Stamp Stuff

Back in July the US Postal Service put out a sheet of first-class (in both senses of the word) stamps honoring Superman, Batman and other DC Comics heroes. I loved the stamps (of course) and other than thinking they probably could have picked a better Wonder Woman picture I had no complaints.
Well now they've announced the new Marvel superhero stamps coming out in Summer 2007, and, hoo boy do I have complaints.

(You can get a better look at them -- along with all the 2007 commemorative stamps, including one honoring the joy of jury duty here.)

For one thing, is this the best the Marvel Universe has to offer as far as female icons? Spider-Woman was slopped together in a hurry because Marvel was afraid some other publisher was going to do something along those lines and they wanted to protect their trademark. She's never been well-done or popular. And Elektra isn't even a hero for God's sake, she's an assassin! She kills people for money; I don't think that should get you on a stamp. Why didn't they use Sue Storm, the Invisible Woman (Marvel's original super-heroine)? Or the Wasp? The Scarlet Witch, Storm, Marvel Girl, the Black Widow, the Black Cat -- even Shanna the She Devil or Aunt May Parker -- all would have been better choices than the two losers they selected.

(All right, I admit it. What I'm really disappointed about is that they didn't use my favorite 8-foot, green-skinned hottie, the She-Hulk. Now this would have made a hella stamp:)

And that's not the only problem. On the backs on the stamps they have information about the characters and artist credits -- only some are incorrect. The Sub-Mariner portrait is credited to Gene Colan and anybody can see that it's actually by John Buscema (well, anybody who's spent their life reading comics.) Captain America is credited to Johnny Romita but any fool can see that's Jack Kirby. John Buscema gets credit for the Hulk portrait and it's actually by Rich Buckler.

Speaking of the Hulk stamp, take a closer look at that one. Notice anything odd?

How about the fact that one earth's mightiest mortals has no muscles in his stomach. That's because when the genuises at the Post Office went lookingh for a picture of the Incredible Hulk -- one of Marvel's most popular characters, who has been around since 1962 -- the best one they could find was one where somebody is standing in front of the She-Hulk's cousin Bruce -- someone they digitally erased and then only halfheartedly touched up the abs. No six-pack for Dr. Banner.

Here's the original cover and the stamp:

Hey, Post Office, I suggest you put Archie and Jughead and the gang at Pop's Choklit Shop on stamps in 2008.

And I suggest you let me pick the pictures of Betty and Veronica.