Blood Brothers (comics) Blood Brothers (comics) The Blood Brothers are fictional characters appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. The Blood Brothers first appeared in "Iron Man" #55 (Feb. 1973) and were created by Jim Starlin. Following their debut, the Blood Brothers returned in a Starlin/Friedrich story in "Marvel Feature" #12 (Nov. 1973), again fighting the superhero Iron Man, here teamed with Fantastic Four member The Thing. The Blood Brothers continued as Iron Man antagonists in "Iron Man" #88-89 (Aug.-Oct. 1976), then disappeared from publication for several years before resurfacing to battle the titular superhero team in "The Avengers" #252-253 (Feb.
Marvel Comics was able to capitalize on its successful superhero comics of the previous decade by acquiring a new newsstand distributor and greatly expanding its comics line. Marvel pulled ahead of rival DC Comics in 1972, during a time when the price and format of the standard newsstand comic were in flux. Goodman increased the price and size of Marvel's November 1971 cover-dated comics from 15 cents for 36 pages total to 25 cents for 52 pages. DC followed suit, but Marvel the following month dropped its comics to 20 cents for 36 pages, offering a lower-priced product with a higher distributor