Dead Reckoning, the graphic novel imprint of the Naval Institute Press, has teamed with Marvel Comics to produce Atlas at War!, a hardcover collection of classic combat comics stories created by a group of now-acclaimed artists—including many who were war veterans—originally published in the 1950s by Atlas Comics, the company that would later become Marvel Comics.
Atlas at War! will be released in June 2020 and features 50 stories published between 1950 and 1961 that have been meticulously restored using digital restoration techniques. The book has been edited by comics historian Michael J. Vassallo and includes the work of a group of 20 post-WWII comics artists who would go on to become some of the most famous cartoonists in the comics industry.
Among the artists included are Jack Kirby (creator of Black Panther, Fantastic Four, and a host of Marvel’s most famous titles), Bernie Krigstein (iconoclastic creator of the acclaimed comics short story “Master Race”), Jerry Robinson (cocreator of DC’s Robin and The Joker characters), Steve Ditko (cocreator/artist of Marvel’s Spider-Man), John Severin (cofounding cartoonist of Mad magazine) and many others. Many of the stories have never been reprinted.
The reprint edition of these stories were restored by comics restoration specialist Allan Harvey in a process that involved a combination of high resolution software and manual restoration to recreate their original appearance.
Launched in 2018 by the nonprofit Naval Institute Press, Dead Reckoning specializes in creating comics works focused on the military including works of fiction, history, education, and biography.
Dead Reckoning director Gary Thompson said, “Between the years 1951 and 1960, Atlas published more war titles than any other company in the industry. All together this collection strives to bring these classic stories back to print in a way that hasn’t been seen in over 60 years.”
