If there's one thing I appreciated about myself as a comic buyer is I appreciate volume value more than financial value. To simplify that, I like a larger comic that fits a great cost! (Fat chance of that happening with monthly books, these days... Oh well, there's always reprint phonebooks...) And for a stretch of time, DC Comics was probably the KING of monthly value books. These books I used to scour comic shops for, because they were not usually highly priced in back issue bins, and I would get a great handful of stories for 64-80 pages. What more could a kid ask for? Or a teenager? Or a full-grown man?
Our legacy begins back in 1964, when DC began publishing a special "80 Page Giant" series, loaded to the gills with various reprints of their library material. The "80 Page Giant" series had a unique numbering series that would more resemble droid names from your average "Star Wars" film, and lasted until 1971. Plus, the "80 Page Giant" format was used previously for individual title annuals. But the reprint format remained the same, which was great for new readers who had no access to... say... Superman or Batman stories originally printed from the 1940's. Out of this original run, I know I owned one volume of a Superman annual, and another special that featured spotlighted female characters of the DC Universe. Of course, the "stellar assortment" of that issue could be debated. Cheetah, Wonder Woman, and Supergirl, I won't argue with. Blackfire... Yeah... See if you remember her.
Cue our next stop in our trip, 1977, with then still new DC President Jeanette Khan stating concern about comics not fitting the reading value of their prices... which is something I WISH current publishers would realize, because if I'm to pay four bucks a book, that book had best be over 20 pages of story... so she transitioned some existing titles into the new Dollar Comics format. Sure, the page count went down from 80 to 64 in the last few years of its run, but you still got comics that were double... or TRIPLE... the size of your average book, for one measly dollar!
I'd say the ones I've had the most success finding were "Superman Family" and "World's Finest". At some point, I'd like to be able to find the DC war comics "Dollar Comics", since that genre has gained some interest with me. But the great thing about these oversized anthology titles was that... unlike its 60's predecessor... you had ALL-NEW stories in each issue. For example, every issue of "World's Finest" delivered a new Batman/Superman story, and you had other features like Green Arrow, Black Canary, Captain Marvel, Hawkman, Vigilante, Wonder Woman... Heck, even the Creeper! (Although I do my best to forget some of those stories. Sorry, but those weren't great creative times for Steve Ditko.) And "Superman Family" offered up individual stories for Jimmy Olsen, Lois Lane, Nightwing and Flamebird, Supergirl... and unfortunately for a while, Krypto the Super Dog. (Yeah, I'm saving my beefs with that mongrel to come for a FFF entry.) So even if you read a story that "sucked", there's still a great chance you'll find a majority of your current issue entertaining!
I was only ever able to find two of the "Adventure Comics" Dollar Comics, and those were treasure troves! I may not agree with the non-Kirby-involved "New Gods" conclusion, but that Don Newton artwork is to DIE for! And those Flash stories were fun, and you got the Elongated Man being featured in his own stories. You'd have to be insane to turn fun like that aside. Another tradition that was reinvigorated from the initial 60's project were one-off specials for the Dollar Comics program. Such books included reprints of the Len Wein/Berni Wrightson "Swamp Thing" run, new super-specials for Wonder Woman and Batman, and even behind-the-scenes material for "Superman 2"!
Alas, all good things cannot last, and the line was discontinued in 1983. However, for a brief window of time in the 2000's, the 80 Page Giant format was resurrected. Of course, they were hardly a mere "Dollar Comic" these days, but 80 Pages for around five dollars is not too shabby of a deal. (Now you just pay nearly that much for a single regular issue. Old man grump and grouch...) I did pick up a few of these latter 80 Page Giants. Some, like the JLA example I provided you an illustration of, were giant adventures. Others, like the Superman and Batman 80 Page Giants were almost successors to the "Superman Family" and "Batman Family" titles of the 70's and 80's periods.
In conclusion, one could argue that these books were an example of quantity over quality in terms of page count. I know I've read MORE than a few stories from various issues that made me mutter and wonder what the hell just passed my eyes. BUT having the oversized option to try out various creators' endeavors, and feeling like the money you spend on a book is justified by the amount of pages you're handling... Nothing can defeat that base level of satisfaction!
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