TM
by
Michael Aushenker
Before Spectacular Spider-Man offered additional Spidey soap opera and long before titles such as Web of Spider-Man and Ultimate Spider-Man swung out of the editorial offices of Marvel Comics, a plucky little series called Marvel Team-Up fed the demand for more Web-Crawler action well beyond Marvel’s flagship book, The Amazing Spider-Man. Sure, the Bronze Age saw the likes of Marvel Tales and Spidey Super Stories. However, those were reprints and kiddie comics, respectively. Launched with a March 1972 cover date, Marvel Team-Up offered exciting new Spider-Man adventures—but with a twist! Mostly self-contained stories free of that pesky continuity complicating Peter Parker’s world in Amazing Spider-Man, Marvel Team-Up offered done-in-one adventures and a novelty: Every issue featured a special guest hero/heroine/group to “team up” with Spidey. “Marvel Team-Up was a fun mag for people who like to see Spider-Man in action with other heroes (or possibly their favorite hero paired up with Spidey),” says longtime Spider-Man writer and editor Danny Fingeroth of the series’ appeal. (At one point, Fingeroth oversaw all Spider-titles.) “The stories were often only loosely tied into the main Spider-Man continuity, which didn’t mean that there weren’t many memorable stories by talented creators.” On any given month, readers could find Spider-Man paired up with the Hulk, Daredevil, Human Torch, Killraven, Dr. Strange, even the Guardians of the Galaxy and television stars. This conceptual conceit, clean and colorful, became sort of the cherry on the ice cream sundae that was Amazing, Marvel’s groundbreaking title spawned from the imaginations of artist Steve Ditko and writer Stan Lee. And Marvel knew a winning recipe when it had one. Two years into MTU, Marvel launched Marvel Two-in-One, a kindred title featuring team-ups with that other humorous wiseacre, the Thing from Fantastic Four [see article following—ed.]. Like many fans of the series, Fingeroth relished the freewheeling, everything-and-the-kitchen-sink approach to the more flamboyant Spidey pairings. The mix of Spider-Man’s wise-crackery and novelty guestappearances fueled an under-the-radar book that would corral a batch of Marvel’s biggest writers and artists and keep the series firing on all cylinders from (cover dates) March 1972 through February 1985! Fingeroth’s favorite MTU covers include Ron Frenz and Al Milgrom on #135, Ed Hannigan and Klaus Janson’s cover for #140, and Hannigan and Bob Wiacek’s cover on #142. Among Fingeroth’s favorite issues: #100, which united writer Chris Claremont and artists Frank Miller and Janson, and #120, the J. M. DeMatteis/Kerry Gammill/Mike Esposito story that
“Live from New York…” Really, was there an issue of Marvel Team-Up more offbeat than this one? Chris Claremont and Jo Duffy take us backstage of this crazy crossover in this article. MTU #74 (Oct. 1978) cover art by Marie Severin. Spider-Man and Marvel Team-Up TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc. SNL © NBC.
Team-Ups Issue
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