This is a "Gonna Make a Change," which takes a look at the odd evolution that comic book series used to make. You see, nowadays, when a comic book series wants to re-tool, comic book companies simply cancel the book and start a brand-new series (heck, change a creative team and books will often reboot). In the old days, however, comic book companies felt that they had too much capital invested in the higher numbers and wanted to avoid starting over with a new #1. So we got to see some weird changes over the years.

Today, based on a suggestion from reader Gary S., we look at the adventurous journey of Adventure Comics!

Debuting at the end of 1935, New Comics #1 was only the second comic book released by Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson's National Allied Newspaper Syndicate, Inc. (which eventually became DC Comics).

The book was a mixture of comedy and adventure stories. This was in the very earliest days of comic books having original stories in them. They were primarily ways to reprint comic strips at this point in time (even after Action Comics #1 and comic books became a bit of a cultural phenomenon, there were still plenty of reprint titles out there).

Still, new comic book stories were becoming more and more popular. With the 12th issue of the title, they decided to change the name to New Adventure Comics...

The fascinating thing is that despite the name of the book adding "Adventure" to it, the stories still had a mixture of humor and adventure. Amusingly, the transition seemed to be a mix of humor and adventure....

before then going straight into traditional Adventure stories...

Twenty issues after adding "Adventure" to New Comics, they then dropped the New entirely with Adventure Comics #32...

We're now past the release of Superman in Action Comics #1 (by this point, Wheeler-Nicholson had been kicked out of his own comic book company) and so a year later, the superhero fever led to Adventure Comics getting their first superhero in Adventure Comics #40, with the Sandman...

While initially, they continued to have the superhero books share the book with non-superhero books, the comic eventually became ALL superheroes within a few years, with Starman becoming the lead character...

Joe Simon and Jack Kirby (newly hired away from Timely Comics) took over the main feature with #73, with their new take on the Manhunter...

The next big change occurred in Adventure Comics #103. You see, More Fun Comics was another superhero title. DC, though, decided to turn that book into a comedy book. They didn't want to lose the characters, though, so they took the characters from More Fun (Superboy, Aquaman and Green Arrow) and brought them into Adventure Comics...

This would be the set-up for the next decade or so. Along the way, though, there was a major addition to comic book history...

Page 2: [valnet-url-page page=2 paginated=0 text='Long live the Legion!']

In 1958, the Legion of Super-Heroes debuted in Adventure Comics #247...

The Legion began to make more and more appearances and eventually, in Adventure Comics #300, they became the regular back-up feature in the series...

In Adventure Comics #311, Legion took over as the main feature (I'm going to show the next issue, though, since it is a classic cover)...

The Legion maintained their lead feature status until Adventure Comics #381, when the Legion were sent to Action Comics to be a back-up while Supergirl took over as the new lead feature in Adventure...

With #425, the book went back to its classic set-up of being an adventure anthology...

That did not work very well at all, so editor Joe Orlando tried some horror-themed heroes, like the Spectre...

Soon, though, Orlando began to work in more traditional superheroes again, like Aquaman, and by Adventure Comics #441, Aquaman took over as the lead feature...

With Adventure Comics #459, the book expanded and became a "Dollar Comic" with more stories...

That only lasted eight issues before it went back to its normal format, splitting the lead spot between Plastic Man and Starman...

Dial H for Hero took over as the main feature in Adventure Comics #479...

The series was then canceled with Adventure Comics #490. Paul Levitz didn't want the book to end under his editorship, however, so he quickly brought it back as a digest series with mostly reprint stories...

It got past #500 (he didn't want the book to end before #500) and it then ended with #503.

In 2009, DC brought the series back as a Superboy series, using dual numbering...

before then returning to the original numbering for the book's return to telling stories about the Legion...

The series ended with #529...

Thanks to Gary for the suggestion!

Okay, folks, if you have suggestions for comic book series whose evolution you'd like to see me spotlight, just drop me a line at brianc@cbr.com!