Eclipse Monthly

High-quality mainstream anthology, with good production values and an adventure-based remit. Eclipse Monthly mixed super-heroes and Westerns, moral tales and thrillers, and featured a star-studded line-up. Steve Ditko’s “Static,” while not the work of a creator at the peak of his powers, is still a thing of wonder (series two #1–3), and Doug Wildey’s complex Western, Rio (#1–4, 9–10), equals Clint Eastwood’s finest efforts in the genre. Steve Englehart and Marshall Rogers’ Coyote appeared in series one #2–8 before spinning off into its own Epic title, and Don McGregor and Gene Colan’s “Ragamuffins” was a far-sighted attempt—with its pencil-only artwork and reflective insight into the terrors and pressures of childhood—to expand what was an acceptable topic for a comic story. Although not to everyone’s taste, Trina Robbins’ stylised adaptation of a neglected and rather risqué Sax Rohmer pulp, Dope, is sympathetically executed. Although relying on a backbone of super-hero adventures (such as B. C.Boyer’s Spirit homage The Masked Man and Mark Evanier and Mike Sekowsky’s Nightingale), Eclipse Monthly got the best out of its contributors and is a lasting monument to the publishing company. The first series is a black and white magazine with occasional color pages, but the second is traditional comic format.