Stephen King and George RR Martin both wrote part of this special Marvel X-Men comic

In the 1985 comic “Heroes for Hope Starring the X-Men,” the mutants of the title discover that the X-Mansion has been mysteriously swept away to a distant desert. While trapped in a barren desert, each X-Man individually begins to encounter a Grim Reaper-like demon who psychically torments them with visions of their worst fear. Shadowcat is afraid of starving to death. Wolverine fears becoming too animalistic. Colossus fears being bullied by his teammates. The demon is simply called Hungry and he wears a green hood, extending strange tendrils from his midsection. Hungry revels in human misery and is happy to give the X-Men nightmares.

At the end of the one-shot book, the X-Men followed Hungry to his lair to fight and defeat him. Then, to ensure that their quest against hunger isn’t just metaphorical, the X-Men also gather large quantities of food and distribute it to poor and hungry regions of Africa. The book was published as a charity project, with many talented authors and artists contributing for free to ‘Heroes for Hope’ to raise money for charities fighting famine in Ethiopia.

Each of the book’s nightmare sequences was written and drawn by a different creative team, and high-profile authors – many of whom didn’t come from the comics industry – worked on them. Stephen King, for example, wrote three of the book’s 48 pages, covering the Shadowcat sequence. Harlan Ellison also contributed. A pre-“Song of Fire and Ice”, George RR Martin wrote a few words. The book ended up raising $50,000 for the American Friends Service Committee.

There was, however, a bit of a scandal with that $50,000, which we’ll cover below.

In the intro to “Heroes for Hope,” Marvel Comics editor-in-chief Jim Shooter explained the genesis of the project. It appears that longtime Marvel writer (and Thanos creator) Jim Starlin and artist Berni Wrightson suggested to Shooter that their company publish a charity comic to fight famine in Africa. For several years, the media had reported that hunger had hit Ethiopia hard, killing between 300,000 and 1.2 million people. American charities have stepped up to raise money for the region, but not always in the most gracious ways. Pop stars came together to record benefit singles like “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” and “We are the world.” The songs are certainly terrible, but they managed to raise money for Ethiopians.

Jim Shooter wanted to jump on the bandwagon and was receptive to Starlin and Wrightson’s idea. They were the ones who suggested that the comic be a “jam”, with contributions from many artists and writers. According to Shooter, this “would allow us to gather a small army of exceptional talent around the project, making it a real event. I thought it was a great idea.” The three of them began pitching their idea to every possible artist and author, and eventually attracted dozens of people to work on the book. The idea was that 100% of the book’s profits would be donated to Oxfam, a conglomerate of international charities organized to fight poverty.

The project did not go off without a hitch, however. The book was assembled and published, but it immediately sparked controversy. Jim Shooter later wrote on his personal blog that Oxfam refused to accept profits from the book… because they hated it so much.

Shooter describes the ins and outs of “Heroes for Hope” in detail on his blog. He knew it was a big project, but admitted he clashed with Pam Rutt, Marvel Comics’ director of public relations at the time. Rutt, he said, was not a big comic book reader and was not very good at selling “Heroes for Hope” to Oxfam. Indeed, Oxfam heard that a “comic strip” was going to support their cause, and they were surprised when they announced that a comedy about famine was coming soon.

When Shooter sent the first mock-up of “Heroes for Hope” to Oxfam, “they wanted nothing to do with it. Outright rejection.” He continued:

“Furthermore, they said the book was incredibly offensive and that we, the people at Marvel Comics, were racist, sexist and objectionable. […] Their response was that, although they would have nothing to do with our project or us in any way, they would send an executive to meet with us and explain to us the many horrible, repugnant and disgusting elements that made our “comic” anathema. »

In the very painful meeting that followed, an Oxfam representative explained that their depiction of Storm was sexist, that the comic contained racist imagery (it didn’t), and that it would destroy Marvel Comics if published. Pop star Janet Jackson also supported Oxfam, and the Oxfam representative believed Marvel ripped off Jackson to create the “Heroes for Hope” logo. It turns out that Marvel employed an artist also named Janet Jackson, but the Oxfam representative didn’t seem to understand that they were two different people.

When Oxfam pulled out, Marvel instead gave the money to the American Friends Service Committee. They were happy to receive this donation.