Marvel Super Hero Contest of Champions #1

History

The series grew out of an aborted Marvel treasury edition planned to celebrate the 1980 Moscow Summer Olympics, conceived by writers Mark Gruenwald, Bill Mantlo, and Steven Grant; when the United States boycotted the Games in protest of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the nearly-complete project was shelved. Two years later, the largely-finished artwork was substantially reworked — Olympic settings were redrawn as a space arena, Ms. Marvel was replaced by She-Hulk (drawn over existing pages), and all sports-themed content was stripped out — before being published in 1982 as a three-issue limited series with pencils by John Romita Jr., inks by Pablo Marcos, and cover art by Romita and Bob Layton, edited by Gruenwald and Tom DeFalco under editor-in-chief Jim Shooter.

Trivia · 8 facts

• First limited series ever published by Marvel Comics, cover-dated June–August 1982 (on-sale March–May 1982).
• Written by Mark Gruenwald, Bill Mantlo, and Steven Grant; penciled by John Romita Jr.; inked by Pablo Marcos; cover art by John Romita Jr. and Bob Layton; edited by Mark Gruenwald and Tom DeFalco under EIC Jim Shooter.
• Issue #1 (titled 'A Gathering of Heroes!') assembles every Marvel hero active in 1982 aboard a cosmic arena, establishing the premise: the Grandmaster and the mysterious 'Unknown' (later revealed as Death) each select twelve champions to compete for four pieces of the Golden Globe of Life, with the Collector's resurrection as the prize.
• First appearances of six newly-created international heroes: Blitzkrieg (West Germany), the Collective Man (China), Defensor (Argentina), Peregrine (France), Shamrock (Ireland), and Talisman (Australia) — all purpose-built to give the tournament a multinational cast.
• First full non-reprint appearance of Captain Britain (Brian Braddock) in a U.S.-published Marvel title, following earlier appearances limited to Marvel Team-Up #65–66 and Marvel UK publications.
• The final two pages of issue #1 begin an alphabetical index and description of every Marvel hero active at the time (A–K in this installment), a feature that continued across all three issues and directly presaged the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe.
• The story's Olympic-tie-in origins left visible traces: the book was substantially reworked from near-complete art, with She-Hulk drawn over existing Ms. Marvel panels and the Olympic dome setting redrawn as a space-based arena.
• The series has been collected multiple times, including in Avengers: The Contest (2010, with Avengers Annual #16 and Avengers West Coast Annual #2), a 2015 single-volume reprint of all three issues, and a Marvel Super Hero Contest of Champions Gallery Edition (2022).

Cast · 40 characters

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