Is There a Place with All the Superhero Hostess Ads in One Place? There is.

I’m watching my Twitter and Facebook feeds blow up with fondness for the whole line of Hostess snack cakes, on this, the day of their shutdown. Then I remembered that maybe, just maybe, it’s because long time comic book readers have a little bit stronger link to the not-quite-as-tasty-as-we-remember snacks, and that has to do with the fact that the very specific and wonderfully drawn Hostess ads littered our comics in the 70s and 80s.

Luckily, there are people on the internet with dubious intentions and lots of free time. I give you Seanbaby.com’s Hostess ad archive, featuring all the known Marvel and DC Hostess ads in one hand place.

Here’s Thor in The Ding-A-Ling Family from 1977. Looks like John Buscema to me.

Comments

  1. Omg, I forgot all about SeanBaby! His SUPERFRIENDS character summaries made me crack up so much back in the day!

    I did not know he archived all these Hostess comics, what an added bonus. Thanks!

  2. That Frank Miller DD ad was gold!

  3. Captain Marvel in “Killer Bee and Son” appears to be drawn by Gil Kane, and is quite nice. Wish Gil had drawn the Supermans too — Curt Swan’s art on these is awful.

    • Found another Gil Kane: Daredevil in “Because!”
      For DC, I doubt Curt Swan and Vince Colletta had any interest at all in this assignment. Looks like they drew all the Supermans, Batmans and Wonder Womans in their sleep. Shazam in “The Cup Cake Caper” is the only one of theirs that I care for. Actually that one was probably not inked by Colletta — too many bricks in panel 3.

  4. The very first Batman I bought with my own money happened to be the one that debuted the Batman and the Mummy ad. Even then I thought a mummy gun was freakin’ weird. The moment I saw how easy it was for a Twinkie to turn an ancient evil into happy-go-lucky, I knew the comic industry would be forever changed…

  5. Wizard did a Preacher parody of these, too. Jesse and Cassidy fight “Pope Pie-us”. Arseface does appear. You will not be surprised to learn that Kieron Dwyer drew it. http://kierondwyer.com/LCD/ART/VERTIGO.htm

  6. I was just thinking of these when I heard the news about Hostess. Maybe if they had continued these ads they wouldn’t be out of business.

  7. “The Ding-a-Ling family is thrust into Thor’s Asgardian orbit…”
    Hmmm.

  8. Amazing, simply amazing on every level.

  9. Thanks for the Hostess ad archive heads-up, Josh! It’s a bookmark I’ll never delete.

  10. Those Hostess ads with the Marvel characters always remind me of my childhood.They seemed to be in almost every comic I read as a kid, along with that ad with Dr. Jay and (I think) Rick Barry. Good times!

    In a related note, does anyone that issue of Marvel Team-Up where Galactus comes to Earth and Franklin Richards teams up with Aunt May to stop him by feeding him Twinies to satisfy his hunger? That was, possibly, the best thing Marvel has ever done, ever.

  11. I think the Hostess ads showcase the best case of how insane this area of comics where.

  12. Hostess Twinkies was Hulk’s spinach after Abomination beat the s*** out of him :), that was the second ad that came to my mind…

  13. I loved these ads as a kid – but I didn’t have my first Twinkie until high school. By that time, they were mythical! And delicious! But I found they aren’t as good for fighting crime as I was lead to believe.

  14. A comic (with that old newsprint smell) and a twinkie.A great way to spend an afternoon.