Today, we look at the bizarre practice of using retconned stories as the basis for essentially creating “first appearances” out of thin air.
This is “Just a Reminder,” when I look back at comic book history whenever I think there’s something worthwhile to look back at on in connection with things going on today.
Here’s something that might shock you about the comic book back issue market (I say this sarcastically, as I am sure it will not actually surprise anyone), and that is that the comic book back issue market pretty much invents its own rules. For instance, the comic book back issue market has determined that Incredible Hulk #180, which has the following in it..
is a cameo appearance and not the “real” first appearance of Wolverine and that the following issue is the “real” first appearance of the iconic Canadian mutant with the sharp claws and the bad attitude…
That’s not something that was just, like, handed down from upon high. It was something that comic book retailers just decided, that cameo appearances don’t count as first appearances.
However, at the same time, as I’ve detailed a number of times (and I can only think of one or two posts of mine that ever got as much pushback as I have received on this bit), those same rules would dictate that Gambit’s first appearance was in Uncanny X-Men Annual #14 and not Uncanny X-Men #266, as Gambit appears on TEN PAGES of Uncanny X-Men Annual #14, which just happened to come out before Uncanny X-Men #266. He gets a scene early on…
where he really establishes himself…
But he’s on EIGHT OTHER PAGES and he has other dialogue…
It’s absolutely, 100% not a “cameo” appearance, but comic book back issue sellers have decided that Gambit’s first appearance is in Uncanny X-Men #266, so his first appearance is in Uncanny X-Men #266. It’s wrong, but whatever, it’s not some absurd situation (still wrong, though). What IS an absurd situation, however, is the weird position on “first appearances” nowadays when it comes to retconned characters.
WHAT IS SERSI’s FIRST APPEARANCE?
The concept behind Jack Kirby’s original Eternals comic book series, which launched in early 1976, is that the Celestials were returning to Earth after millennia earlier visiting the planet, where they altered humanity into three groups, the heroic, god-like Eternals, the evil, demon-like Deviants and, well, you know, humanity. So now that they were returning, the Eternals had to reveal themselves. In the opening issue, a famous archaeologist and his daughter, Margo, discovered all of this during a dig at a temple in the Andes when their cameraman revealed himself to secretly be the Eternal known as Ikaris and that their dig had discovered a cosmic beacon designed to call the Celestials back to Earth.
The Deviants, however, decided to choose this moment to turn on their creators and try to keep them from returning. Once they proved to be too late, they decided to use their weapons to fight the Celestials, even if the Earth was razed in the middle of all of this. Daniel Damian stayed at the dig, but his daughter, Margo, was taken by Ikaris and since Ikaris needed to be able to go battle against the Devaints without endangering Margo, he entrusted her in the care of one of his fellow Eternals, the mysterious Sersi, who received one of the great Jack Kirby introduction pages in The Eternals #3 (by Kirby and John Verpoorten)…
Clearly, just like Ikaris, Sersi has been around for a long time, but it wouldn’t be until the following issue that we learned more about Sersi’s specific past.
In The Eternals #4 (by Kirby and Verpoorten), Sersi filled Margo in on Sersi’s history on Earth and, sure enough, she reveals that she was known as Circe in Ancient Greece…
Okay, so over a decade earlier, Strange Tales #109 was released…
In the issue (by Stan Lee, Robert Bernstein, Jack Kirby and Dick Ayers), the Human Torch faced off against an evil sorcerer who happened to have Pandora’s Box and he explained how the Greek magician, Circe, put the evils back into the box…
And wouldn’t you know it, Strange Tales #109 now sells as “The First Appearance of Sersi.” It’s ludicrous, but that’s commerce for ya.
A CHARACTER’s FIRST APPEARANCE IS THEIR FIRST APPEARANCE…THIS SHOULD NOT BE SO HARD
In reality, of course, a character’s first appearance is their first appearance and not their retroactive first appearance. If a new comic book comes out tomorrow and says, “the guy in the green suit on the bottom right panel of this page from Action Comics #1 is Martian Manhunter in disguise”…
that does not actually make Action Comics #1 Martian Manhunter’s first appearance.
And yet that absurdity doesn’t keep people from trying this nonsense. Another example is Misty Knight, who debuted in Marvel Premiere #21 (by Tony Isabella, Arvell Jones and Vince Colletta)…
A few years later, Chris Claremont and John Byrne revealed that this lady from Marvel Team-Up #1 (which came out a couple of years before Marvel Premiere #21)….
was Misty Knight. That does not retroactively make Marvel Team-Up #1 Misty Knight’s first appearance. And yet, people actually sell it like that.
The first appearance of a character is their first appearance. If someone retroactively decides something else later, then that’s fine, but it doesn’t change their actual first appearance. Similarly, Domono’s first appearance was in New Mutants #98 (by Rob Liefeld and Fabian Nicieza)…
That a later comic book revealed that this Domino was someone else in disguise and the “real” Domino was in captivity does not make X-Force #11 the first appearance of Domino!
And heck, even THERE, the “real” Domino appeared in a flashback in X-Force #8, so even by that absurd position, X-Force #11 STILL wouldn’t be the first appearance of the “real” Domino!
In any event, as we can see, sellers can make up any nonsense that they want, but we all know the truth – the first appearance of a character is their first appearance. If you want to say “cameos” should be excluded, then fair enough, but be reasonable with what constitutes a “cameo” in that regard.
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