All-Winners Comics is an American comic book superhero anthology series published by Timely Comics, the precursor to the modern publishing house Marvel Comics. Each issue of the series featured multiple stories (usually five), spotlighting a different superhero of the era. Notable recurring characters include Captain America & his sidekick, Bucky Barnes, the Sub-Mariner, the original android Human Torch as well as his human sidekick Toro. Other recurring heroes in the title include Thomas Holloway, aka, the Angel, the Black Marvel, the Destroyer, Miss America and the Whizzer.
All-Winners Comics was published on a seasonal quarterly shipping schedule by Timely Comics, the precursor to Marvel Comics.
There is no issue #20 of this series. Following All-Winners Comics #19, the title changes to All Teen then reverts to the original series title with issue #21.
This title is notable for introducing the superhero team known as the All-Winners Squad. In addition to the actual formation of the team in issue #19, they have also been featured in flashback stories in issues of The Invaders, What If...? and She-Hulk.
A one-shot issue, printed under the series title All Winners was published in 1948 and featured the Blonde Phantom. This series was changed into All-Western Winners, which lasted only three more issues under that title before being changed again to Western Winners.
Between 2005 and 2011, many of the stories from All-Winners Comics were reprinted in ''Marvel Masterworks: Golden Age All-Winners Comics''. Four volumes of this hardcover collection series were published.
In October2009, Marvel released the All Winners Comics 70th Anniversary Special, celebrating the history of the series. The issue is written by Karl Kesel with artwork by Steve Uy.
From August to December of 2011, Marvel published a five-issue limited series called All-Winners Squad: Band of Heroes. The series was written by Paul Jenkins with artwork by Carmine Di Giandomenico and took a more hardline look at the unsung costumed heroes of World War II.
Originally, the Captain America and Bucky featured in this series were Steve Rogers and James Buchanan Barnes. Avengers, Volume 1 #4 however, which is the first modern-age appearance of Captain America, establishes that Bucky died in 1945 and Cap went missing. Retroactively, all appearances of Captain America and Bucky Barnes that appeared in this series following April, 1945 have been attributed to William Naslund and later, Jeff Mace in place of Steve Rogers and Fred Davis replacing James Buchanan Barnes.
All-Winners Comics #19 is the first canonical appearance of the All-Winners Squad. Although all characters from the group made previous appearances in solo stories throughout the series, they did not become a group until this issue.
In terms of publishing history, the All-Winners Squad is the very first Marvel Comics superteam. Canonically however, they were preceded by the World War II era adventurers, the Invaders.
Artist Alex Schomburg illustrated the cover to the very first issue of All-Winners Comics.