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WEEK NiNE < > WEEK ELEVEN

THE MiGHTY MARVEL CHECKLiST: WEEK NiNE

24 September 2025 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

SATURDAY 24th SEPTEMBER 1988

Another Wednesday in 2025 becomes another Saturday morning in 1988 with Brian Williamson and Dave Harwood’s cover to #16 of The Real Ghostbusters and Andrew Wildman’s cover for #185 of The Transformers and Visionaries for our latest look at Marvel UK’s wares in The Mighty Marvel Checklist.

The Ghostbusters comic would sometimes group stories together into themes and that was true of this edition that really raised the temperature, with Peter and Egon off on a hot bust in Hawaii Fire-Ho! and Ray up against some haunted ice cream. Then Tobin’s spirit, of Tobin’s Spirit Guide fame from the movie and cartoon visits Egon in his Spengler’s Spirit Guide to test readers on everything they’ve learned so far.

In Transformers, Soundwave was leading the Decepticons into battle in Space Pirates so if, like me, you heard the cartoon or movie voices in your head when reading these, his vast amount of speech might’ve taken a while to read! In Visionaries, their magical animal selves provide some great spy drama and humorous moments in equal measure, and the biggest toy ever (to my young eyes when I saw it anyway) was up for grabs for free. Now, last week I said there was a surprise entry in the checklist this week, can you guess which one I meant?

You probably didn’t expect to see Thomas pop up here. While I was ten-years-old at the time I was obsessed with the original books and TV show and, despite this technically being a nursery comic, I still collected it for a couple of years. So it was fun to see it sharing space with these other comics, although I do get the feeling now that the inhabitants of Sodor were being used to fill what might’ve been a bit of blank space this week.

Elsewhere, if I’d realised at the time so many of Marvel’s comics were giving away Real Ghostbusters stickers for my Panini album I’d have been buying more of them. Stickers and something new to read? Yes, please. Although, my parents were probably glad I didn’t know. Who knows what else I’d have wanted to add to my reservation list! Finally for the checklist, it was cartoon crossover time with two properties from the complete opposite ends of time coming together.

This week one new advert for Marvel UK’s publications popped up and it’s yet another for their range of annuals. The Real Ghostbusters’ penchant for short comedy strips saw its book grouped together with more of the light-hearted fare. Count Duckula and Inspector Gadget had Marvel annuals? If I’d paid closer attention at the time I think Santa’s sleigh could’ve been weighed down that year, judging by last week’s and this week’s adverts.

That’s you all caught up for another week. Do you remember any of these specific issues? Did you collect any of the series mentioned? Did you own those Duckula or Gadget annuals? Let me know on the blog’s socials on Bluesky, Instagram or Facebook and I’ll see you back here in seven days.

TRANSFORMERS 185 (Instagram)

THOMAS THE TANK ENGiNE & FRiENDS
RETROSPECTiVE

THE REAL GHOSTBUSTERS ANNUAL 1

WEEK EiGHT < > WEEK TEN

THE MiGHTY MARVEL CHECKLiST: WEEK EiGHT

17 September 2025 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

SATURDAY 17th SEPTEMBER 1988

On this day back in 1988 the newest issues of The Real Ghostbusters and Transformers and Visionaries sat on newsagent shelves across the UK waiting for excited children like me to run in and grab them. Inside sat the latest Mighty Marvel Checklist, ready to drain parents’ wallets across the land.

Humour comics legend John Geering supplied the cover for the ‘Busters alongside Dave Hine, while the other was provided by the artist responsible to the epic cover to #1 of Transformers, Jerry Paris. Two big competitions this week! We could’ve won a bicycle courtesy of those Frosties reflectors we ALL had on our bike wheels back then (this was also run in Transformers #182, as seen on its cover two week ago) and, possibly even bigger than that, new Optimus Prime toys! It was this second, Power Master version of Prime that I would eventually own.

Dreadwind took over the Transformers letters page too and quickly established himself as the most brilliant, sarcastic responder comics ever had, which lightened things up after the main strip ended this week with a bunch of fan-favourite Autobots strung up, dead or dying! As you can see below, Janine also thought she was receiving equally bad news but the title of the story kind of gives it away before even reading it. It was still a fun tale though. Strangely, there’s no word on the cover or the checklist that this issue had four extra pages, something Marvel UK usually hyped.

The previously advertised Marvel Bumper Comic Holiday Special was now a fortnightly and the checklist makes it clear it was mainly a reprint title, although Marvel did go one better than Fleetway’s Big Comic Fortnightly and provided the occasional new strip, like here in the premiere issue to entice the Ghostbusters fans.

The Flintstones would also appear in it now and again, and in their own comic the cut-out figures and buildings of Build Bedrock was something I bet absolutely no one actually made. Elsewhere, a Geoff Senior cover is always a big deal and I see I’m not alone in thinking that as it gets top billing for the latest issue of Action Force Monthly, while in Thundercats and Galaxy Rangers the name “Shane Gooseman” sounds more like a character from Count Duckula.

Annuals season was in full swing too. Although most of us never got to actually read them until Christmas Day, the months-long advertising just made them all the more coveted. The Real Ghostbusters Annual was the latest to get the full-page treatment and even seeing these few sample pages brings back all the Christmassy feels of receiving it myself that year, reading it wrapped up in bed during that void week between Christmas and New Year.

The selection of action titles was particularly brilliant in 1988, wasn’t it? Personally I received the Transformers and Visionaries books and absolutely loved them! That Visionaries Annual was certainly popular when it appeared on the blog, especially with all you American readers. I’d love to have a nosey at the Galaxy Rangers and Action Force ones. Now that I think about it, I was a big fan of the Action Force back up strips in Transformers so I’ve no idea why I never asked for their annuals and specials!

There’s a surprise guest appearance in the checklist next week, the only time this particular fortnightly appeared in it. I was so happy to see it included at the time but with hindsight I’m thinking they were desperate to fill a gap for the week! What was it? You’ll find out in seven days.

TRANSFORMERS 184 (Instagram)

THE REAL GHOSTBUSTERS ANNUAL 1

TRANSFORMERS ANNUAL 4 (Instagram)

ViSiONARiES ANNUAL

WEEK SEVEN < > WEEK NiNE

THE MiGHTY MARVEL CHECKLiST: WEEK SEVEN

10 September 2025 Phil Boyce 2 Comments

SATURDAY 10th SEPTEMBER 1988

It was all change this week across Marvel UK’s best-sellers as The Real Ghostbusters changed to a weekly format and Transformers and Action Force became… Transformers and Visionaries! It was about time too, seeing as how Visionaries fans had been waiting since July for their adventures to continue.

Andy Wildman’s cover may present what was meant to be a shocking moment in Space Pirates but it was the inclusion of the Knights of the Magical Light and a brand new look to the comic which excited me the most when I read this for its real time read through a few years back. The Real Ghostbusters never changed its look at all over the course of its run, although this issue did stray from the typical multi-story formula.

Instead, an epic (for this comic anyway) tale took over the whole issue with a two-part, 11-page strip drawn by cover artists Andy Lanning and Dave Hine who brought us a superb set of Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Even the prose story, Spengler’s Spirit Guide and Lew Stringer’s Blimey It’s Slimer tied into the same story. Unfortunately my Panini sticker album is long gone but I did have fond memories of trying (and ultimately failing) to complete it. There’s also a competition to win a Commodore 64 computer, a machine I’d become obsessed with over three years later!

In Doctor Who Magazine John Freeman hit on a story title that might seem familiar to fans of the show today, Dragon’s Claws had one of their most entertaining adventures from their whole run when they find themselves between warring factions in France and the comic slowly begins to unveil its background story. Then, were we really meant to believe anyone would think Alf was the sexiest alien alive when we’d just had V on TV a few years previous? Come on!

As you can see there was a trilogy of changes on the checklist completed with the merging of the short-lived The Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers into the hit Thundercats comic. I don’t think it remained merged for long though before running out of already completed stories for the ranger. The merge was advertised across their range for quite a few weeks with this rather simple advert.

I’m surprised the Galaxy Rangers didn’t merge into Transformers if I’m honest. Space-faring adventures chasing down aliens and mechanoid outlaws with four of the coolest robotic horses sounds like a perfect fit! I’d have lapped them up if that had been the case, but with Visionaries needing a new home too there was only so much back up space to go around.

Did you collect Thundercats or The Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers? What did you make of the merge? Can you remember one of the very best issues of The Real Ghostbusters from its whole 193-issue run? More importantly, did you finish the album? Join in the conversation over on the socials on Bluesky, Instagram and Facebook, and I’ll see you back here next week for another checklist and two classic ads.

TRANSFORMERS 183 (Instagram)

DRAGON’S CLAWS 4

WEEK SiX < > WEEK EiGHT

THE MiGHTY MARVEL CHECKLiST: WEEK SiX

4 September 2025 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

This post was due yesterday but
was delayed due to a health issue

SATURDAY 3rd SEPTEMBER 1988

For the last time (for a while anyway) we’ve only one physical comic to pull from this week. This is all set to change in seven days and the reason was advertised in this week’s Transformers and Action Force. But first, what’s behind this ominous Lee Sullivan cover for #182 of Marvel UK’s top seller?

Part one of the epic Space Pirates strip saw the end of the planet Quintesson and Simon Furman neatly tied it in with the abysmal cartoon episode adaptation from a few weeks ago, and the reason Wreck Gar told the fabricated tale (fabricated for the UK story arc anyway) in the first place. There’s also great news for Lew Stringer fans as Combat Colin took up six full pages in this issue! The comic had finished one Action Force story but the next US import wasn’t quite ready yet so a multi-issue strip of Colin and Semi-Automatic Steve from Action Force’s weekly was reprinted.

For the last time for quite a while we’ve no actual checklist. However, for anyone who was collecting both Transformers and The Real Ghostbusters page 23 of this comic contained some amazing news. To reiterate, as a kid I hadn’t started reading Transformers yet, so I never saw the advert below before picking up #14 of Slimer et all’s comic the following week.

Unbelievably, Marvel UK hadn’t hyped this happening in the previous issue of The Real Ghostbusters! We only found out when we went to pick up our latest issue and it proclaimed it was the first weekly issue on the cover, so Transformers readers found out first a whole seven days earlier. At the time, when I eventually saw the advert through a friend’s collection, I thought “ectoplasmic activity” referred to a cut-out Ghostbusters membership card in #1 and the promise of more such stuff which never materialised. Although #14 would contain a cut-out Doomsday Mask there’d be nothing for months after that. Now, I’m thinking it just means the general ghostly vibes.

Okay, so from next week expect Mighty Marvel Checklists in every post and a liberal sprinkling of classic comic ads to boot! If you thought your grey memory cells had been given a workout so far you ain’t seen nothin’ yet (or some other clichéd 80s’ hype slogan if you wish). I’ll be back this day next week, see you then.

TRANSFORMERS 182 (Instagram)

THE REAL GHOSTBUSTERS RETROSPECTiVE

WEEK FiVE < > WEEK SEVEN

THE MiGHTY MARVEL CHECKLiST: WEEK FiVE

2 September 2025 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

This post was due on Wednesday 27th August
but was delayed due to a health issue

SATURDAY 27th AUGUST 1988

Well this week is a turn up for the (comic) books! For the first time we’re not choosing between a Mighty Marvel Checklist and a classic comic advert because this week we have both. In fact we’ve more than that, we’ve got two adverts. All taken from the pages of these two comics, on sale Saturday 27th August back in 1988.

Lee Sullivan’s cover for The Transformers and Action Force #181 refers to the second part of the story I mentioned last time and, despite the lengths Marvel UK went to in order to explain away the American story, their editorial still contains a plea asking people not to write in complaining! Unfortunately nothing is made of the issue number for The Real Ghostbusters (cover by Martin Griffiths and Dave Hine) which feels like a bit of a missed opportunity. Inside, the comic teamed up with Sport Aid and had the characters taking part in a sponsored fun run in which Ray comes across a little sprite called The Spirit of Competition.

In the checklist the publisher may have stopped short of the usual “Great News For All Readers” blurb used when our comics merged (and which never convinced us to be happy about it) but it’s obvious what #9 of Galaxy Rangers would mean for its readers. They’d be off to join forces with the Thundercats soon enough, who seem to be welcoming what sounds like a trio of deodorant scents to their ranks.

The Action Force comic here was the later monthly title rather than the original weekly. This smaller format comic was an attempt to sell the British strips back to the US where it was renamed G.I. Joe The European Missions. The addition of the Transformers crossover reprint (originally in the weekly) may have been exciting to American readers but it just meant a third of the comic was reprint for UK fans. Given the talent involved I’m sure the rest made up for it though.

Inside The Real Ghostbusters we have the second of the strip adverts we’ll see during this series, this time for Dragon’s Claws. Written by Simon Furman and drawn by Geoff Senior, this was the final version after a few edits had to be made after a last-minute name change. You can find out more about that in the link at the bottom of this post. There’s also a small cameo for a character who’ll pop up in the checklists soon enough. Or at least, his arm makes a cameo anyway.

It may only be the end of August but it was already the start of the Marvel Annuals hype season on the back cover of Transformers. Strangely, while the annual would be mentioned a couple of times on the editorial and letters pages (and given away in a competition closer to Christmas) this was the only time this advert appeared in the pages of Transformers! It did appear several times in The Real Ghostbusters though. The countdown to the best time of the year had begun!

Okay, so next week there’s no checklist again but that’ll be the last time for a while because Peter, Winston, Egon and Ray would soon be returning every seven days instead of every 14, so between the two comics the checklists will be more consistent. Next week, Transformers announces the good news, so I’ll catch you then.

TRANSFORMERS 181 (Instagram)

DRAGON’S CLAWS: iN REAL TiME

TRANSFORMERS ANNUAL 4 (Instagram)

WEEK FOUR < > WEEK SiX

THE MiGHTY MARVEL CHECKLiST: WEEK FOUR

20 August 2025 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

SATURDAY 20th AUGUST 1988

The Real Ghostbusters were taking another break this week before their last fortnightly issue but out in deep space Marvel UK’s The Transformers and Action Force had to get around a problem with their next imported US strip.

I remember receiving a Transformers video for Christmas back then with a particularly dodgy episode on it called The Big Broadcast of 2006. In the UK comic we had stories set after The Transformers: The Movie (which was set in the then-future of 2005/6) and those characters travelled back in time and interacted with the Cybertronians in present day tales skilfully interwoven with the imported strips from across the pond by writer Simon Furman.

But Marvel US had decided to adapt said dodgy cartoon episode into comic form and it completely contradicted a whole bunch of lengthy British story arcs. The solution? Lee Sullivan’s cover should tell you everything you need to know. One page was added at the beginning and end (next week) of the strip, giving the comic its own Dallas-type moment of “it was all a fairytale”, read out by TV-loving Wreck-Gar. It wasn’t as bad as it sounds. The UK bits, anyway.

More importantly though, we’re Checklist-less this time (don’t worry, very soon they’ll be here every single week) but that doesn’t mean I can’t uphold my promise from the beginning of this series. So I’ve borrowed an advert from another Marvel UK comic this week to plug the gap.

Around this time Marvel editor Richard Starkings knew from launching The Real Ghostbusters that it was possible to tell a story in one page so he commissioned strip adverts for a load of their comics, meaning they could be rerun instead of new ones having to created all the time for individual issues. Mostly these were all created in the style of the comic they were advertising and I particularly liked this one written by Simon, drawn by Lee and lettered by Richard.

Speaking of ads, alongside next week’s Mighty Marvel Checklist there’ll be two more adverts, one in keeping with the style above. Then, when The Real Ghostbusters goes weekly from #14 we’ll have an unbroken run of checklists for at least a couple of months. So I hope you’re enjoying these weekly trips down memory lane to the 80s so far. If so, please let me know on socials over at Bluesky (personal), Instagram (OiNK) and Facebook (OiNK).

See you next week!

TRANSFORMERS 180 (Instagram)

TRANSFORMERS READ THROUGH

WEEK THREE < > WEEK FiVE

THE MiGHTY MARVEL CHECKLiST: WEEK THREE

13 August 2025 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

SATURDAY 13th AUGUST 1988

The Mighty Marvel Checklist is back after a week’s rest (that first outing must’ve exhausted the poor thing) and there’s a lot more squeezed into its half-page entry inside The Real Ghostbusters (cover by Brian Williamson and Dave Elliott) from this day way back in 1988.

There was no checklist in #179 of The Transformers and Action Force but this will happen with either comic at different points over the course of the checklist’s run, and since I’ll be showing adverts from both along the way I’m just going to show both covers every week anyway. It also doesn’t hurt that Jerry Paris provided this Transforms cover, with the new and improved Optimus Prime taking on the role of quippy 80s action hero rather well.

The checklist doesn’t do the ‘busters justice this week, because not only do they meet the ghost of King Arthur of Camelot in the story briefly mentioned below, but in another strip the Containment Unit malfunctions and lots of fan-favourite ghosts and monsters from previous issues make cameo appearances and Slimer enters the unit to make the fix for Egon. Two very memorable strips for me.

Our two comics may get short-changed a bit but at least Huckleberry Hound gets his promotion promoted, the Galaxy Rangers edge closer to their final issue and in Thundercats did they really have to rescue those two? Interesting that the Doctor Who Magazine entry focuses solely on the comic strip when it’s only one part of the publication. Then again, it had a lot less pages back then so the strip was a bigger part of the whole.

Finally, Dragon and his Claws got their first inkling of the true nature of their missions for the National Union of Retired Sports Experts (N.U.R.S.E) in the dystopian future of 8162, the start of an arc that would become the main thread of the final issues the following year. I read the whole series for the first time only two years ago and it was a phenomenal comic, one that deserved to run and run but would ultimately be cut short just ten issues in.

As we go through this weekly series any issues of the comics featured on the checklist (or adverts) that have been covered on the blog (or on Instagram in the case of Transformers) will be linked to at the bottom of each post, alongside any titles that have received a more general round up in the Retrospectives section. You never know, there might be more of these Marvel UK comics to add to these links on the blog as time goes on.

Don’t forget, if you remember reading any of these issues let us know on the socials (links in the menu).

TRANSFORMERS 179 (Instagram)

DRAGON’S CLAWS 3

WEEK TWO < > WEEK FOUR

THE MiGHTY MARVEL CHECKLiST: WEEK TWO

6 August 2025 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

SATURDAY 6th AUGUST 1988

Okay, so as I said on the menu page for this series there were eight weeks in total out of a whopping 74 that The Real Ghostbusters (still fortnightly so no issue this week) and Transformers didn’t print a Mighty Marvel Checklist. However, I did promise I’d also be showing you all of the comics adverts published alongside the checklists as we go, and that they’d help us plug those annoying gaps.

First up though, what’s with that circus-based Stephen Baskerville cover? The Cosmic Carnival is a story I’ve seen derided in the usual negativity-filled corners of the fandom but when I read it for the first time a handful of years back I found it to be a silly but fun story. Taking prisoner the brilliant Sky Lynx and the human children he’s protecting, a space station-based circus puts them to work in small display cages and in the ring for daring feats. It’s actually a clever script that highlighted the problem with zoos of the day, as well as introducing a wider universe of alien species to the comic.

It’s also important to remember we’re talking about a comic starring sentient robots from outer space that can transform into various forms of human transport so sometimes it’s best not to take things too seriously. So, on to that advert and it’s one that brings back memories. Back in 1988 I read the comic advertised this week, the very first edition of The Marvel Bumper Comic. Fleetway had been enjoying great success with their Big Comic Books and had just released their new fortnightly comic version in mid-June. Repackaging reprints had the potential of great returns with little outgoings.

The Marvel Bumper Comic would soon become a fortnightly (then weekly) comic itself but this was the only one I bought as a kid. I remember enjoying it but wishing the strips weren’t so short. Obviously quantity was key here to reinforce the “Bumper” part of the title. Plus it didn’t hurt trying to appeal to as wide an audience as possible. It’s a curious glimpse at the Marvel UK of the day in one purchase if you can find it on eBay. Perhaps one to join the blog at a later date? Perhaps.

Did you buy the Holiday Special edition of the Bumper Comic? Have you any particularly fond memories of it or any of its contents? What did you think of publishers repackaging old strips to coax more pocket money out of our… erm, pockets? Let us know on the socials at Bluesky, Instagram or Facebook, why don’t you? More comics to check off the list next week.

TRANSFORMERS 178 (Instagram)

WEEK ONE < > WEEK THREE