Secret Origins #7 - 1974

Comics Weekend I thought I'd pair up yesterday's examination of the Millennium Edition of More Fun Comics #101 with the--as far as I know--only other time a More Fun Aquaman story has been reprinted, in DC's 1974 all-reprint series Secret Origins.

Secret Origins was one of those titles DC had out on the market to try and compete with Marvel who at the time was flooding the newsstands with product.

And while DC's 100-Page Super Spectaculars mixed new material with old, this series was all-reprint, and obviously comics fans didn't take to it too well--this seventh issue was the last (even though the series sported nice covers by Nick Cardy).

There's no indication in the letter's page (titled "Original Thinking") that this is the final issue, so we can assume the cancellation was fairly abrupt. Oh well--nice try, fellas!

Here's what editor E.Nelson Bridwell had to say about this reprint at the time:

Anyway, this issue reprints Aquaman's debut appearance in More Fun Comics #73, with the Sea King's then-yellow-colored gloves re-colored green, to match the more current, widely-known version of the character.

But the changes didn't stop there. The original final panel of the story promotes Aquaman's further appearances in More Fun Comics, but since that title was long gone by 1974, DC re-lettered it to be more current:

...according to a comment left on this blog by Laura of The Unofficial Aquaman Website, these changes were done a little too capriciously: "I heard through the grapevine that DC lost their original copy of this story when a reprint was done some time ago. For the Millennium Edition they had to borrow a copy to get the "next issue" box in the final panel, which was changed in previous reprints."

Since us obsessive AquaFans may never actually see the original More Fun debut story as it exactly appeared, I went ahead and changed Aquaman's glove back to its original state.

You're welcome.