Category: Marvel Masters & Masterworks

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Marvel Masterworks volume 10: Amazing-Spider-Man 21-30 & Annual 1


By Stan Lee & Steve Ditko (Marvel)
ISBN: 0-87135-596-5

The third magnificent full-colour hardback collection of Spider-Man’s earliest adventures sees the World’s Most Misunderstood Hero begin to challenge the dominance of the Fantastic Four as Marvel’s premier comicbook both in sales and quality. Steve Ditko’s off-beat plots and unconventionally inspirational art had gradually reached an accommodation with the slick and potent superhero house-style Jack Kirby was developing (at least as much as such a unique talent ever could), with less line-feathering, more controlled, moody backgrounds and fewer totemic villains.

Although still very much a Ditko vehicle, Spider-Man had by this time attained a sleek pictorial gloss. Stan Lee’s scripts were comfortably in tune with the times if not his collaborator’s tastes and, although his assessment of the audience was probably the more correct one, all disagreements with the artist over the strip’s editorial direction were still confined to the office and not the pages themselves.

Thematically, there’s still a large percentage of old-fashioned crime and gangsterism here. The dependence on costumed super-foes as antagonists was still finely balanced with ordinary thugs, hoods and mobsters, but those days were rapidly coming to an end too.

When Ditko abruptly left the series and the company, the dreaded loss in quality and sales never happened. The mere “safe pair of hands” that John Romita (senior) considered himself blossomed into a major talent in his own right, and the Wall-Crawler continued his unstoppable rise at an accelerated pace but that’s a bridge crossed in another volume…

This terrific tome (reprinting Amazing Spider-Man #21-30 and Amazing Spider-Man Annual #1) kicks off with ‘Where Flies The Beetle’ featuring a hilarious love triangle as the Human Torch’s girlfriend used Peter Parker to make the flaming hero jealous. Unfortunately the Beetle, a villain with a high-tech suit of insect-themed armour, was simultaneously planning to use her as bait for a trap. As ever Spider-Man was simply in the wrong place at the right time, resulting in a spectacular fight-fest.

‘The Clown, and his Masters of Menace’ saw a return engagement for the Circus of Crime with splendidly outré action and a lot of hearty laughs provided by increasingly irreplaceable supporting stars Aunt May, Betty Brant and J. Jonah Jameson whilst #23 presented a superb thriller blending the ordinary criminals that Ditko loved to depict with the arcane threat of a super-villain attempting to take over the Mob. ‘The Goblin and the Gangsters’ was both moody and explosive, a perfect contrast to ‘Spider-Man Goes Mad!’ in #24. This psychological stunner found a clearly delusional hero seeking psychiatric help, but there was more to the matter than simple insanity, as an insidious old foe made an unexpected return…

Issue #25 once again saw the obsessed Daily Bugle publisher take matters into his own hands: ‘Captured by J. Jonah Jameson!’ introduced Professor Smythe – whose robotic Spider-Slayers would bedevil the Web-Spinner for years to come – hired by the bellicose newsman to remove Spider-Man for good.

Issues #27 and 28 comprised a captivating two-part mystery exposing a deadly duel between the Green Goblin and an enigmatic new masked criminal. ‘The Man in the Crime-Master’s Mask!’ and ‘Bring Back my Goblin to Me!’ together form a perfect Spider-Man saga, with soap-opera melodrama and screwball comedy leavening tense thrills and all-out action.

‘The Menace of the Molten Man!’ from #28 was a tale of science gone bad and remains remarkable today not only for the spectacular action sequences – and possibly the most striking Spider-Man cover ever produced – but also as the story in which Peter Parker finally graduated from High School.

‘Never Step on a Scorpion!’ saw the return of that lab-made villain, hungry for vengeance against not just the Web-Spinner but also Jameson for turning a disreputable private eye into a super-powered monster, and the chronological tales here conclude with #30’s off-beat crime-caper which cannily sowed the seeds for future masterpieces. ‘The Claws of the Cat!’ featured the city-wide hunt for an extremely capable burglar (way more exciting than it sounds, trust me!), plus the introduction of an organised mob of thieves working for mysterious new menace the Master Planner.

Out of place but never unwelcome, this volume ends with the timeless landmark and still magnificently thrilling battle against the ‘Sinister Six’ which actually first appeared between Amazing Spider-Man #16 and 17.

When a team of villains comprising Electro, Kraven, Mysterio, Sandman, Vulture and Doctor Octopus abducted Aunt May and Peter Parker’s girlfriend Betty, Spider-Man was forced to confront them without his Spider-powers. A staggeringly enthralling Fights ‘n’ Tights saga, this influential tale also featured cameos (or more likely product placement ads) by every other extant hero of the budding Marvel universe. Also included are special feature pages on ‘The Secrets of Spider-Man!’ and the comedic short ‘How Stan Lee and Steve Ditko Create Spider-Man’ and a gallery of pin-up pages featuring ‘Spider-Man’s Most Famous Foes!’

Full of energy, verve, pathos and laughs, gloriously short of post-modern angst and breast-beating, these fun classics are quintessential comic magic and with the Fantastic Four form the very foundation of everything Marvel became. This sturdy compendium is another unmissable opportunity for readers of all ages to celebrate the magic and myths of the modern heroic ideal in delightfully decadent luxury – and would make an ideal gift.
© 1964, 1965, 1989 Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Marvel Masterworks Invincible Iron Man volume 2: Tales of Suspense 51-65


By Stan Lee, Don Heck, Jack Kirby & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-0886-3 or 978-0-7851-1771-1

There are a number of ways to interpret the life and moonlighting career of Tony Stark, glamorous millionaire industrialist/inventor and his armoured alter-ego, Iron Man.

Created in the aftermath of the Cuban Missile Crisis and at a time when “Red-baiting” and “Commie-bashing” were American national obsessions, the emergence of a brilliant new Thomas Edison, using Yankee ingenuity and invention to safeguard and better the World, seemed inevitable. Combine the then-common belief that technology could solve any problem with the universal imagery of noble knights battling evil and the proposition almost becomes a certainty. Of course it might simply be us kids thought it both great fun and very, very cool…

This glorious full colour deluxe hardback compendium of the Golden Avenger’s early days reprints his further early adventures, with a smattering of feature pages and pin-ups from Tales of Suspense #51 (cover-dated March 19664) through #65 (May 1965), a period when Marvel built steadily and irresistibly on their creative inspiration and began scoring solid commercial successes: a time that would see them start to topple DC Comics from a position of dominance, but before the flashy underdogs became the darlings of the student counter-culture. In these tales Tony Stark is still very much the patriotic armaments manufacturer, and not the enlightened capitalist dissenter he would become.

Behind the first of fifteen fabulous Jack Kirby covers the wonderment begins with TOS #51 and ‘The Sinister Scarecrow’ (by Stan Lee & Don Heck) wherein the Golden Avenger tackled a tricky contortionist who quickly became a major menace after stealing vital weapons plans, after which Soviet femme fatale The Black Widow debuted with a savage partner who almost destroyed Iron Man in a Russian-made armour-suit when ‘The Crimson Dynamo Strikes Again!’ scripted, as was the next issue, by the enigmatic “N. Kurok”.

She was back in #53 when ‘The Black Widow Strikes Again!’ a far deadlier threat on her own after stealing an anti-gravity ray but nevertheless still failed to hit her gleaming target and the oriental mastermind who would become Stark’s greatest enemy returned in Tales of Suspense #54 to exact ‘The Mandarin’s Revenge!’; a two-part tale which concluded in ‘No One Escapes the Mandarin!’

Happily Iron Man did, and after bonus factoid-featurettes ‘All About Iron Man’ and ‘More Info About Iron Man’, plus pinups of devoted friends and confidantes Happy Hogan and Pepper Potts, our hero was attacked by Commie super agent ‘The Uncanny Unicorn!’

The Widow resurfaced to beguile budding superhero ‘Hawkeye, the Marksman!’ into attacking the Golden Avenger in #57, before a true landmark event occurred in the next issue. Iron Man had monopolised Tales of Suspense since his creation but ‘In Mortal Combat with Captain America’ (inked by Dick Ayers) an all-out battle between the two heroes – resulting from a clever impersonation by evil impressionist The Chameleon – hinted at a big change in the title.

The clash was a primer for the next issue when Cap would begin his own solo adventures, splitting the monthly comic into a shared anthology featuring Marvel’s top patriotic heroes.

Iron Man’s outing in TOS #59 was against high-tech bandit ‘The Black Knight!’ as a result of which Stark was unable to remove the armour without triggering a heart attack, a situation which hadn’t occurred since the initial heart injury forced Stark to devise his iron-shod alter-ego. Up until this time he had led a relatively normal life by simply wearing the life-sustaining chest-plate under his clothes but now he was a trapped by his own tech…

The introduction of soap-opera sub-plots were a necessitated by the shorter page counts, as were continued stories, but this seeming disadvantage worked to improve both the writing and the sales.

With Stark’s “disappearance,” Iron Man was ‘Suspected of Murder!’ – a tale which featured the return of Hawkeye and the Black Widow – leading directly into ‘The Death of Tony Stark!’ and after another stunning pin-up, ‘The Origin of the Mandarin!’.

After that extended epic, a change of narrative pace occurred as short, complete exploits returned. The first was #63’s industrial sabotage thriller ‘Somewhere Lurks the Phantom!’, followed by the surely self-explanatory ‘Hawkeye and the New Black Widow Strike Again!’ (inked by Chic Stone and disclosing the sultry spy’s conversion into a wall-crawling super-character), before this gold-plated triumph ends with ‘When Titans Clash!’ (inked by Mike Esposito under the pseudonym Mickey Demeo) as a petty thief steals the new armour and Stark must defeat his greatest invention clad only in his clunky old suit.

Iron Man developed amidst the growing political awareness of the Viet Nam Generation who were the comic’s maturing readership. Wedded as it was to the American Military-Industrial Complex, with a hero – originally the government’s wide-eyed golden boy – gradually becoming attuned to his country’s growing divisions, it was, as much as Spider-Man, a bellwether of the times.

That these tales also remain such a thrilling rollercoaster riot of classic super-hero fun is a lasting tribute to the talents of the superb creators who worked on them and this sturdy invincible tome is absolutely the best way to review these masterpieces of Marvel mettle.
© 1964, 1965, 2005 Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Marvel Masterworks volume 7: X-Men 11-21


By Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, Roy Thomas, Werner Roth, Dick Ayers & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 0-87135-482-9
In 1963 things really took off for the budding Marvel Comics as Stan Lee & Jack Kirby expanded their diminutive line of action titles, putting a bunch of relatively new super-heroes together as the Avengers, launching a decidedly different war comic in Sgt Fury and his Howling Commandos and creating a group of alienated but valiant teenagers who were called together to fight a rather specific threat to humanity.

After spectacular starts on all those titles, Kirby’s increasing workload compelled him to cut back to simply laying out these lesser lights as Thor and Fantastic Four evolved into perfect playgrounds and full-time monthly preoccupations for his burgeoning imagination. The last series he surrendered was the still-bimonthly X-Men wherein outcast tribe of mutants Cyclops, Iceman, Angel, Beast and Marvel Girl – very special students of wheelchair-bound telepath Professor Charles Xavier -worked diligently and clandestinely to foster peace and integration between the unwary masses of humanity and the gradually emergent race Homo Superior.

This second lavish deluxe edition covers issues #11-21 (May 1965 to June 1966) and features two key transitional moments as first Kirby and then Stan Lee handed the series over to fresh new talent…

A major turning point signalled The King’s departure in #11 with ‘The Triumph of Magneto!’ as our heroes and the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants both searched for a fantastically powered being called The Stranger. None were aware of his true identity, nature or purpose, but when the Master of Magnetism found him first it spelt the end of the war with the X-Men…

With Magneto gone and the Brotherhood broken, Kirby relinquished the pencilling to other hands, providing loose layouts and design only. Alex Toth & Vince Colletta proved an uncomfortable mix for #12′s tense drama ‘The Origin of Professor X!’ – the start of a two-part saga which introduced Xavier’s half brother Cain Marko and revealed that simple lout’s mystic transformation into an unstoppable human engine of destruction.

The story concluded with ‘Where Walks the Juggernaut’, a compelling tension-drenched tale guest-starring the Human Torch, but most notable for the introduction of penciller Werner Roth (using the name Jay Gavin) who would be associated with the mutants for the next half decade. His inker for this first outing was the infallible Joe Sinnott.

Roth was an unsung veteran of the industry, working for the company in the 1950s on such star features as Apache Kid and the inexplicably durable Kid Colt, Outlaw, as well as Mandrake the Magician for King Features Comics and Man from U.N.C.L.E. for Gold Key. As with many pseudonymous creators it was his DC commitments (mostly romance stories) which forced him to disguise his moonlighting until Marvel grew big enough to offer him full-time work.

‘Among us Stalk the Sentinels!’ from issue #14 (inked by Colletta), celebrated the team’s inevitable elevation to monthly publication with the first chapter of a three-chapter epic introducing anthropologist Bolivar Trask, whose solution to the threat of Mutant Domination was super-robots that would protect humanity at all costs. Sadly their definition of “protect” varied wildly from the expected, but what can you expect when a social scientist dabbles in high-energy physics and engineering?

The X-Men took the battle to the Sentinels secret base and became ‘Prisoners of the Mysterious Master Mold!’ before wrapping up their ferrous foes with ‘The Supreme Sacrifice!’ Veteran Dick Ayers joined as inker from #15, his clean line blending perfectly with Roth’s clean, classicist pencils. They remained a team for years, adding vital continuity to this quirky but never top-selling series.

X-Men #17 dealt with the aftermath of the battle – probably the last time the US Army and government openly approved of the team’s efforts – and the sedate but brooding nature of ‘…And None Shall Survive!’ enabled the story to generate a genuine air of apprehension as the Xavier Mansion was taken over by an old foe who picked them off one by one until only the youngest was left to battle alone in the climactic conclusion ‘If Iceman Should Fail..!’

‘Lo! Now Shall Appear… The Mimic!’ in #19 was Lee’s last script, a pithy tale of a troubled teen with the ability to copy the skills, powers and abilities of anyone in close proximity, after which the writing reins were turned over to Roy Thomas in #20, who promptly jumped in guns blazing with ‘I, Lucifer…’ an alien invasion yarn that starred Xavier’s arch-nemesis as well as Unus the Untouchable and the Blob, revealing in passing how Professor X lost the use of his legs.

With the canny concluding part ‘From Whence Comes Dominus?’, Thomas & Roth completely made the series their own, blending juvenile high spirits, classy superhero action and torrid soap opera with beautiful drawing and stirring adventure.

At this time Marvel Comics had a vast and growing following among older teens and college kids, and the youthful Thomas spoke and wrote as they did. Coupled with his easy delight in large casts this would increasingly make X-Men a very welcoming read for we adolescents…

These quirky tales are a million miles removed from the angst-ridden, breast-beating, cripplingly convoluted X-brand of today’s Marvel and, in many ways are all the better for it. Well drawn, highly readable adventures are never unwelcome or out of favour, and it should be remembered that everything here informs so very much of the mutant monolith. These are stories for the dedicated fan and newest convert, and never better packaged than in this fabulously stylish full-colour tome. Everyone should have this book.
© 1965, 1966, 1988 Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Marvel Masterworks volume 9: The Avengers 11-20


By Stan Lee, Don Heck, Dick Ayers & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 0-87135-595-7   second edition: 978-0-7851-1178-8

Whenever Jack Kirby left a title he’d co-created it took a little while to settle into a new rhythm, and none more so than the collectivised champions called the Avengers. Although writer Stan Lee and the marvellously utilitarian Don Heck were perfectly capable of producing cracking comics entertainments, they never had The King’s unceasing sense of panoramic scope and vast scale which constantly searched for bigger, bolder blasts of excitement. After Kirby, the tales concentrated on human beings in costume, not wild new gods bestriding the Earth…

The wonderment herein contained (covering issues #11-20, December 1964 – September 1965) begins with ‘The Mighty Avengers Meet Spider-Man!’, a clever cross-over tale inked by Chic Stone and featuring the return of time-bending tyrant Kang the Conqueror who attempted to destroy the team by insinuating a robotic duplicate within their serried ranks, which precedes a cracking end-of-the-world thriller with guest Fantastic Four villains Mole Man and the Red Ghost.

‘This Hostage Earth!‘ (inked by Dick Ayers) was a welcome return to grand adventure with lesser lights Giant-Man and the Wasp taking rare lead roles, followed by a rousing gangster thriller of a sort seldom seen outside the pages of Spider-Man or Daredevil, which introduced Marvel universe Mafia analogue The Maggia and another major bad-guy in #13’s ‘The Castle of Count Nefaria!’

That caper ended on a tragic cliffhanger as the Wasp was left gunshot and dying, leading to a high-point in melodramatic tension in #14 (scripted by Paul Laiken & Larry Lieber over Stan’s plot) as the shattered team of heroes scoured the globe for the only surgeon who could save her.

‘Even Avengers Can Die!’ – although of course she didn’t – resolved into a classy alien invader tale with overtones of This Island Earth as Kirby returned to lay out the epic for Heck & Stone to illustrate, which only whetted the appetite for a classic climactic confrontation as the costumed champions finally dealt with the Masters of Evil and Captain America finally avenged the death of his dead partner Bucky.

‘Now, by My Hand, Shall Die a Villain!’ in #15 (laid-out by Kirby, pencilled by Heck with inks by Mike Esposito) featured Captain America and Baron Zemo in one final, fatal confrontation in the heart of the Amazon jungle, whilst the other Avengers and Zemo’s army of masked menaces clashed once more on the streets of New York…

The battle ended in the concluding episode ‘The Old Order Changeth!’ (again visually broken down by Kirby before being finished by Ayers) which presaged a dramatic change in concept for the series; presumably because as Lee increasingly wrote to the company’s unique strengths – tight continuity and strongly individualistic characterisation – he discovered that juggling individual stars in their own titles as well as a combined team episode every month was just incompatible if not impossible.

As Cap and teen sidekick Rick Jones fought their way back to civilisation, the Avengers set-up changed completely with big name stars replaced by three erstwhile villains: Hawkeye, Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch.

Eventually, led by perennial old soldier Captain America, this relatively powerless group with no outside titles to divide the attention (the Sentinel of Liberty did have a regular feature in Tales of Suspense but it was at that time recounting adventures set during the hero’s WWII career), evolved into another squabbling family of neuroses, extended sub-plots and constant action as valiant underdogs; a formula readers of the time could not get enough of.

Acting on advice from the departing Iron Man the neophytes sought to recruit the Hulk to add raw power to the team, only to be sidetracked by the malevolent Mole Man in #17’s ‘Four Against the Minotaur!’ (Lee, Heck & Ayers), after which they then fell foul of a dastardly “commie” plot ‘When the Commissar Commands!’

This brace of rather run-of-the-mill tales was followed by an ever-improving run of mini-masterpieces which began with a two part gem that provides an origin for Hawkeye and introduces a favourite hero/villain to close this sturdy, full-colour hardback compendium.

‘The Coming of the Swordsman!’ featured a dissolute and disreputable swashbuckler – with just a hint of deeply-buried nobility – who attempted to force his way into the highly respectable team, before becoming an unwilling pawn of a far greater menace – the Mandarin – and was closely followed by the superb ‘Vengeance is Ours!’ inked by the one-and-only Wally Wood wherein the constantly-bickering Avengers finally pulled together as a supernaturally efficient, all-conquering super-team.

These immortal epics are available in numerous formats (including softcover editions of the luxurious and enticing item under review here), but for a selection that will survive the continual re-readings of the delirious, incurable fan nothing beats these substantially lavish and colourful Marvellous Masterwork hardbacks.

After all, if you’re going to enjoy the exploits of Earth’s Mightiest Super-Heroes surely you want to do it in appropriate style?
© 1964, 1965, 1989, 2004 Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Marvel Masterworks volume 5: The Amazing Spider-Man 11-20


By Stan Lee & Steve Ditko (Marvel)
ISBN: 0-87135-480-2

After a shaky start The Amazing Spider-Man quickly became a popular sensation with kids of all ages, rivalling the creative powerhouse that was Lee & Kirby’s Fantastic Four and soon the quirky, charming action-packed comics soap-opera would become the model for an entire generation of younger heroes elbowing aside the staid, (relatively) old thirty-something mystery-men of previous publications.

This second supremely lavish deluxe hardback collection gathers issues #11-20 of the pulsating prodigy’s enduring exploits, covering April 1964 to January 1965, a truly stellar period of imaginative innovation and terrific thrills…

The wonderment begins with a magical two-part adventure ‘Turning Point’ and ‘Unmasked by Dr. Octopus!’ which saw the return of the lethally deranged and deformed scientist and the disclosure of a long-hidden secret which had haunted Peter Parker’s girlfriend Betty Brant for years.

The dark, tragedy-filled tale of extortion and excoriating tension stretched from Philadelphia to the Bronx Zoo and cannily tempered the trenchant melodrama with spectacular fight scenes in unusual and exotic locations, before culminating in a truly staggering super-powered duel as only the masterful Steve Ditko could orchestrate it.

A new super-foe premiered in Amazing Spider-Man #13 with ‘The Menace of Mysterio!’ as a seemingly eldritch bounty-hunter hired by Daily Bugle publisher J. Jonah Jameson to capture Spider-Man eventually revealed his own dark agenda, whilst #14 was an absolute milestone in the series as a hidden criminal mastermind manipulated a Hollywood studio into making a movie about the wall-crawler.

Even with guest-star opponents such as the Enforcers and the Incredible Hulk ‘The Grotesque Adventure of the Green Goblin’ is most notable for introducing Spider-Man’s most perfidious and flamboyant enemy.

Jungle superman and thrill-junkie ‘Kraven the Hunter!’ made Spider-Man his intended prey at the behest of embittered old Spidey-foe the Chameleon in #15, whilst the Ringmaster and his Circus of Evil prompted #16′s dazzling and delightful ‘Duel with Daredevil’.

An ambitious three-part saga began in Amazing Spider-Man #17 which saw the rapidly-maturing hero touch emotional bottom before rising to triumphant victory over all manner of enemies. ‘The Return of the Green Goblin!’ saw the wall-crawler endure renewed print assaults from the Daily Bugle just as the Goblin began a war of nerves using the Enforcers, Sandman and an army of thugs to publicly humiliate the Amazing Arachnid, just as Aunt May’s health took a drastic downward turn.

Continued in ‘The End of Spider-Man!’ and concluded in ‘Spidey Strikes Back!’ – featuring a turbulent team-up with friendly rival the Human Torch – this extended tale proved that the fans were ready for every kind of narrative experiment (single issue and even two stories per issue were still the norm in 1964) and Stan and Steve were more than happy to try anything.

This magical compendium closes with ‘The Coming of the Scorpion!’ wherein Jameson let his obsessive hatred for the cocky kid crusader get the better of him; hiring scientist Farley Stillwell to endow a private detective with insectoid-based superpowers. Unfortunately the process drove Mac Gargan completely mad before he could capture Spidey, leaving the web-spinner with yet another lethally dangerous meta-nutcase to deal with…

Such was the early life of comic’s most misunderstood hero and this gloriously lavish collection of landmark tales absolutely resonates with mesmerising power and creativity.

This sturdy chronicle is simply the most self-indulgent way to enjoy these Marvel masterpieces.
© 1962, 1963, 1964, 1965, 2006 Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Marvel Masterworks volume 11: Giant-Size X-Men #1 and X-Men 94-100


By Len Wein, Chris Claremont, Dave Cockrum & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 0-87135-597-3

The X-Men #1 introduced Cyclops, Iceman, Angel, Marvel Girl and the Beast: very special students of Professor Charles Xavier, a wheelchair-bound telepath dedicated to brokering peace and integration between the masses of humanity and the emergent off-shoot race of mutants dubbed Homo Superior. After years of eccentric and spectacular adventures the mutant misfits disappeared at the beginning of 1970 (issue #66 cover-dated March) during a sustained downturn in costumed hero comics as mystery and all things supernatural once more gripped the world’s entertainment fields.

Although their title was revived at the end of the year as a cheap reprint vehicle, the missing mutants were reduced to guest-stars and bit-players throughout the Marvel universe and the Beast was transformed into a monster to cash in on the horror boom, until Marvel editor-in-chief Roy Thomas green-lighted a bold one-shot in 1975 as part of the company’s line of Giant-Sized specials.

This magnificent deluxe hardcover compendium recaptures the sun-bright excitement of those exuberant and pivotal early stories from Giant Size X-Men #1 and issues #94-100 of the definitely “All-New, All-Different” X-Men from May 1975, through to August 1976 when the merry mutants were still, young, fresh and delightfully under-exposed and opens with a classic mystery monster mash in ‘Second Genesis!’ as Len Wein & Dave Cockrum (the latter hot from a stint reviving DC’s equally eclectic super-team The Legion of Super-Heroes) detailed how the classic team had been lost in action, leaving Charles Xavier to scour the Earth and the Marvel Universe for a replacement team.

To old foes-turned-friends Banshee and Sunfire was added a one-shot Hulk villain dubbed the Wolverine, but most time and attention was paid to new creations Kurt Wagner, a demonic German teleporter who would be codenamed Nightcrawler, African weather “goddess” Ororo Monroe AKA Storm, Russian farmboy Peter Rasputin, who could transform into a living steel Colossus and bitter, disillusioned Apache superman John Proudstar who was cajoled into joining the makeshift squad as Thunderbird.

The second chapter of the epic introductory adventure ‘…And When There Was One!’ reintroduced the wounded team leader Cyclops who swiftly trained the team before leading them into primordial danger against the monolithic threat of ‘Krakoa… the Island That Walks Like a Man!’

Overcoming the phenomenal terror of the living mutant eco-system and rescuing the original team should have led to the next quarterly issue, but so great was the groundswell of support that the follow-up adventure was reworked into a two part for in the rapidly reconfigured reprint monthly which became a bimonthly home to the team and began the mutant madness we’re still experiencing today.

X-Men #94 (August 1975) presented ‘The Doomsmith Scenario!’, plotted by Editor Wein, scripted by Chris Claremont and with Bob McLeod inking the man-on-fire Dave Cockrum, in a canny Armageddon-countdown shocker as the newly pared-down strike-squad (minus Sunfire and recovering mutants Marvel Girl, Angel, Iceman, Havok and Lorna Dane) were dispatched by The Beast – then serving as a full-time Avenger – to stop criminal terrorist Count Nefaria from starting an atomic war.

The insidious mastermind had invaded America’s Norad citadel with a gang of artificial superhumans and accidentally turned a nuclear blackmail scheme into an inescapable holocaust before the new mutants stormed in to save the world in the epic conclusion ‘Warhunt! (inked by Sam Grainger).

However one of the valiant neophytes didn’t make it back…

X-Men #96 saw Claremont take full control of the team’s writing (albeit with some plotting input from Bill Mantlo) in ‘Night of the Demon!’ as a guilt-wracked Cyclops, blaming himself for the loss of a team-mate, accidentally unleashed a demonic antediluvian horror from earth’s dimmest prehistory for the heroes-in-training to thrash. The infernal Nagarai would return over and again to bedevil mankind, but the biggest innovation in this issue was the introduction of gun-toting biologist/housekeeper Moira MacTaggert and the first inklings of the return of implacable old adversaries…

Issue #97 began a long-running, intergalactically-widescreen plotline with ‘My Brother, My Enemy!’ as Xavier, plagued by visions of interstellar wars, tried to take a vacation, just as Havok and Lorna Dane (finally settling on the superhero nom de guerre Polaris) attacked the team, seemingly willing servants of a mysterious madman using Cyclops’ old alter ego Eric the Red.

The devastating conflict segued into a spectacular, three-part saga as the pitiless robotic Sentinels returned under the hate-filled auspices of mutantophobic Steven Lang and his mysterious backers of Project Armageddon. The action began with #98’s ‘Merry Christmas, X-Men…the Sentinels Have Returned!’ with coordinated attacks successfully capturing the semi-retired Marvel Girl, Wolverine, Banshee and Xavier, compelling Cyclops and the remaining heroes to co-opt a space shuttle and storm Lang’s orbital HQ to rescue them in ‘Deathstar Rising!‘ (inks by Frank Chiaremonte) – another phenomenal all-action episode.

After a magical pinup of the extended team by Arthur Adams (the cover of Classic X-Men #1 from 1986 if you were wondering) this first stellar, deluxe hardcover compilation concludes on an agonising cliffhanger with the 100th issue anniversary classic ‘Greater Love Hath no X-Man…’ (with Cockrum inking his own pencils) wherein the new X-Men apparently battled the original team before overturning Lang’s monstrous schemes forever.

However, their catastrophic clash had destroyed their only means of escape and, as a colossal solar flare threatened to eradicate the entire satellite, the only chance to survive meant certain death for another X-Man…

With even greater excitement and innovation to follow in succeeding issues, these superb comics thrillers revolutionised a moribund genre and led directly to today’s ubiquitous popular cultural landscape where superheroes are as common as cops, cowboys, monsters or rom-com romeos.

The immortal epics compiled here are available in numerous formats (including softcover editions of the luxurious and enticing hardback under review here), but for a selection that will survive the continual re-readings of the serious, incurable fan there’s nothing to beat the sturdy and substantial full-colour feel of these Marvellous Masterwork editions.
© 1975, 1976, 1989 Marvel Entertainment Group, Inc/Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Essential Ghost Rider volume 1


By Roy Thomas, Gary Friedrich, Mike Ploog, Jim Mooney, John Byrne & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-1838-1

At the end of the 1960s American comicbooks were in turmoil, much like the youth of the nation they targeted. Superheroes had dominated for much of the decade; peaking globally before explosively falling to ennui and overkill. Older genres such as horror, westerns and science fiction returned, fed by radical trends in movie-making where another, new(ish) wrinkle had also emerged: disenchanted, rebellious, unchained Youth on Motorbikes seeking a different way forward.

Green Lantern/Green Arrow, Jack Kirby’s Jimmy Olsen, Captain America and many others all took the “Easy Rider” option to boost flagging sales (and if you’re interested the best of the crop was Mike Sekowsky’s tragically unfinished mini-masterpiece of cool Jason’s Quest in Showcase). Over at Marvel, a company still reeling from Kirby’s defection to DC/National in 1970, canny Roy Thomas green-lighted a new character who combined the freewheeling, adolescent-friendly biker-theme with the all-pervasive supernatural furore gripping the entertainment fields.

Back in 1967, Marvel published a western masked hero named Ghost Rider: a shameless, whole-hearted appropriation of the cowboy hero creation of Vince Sullivan, Ray Krank & Dick Ayers (Magazine Enterprises from 1949 to 1955), who utilised magician’s tricks to fight bandits by pretending to be an avenging phantom of justice.

Scant years later with the Comics Code prohibition against horror hastily rewritten – amazing how plunging sales can affect ethics – scary comics came back in a big way and a new crop of supernatural superheroes and monsters began to appear on the newsstands to supplement the ghosts, ghoulies and goblins already infiltrating the once science-only scenarios of the surviving mystery men titles.

In fact the lifting of the Code ban resulted in such an en masse creation of horror titles (new stories and reprints from the first boom of the 1950s), in response to the industry-wide down-turn in superhero sales, that it probably caused a few more venerable costumed crusaders to (temporarily, at least) bite the dust.

Almost overnight nasty monsters (and narcotics – but that’s another story) became acceptable fare within four-colour pages and whilst a parade of pre-code reprints made sound business sense the creative aspect of the contemporary fascination in supernatural themes was catered to by adapting popular cultural icons before risking whole new concepts on an untested public.

As always in entertainment, the watch-world was fashion: what was hitting big outside comics was to be incorporated into the mix as soon as possible.

When proto-monster Morbius, the Living Vampire debuted in Amazing Spider-Man #101 (October 1971) and the sky failed to fall in, Marvel moved ahead with a line of shocking superstars – beginning with a werewolf and a vampire – before chancing something new with a haunted biker who could tap into both Easy Rider‘s freewheeling motorcycling chic and the supernatural zeitgeist.

The all-new Ghost Rider debuted in Marvel Spotlight #5, August 1972 (preceded by western hero Red Wolf in #1 and the aforementioned Werewolf By Night).

This copious compendium collects in moody monochrome the earliest exploits adventures from Marvel Spotlight #5-12, Ghost Rider #1-20 and an horrific crossover with Daredevil #138, beginning with that landmark first appearance which introduced stunt biker Johnny Blaze, his fatally flawed father-figure Crash Simpson and Johnny’s devoted girlfriend: sweet virginal Roxanne Simpson…

‘Ghost Rider’, plotted by Thomas, scripted by Friedrich and stunningly illustrated by Ploog, saw carnival cyclist Blaze sell his soul to the devil in an attempt to save his foster-father Crash from cancer. As is the way of such things, Satan followed the letter but not spirit of the contract and Simpson died anyway, but when the Dark Lord later came for Johnny Roxanne intervened, her purity preventing the Devil from claiming his due. Temporarily thwarted Satan afflicted Johnny with a body that burned with the fires of Hell every time the sun went down…

Haunting the night and terrorising thugs and criminals at first, the traumatised biker soon left the Big City and headed for the solitary deserts where in ‘Angels From Hell’ the flaming skulled fugitive joined a biker gang led by the enigmatic Curly Samuels: a resurrected agent of Satan attempting to destroy the protective Roxanne and claim Blaze.

No prizes for guessing Curly’s true identity then, when the next chapter (inked by Frank Chiaramonte) is entitled ‘Die, Die, My Daughter!’ before the origin epic concluded with a monumental battle against ‘…The Hordes of Hell!’ (with a rather uncomfortable artistic collaboration by Ploog and Jim Mooney) resulting in a torturous Cold War détente between the still nightly-transforming Blaze and Satan, as well as the introduction of a new eldritch enemy in Native American Witch Man Snake-Dance…

Marvel Spotlight #9 saw the tragically undervalued Tom Sutton take over the pencilling – with inks by Chic Stone – for ‘The Snakes Crawl at Night…’ as Medicine Man magic and demonic devil-worship combined to torment Johnny Blaze just as Roxanne went west to look for him. To further confound the cursed cyclist, Satan decreed that although he must feel the pain, no injury would end Johnny’s life until his soul resided in Hell… which came in very handy when Roxanne was sacrificed by Snake-Dance and the Ghost Rider had to battle his entire deviant cult to rescue her…

In #10 ‘The Coming of… Witch-Woman!’ (Friedrich, Sutton & Mooney) opened with Blaze, a fugitive from the police, rushing the dying Roxanne to hospital whilst on the Reservation tensions remained high as Snake-Dance’s daughter Linda Littletrees revealed her own connection to Satan, culminating in a devastating eldritch assault on Blaze in #11’s ‘Season of the Witch-Woman!’ (inked by the incomparable Syd Shores).

That cataclysmic conflict continued into Ghost Rider #1 (September 1973), which further extended the escalating war between Blaze and the devil, whilst introducing a new horror-hero who would take over the biker’s vacant spot in Spotlight.

Linda Littletrees wasn’t so much a Satan-worshipping witch as a ‘A Woman Possessed!’ but when her father and fiancé Sam Silvercloud called Boston-based exorcist Daimon Hellstrom for help, they were completely unprepared for the kind of assistance the demonologist offered.

With Roxanne slowly recovering and Blaze still on the run, issue #2 saw the bedevilled biker dragged down to Hell in ‘Shake Hands With Satan!’ (illustrated by Mooney & Shores) before the saga concluded in Marvel Spotlight #12 with the official debut of ‘The Son of Satan!’ by Friedrich, Herb Trimpe & Frank Chiaremonte, which revealed Daimon Hellstrom’s long-suppressed inner self to be a brutal scion of the Infernal Realm eternally at war with his fearsome father.

The released Prince of Hell swiftly rushed to Blaze’s aid – although more to spite his sire than succour the victim – and, with his own series off to a spectacular start, continued to take the pressure of the flaming-skulled hero. From Ghost Rider #3’s ‘Wheels on Fire’ (Friedrich, Mooney & John Tartaglione) a fresh direction was explored with more mundane menaces and contemporary antagonists such as the thuggish gang of Big Daddy Dawson – who had kidnapped the still frail Roxanne…

Blaze also learned to create a spectral motorcycle out of the Hellfire that perpetually burned through his body: a most useful trick considering the way he got through conventional transport…

Eager to establish some kind of normal life, the still wanted-by-the-cops Blaze accepted a pardon by the State Attorney General in #4’s ‘Death Stalks the Demolition Derby’ (inked by Vince Colletta) in return for infiltrating a Las Vegas showman’s shady operation, leading to another supernatural encounter, this time against a demonic gambler dubbed Roulette in ‘And Vegas Writhes in Flame!’ by the transitional creative team of Marv Wolfman, Doug Moench, Mooney & Sal Trapani.

With #6, ill-considered attempts to convert the tragic biker into a more conventional superhero began with ‘Zodiac II’ (story and concept by Tony Isabella & Friedrich) as Blaze stumbled into a senseless fight with a man who had all the powers of the old Avengers’ arch-foes. However there was a hidden Satanic component to the mystery as Johnny discovered when reformed super-villain turned TV star Stunt-Master turned up to help close the case and watch helplessly as the one-man Zodiac fell-foul of his own diabolical devil’s bargain in ‘…And Lose His Own Soul!’ (Isabella, Mooney & Jack Abel).

A final confrontation – of sorts – began in Ghost-Rider #8 as ‘Satan Himself!’ came looking for Johnny’s soul with a foolproof scheme to force Roxanne to rescind her protection, which she finally did as the Hell-biker battled Inferno, the Fear-demon and most of San Francisco in a game-changing epic called ‘The Hell-Bound Hero!’ wherein Blaze was finally freed from his satanic burden by the intervention of someone who appeared to be Jesus Christ…

The cover of issue #10 (by Ron Wilson and Joe Sinnott, I think) featured Ghost Rider battling the Hulk, but a deadline cock-up delayed that tale until #11 and the already included origin from Marvel Spotlight #5 filled those pages. Gil Kane & Tom Palmer reinterpreted the scene for their cover on next issue which finally detailed ‘The Desolation Run!‘ by Isabella, Sal Buscema, Tartaglione & George Roussos, as Johnny joined a disparate band of dirt-bikers in a desert race which collided with the legendarily solitary and short-tempered Green Goliath, after which artists Frank Robbins, Frank Giacoia & Mike Esposito recounted the fate of World War I fighter ace Phantom Eagle when Blaze tried to unknowingly attempted to rescue the warrior’s murderer from the ‘Phantom of the Killer Skies’…

Ghost Rider #13 declared ‘You’ve Got a Second Chance, Johnny Blaze!’ (Isabella, George Tuska & Colletta) as the terms of the hero’s on-going curse were changed again, just as the dissolute biker headed to Hollywood and a promised job as Stunt-Master’s body-double. No sooner had he signed up however, than Blaze became involved with starlet Karen Page – Daredevil’s one-time girlfriend – and a bizarre kidnap plot by super-villain The Trapster.

Not included here is a yarn where Ghost Rider and Spider-Man battled the demented biker bad-guy The Orb (you’ll need to track down Marvel Team-Up #15 or at least the first Essential Marvel Team-Up volume for that tale) which is a pity as ‘A Specter Stalks the Soundstage!’ features his revenge-hungry return attempt to destroy Blaze which spectacularly concludes with ‘Vengeance on the Ventura Freeway!’ (illustrated by Bob Brown & Don Heck).

Whilst hanging out on the West Coast Blaze joined new superteam The Champions, but they played no part in Bill Mantlo, Tuska & Colletta’s fill-in issue ‘Blood in the Waters’ as the Ghost Rider oh, so topically tangled with a Great White Shark in the gore-soaked California surf before #17 highlighted a team-up with the Son of Satan in ‘Prelude to a Private Armageddon!’ (by Isabella, Robbins & Colletta) wherein fellow stunt-actor Katy Milner was possessed by a demon and only Hellstrom could help.

The saga continued with ‘The Salvation Run!’ as Blaze was forced to race through the bowels of Hell and relive his own traumatic past before finally saving the day, Katy and his own much-tarnished soul in ‘Resurrection’.

All this time the mystery of Karen’s attempted abduction had been percolating through the subplots here, but explosively boiled over in Daredevil #138 as ‘Where is Karen Page?’ (by Wolfman, John Byrne & Mooney) revealed the machinations of criminal maniac Death’s-Head to be merely part of a greater scheme involving Blaze, Stunt-Master, the Man without Fear and the homicidal Death Stalker. The convoluted conundrum cataclysmically climaxed in Ghost-Rider #20 with ‘Two Against Death!’ by Wolfman, John Byrne & Don Perlin…

This spooky, black and white thriller compendium finishes the chilling action with Marvel Universe Handbook pages imparting all the background you could ever desire regarding Johnny Blaze and Daimon Hellstrom to truly complete your fear-filled fun fest.

One final note: backwriting and retcons notwithstanding, the Christian boycotts and moral crusades of a later decade were what compelled the criticism-averse and commercially astute corporate Marvel to “translate” the biblical Satan of these early tales into generic and presumably more palatable or “acceptable” demonic creatures such as Mephisto, Satanish, Marduk Kurios and other equally naff downgrades, but the original intent and adventures of Johnny Blaze – and indeed series spin-offs Daimon Hellstrom and Satana, respectively the  Son and Daughter of Satan, tapped into the period’s global fascination with Satanism, Devil-worship and all things Spooky and Supernatural which had begun with such epochal films as Rosemary’s Baby (Roman Polanski’s 1968 film more than Ira Levin’s novel) and remember aren’t your feeble bowdlerised “Hell-lite” horrors.

These tales are about the real-deal Infernal Realm and a good man struggling to save his soul from the baddest of all bargains – as much as the revised Comics Code would allow – so brace yourself, hols steady and accept no supernatural substitutes…

© 1972, 1973, 1974, 1975, 1976, 2005 Marvel Characters, Incorporated. All rights reserved.

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Marvel Masterworks volume 15: Silver Surfer 1-5


By Stan Lee, John Buscema & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 0-87135-631-7

Although pretty much a last minute addition to Fantastic Four #48-50’s ‘Galactus Trilogy’, Jack Kirby’s scintillating creation the Silver Surfer quickly became a watchword for depth and subtext in the Marvel Universe and one Stan Lee kept as his own personal toy for many years.

Tasked with finding planets for space god Galactus to consume and despite the best efforts of intergalactic voyeur Uatu the Watcher, one day the Silver Surfer discovered Earth, where the latent nobility of humanity reawakened his own suppressed morality; causing the shining scout to rebel against his master and help the FF save the world.

In retaliation, Galactus imprisoned his one-time herald on Earth, making him the ultimate outsider on a planet remarkably ungrateful for his sacrifice.

The Galactus Saga was a creative highlight from a period where the Lee/Kirby partnership was utterly on fire. The tale has all the power and grandeur of a true epic and has never been surpassed for drama, thrills and sheer entertainment. It’s not included here: for that treat you’ll need to see Essential Fantastic Four volume 3 or many other Marvel collections…

In 1968, after increasingly frequent guest-shots and even a solo adventure in the back of Fantastic Four Annual #5 (also omitted, but it is in Essential Fantastic Four volume 4) the Surfer finally got his own (initially double-sized) title at long last.

This stellar hardback deluxe edition collects the first five extra-length adventures from August 1968 to April 1969 and begins with ‘The Origin of the Silver Surfer!’ by Lee, John Buscema & Joe Sinnott who, after a prolonged flashback sequence and repeated examples of crass humanity’s brutal callousness and unthinking hostility, detailed how Norrin Radd, discontented soul from an alien paradise named Zenn-La, became the gleaming herald of a planetary scourge.

Radd had constantly chafed against a civilisation in comfortable, sybaritic stagnation, but when Galactus shattered their vaunted million years of progress in a fleeting moment, the dissident without hesitation offered himself as a sacrifice to save the world from the Devourer’s hunger.

Converted into an indestructible gleaming human meteor Radd agreed to scour the galaxies looking for uninhabited worlds rich in the energies Galactus needed to survive, thus saving planets with life on them from destruction. He didn’t always find them in time…

The stories in this series were highly acclaimed – if not commercially successful – both for Buscema’s agonised, emphatic and truly beautiful artwork as well as Lee’s deeply spiritual and philosophical scripts; with the isolated alien’s travails and social observations creating a metaphoric status akin to a Christ-figure for an audience that was maturing and rebelling against America’s creaking and unsavoury status quo.

The second 40 page adventure detailed a secret invasion by extraterrestrial lizard men ‘When Lands the Saucer!’ forcing the Surfer to battle the sinister Brotherhood of Badoon without human aid or even awareness in ‘Let Earth be the Prize!’…

A little side-note for sad nit-picking enthusiasts like me: I suspect that the original intention was to drop the page count to regular 20-page episodes from #2, since in terms of pacing both the second and third issues divide perfectly into two-parters, with cliffhanger endings and splash page/chapter titles that are dropped from #4 onwards.

Silver Surfer #3 is pivotal in the ongoing saga as Lee & Buscema introduced Marvel’s Satan-analogue in ‘The Power and the Prize!’

Mephisto is Lord of Hell and saw the Surfer’s untarnished soul as a threat to his evil influence on Earth. To crush the anguished hero’s spirit the demon abducted Norrin Radd’s true love Shalla Bal from still-recovering Zenn-La and tormented the Sentinel of the Spaceways with her dire distress in his sulphurous nether-realm…

The concluding chapter sees mortal angel of light and devil of depravity conduct a spectacular ‘Duel in the Depths’ wherein neither base temptations nor overwhelming force were enough to stay the noble Surfer’s inevitable triumph.

Just as wicked a foe then attempted to exploit the Earth-bound alien’s heroic impulses in #4’s ‘The Good, The Bad and the Uncanny!’ (inked by new art collaborator Sal Buscema) wherein Asgardian God of Evil Loki offered lies, deceit and even escape from Galactus’ terrestrial cage to induce the Silver Stalwart to attack and destroy the Mighty Thor; resulting in a staggering and bombastic clash that just builds and builds as the creative team finally let loose and fully utilised their expanded story-proportions and page count to create smooth flowing epic action-adventures.

This magical collection concludes with a powerful parable about race, prejudice and shared humanity when the Surfer was befriended by ostracised black physicist Al Harper in ‘…And Who Shall Mourn Him?’

As the two outcasts bonded the scientist realised he might have a way to free the Surfer from his Galactine incarceration, but as they put their plan into operation remorseless alien entity The Stranger turned up, determined to erase the potential threat mankind offered to the rest of the universe. To stop him both Harper and Norrin Radd had to sacrifice everything they cherished most for a world that didn’t care if they lived or died…

The Silver Surfer was always a pristine and iconic character when handled well Рand sparingly Рand these early forays into a more mature range of adventures, although perhaps a touch heavy-handed, showed that there was far more to comicbooks than cops and robbers or monsters and misfits. That exploratory experience and mystique of hero as Christ allegory made the series a critically beloved but commercially disastrous cause celebr̩ until eventually financial failure killed the experiment.

After the Lee/Kirby/Ditko sparks had initially fired up the imaginations of readers in the early days, the deeper, subtler overtones and undercurrents offered by stories like these kept a maturing readership enthralled, loyal and abidingly curious as to what else comics could achieve if given half a chance and this fabulously lavish tome offers the perfect way to discover or recapture the thrill and wonder of those startlingly different days and times
© 1968, 1969, 1990 Marvel Entertainment Group/Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Marvel Masterworks (volume 6): The Fantastic Four 11-20


By Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, Dick Ayers, Steve Ditko & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 0-87135-481-0   Second edition 978-0-7851-0980-8

After blasting into the comics-buying consciousness and swiftly garnering a devoted following in 1961 “the World’s Greatest Comic Magazine!” continued to live up to its boast in an astounding succession of boldly experimental, evocatively enthralling and amazingly human funny, thrilling and completely compelling sequential sagas.

This second deluxe hardcover compilation carries on reprinting those groundbreaking classics in lavish full-colour splendour, re-presenting Fantastic Four #11-20, originally released between February and November 1963, and almost unanimously the result of Stan Lee, Jack Kirby & Dick Ayers’ close and effective collaboration.

Actually I’m possibly rewriting history just a bit here. The innovations continued but didn’t always hit the mark, as tellingly described in Lee’s effusive introduction to this volume.

Issue #11 had two short stories instead of the usual book-length yarn; ‘The Impossible Man’ – a baddie-free yet compellingly light-hearted tale about a fun-seeking but obnoxiously omnipotent visitor from the stars and ‘A Visit with the Fantastic Four’, which offered background into the characters plus a behind-the-scenes travelogue of off-duty life with the team which mischievously reiterated the novel fact the heroes collected and read a comic book about themselves…

Fans hated the issue at the time but now these vignettes are considered some of the most effective tales of that formative period…

Fantastic Four #12 featured an early crossover experiment when the team were asked to help the US army capture ‘The Incredible Hulk’ (whose own short-lived title had recently been cancelled). This tense cold-war spy and sabotage thriller set the ground rules for many a two-fisted clash between the Jade Goliath and the blockbusting Thing…

This was followed by ‘Versus the Red Ghost and his Incredible Super Apes!’ another politically-charged, commie-baiting drama pitting Marvel’s First Family against a Soviet scientist in the space-race to the Moon: a tale notable not only for the supremely moody inking of Steve Ditko (replacing the adroit Ayers for one month) over Kirby’s astounding pencils but also for the introduction of the cosmic voyeurs called The Watchers and the discovery of the intoxicatingly intriguing lost city in the “Blue Area of the Moon”.

Issue #14 featured the return of ‘The Sub-Mariner and the Merciless Puppet Master!’ with the Atlantean Prince a hapless pawn of the mind-controlling doll-despot’s revenge plot, promptly followed by ‘The Mad Thinker and his Awesome Android!’ a chilling war of intellects with plenty of room for all-out action as a master-strategist manipulated the team into splitting up in order to steal all Reed Richards’ scientific secrets.

FF #16 revealed ‘The Micro-World of Doctor Doom!’ in a spectacular other-worldly rollercoaster action-romp guest-starring new hero Ant-Man, after which the incorrigible Iron-Clad villain promptly returned with infallible, deadly traps a month later when the quartet were almost ‘Defeated by Doctor Doom!’

A shape-changing super-alien with all their cosmically induced powers was next to menace our heroes when ‘A Skrull Walks Among Us!’ and issue #19 introduced another of the company’s top-ranking super-villains when the FF became ‘Prisoners of the Pharaoh!’ whilst exploring ancient Egypt seeking a cure for the blind sculptress Alicia Masters. This time travel tale has been revisited by so many writers that it is considered one of the key-stone stories of Marvel continuity.

Fantastic Four #20 concludes this compendium with a terrifying new foe, as the compulsorily aloof Watcher broke his eternal vow of neutrality to warn the heroes of a potential threat to all Existence before standing back and letting them do all the hard work by defeating ‘The Mysterious Molecule Man!’

Also included in this tantalising tome is a splendid Thing pin-up and a brace of pseudo-scientific Fantastic Four Feature Pages by Lee, Kirby & Ayers telling all you need to know about the powers of the Human Torch.

Although possibly – just, perhaps – a little dated in tone, these are undoubtedly graphic classics of comic story-telling illustrated by one of the world’s greatest talents just approaching his mature peak: fast, frantic fun and a joy to read or re-read. This comprehensive, joyous introduction (or even reintroduction) to these characters is a wonderful reminder of just how good comic books can – and should – be.
© 1963, 1964, 1988, 2003 Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Marvel Masterworks volume 14: Captain America from Tales of Suspense 59-81


By Stan Lee, Jack Kirby & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 0-87135-630-9   second edition 978-0-7851-1176-4

During the earliest days of Marvel Comics Stan Lee and Jack Kirby emulated the same strategy which had worked so tellingly for National Periodicals/DC, but with mixed results. Julie Schwartz had achieved incredible success with his revised versions of DC’s Golden Age greats, so it was only natural to try and revive characters who had dominated the ailing new kids of Timely/Atlas in those halcyon days of yore. A completely new Human Torch had premiered as part of the revolutionary Fantastic Four and in the fourth issue of that title Sub-Mariner resurfaced after a twenty year amnesiac hiatus (everyone concerned had apparently forgotten the initial abortive attempt to revive the superheroes in the mid-1950s).

Torrid Teen Johnny Storm was promptly given his own solo feature in Strange Tales from issue #101 (as collected in Essential Human Torch volume1) where, in #114 the flaming kid fought a malevolent acrobat pretending to be a revived Captain America. An unabashed test-run, the tales was soon eclipsed when the real McCoy promptly surfaced in Avengers #4. After a captivating and centre-stage hogging run in that title the Sentinel of Liberty was quickly awarded his own series as half of the “split-book” Tales of Suspense, beginning with #59 (after another impostor battled titular star Iron Man in the previous issue).

This magnificent full-colour hardback stirringly re-presents those early short sagas which span the period cover-dated November 1964-September 1966), opening with the initial outing ‘Captain America’, scripted by Stan Lee and illustrated by the staggeringly perfect team of Jack Kirby & Chic Stone: an unapologetic all-action romp wherein an army of thugs invades Avengers Mansion since only the one without superpowers is at home… The next issue held more of the same, when ‘The Army of Assassins Strikes!’, this time attempting to overwhelm the inexhaustible human fighting machine at the behest of arch foe Baron Zemo, whilst ‘The Strength of the Sumo!’ was insufficient when Cap invaded Viet Nam to rescue a captured US airman, after which he took on an entire prison’s population to stop the ‘Break-out in Cell Block 10!’

After these gloriously simplistic romps the series took an abrupt turn and began telling tales set in World War II. ‘The Origin of Captain America’, by Lee, Kirby & Frank Ray (AKA Frank Giacoia – one of an increasing wave of DC stalwarts anonymously moonlighting at the House of Ideas) recounted, recapitulated and expanded the way physical wreck Steve Rogers was selected to be the guinea pig for a new super-soldier serum only to have the scientist responsible die in his arms, cut down by a Nazi bullet.

Now forever unique, Rogers was became a living fighting symbol and guardian of America, based as a regular soldier in a boot camp.

It was there he was unmasked by Camp Mascot Bucky Barnes, who blackmailed the hero into making the boy his sidekick. The next issue (Tales of Suspense #64) kicked off a string of spectacular thrillers as the heroes defeated the spies Sando and Omar in ‘Among Us, Wreckers Dwell!’ before Chic Stone returned for the next tale ‘The Red Skull Strikes!’ in which the daring duo foiled the Nazi mastermind’s sabotage plans in America.

‘The Fantastic Origin of the Red Skull!’ saw the series swing into high gear and switch settings to Europe as sub-plots and characterisation were added to the all-out action and spectacle. ‘Lest Tyranny Triumph!’ and ‘The Sentinel and the Spy!’ (both inked by Giacoia) combined espionage and mad science in a plot to murder the head of Allied Command after which the heroic duo stayed in England for ‘Midnight in Greymoor Castle!’ (with art by Dick Ayers over Kirby’s layouts – rough pencils sketches that break down the story elements on a page). The second part ‘If This be Treason!’ had Golden Age veteran and Buck Rogers newspaper strip artist George Tuska perform the same function. The final part (and the last wartime adventure) was ‘When You Lie Down with Dogs…!’ which added Joe Sinnott inks to the mix for a rousing conclusion to this frantic tale of traitors, madmen and terror weapons…

It was back to the present for Tales of Suspense #72 and Lee, Kirby & Tuska revealed that Cap had been telling war stories to his fellow Avengers for the last nine months. ‘The Sleeper Shall Awake!’ began a spectacular contemporary adventure as a Nazi super-robot was activated twenty years after Germany’s defeat to exact a world-shattering vengeance. Continuing its rampage across Europe in ‘Where Walks the Sleeper!’ before concluding in ‘The Final Sleep!’ this masterpiece of tension and suspense perfectly demonstrated the indomitable nature of the ultimate American hero.

Dick Ayers returned with John Tartaglione inking ‘30 Minutes to Live!’ which introduced both Batroc the Leaper and a mysterious girl who would eventually become Cap’s long-term girl-friend, S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Sharon Carter, in a taut 2-part countdown to disaster ending with ‘The Gladiator, The Girl and the Glory’, illustrated by John Romita (Senior). This was the first tale which had no artistic input from Jack Kirby, but he laid out the next issue (TOS #77) for Romita & Giacoia. ‘If a Hostage Should Die!’ again returned to WWII and hinted at both a lost romance and tragedy to come.

‘Them!’ returned Kirby to full pencils and Giacoia to the regular inks-spot as Cap teamed with Nick 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. It was followed by ‘The Red Skull Lives!’ as his arch nemesis returned from the grave to menace the Free World again. He was initially aided by the subversive technology group AIM, but stole their ultimate weapon in ‘He Who Holds the Cosmic Cube!’ (inked by Don Heck) – a device which could rewrite reality with but a whim…

This staggeringly fast-paced, rollercoaster collection climaxes with a classic confrontation in ‘The Red Skull Supreme!’ and concludes with one last breathtaking Cap pin-up by Kirby & Ayers.

These are tales of dauntless courage and unmatchable adventure, addictive and superbly illustrated, which rightly returned Captain America to heights his Golden Age compatriots the Torch and the Sub-Mariner never regained – pure escapist magic.

Great, great stuff for the eternally young at heart, perfectly presented in a sturdy deluxe hardcover edition.
© 1963, 1964, 1965, 1990 Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.