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Wednesday, March 28, 2007

Wonder Bread Card - 1974

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One of a series of DC character cards that came with loaves of yummy Wonder Bread in 1974. Nice color portrait on the front, odd example of his powers on the back. I don't recognize the art style (front or back)--anyone have a clue?

I miss the days when manufacturers had fun little giveaways like this. I do most of the food shopping, and I don't see many products anymore offering trading cards or mini-comics or whatever in my local supermarket. I know marketers are all about creating Brand Loyalty, especially to kids (which is kinda evil, really...ironic that superheroes were used for such a nefarious purpose), and I can say from experience that any cereal or fruit drink that gave away superhero stuff was something I would bug my Mom for, week in, week out.

Heck, I still buy Slurpees hoping one day they'll bring back the superhero cups!

7 comments:

Rick L. Phillips said...

I remember buging my parents to get things like that out of cereal. My parents would rarely buy it as they knew I didn't like cereal and would only take out the toy and not eat the food. I still don't care that much of cereal to this day. On the rare time they would buy it I had fun getting the toys.

Anonymous said...

The color illustration looks like Murphy Anderson. I like this pose a lot!

Plaidstallions said...

Grrr, my mom was a health nut, wonderbread was contraband.

Anonymous said...

I agree with russell. The front of the card is almost certainly Murphy Anderson.

Can't make out the back.

Anonymous said...

I think you're *partially* right about the front being Murphy Anderson; if nothing else he inked at LEAST the head and maybe--but it's hard to really judge from the low-res image--the rest of the figure. But it's definitely not Murphy's pencils under those inks. The hands are all wrong, the perspective and posing aren't his.

The back is driving me nuts. I KNOW that artist's work but I can't quite pin it down. The profile in the 3rd panel is so familiar! I keep thinking that it's Paul Norris (still alive last I heard). It's the sort of assignment Joe Orlando-who did custom comics in those days-would have made.

Other opinions?

Paul

rob! said...

here's a bigger version:

http://www.namtab.com/aquablog/wonderbreadbig.gif

...i thought it looked a little Anderson-ish, at least the face. but the rest didnt look right.

Anonymous said...

Hah! Got it now!

The penciller was Pat Gabrielle! I KNEW I recognized that profile in panel 3 (I was Pat's editor, early-90s, on a couple of projects that never seemed to get off the ground). The face on the color side is definitely Murphy, an in-house correction.

Ahh. I feel much better now.

Paul