This November, Bloomsbury Academic is partnering with Marvel to launch a brand new series, Marvel Age of Comics, with the publication of three titles. The series of beautifully designed books sets out to explore the deep and rich history of more than 85 years of Marvel Comics.
The first three titles: The Mighty Avengers vs. the 1970s; Daredevil: Born Again and Doctor Strange: A Decade of Dark Magic are all set to launch in stores on November 13, 2025.
In The Mighty Avengers vs. the 1970s, author Paul Cornell explores how the comic reflected the social changes in the U.S. and around the world during that tumultuous decade, a period that included the Vietnam War, Watergate, the Women’s Liberation Movement, and the heyday of the Black Panther Party.
Throughout the 1970s, various writers took up The Avengers, and Cornell delves into some of the major writers’ individual styles and tics, paying particular attention to Roy Thomas, Steve Engelhart, and Jim Shooter. Cornell also traces how the series maintained continuity while developing stylistically and consistently backed by amazing art.
Whilst in Daredevil: Born Again, Chris Ryall strips bare all that is known about Matt Murdock and his costumed alter ego Daredevil, celebrating the union of writer Frank Miller and artist David Mazzucchelli as both grew as talents capable of a brutal, tender, exhilarating storyline with vivid dialogue and incomparable art in the seven-part saga widely recognised as having lasting resonance.
“Writer Frank Miller’s return to writing Daredevil raised the stakes for characters in then-unheard-of ways,” Ryall writes. “Add to that the fact that artist David Mazzucchelli was on a rapid artistic rise at the time he and Miller joined forces, and the pieces were in place for their first partnership to be something truly special.”
In Doctor Strange: A Decade of Dark Magic, Stuart Moore reveals how the Master of the Mystic Arts converted him from a DC kid to Marvel acolyte. Moore explores the complicated nature of Doctor Strange, whoinspired Beat icon and Merry Prankster Ken Kesey, and the series’ trippy, other-dimensional foundations that reflected thecounterculture of the 1960s.
Beginning with the creation of Doctor Strange by Steve Ditko and Stan Lee in 1963, Moore follows the series development in their hands and then in the care of other talented writers and artists. He traces Strange’s evolution from arrogant surgeon to philosopher mage, chronicling Strange’s journey from the loss of his surgical ability through every battle and tortured decision until he is Sorcerer Supreme, endowed with an enlightened perspective on multiple realms and the nature of time.
Find out more about the series at www.bloomsbury.com/marvel-books.
