I'm assuming Canada received the Marvel G1 comics in some way in the 80s. Did they receive just the U.S. comics or the whole UK shebang?

 

I think it was just the US run. I don’t think the UK comics saw any North American release at the time, but I don’t know for certain.

 

Only if you had some kind of amazing comic store that ordered it for you or some super stocked newsstand that got UK periodicals would you have had access to the UK stuff in North America.

 

It's pretty cool that I can read scans of it from NYS for free these days as opposed to them being basically non existent to North American fans in the 80s.

 

I only knew about it because I saw issues of it listed in an ad for mail order comics. It looked something like this (prices VERY approximate):

Transformers (1984)

1 20.00
2 - 5 7.00
5 - 20 3.00
21 - up 1.25

So that was fairly typical of an ad at that time. But then there was also:


Transformers (1985)

1 15.00
2 - 48 8.00
49 - 90 5.00
90 - 119 4.00
120 - up 2.00

What was this Transformers comic that started in 1985 and had at least one hundred issues? I sent away for some random issues, fully expecting it to be a mistake, but was pleasantly surprised to get several issues in the mail. Unfortunately, most of the issues I ordered ended up being reprints, but the couple I received that weren't were a revelation.

I did come across an issue at a Half Price books (or something like it) in roughly 1990 or so, which was a surprise.