Lost Marvels No. 1: Tower of Shadows

Neal Adams, Jim Steranko, Barry Windsor-Smith

$34.99

Publish Date: April 29, 2025

Publisher:

Fantagraphics

ISBN:

9798875000379

Pages:

176

Language:

English

Not currently on our shelves. Expected in store within 3-7 business days.

Description

The never-collected horror anthology series featuring stories by Jim Steranko, Neal Adams, Barry Windsor-Smith, Stan Lee, John Buscema, and other Silver Age masters.

In 1969, with its revolutionary superhero line well established, Marvel took a chance on the kind of supernatural, EC-style anthology series that had been banned since the formation of the Comics Code in the 1950s. Tower of Shadows featured a staggering array of artists and writers, including Neal Adams, Jim Steranko, Barry Windsor-Smith, John Buscema, Gene Colan, Wally Wood, Stan Lee, Roy Thomas, John Romita, Johnny Craig, Marie Severin, Gerry Conway, and Bernie Wrightson, to name a few. Freed from the conventions of the superhero adventure, these creators brought their storytelling skills to a more quietly sinister genre, producing atmospheric gems of twisted suspense and sardonic horror.

Not only do these nine issues feature Marvel’s best creators working at their peak, but Tower of Shadows is one of the lost, never-collected Marvels. In the first of a new series of Lost Marvels, Fantagraphics and Marvel join forces to introduce these pages to a new generation of readers and restore this series to its rightful place in comics history. This gorgeous volume brings every Tower of Shadows story and cover to life in vivid color and features background and analysis by comics journalist Michael Dean.

About the Author

Neal Adams (1941-2022) was an American comic book artist. He was the co-founder of the graphic design studio Continuity Associates, and was a creators-rights advocate who helped secure a pension and recognition for Superman creators Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster. During his career, Adams co-created the characters John Stewart, Man-Bat, and Ra's al Ghul for DC Comics.

Jim Steranko is an American graphic artist, comic book writer/artist, comics historian, magician, publisher and film production illustrator.

Barry Windsor-Smith began his career by drawing mainstay Marvel characters such as the X-Men and Daredevil in 1969 in the traditional Marvel style. However, in 1971 he broke from the Marvel formula when he started drawing the Conan series, turning heads with a fresh and controversial stylistic approach and winning numerous industry awards. Part of a young generation of artists that included compatriots Bernie Wrightson, Mike Kaluta, and Jeff Jones, Windsor-Smith proceeded to carve an independent path for himself. In the ‘90s, he conceived, wrote, and drew three independent series, The Freebooters, Young Gods, and The Paradox-Man. In 1999 and 2001 Fantagraphics published Opus volumes 1 and 2, autobiographical coffee table art books. The critically acclaimed and award winning Monsters (2021) is his most recent work. He currently lives in New York.

Praise for Lost Marvels No. 1: Tower of Shadows

Old-school Marvel fans will eagerly add this to their shelf and look forward to forthcoming volumes.
— Publishers Weekly

It’s very exciting to see this largely forgotten 1969-debuting Marvel series getting its own collection.
— Broken Frontier

Another great collection by Fantagraphics. From cover to cover, it’s filled with excitement. The killer content and added backstories are a must have for fans of the horror-comic genre.
— Cinema Sentries

It’s a rare protagonist even vaguely sympathetic, ensuring a sense of retribution when they meet their fate. This is in consistently imaginative ways in the out and out supernatural stories... Most work here hasn’t been reprinted in decades, and they’re worth seeing in digitally restored form, while the background information and contextualization is very welcome.
— Slings and Arrows Graphic Novel Guide