Continuing my ongoing series about the cover lettering of Danny Crespi at Marvel Comics, mostly from 1974-1979. Photocopies of saved cover lettering from Danny’s files were compiled into a collection by letterer and friend Phil Felix during the 1980s when he worked with Danny on staff at Marvel, and Phil sent me copies. This time I’ll look at pages 45 (above) through 48. The lettering in page 45 is all by Danny Crespi. Sources are below, except for “Firelord,” which I can’t find. It looks unfinished, and may be unused. Oh, and “New,” can’t find that one either.

Blood Church” from MARVEL TEAM-UP #35, July 1975.

“Rampage of Reed Richards” from FANTASTIC FOUR #188, Nov. 1977.

“2nd Searing Issue” from GODZILLA #2, Sept. 1977.

“Doorway Down Into Hell” from FEAR #28, June 1975.

“War of the Giants” and “Batragon” from GODZILLA #4, Nov. 1977.

“A Doom Named Dr. Druid” from GHOST RIDER #26, Oct. 1977.

Page 46. All by Danny Crespi I think. I can’t find the smaller blurbs on the left side, perhaps you’ll have more luck. Sources of the others are below.

“Showdown” and the arrow below it from MARVEL TEAM-UP #62, Oct. 1977. SHOWDOWN is a little unusual in that the drop shadow is above the letters, but that leaves more room for the small letters below it.

“Sentinels are attacking” and “Last Stand” from THE CHAMPIONS #17, Jan. 1978. Not a smidgen of space left on this cover for any more lettering!

“Back from the Fabulous ’50s” from MARVEL SUPER ACTION #4, Nov. 1977.

Page 47. I believe all by Danny Crespi, not sure about “Absorbing Man,” which is late for him, but it looks like his work. I can’t find the source for “Supernatural Mystery,” the other sources are below.

“Man-Thing” from THE INCREDIBLE HULK #198, April 1976.

“Absorbing Man” from THE INCREDIBLE HULK #261, July 1981. As said above, this is late for Danny, but it does look like his work. Perhaps he pitched in to help with a rush job.

“Darth Vader” from STAR WARS #4, Oct. 1977.

“Holocaust” from DAREDEVIL #123, July 1975. I suspect putting the world Holocaust on a super-hero comic cover would not be approved today.

“Return of the Ancient One” from DOCTOR STRANGE #26, Dec. 1977.

“The Last Gunfight” from RAWHIDE KID #151, May 1979.

“Humanimals” from THE ISLAND OF DR. MOREAU #1 (A Marvel Movie Special), 1977. Funny how over-the-top melodrama is in this Gil Kane cover for the much more sedate original novel, but that’s comics.

Page 48, all by Danny Crespi, I believe. Of the blurbs on the left, I’ve only found the one in a circle, “Havoc,” which appears on the cover of MARVEL TEAM-UP #62, seen earlier in this post, and the two double-bordered balloons, source below. Finding individual speech balloons is very difficult, as they are often not mentioned or indexed, and therefore don’t turn up in searches. Sources for the four captions at the right are below.

Those double-bordered balloons are from POWER MAN #47, Oct. 1977. Thanks to Michael Styborski for finding them. As usual with Danny’s word balloons, the tails are added later, when they’re pasted on the cover art.

“The Day They Caught The Kid” from KID COLT OUTLAW #197, Aug. 1975.

“Hordes of Hitler” from GIANT-SIZE INVADERS #1, June 1975. Looking at the original lettering, notice the heavy border with small gaps on HITLER? That’s something I think Gaspar Saladino originated, being borrowed by Danny here. I’ve used it many times myself.

“The Guardians’ Last Stand” from MARVEL PRESENTS #12, Aug. 1977.

“Power of the Executioner” from MARVEL TWO-IN-ONE #7, Jan. 1975. The layout of this caption is very odd, with lots of extra space where it isn’t needed. The word EXECUTIONER is pasted in, perhaps from another layout. No idea how it ended up this strange, but except for this caption. all the lettering on these pages of the Crespi Files is nicely done if not particularly memorable.

More when I have time to research them. Other parts of this series and more articles you might enjoy are on the COMICS CREATION page and other pages of my blog.