By Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, Dennis O’Neil, Roy Thomas, John Severin, Joe Sinnott, Don Heck, Howard Purcell, Ogden Whitney, John Buscema, Joe Sinnott, Frank Giacoia, Mike Esposito, Jim Steranko & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-2686-7 (HB)
This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.
Veteran war-hero and superspy Nick Fury debuted in Fantastic Four #21 (cover-dated December 1963): a grizzled, world-weary and cunning (but innately Good) CIA Colonel at the periphery of the really big adventures in a fast-changing world.
What was odd about that? Well, the gruff, crudely capable combat everyman was already the star of the reemergent publisher’s only war comic, set twenty years earlier in – depending on whether you were American or European – the beginning or middle of World War II. Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos was an improbable, decidedly over-the-top and raucous combat comics series, similar in tone to later movies such as The Wild Bunch or The Dirty Dozen and had launched in May of that year.
Nevertheless, Fury’s latterday self became a big-name star as espionage yarns continued guiding a global zeitgeist in the wake of popular TV sensations like Danger Man and The Man From U.N.C.L.E. and Bond movies (and many imitators) so the contemporary iteration was granted a second series. It began in Strange Tales #135 (cover-dated August 1965).
Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. combined Cold War tensions with sinister schemes of World Conquest by a subversive, all-encompassing, hidden enemy organisation. The ever-unfolding saga came with captivating Kirby-designed super-science gadgetry and – eventually – iconic, game-changing imagineering from Jim Steranko, whose visually groundbreaking graphic narratives took the comics art form to a whole new level…
For those few brief years with Steranko in charge, the S.H.I.E.L.D. series was one of the best strips in America (if not the world) but when the writer/artist left just as the global spy-fad was giving way to supernatural mystery and horror stories, the whole concept faded into the fundamental background architecture of the Marvel Universe…
This astounding full-colour compendium (available in hardcover and digital editions) deals with the outrageous, groundbreaking, but still notionally wedded-to-mundane-reality iteration which set the scene.
Here Jack Kirby’s genius for graphic wizardry and gift for dramatic staging mixed with Stan Lee’s manic melodrama to create a tough and tense series which the new writers and veteran artists that followed turned into a non-stop riot of action and suspense, with Steranko’s late arrival only hinting at the magic to come…
These epic early days of spycraft encompass Strange Tales #135-153 and Tales of Suspense #78, collectively covering August 1965 – February 1967 and guaranteeing timeless thrills for lovers of adventure and intrigue. Following a history lesson from Kirby scholar John Morrow in his Introduction, the main event starts in at full pelt in ST #135 as the Human Torch solo feature was summarily replaced by Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. (which back then stood for Supreme Headquarters International Espionage Law-enforcement Division). In the rocket-paced first episode, Fury is asked to volunteer for the most dangerous job in the world: leading a new counter-intelligence agency dedicated to stopping secretive subversive super-science organisation Hydra. With assassins dogging his every move, the Take-Charge Guy with the Can-Do Attitude quickly proves he is ‘The Man for the Job!’ in a potent 12-page thriller from Lee, Kirby and inker Dick Ayers.
Even an artist and plotter of Kirby’s calibre couldn’t handle another strip at that busiest of times, so from the next issue “The King” cut back to laying out episodes, allowing a variety of superb draughtsmen to flesh out the adventures. Happily, however, there’s probably a stunning invention or cool concept on almost every page that follows so the Kirby Touch was fully upon the unfolding suspense and intrigue. ‘Find Fury or Die!’ brought veteran draughtsman John Severin back to the company that used to be Atlas. He pencilled and inked Jack’s blueprints as – aided and abetted by full-on patriotic weaponsmith Tony Stark – the new Director of the latest spy-agency becomes the target of incessant assassination attempts as we meet mysterious masked maniac the Supreme Hydra…
The tension ramps up for the next instalment as a number of contenders are introduced – any of whom might be the obscured overlord of evil – even as S.H.I.E.L.D. strives mightily but fails to stop Hydra launching its deadly Betatron Bomb in ‘The Prize is… Earth!’ Despite the restrictions of the Comics Code, these early S.H.I.E.L.D. stories were bleakly grim and frequently carried a heavy body count. Four valiant agents died in quick succession in #137 and the next issue underscored the point in ‘Sometimes the Good Guys Lose!’, with further revelations of Hydra’s inner workings.
Fury and fellow WWII era Howling Commando stalwarts Dum-Dum Dugan and Gabe Jones meanwhile played catch-up after Hydra assassins invade S.H.I.E.L.D., almost eliminating Fury and Stark – the only man capable of destroying an atomic sword of Damocles hanging over the world. Although Fury saves the munitions genius, he is captured in the process…
Tortured by Hydra in #139’s ‘The Brave Die Hard!’ (with Joe Sinnott replacing Severin as finisher), Fury latches on to an unlikely ally in Laura Brown, the Supreme Hydra’s daughter and a young woman bitterly opposed to her father’s megalomaniacal madness. Even with only half a comic book per month to tell a tale, creators didn’t hang around in those halcyon days, and #140 promised ‘The End of Hydra!’ (Don Heck & Sinnott over Kirby) as a S.H.I.E.L.D. squad invades the enemy’s inner sanctum to rescue the already-free-&-making-mayhem Fury. In the meantime, Stark travels into space to remove the orbiting Betatron Bomb with his robotic Braino-Saur system. The end result leaves Hydra temporarily headless…
Strange Tales #141 sees Kirby return to full pencils (inked by pseudonymous Frank Giacoia, moonlighting as Frank Ray) for the mop-up, prior to ‘Operation: Brain Blast!’ introducing Mentallo – a mutant and career criminal renegade from S.H.I.E.L.D.’s ESP division. He joins technological savant The Fixer to assail the organisation as their first step in an ambitious scheme to rule Earth. The momentous raid begins in ‘Who Strikes at… S.H.I.E.L.D.?’ (illustrated by Kirby & Mike Demeo – AKA Mike Esposito) with the ruthless rogues hitting hard and fast: seizing and mind-controlling Fury before strapping him to a mini H-bomb. With Howard Purcell & Esposito embellishing Kirby’s layouts, Dum-Dum and the boys come blasting in ‘To Free a Brain Slave’ in #143. A new and deadly threat emerges in #144’s ‘The Day of the Druid!’ as a mystic-seeming charlatan targets Fury and his agents with murderous flying techno-ovoids. Happily, new S.H.I.E.L.D. recruit Jasper Sitwell is on hand to augment the triumphant fightback in ‘Lo! The Eggs Shall Hatch!’ (finished by Heck & Esposito).
As Marvel continuity grew evermore interlinked, ‘Them!’ details a Captain America team-up for Fury in the first of the Star-Spangled Avenger’s many adventures as a (more-or-less) Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. Taken from Tales of Suspense #78 (June 1966): scripted by Lee with Kirby on full pencils and Giacoia inking, the story depicts the WWII wonders battling an artificial assassin with incredible chemical capabilities, after which Nick seeks the creature’s mysterious makers in ST #146, ‘When the Unliving Strike!’(Kirby, Heck & Esposito).
Proclaiming themselves a technological Special Interests group, Advanced Idea Mechanics courts S.H.I.E.L.D.’s governmental and military masters (and contracts), promising potent and incredible new weapons if only they would sack that barbaric slob Fury. However, the surly supremo is getting close to exposing A.I.M.’s connection to “Them” …and an old enemy thought long gone.
A concerted whispering campaign and briefing-against seemingly sees Fury ousted in ‘The Enemy Within!’, before being put on trial in ‘Death Before Dishonor!’ (scripted by Kirby with Heck & Esposito finishing his layouts), but it’s all part of a cunning counterplan which delivers a shattering conclusion and ‘The End of A.I.M.!’ (ST #149, dialogued by Denny O’Neil with art by Kirby & Ogden Whitney). Then, revealed by Lee, Kirby, John Buscema & Giacoia, a malign, devilishly subtle plan is finally exposed in Strange Tales #150 as Fury’s team compares clues from all the year’s past clashes to come to one terrifying conclusion… ‘Hydra Lives!’
The shocking secret also hints at great events to come as newcomer Steranko assumes the finisher’s role over Lee & Kirby for ‘Overkill!’ with Fury targeted by the new – true – Supreme Hydra who devises a cunning scheme to infiltrate America’s top security agency and use his enemy as the means of triggering global Armageddon…
Although the Good Guys seemingly thwart that scheme, ‘The Power of S.H.I.E.L.D.!’ is actually helpless to discern the villain’s real intent as this initial dossier of doom pauses on a cliffhanger after ‘The Hiding Place!’ (ST #153, scripted by Roy Thomas) closes with the archvillain comfortably ensconced in Fury’s inner circle and ready to destroy the organisation from within.
To Be Continued…
Although the S.H.I.E.L.D. saga stops here, there’s an added bonus still to enjoy: the aforementioned FF #21. This depicted Fury as a wily CIA agent seeking the team’s aid against a sinister demagogue ‘The Hate-Monger’ (Lee & Kirby, inked by George Roussos, under protective nom-de-plume George Bell) just as the 1960s espionage vogue was taking off. Here Fury craftily manipulates Marvel’s First Family into invading a sovereign nation reeling in the throes of revolution in a yarn crackling with tension and action…
Fast, furious and fantastically entertaining, these high-octane vintage yarns from a time when the US were global Good Guys and “World Police” are a superb snapshot of early Marvel Comics at their creative peak and should be part of every fanboy’s shelf of beloved favourites.
Don’t Yield! Back S.H.I.E.L.D.!
© 1965, 1966, 1967, 2018 Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.
Today in 1907, Belgian artist Jacques Laudy (Le Journal de Tintin) was born, as was occasional Green Lantern scripter Henry Kuttner in 1915 and Canadian cartoonist Jacques Boivin (Melody) in 1952. In 2007, B,C. creator Johnny Hart died.
Today in 1935 Dr. Seuss launched his short lived but influential strip Hejji and, in 1992, Art Spiegelman received a Special Pulitzer Prize for Maus.