time, of course. The old school’s comic strips will remember the 1976 first cross event “Superman against The Amazing Spider-Man: The Battle of the Century”, where the heroes of DC and Marvel entered a brief fight. There are no parallel universes in this comic strip. Superman and Spider-Man simply live on the same land. The fight between the characters is equalized by a radiation of high-tech radiation which slightly weakens Superman, but considerably reinforces Spider-Man. And it was only the first superhero crossover. Everyone’s about a few years, another event would appear and the comics of comics would learn, say, if the Hulk could beat Superman, etc.
But the very first collaboration between companies came in 1975 to a very strange and very contested project. The two companies, it seems, worked on simultaneous comic adaptations of the MGM classic in 1939 “The Wizard of Oz”. But rather than a company assigning the project to the other, however, they ended up uniting their forces. The result was an 84 -page comic strip called “MGM MGM Wizard of Oz”.
The story was told in a 1987 issue of The Baum Bugle, archived with the Oz club.
No one remembers that MGM is The Marvelous Wizard of Oz
At the time, a man by the name of Roy Thomas had just finished his mandate as editor -in -chief of Marvel Comics. A discovery letter he wrote revealed that Marvel and DC negotiate comics for “The Wizard of Oz” from MGM at the same time. At that time, Victor Fleming’s classic film was only 36 years old, but had already rooted in popular conscience. He was broadcast on television and adapted in new musicals like “The Wiz”. Thomas was a super-wizard of Oz “Advoured”, and it was obviously his idea of bringing the film on the page. With the rights of MGM, comics would be authorized to use the images of the film and the resemblances of its actors Judy Garland, Ray Bolger, Jack Haley, Bert Lahr, Margaret Hamilton, Billie Burke and all the others.
DC negotiated with MGM to do not only comics from “The Wizard of Oz”, but also a new range of toys. Marvel, however, won the contract, and Roy Thomas, working with artist Marvel John Buscema, immediately started working on comics. At the beginning, they built several pages in the pencil of completely original drawings, sporting all new designs of characters from the immortal characters of L. Frank Baum, but this version was abandoned in favor of a more precise screen version.
It was before the advent of VHS, so Buscema had no visual clue to pass, apart from several fixed production images that MGM provided. As a frustrating way, MGM refused to give Thomas a copy of the “Wizard of Oz” script, then Thomas was released and bought a heavy audio cassette of the film’s soundtrack. He was able to transcribe the audio and describe the visuals to Buscema. Thomas also filled the missing dialogue itself, because the soundtrack cassette did not have the whole film on it. In a stroke of luck, Buscema had seen the film several times (which did not do it?), And he was able to trace the images of memory.
How did DC Comics involved in the Wizard of Oz Comic?
In Thomas’ letter, however, it was noted that DC Comics had a reprisal plan. It seems that DC, in order to saper Marvel, decided to start working on a “Wizard of Oz” adaptation. The original novel was in the public domain, so DC was in the right to use the title, even if he could not use the resemblances of the actors of the 1939 film. Marvel was indeed in their legal and creative rights to work on their “sorcerer”, but, according to Thomas, the company was afraid that DC will exceed them to a certain extent. “At the last minute,” he said in Thomas’ letter, “Marvel seems to have panicked and concluded an agreement with DC to avoid two oz pounds at the same time.”
The real reasons for this agreement remain vague, but the agreement has nevertheless been concluded. “The Marvelous Wizard of Oz” of MGM was to be published as a joint marvel / DC business. Curiously, however, nobody from DC Comics contributed to the book in a creative way. He remained the Thomas and Buscema project until the end. Inkers and co-authors were also employees of Marvel personnel. The finished book was planned to be 72 pages, but extended to 84, including fixed images, Oz maps and a brief biography of L. Frank Baum.
The book, however, was not a success. There was no marketing, for one. Because the book was so thick and printed in a larger format than the traditional comics, most comic fans remained away. Traditional bookstores refused to store it because at the time, bookstores rarely supplied comics.
The comic strip is quickly and disappeared from public conscience. This historic collaboration between two main manufacturers of comics should have been more of a famous cause, but it ended up being simply a Curio. A footnote. These days, only curious souls with a few dollars to burn can buy the book on the used market.
