The Avengers (comic book)

The Avengers
The Avengers #1 (September 1963). Cover art by Jack Kirby and Dick Ayers.
Publication information
Publisher	Marvel Comics
Schedule	Monthly (Vols. 1-4), Semi-monthly (Vol. 5)
Format	Ongoing series
Genre	Superhero
Publication date	(Vol. 1) September 1963 – September 1996 (Vol. 2) November 1996 – November 1997 (Vol. 3) February 1998 – August 2004 (Vol. 1 resumption) September – December 2004 (Vol. 4) July 2010 – January 2013 (Vol. 5) February 2013 – June 2015
Number of issues	(Vol. 1): 402 and 23 Annuals (Vol. 2): 13 (Vol. 3): 88 and 4 Annuals (Vol. 4): 36 (#1-34 plus #12.1 and #24.1) and 1 Annual (Vol. 5): 46 (#1-44 plus #34.1 and #34.2) and 1 Annual
Main character(s)	Avengers
Creative team
Writer(s)	List (Vol. 1) Stan Lee, Roy Thomas, Steve Englehart, Gerry Conway, Jim Shooter, David Micheline, Roger Stern, Walt Simonson, John Byrne, Larry Hama, Bob Harras, Mark Waid (Vol. 2) Jeph Loeb, Walt Simonson (Vol. 3) Kurt Busiek, Geoff Johns, Chuck Austen (Vol. 4) Brian Michael Bendis (Vol. 5) Jonathan Hickman
Penciller(s)	List (Vol. 1) Jack Kirby, Don Heck, John Buscema, George Tuska, Gene Colan, Barry Smith, Sal Buscema, Neal Adams, Rich Buckler, Bob Brown, George Pérez, John Byrne, Bob Hall, Al Milgrom, Paul Ryan, Steve Epting, Mike Deodato (Vol. 2) Jim Valentino, Ian Churchill, Rob Liefeld, Michael Ryan (Vol. 3) George Pérez, Alan Davis, Kieron Dwyer, Olivier Coipel (Vol. 1 resumption) David Finch (Vol. 4) John Romita Jr. (Vol. 5) Jerome Opeña
Inker(s)	List (Vol. 1) Dick Ayers, Vince Colletta, Tom Palmer, Pablo Marcos, Joe Sinnott (Vol. 3) Al Vey, Mark Farmer, Andy Lanning (Vol. 1 resumption) Danny Miki (Vol. 4) Klaus Janson
Colorist(s)	List (Vol. 2) Andy Troy (Vol. 3) Tom Smith, Chris Sotomayor (Vol. 4) Dean White

The Avengers is the name of several comic book titles featuring the team the Avengers and published by Marvel Comics, beginning with the original The Avengers comic book series which debuted in 1963.

In 1960, DC Comics launched a comic book series featuring a team of superheroes called the Justice League. Impressed by that book's strong sales, Martin Goodman, the owner of Marvel Comics predecessor Timely Comics, asked Stan Lee to create a title featuring a similar team of superheroes for Marvel. Lee recounts in Origins of Marvel Comics:

Martin mentioned that he had noticed one of the titles published by National Comics seemed to be selling better than most. It was a book called The [sic] Justice League of America and it was composed of a team of superheroes. ... 'If the Justice League is selling,' spoke he, 'why don't we put out a comic book that features a team of superheroes?'

Much like the Justice League, the Avengers were an assemblage of pre-existing superhero characters created by Lee and Jack Kirby. Kirby did the artwork for the first eight issues only, in addition to doing the layouts for issue #16. This initial series, published bi-monthly through issue #6 (July 1964) and monthly thereafter ran through issue #402 (Sept. 1996), with spinoffs including several annuals, miniseries and a giant-size quarterly sister series that ran briefly in the mid-1970s. Marvel filed for a trademark for "The Avengers" in 1967 and the United States Patent and Trademark Office issued the registration in 1970.

Between 1996 and 2004, Marvel relaunched the primary Avengers title three times. In 1996, the "Heroes Reborn" line, in which Marvel contracted outside companies to produce four titles, included a new volume of The Avengers. It took place in an alternate universe, with a revamped history unrelated to mainstream Marvel continuity. The Avengers vol. 2 was written by Rob Liefeld and penciled by Jim Valentino, and ran for 13 issues (Nov. 1996–Nov. 1997). The final issue, which featured a crossover with the other Heroes Reborn titles, returned the characters to the main Marvel Universe.