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A bit of history about the Mexican NON-CANON comics

Non Canon comics from Editorial La Prensa

The first company that edited the Amazing Spiderman (El Sorprendente Hombre
Araña in Spanish) comics in Mexico was La Prensa. Although it was not the first
Marvel title edited (the first one was the Fantastic Four), it was a bestselling, so La
Prensa took advantage of the previous history that Mexico had making their own
comics and publishing them during the 30’s, 40’s & 50’s along with US comic
translations. So La Prensa started to create its own characters and comics 100%
Mexican such as Azor (kind of Tarzan), Cabalgando con Villa, Dalia Negra, among
other titles together with US Marvel characters.

Moreover, Novaro (La Prensa rival in the comic industry in Mexico), which edited
mainly DC comics, already created and published its own comic titles, using Mexican
comic writers and artists. Remember that Novaro edited 100% Mexican comics such
as ‘Joyas de la Mitología’, ‘Grandes Viajes’, ‘Epopeya’, etc.

because in previous years made the same with the comic of the Blackhawk of DC,
which initially La Prensa had the copyright from DC but as La Prensa bought the
rights of the name in Spanish of the characters
`Halcon Negro` in Mexico, they continued editing
the title even though Novaro had bought the rights
of the Blackhawk for Mexico, but in a clever move
La Prensa changed the name of its ‘Blackhawk’
characters (in order to avoid lawsuits from
Novaro) and continued editing the magazine but
done entirely by Mexicans from the number 77
until the number 309, 233 fake Blackhawk comics!!.
Novaro called its Blackhawk Halcón de Oro in
Spanish.

but only with - as far as I remembered- some


Marvel characters focusing (I suppose) on its bestselling titles: Spider-Man,
Blackhawk (DC), Heroes del Oeste (Western Marvel) and Sergeant Fury.

The non-canon Spider-man

1
The non-canon Spider-man comics were edited during the final years of life of La
Prensa Editorial, They ‘officially’ started at
the Hombre Araña Nº 123 (March 15 of 1972)
and it ended in the Hombre Araña Nº 185
(Oct. 23 of 1973). But I have to say that the
cover of the previous number, Hombre Araña
Nº 122 was drawn by a Mexican comic artist,
but the interior was some pages left of the
previous US Amazing Spider-Man Nº 102 plus
and additional story of Kull the conqueror so
they were official Marvel content.

List of Non-Canon Spider Man La Prensa:

122 (Only the cover page is non-canon, the


content is the final part of the previous issue
US AS 102), 123, 124, 125, 128 (Peter
Parker's wedding with Gwen Stacy), 129, 135, 136, 137, 138, 139, 146, 147, 148, 149,
150, 151, 152, 153, 154, 155, 156, 157, 158, 159, 163, 164, 165, 166, 167, 168, 169, 170,
171, 172, 173, 176, 177, 178, 179, 180, 181, 182, 183, 184, 185.

In total 45 non-canon comics plus a cover. You can check all the covers (canon and
non-canon) at http://www.spidermex.com/portadas.php?edi=mex&cve=epre&pag=7

My personal hypothesis is that since the copyright that editorial La Prensa had to
edit the Spiderman in Mexico ended in 'Amazing Spider-Man' No. 120, and also than
Macc Division (another Mexican publisher had already acquired the copyright to
continue editing Hombre Araña in Mexico) a way to extend on its own, the benefits
of the Hombre Araña title was the creation and publication of its ‘own’ Spider-Man
stories made by Mexican scriptwriters and artists, since La Prensa began to publish
them in Spiderman No. 123 on March 15, 1972 and the last one published on October
23 of 1973, approximately one year and 7 months in advance. I mean, La Prensa
already knew that they will finish to edit Hombre Araña in Mexico. Also remember
that La Prensa already had experience editing non-canon comics for many years
before editing fake Spiderman,

2
When La Prensa closed its comic branch (about October 1973), a smaller company
took over the editing of some of the Marvel titles: This was Macc Division
Historietas. It was based on the State of Mexico. Next to the Capital (Distrito
Federal), and the original print run was quite small comparing to La Prensa, and the
distribution was worse. So although Macc Division Historietas comics were latest
than La Prensa comics, always were more complicated to find them.
(http://www.spidermex.com/portadas.php?edi=mex&cve=emdh&pag=1)

Macc again used the same strategy: to publish fake Spiderman comics, together with
the real ones, being the first non-canon comics the numbers 12, 19 and 21. During this
period they edited in the Hombre Araña title the US comics of Amazing Spiderman,
Black Panther, Marvel Team Up, Spidey & non-canon Spiderman and Black Panther
Comics. During the Macc period they edited ‘officially’ 115 Hombre Araña numbers
(including the fake ones) but the edited sometimes the same number with a different
content -What the heck…! (keep reading).

I have counted the fake comics edited inside the


Hombre Araña Macc title: They were 29 comics.
The first 3 non-canon Spiderman comics were the
numbers 12, 19 and 21, then comics 5 non canon
Black Panther comics and then the fake Spider-
Man comics were edited under the title of Spidey.
Let me explain this: From Hombre Araña No. 38
Macc Division began to publish the USA stories of
Spidey comic in the even numbers of Spider-Man
of Macc, so that all even numbers of Macc after
No. 38 were changed the head and put ‘Arañita’
instead of Hombre Araña , (look at the photo).

3
This happened until the number 100
(which by the way there are two comics
with the number 100 in Macc!!) from
which they began to include stories of the
Spiderman from ‘Amazing’ and of
‘Spectacular’ but starting in the number 2
(check the pictures).

The exact list of non-canon comics are


this: Hombre Araña 12, 19, 21, then Black
Panther at Nº 36, 42, 44, 46 & 48. Under
the title of Spidey , the numbers 40, 44,
50, 52, 56, 58, 60, 62, 64, 66, 68, 70, 76,
82, 84, 86, 90, 92, 94, 96. As I mentioned
before sometimes Macc Edited the same
numbers two times, so for instance you have Black Panther 44 and Spidey 44, both
titles initially edited under the title of Hombre Araña.

Although they are less known , it is important to note that Macc edited also fake
comics of Fantastic Four, Black Panther,
Shang Chi, Iron Fist or Marvel war comics
(As you can check in the pictures). In this
way the Mexicans created the non-canon
Spiderman and other Marvel Mexican
comics. So the final line is this, although
the Non-canon Spiderman (and other
Marvel heroes) edited by Macc Ediciones
were later that Non-canon La Prensa, the
Macc titles were and are more difficult to
find, because the print run was smaller
and the distribution much worse than La
Prensa comics.

So today there are several Marvel fans over the world very interested for these rare
and weird comics, nowadays almost impossible to find. © Copyright ABM

Updated 06.07.2019

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