What the Cavekids read... (part 3)

THE COMIC READER #193 had their Top 100 chart for March 1981. Here is 1979 and 1980. You can see the shape of the modern direct market slowly evolving here. About 30 stores were responding to the survey. Here's the usual mostly complete list of comics published that month.

X-MEN generally topped this chart by a wide margin back then, except for an occasional first issue.  Not this month, though, with it being narrowly edged out by WHAT IF. Which featured an alternative ending to the storyline which had just finished in X-MEN less than a year ago.

SPIDER-WOMAN jumping up to #3 shows the reason for the growing use of guest shots of popular characters, with an X-Men appearance providing a big boost. That kind of marketing became ridiculous in a few years.

WARLORD is no longer the top DC title in these markets, with NEW TEEN TITANS usually being a distant #2 to X-MEN, but dropped down to #4 with the temporary X-Boosts to other titles. One of the first mini-series TALES OF THE GREEN LANTERN CORPS does well with its second issue. WARLORD is still pretty solid at #24, and a few more DC books manage to come out just ahead of the lowest non-reprint standard format Marvel, GHOST RIDER.

FLASH GORDON, now with the Whitman imprint, is the top non-Marvel/DC book, with the third part of the classic adaptation of the not-so-classic movie.

CHARLTON BULLSEYE at #49 is the first time a first issue shows up in this or the two previous March charts. Apparently they didn't get the memo about not launching a book in March. I think this is one of if not the first non-reprint Charlton comic in several years, and features Blue Beetle and The Question.

#50 to #71 features a few of the more expensive alternative format items, DC's digests, magazines like THE SPIRIT and HEAVY METAL and the Warren titles. Mixed in there are Marvel's reprint books and DC's war and DC's various non-super-hero books. Marvel's CRAZY is their lowest seller at this section.

#72 to #84 are all Harvey books, mostly greed glorifying RICHIE RICH titles. #85 to #99 is all Archie, all the time.  Rounding out the list is another Charlton title, featuring reprints of the 1960s Hercules series.