A Beginners Guide to Captain Britain.

It's been a fantastic couple of weeks for me collecting and grading wise.

For those who have been following me on the boards, you'll already know about the rare treat I had with my (now beloved) Incredible Hulk 181.

However before this beauty dropped through my door, I was on a high already when, only a few days previously, my collection of Captain Britain comics submitted for grading were delivered. I've been a fan of Captain Britain as long as I've been aware of comics (it was one of the first comics I owned as a child) and as such, I've always had a soft spot for the character.

Captain Britain debuted in the Marvel UK weekly comic, Captain Britain Weekly #1, back in 13th October 1976 and was created by Chris Claremont and Herb Trimpe.

It was unique among Marvel Comics printed for the British market at the time: the Captain Britain stories were printed in colour and perhaps more importantly, it featured all-new material (albeit with reprints of Nick Fury and Fantastic Four strips as backup - previously all of Marvel's British output had been black and white reprints of American comics). Indeed, Stan Lee's himself came up with the idea and ordered a new series set in Britain, featuring a British cast and to be released solely to a British audience in an attempt to create a little bit of the old Marvel magic for English readers. Bizarrely though, it was written and drawn in America, by Americans; so to all intents and purposes this was an American comic book, reminiscent of the 1970s-era Marvel stateside black and white magazines.

Initially a success, the title ran for 39 issues before it was combined with another Marvel UK title, Super Spiderman (becoming Super Spider-Man and Captain Britain - starting with issue #231), a weekly reprint series. The first 23 Captain Britain stories were in colour, drawn by Herb Trimpe and inked by Golden Age artist Fred Kida (of Airboy fame) before the entire comic switched to black and white with issue #24 for the remainder of its run featuring other greats such as John Buscema with inks by Tom Palmer.

Chris Claremont wrote the first ten issues alongside Trimpe and Kida before he left the series (he has since stated this was due to differences of view regards the character and series to that of then Marvel UK editor, Neil Tennant, later of Pet Shop Boys fame). These issues introduced us to this uniquely British superhero who was initially intended to be a British equivalent of Captain America, endowed with extraordinary powers by the Merlyn and his daughter Roma to uphold the laws of Britain, introducing a number of characters and concepts that have since become Marvel universe mainstays. Perhaps the most well known was the introduction in Issue 8 of Captain Britain's twin sister, a certain Elizabeth "Betsy" Braddock, who would later join the X-Men and become Psylocke.

The initial issues of these UK comics also had paper covers, thus were damaged and marked easily making them relatively scare in high grade; both raw and graded copies. The first two issues were also promoted with free gifts, including a cardboard Captain Britain mask and a Captain Britain boomerang respectively and generally receive Qualified Grades as CGC policy is not to include loose inserts (I've queried this on the boards previously http://boards.collectors-society.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Board=30&Number=6791662&Searchpage=3&Main=303470&Words=everydayastory&topic=0&Search=true#Post6791662).

These are the issues and grades I was fortunate to receive.

Captain Britain Issue 3 - CGC Graded 9.8 White Pages (Highest graded, one of only 7 - 8 graded in total)

Captain Britain Issue 4 - CGC Graded 9.8 White Pages (Highest graded, one of only 9 - 17 graded in total)

Captain Britain Issue 5 - CGC Graded 9.6 Off-White To White Pages (Highest graded, one of only 3 - 6 graded in total)

Captain Britain Issue 6 - CGC Graded 9.4 White Pages (One of only 3 - 5 graded in total inc 1x9.8)

Captain Britain Issue 7 - CGC Graded 9.6 Off-White To White Pages (One of 2 - 8 graded in total inc 5x9.8's)

Captain Britain Issue 8 - CGC Graded 9.4 White Pages - 1st appearance of Elisabeth ""Betsy"" Braddock (Later becomes Psylocke) (One of 13 inc 3 SS - 49 graded in total inc 9 x 9.8's & 14 x 9.6's)

Captain Britain Issue 9 - CGC Graded 9.8 Off-White To White Pages (Highest graded, one of 12 - 17 graded in total)

Captain Britain Issue 10 - CGC Graded 9.2 Off-White To White Pages (One of only 2 - 8 graded in total inc 4 x 9.8's & 2 x 9.6's)

Captain Britain Issue 11 - CGC Graded 9.6 Off-White To White Pages (One of 13 - 19 graded in total inc 4 x 9.8's)

The good news, with these grades I immediately jumped up the leader board to number 2 (http://comics.www.collectors-society.com/registry/comics/SetTypeDetail.aspx?SetTypeID=2938). I'm now working on obtaining the complete run and hopefully grabbing the top spot.

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