Marvelman (later to become Miracleman) was a British-authored superhero comic, first published on February 3, 1954.
Its origins were in black and white reprints of the American Captain Marvel comics. The London publisher, L. Miller & Son, faced with the supply of Captain Marvel material being cut off, had turned to a British comic writer, Sidney Anglo, for help, and launched the new "Marvelman" comic.
Marvelman's origin was based loosely on that of Captain Marvel: a young reporter named Micky Moran encounters an astrophysicist who gives him his siuper powers, based on atomic energy. To transform into Marvelman, he has to speak the word "Kimota" ("atomic" backwards). Marvelman was joined by Dicky Dauntless, a messenger boy who became Young Marvelman on speaking the name "Marvelman", and young Johnny Bates (Kid Marvelman, magic word "Marvelman")
They had the standard superhero adventures, and the comic ran until the 1960s: the titles published were Marvelman, Kid Marvelman, adn Marvelman Family, which usually featured Marvelman, Young Marvelman and Kid Marvelman together. A variety of Marvelman and Young Marvelman albums were printed annually from 1954 to 1963.
In March 1982, a new British monthly black and white comic was launched called Warrior. From the first issue until issue 20 it featured a new, darker version of Marvelman, written by Alan Moore.Moore had been fascinated by the notion of a grown up Micky Moran, unable to remember the magic word, and this was the Moran presented in the first issue; married, plagued by migraines, having dreams of flying, and unable to remember the word that had such significance in his dreams.
Moran, of course, eventually remembers the word, and the series, like many of Moore's other works, exploded the existing history. The adult Moran gradually remembers his early life as a superhero, only to find the entire experience was a simulation as part of a military research project attempting to enhance the human body with alien technology. Moran and the other subjects had been kept unconscious, living out comic book style stories for fear of what they could do if they awoke.
The series was abruptly stopped in issue 21, just before the birth of Marvelman's child: after a hiatus of some years, it was reprinted in colour by an american publisher, and the series carried to a conclusion. For this printing, to avoid trademark and copyright problems, Marvelman became "Miracleman".
Writer Neil Gaiman developed the series further in the 1990s.The first part Miracleman: The Age of Gold< showed the world some years later, a utopia gradually being transformed by alien technologies, and benignly ruled by Miracleman and other parahumans, though he has nagging doubts about whether he has done the right thing by taking power.
A couple of episodes of the second part, The Age of Silver, appeared, but this appears to be on hold at present.