Welcome to Comic Book Legends Revealed! This is the six hundred and sixty-eighth week where we examine comic book legends and whether they are true or false.

Click here for Part 1 of this week's legends.

COMIC LEGEND:

Marvel UK reprinted an issue of Captain Marvel where he fights the Hulk as a Hulk story...WITHOUT Captain Marvel in it!

STATUS:

True

Marvel UK began in the early 1970s as an attempt to release Marvel material for the British market. This involved adapting things a lot, as the market was a lot different from the United States. For instance, weekly comics were the norm in England, not monthly. So Marvel would often see their stories get chopped up so that they would fit into the anthology format.

However, sometimes they would also have to make edits far more substantial than just cutting for length.

In the 1973 comic, Mighty World of Marvel #44, Marvel UK's Tony Isabella (working with Tom Orzechowski and Al MIlgrom) managed to have a Hulk story be the featured story in the comic (the cover art was by Jim Starlin)...

However, the comic was adapted from a Captain Marvel story by Roy Thomas, Gil Kane and Dan Adkins...

And the Marvel UK version did not have Captain Marvel in it!! Presumably this was because Marvel UK were not reprinting any Captain Marvel stories in the UK at the time, so the inclusion of the character was seen as simply too confusing. So they decided to just cut Captain Marvel out of the comic book story all together.

See the openings of the original comic and then the Marvel UK version...

The big difference between the two is that in the original story, Bruce Banner decides to try to find a way for Rick Jones and Captain Marvel to both exist on Earth (this was during the period where they would switch places with each other in the Negative Zone through their connection via the Nega Bands that they wore)...

While in the Marvel UK story, since Captain Marvel was not involved, it was instead that Bruce Banner was trying to help cure an old professor of his...

Student protests ended up angering the Hulk, but see how the two comics even quoted different people!! Thomas Randolph to William Shakespeare...

Once the Hulk goes on a rampage, Captain Marvel shows up to stop him and then they fight, before Captain Marvel turns back into Rick Jones...

In the Marvel UK version, it was only just Rick all along...

The endings were fairly similar, though, except that the Marvel UK version uses the old professor that Banner was trying to help in this version of the story...

Crazy, crazy stuff.

Thanks to reader Rob H., who suggested that I feature this one years ago, but I didn't have scans of the British comic. He finally got his copy and scanned it for me! Thanks, Rob!


Check out my latest Movie Legends Revealed - Was He-Man initially created as a movie toy tie-in for the Conan the Barbarian movie?


Part 3 will be up later on Sunday! Feel free to write in with suggestions for future legends to either cronb01@aol.com or brianc@cbr.com!