Tuesday, October 25, 2022

The Times of Monsters #22

 

I never owned an issue of The Monster Times growing up.  I either never saw it or it did not get distributed in my area.  I think I saw one once in WV, but I cannot say for sure at the vintage I now am.  I had read about them here and there, but never read any until the newspaper ceased publication in July of 1976.  Interestingly, the issue I may have seen in a store was probably the last one, but I think I purchased the first issue of Starlog instead (exact same time frame).  The Monster Times was published from January 26th, 1972 until August of 1976, and at first it was biweekly, then monthly.  I think I would have enjoyed it a lot, since it almost always had comic books, movies and television shows featured in it.  It also featured a lot of articles about Godzilla and other Japanese monsters.  That would have caught my attention.

So this reprint book (it is a hardcover, I couldn't find the softcover, but I don't mind) is published by Gwandanaland Comics, a publisher who specializes in public domain reprints.  Apparently, the last several issues of TMT were published without copyright notice and that is the loophole.  They don't label it as TMT, but give you lots of clues about where the material comes from.  This book publishes issues 38-42, and features a lot of Godzilla related material.  The reproduction is great, and it includes ads and LOCs as well.  The only problem this reader has is that the articles are reduced in size, and it makes it slightly more difficult for readers of a certain vintage to read.  

I have a few of the Gwandanaland collections, and have enjoyed all of them.  They are available on many platforms.

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