Off The Shelf: The Rampaging Hulk

The Rampaging Hulk was a comic title in magazine format featuring the Green Goliath released in 1977 by Curtis Publishing (an imprint of Marvel Comics) and ran until 1981.

The Rampaging Hulk was first released with a full-color cover and black-and-white interior in magazine format. It featured full-length stories dealing with a more realistic depiction of violence, death, loss and alienation - subjects intended for a more mature audience. The title veered away from the mindless and sulking "Me Smash" Hulk that ol' green jeans had sadly devolved into since the good old days. The Rampaging Hulk was a return to the darker original character of the Hulk in the tradition of Tales to Astonish - a science fiction anthology that, after the first Hulk book was canceled in 1963, developed the Hulk as a raging, atomic super-mutant. In fact, many of the Rampaging Hulk stories were originally intended for the defunct Tales to Astonish title.

When the whole magazine went full-color the title featured interviews with Bill Bixby and Lou Ferrigno while the Incredible Hulk TV series was in full swing on CBS as well as the art of a young John Romita Jr. at 19 (he later a became a writer and artist on Amazing Spiderman) and his father John Romita Sr. one of the original Marvel Bullpen.



References:

• Wikipedia, The Rampaging Hulk
• Wikipedia, Incredible Hulk TV series
• Comic Covers, The Rampaging Hulk
• Amazon, Essential Rampaging Hulk, Vol. 1