For Those Who Came In Late…
On February 17, King Features Syndicate launches Lee Falk’s The Phantom as a daily newspaper strip, written by Lee Falk and drawn by Ray Moore.
The merch seems to start in Yugoslavia in 1937 or 1938, with the unlicensed printing of Fantom postcards. The card featured a photograph of a man in a homemade Phantom costume.
Columbia Pictures produces The Phantom, a 15-part TV serial based on the newspaper strips. The series stars Tom Tyler and Jeanne Bates.
The first novel based on the Phantom comic strip, The Son of the Phantom, is released in hardcover by Whitman Publishing Company. The book tells the story of The 21st Phantom’s childhood; however, it is not considered Phantom canon.
In Australia, FREW begins publishing comic book reprints of the newspaper strips.
Publisher BGE in Brazil begins publishing Phantom comic book stories..
Gold Key starts publishing Phantom comics for sale on newsstands and spin racks in the United States. The first story is called “The Game,” a retelling of “Ragon’s Game” from the newspaper stories. The same year, Fratelli Spada in Italy starts publishing original Phantom stories for the Italian audience.
The first Team Fantomen story, “The Treasure in the Skull Cave,” is published in Scandinavia.
Charleton Comics continues the US series. In all, 74 comics were published by the time the series ended in 1974.
Avon published 15 novels based on Lee Falk stories published in the newspaper strips between 1972 and 1975. Five of the novels appeared under Lee Falk’s byline. From 2016 to 2020 Hermes Press reprinted the Avon novels.
Defenders of the Earth, a TV animated series produced by King Features and Marvel Productions. It depicted the Phantom as a team of heroes set in the year 2015. The series ran for 65 episodes and was later released in a 2-set DVD collection.
DC Comics introduced a 4-part series of Phantom comics followed by a 13-part series in 1989-90. The latter, guided by consultations with Lee Falk, was closely modeled on the world created in the newspaper strips.