buckrogersinthe21stcentury asked: Wasn't it true that Archie's mighty comics/red circle from the 60s was supposed to be a marvel parody and not legitimately good. I think it was jerry seigel was trying to apply the batman 66 camp to marvel titles.
Not really, not quite. What Might Comics/Radio Comics was trying to do was to duplicate the success of the Marvel books of that era, without really quite understanding what was making them successful. So they hired a former Marvel artist (Paul Reinman), and tried to have him draw in a Jack Kirby style. They attempted to replicate Stan’s copy, his promotional efforts, his voice. They even went so far as to credit all of the creators with their first name and last initial–Paul Reinman, for example, was credited as “Paul Arr”–because they knew that Stan Lee was Stan Lieber. They gave their characters very basic problems, and had them fight one another at the drop of a hat as well. And with all of that, they missed the boat completely in terms of sussing out why Spider-Man worked, but turning The Fly into Fly-Man didn’t work.
