Category: Sub-Mariner

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Black Panther: The Saga of Shuri and T’Challa


By Reginald Hudlin, Jonathan Mayberry, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Aaron Covington, John Romita Jr., Ken Lashley, Gianlucca Gugliotti, Pepe Larraz, Brian Stelfreeze, Chris Sprouse, Mario Del Pennino, Klaus Janson, Paul Neary, Karl Story, Walden Wong, Goran Sudžuka, Roberto Poggi & various (MARVEL)
ISBN: 978-1302946005 (TPB/Digital edition)

The Black Panther rules over a fantastic African paradise which isolated itself from the rest of the world millennia ago. Blessed with unimaginable resources – both natural and not so much – the nation of Wakanda developed unhindered by European imperialism into the most technologically advanced human nation on Earth. It has never been conquered, with the main reason being an unbroken line of divinely-sponsored warrior kings who safeguard the nation. The other is a certain miraculous super-mineral found nowhere else on Earth…

In contemporary times that chieftain is (usually) T’Challa: an unbeatable, feline-empowered, strategic genius dividing his time between ruling at home and serving abroad in superhero teams such as The Avengers and The Ultimates beside costumed champions like Iron Man, Mr. Fantastic, Thor, Captain Marvel and Captain America…

Acclaimed as the first black superhero in American comics and one of the first to carry his own series, the Black Panther’s popularity and fortunes have waxed and waned since he first appeared in the summer of 1966. As originally created by Jack Kirby & Stan Lee T’Challa, son of T’Chaka, was an African monarch whose secretive kingdom is the only source of vibration-absorbing wonder mineral Vibranium. The miraculous alien metal – derived from a fallen meteor which struck the continent in lost antiquity – is the basis of Wakanda’s immense wealth, allowing that isolationist nation to become one of the wealthiest and most secretive on Earth. These riches enabled young king T’Challa to radically remake his country, even after he left Africa to fight as an Avenger.

For much of its history Wakanda was a phantom, utopian wonderland with tribal resources and people safeguarded and led since time immemorial by a warrior-king deriving cat-like physical advantages from secret ceremonies and a mysterious heart-shaped herb. This has ensured the generational dominance of the nation’s Panther Cult and Royal Family. The obsessively secured “Vibranium mound” guaranteed the nation’s status as a clandestine superpower for centuries, but recent times increasingly saw Wakanda a target of incursion, subversion and invasion as the world grew ever smaller. However, as crises arose, T’Challa was confident his system of Regents and his own kin could handle the load of governance.

This selective trawl highlights his interactions with his half-sister Shuri re-presenting Black Panther (volume 4/2005) #2, Black Panther (volume 5/2009) #1-6, Klaws of The Panther #1-4 (2010), Black Panther (volume 6/2016) #1 & 9, #8 & 10, 11, and Black Panther: Long Live the King (2018) #3-4: spanning cover-dates May 2005 to March 2018.

The reprise begins with ‘Who is The Black Panther: Part Two’ by Reginald Hudlin, John Romita Jr., Klaus Janson & Dean White as seen in Black Panther #2 (volume 4, May 2005) which reworked the classic origin and set-up for a new century. What began with Fantastic Four #52-53 (July & August 1966), as T’Challa launched himself on the world stage by ambushing the FF in his savage super-scientific kingdom as part of an extended plan to gain vengeance on the murderer of his father, was acknowledged but refined. Now lone mad scientist Ulysses Klaw was remodelled as a murderous agent of an international cabal, America’s NSA was acting against Wakanda, and the ritual of clan members duelling for the right to be Black Panther was reimagined to introduce an unsuspected younger sister for the King. In the war that inevitably erupted (and for which you’ll need to read a different collection – I suggest Black Panther: Who is the Black Panther?) headstrong Princess Shuri endured a hellish trail by combat all her own…

Increasingly, over decades of publishing, Vibranium made Wakanda a target for subversion and incursion. Volume 5 #1-6 (cover-dated April – September 2009) Black Panther: The Deadliest of the Species – by Hudlin, Ken Lashley & Paul Neary – confirmed changing global Realpolitik as T’Challa and his new bride Ororo embark on a goodwill tour. As a mutant – and far worse, an American – married to the king, the X-Men leader is keenly aware of her tenuous position and potential for disrupting an ancient social order. All thoughts of winning over the people are forgotten when her husband’s jet – gone for only hours on a diplomatic mission – catastrophically crashes in the heart of the city despite all the weather goddess’ efforts to slow it down…

Five hours previously the Black Panther had secretly met with regal rival Namor the Sub-Mariner to hear an invitational offer from a Cabal of world-conquerors led by former Green Goblin-turned government operative Norman Osborn. Now the adored sovereign is near death. His formidable Dora Milaje bodyguards are gone and, after being dragged from the wreckage burned and broken, T’Challa agonisingly reveals how he was ambushed before lapsing into a coma. As Queen Mother Ramonda and Shuri rush to the hospital, the ruling council are frantic: terrified the assassination attempt is prelude to invasion. Wakanda is always ready for such assaults, but that was with a healthy Black Panther. Right now, they are spiritually defenceless. Even though the king is not quite dead, his Ministers advocate activating protocols to create a new Panther warrior – but the question is who will succeed?

Hours ago, after Namor departed, a far less friendly potentate accosted T’Challa as he left the conference. Dr. Doom is also a member of the Cabal and took the Panther’s refusal to join the club very, very badly. Back in the now-desperate meetings and Ororo’s refusal to undertake the mystic rituals result in Shuri being reluctantly assigned – over her own mother’s strenuous protests – the role of Black Panther Apparent. As T’Challa’s sister it’s a role she was destined for, but one her brother seized decades ago. At that time, she was being schooled in the West when Ulysses Klaw claimed her father’s life. With cruel circumstance demanding nothing less, the boy took the initiative, the role and responsibility of defending the nation.

Thus, after years as an irrelevant spare, the flighty jet-setter is asked to take up a destiny she now neither wants nor feels capable of fulfilling. She is especially afraid of the part of the ceremony where she faces the Panther God and is judged…

T’Challa cannot reveal how the battle with Doom ended in brutal defeat and imminent death, or how his valiant Dora Milaje gave their lives to get his maimed body in the jet and home via auto-pilot. He is unable to even stay alive and, when the world’s greatest doctors abandon hope, Ramonda convinces Queen Ororo to try something terrible and very ancient instead…

Despite pervasive secrecy bad news travels fast. Across the continent adherents of the Panther Cult’s theological antitheses revel in Wakanda’s misfortune. Smug, gleeful worshippers of rival cults prepare arcane rituals to finally destroy their enemies and – in a place far removed from the world -T’Challa awakes to meet his dead bodyguards once more…

In an isolated hut Queen and Queen Mother bicker with sinister shaman Zawavari. The wizard claims to be able to bring T’Challa back but gleefully warns the price will be high. Thanks to years of constant training, Shuri has no problem with the physical rigours of the Panther Protocols and foolishly grows in confidence. Far away, Wakanda’s enemies succeed in summoning terrible Morlun, Devourer of Totems – wholly unprepared for the voracious horror to consume them before turning his attention to more distant theological fodder. In Limbo, a succession of dead friends and family subtly, seductively seek to convince T’Challa his time is past and that he must lay down his regal burdens…

As Morlun ponderously makes his way to Wakanda – stopping only to destroy other petty pantheons such as the master of the Man-Ape sect – Death continues her campaign to con T’Challa into surrendering to the inevitable and Shuri faces her final test.

It does not end well. The Panther God looks through her, declaring Shuri pitifully unworthy to wear the mantle or defend Wakandan worshippers. Despondent, she is ignominiously despatched back to the physical world just as her sister-in-law lands in Limbo, sent by Zawavari to retrieve her husband from Death’s clutches. Ororo doesn’t want to tell T’Challa it is their last meeting. The price of his safe passage back is her becoming his replacement…

In the world of the living, Morlun is at Wakanda’s borders, drawn inexorably to T’Challa’s (currently vacant) physical form. The beast is utterly invulnerable to everything in the nation’s arsenal and leaves a mountain of corpses behind him. With armageddon manifesting all about them, the Royal Family and Ruling Council are out of options until Zawavari points out an odd inconsistency. The price for failing to become Wakanda’s living totem has always been instant death, but Shuri, although rejected, still breathes…

Realising both she and her country have one last chance, the latest Black Panther goes out to battle the totem-eater whilst in the Country of the Dead T’Challa and Ororo resolve to ignore the devil’s bargain and fight their way back to life. And as both hopeless battles proceed, Ramonda and Zawavari engage in a last-ditch ploy which will win each war by bringing all combatants together…

After one all-out attack culminating in Doctor Doom seizing control, recuperating T’Challa was forced to render all Vibranium on Earth inert, defeating the invader but leaving Wakanda broken and economically shattered. During the cataclysmic clash, once-flighty, Shuri fully took on the role of Black Panther: clan and country’s champion whilst her predecessor recovered from post-fatal injuries and struggled with the disaster he had deliberately caused.

Packed with guest-stars, Klaws of the Panther was a 2010-2011 4-part fortnightly miniseries that traced her progress through the Marvel Universe: striving to outlive a wastrel reputation, serve her country and the world whilst – crucially – defeating a growing homicidal rage increasingly burning inside her. Written by Jonathan Mayberry, with art by Shawn Moll & Walden Wong, the story starts with ‘Honor’ as the Panther Champion brutally repels an invasion by soldiers of Advanced Idea Mechanics: simply the latest opportunist agency attempting to take over diminished Wakanda.

With her brother and Queen Storm absent, Shuri is also de facto ruler of the nation, but faces dissent from her own people as embarrassing reports and photos of her days as a billionaire good-time girl continually surface to stir popular antipathy to her and the Panther clan. When opportunist G’Tuga of the outlawed White Gorilla sect challenges for the role of national champion, Shuri treats the ritual combat as a welcome relief from insurmountable, intangible problems but has badly misjudged her opponent and the sentiment of the people…

That last bit was a prelude from Age of Heroes #4 and the Klaws of the Panther graphic novel. I’ve included it for context as it inexplicably is omitted here. This book opens with the main event by Mayberry, Gianluca Gugliotta & Pepe Larraz already underway with ‘Savage Tales’ as Shuri is lured to fantastic dinosaur preserve the Savage Land, in hope of purchasing a supply of anti-metal (a Vibranium isotope) but instead uncovering a deadly plot by AIM and sentient sound-wave Klaw. The incredible fauna of the lost world has been enslaved by the Master of Sound – who murdered Shuri and T’Challa’s father in an earlier attempt to seize ultimate power – and the villain has captured the region’s protector Ka-Zar whilst seeking to secure all Savage Land Vibranium for his nefarious schemes. Klaw, however, only thought he had fully compensated for the interference of Shuri and Ka-Zar’s formidable spouse Shanna the She-Devil…

Driven by lust for vengeance, Shuri almost allows Klaw to destroy the Savage Land with only the timely intervention of sister-in-law Storm preventing nuclear armageddon in ‘Sound and Fury’, after which the Panther seeks out Wolverine in outlaw haven Madripoor, looking for help with her anger management issues. Once again, AIM attacks, attempting to steal the rogue state’s stockpile of Savage Land Vibranium, but instead walks into a buzzsaw of angry retribution…

Shuri is extracting information from a surviving AIM agent in time-honoured Wakandan manner when Klaw appears, hinting at a world-shattering plan called “The Scream” which will use mystery device M.U.S.I.C. to utterly remake Earth…

Following another furious fight, the Panther gains the upper hand by using SLV dust, but squanders her hard-won advantage to save Wolverine from certain death. Knowing the planet is at stake, Shuri accepts the necessity for major-league assistance in ‘Music of the Spheres’ but sadly the only hero in Avengers Tower is relatively low-calibre Spider-Man. Reluctantly she takes the wisecracking half-wit on another raid on AIM, at last catching a break when one of Klaw’s AIM minions reveals the tragic secret of the horrific M.U.S.I.C. device…

All this time, Black Panther has had a hidden ally in the form of tech specialist Flea: providing intel from an orbiting spaceship. Now the full truth is revealed as the heroes find Klaw’s plans centre on an attack from space. The maniac intends to destroy humanity from an invulnerable station thousands of miles above the planet and nothing can broach the base’s incredible defences. Happily, Spider-Man and Captain America Steve Rogers know the world’s greatest infiltration expert and ‘Enter the Black Widow’ sees Earth’s fate turning on an all-or-nothing assault by the icily calm Panther and the world’s deadliest spy.

Cue tragic sacrifice, deadly combat, spectacular denouement, reaffirmed dedication and a new start for the ferociously inspired and determined Black Panther…

Despite initially being rejected by the Panther Spirit, Shuri proved a dedicated and ingenious protector, updating, innovating and serving with honour until she perished defending Wakanda from Thanos in crossover events Infinity and Time Runs Out. When T’Challa inevitably resumed his position as warrior-king, one of his earliest and most urgent tasks was resurrecting his sister: task made a little easier as he had gained the power to talk to his deceased predecessors as Wakanda’s King of the Dead.

He learned Shuri had passed into the Djalia (the people’s communal Spiritual Plane of Memories) and absorbed the entire history of the nation from ascended Elders. On her return to physicality, she gained mighty new powers as the Ascended Future…

Since then – thanks to the equally formidable magic of a bravura role in a blockbuster movie – a slightly reimagined Shuri starred in her own series, blending established comics mythology with the fresh characterisation of a spunky, savvy, youthful super-scientist. The start of that transition came with Black Panther volume 6. Here Wakanda’s status and its vibranium tech were fully restored in time for further immense changes instigated by correspondent turned author Ta-Nehisi Coates (Between the World and Me) and designer/illustrator Brian Stelfreeze (Batman: Shadow of the Bat, Day Men).Again reading complete collections for the full story will pay off best, but salient moments first seen in Black Panther (volume 6) #1 & 8-11 here reveal the next stage in the evolving sibling relationship. As ever, Vibranium has ensured the nation’s secret superpower status but makes Wakanda target for subversion and incursion. Addressing real world political unrest in Africa’s oldest surviving kingdom and Earth’s most advanced (human) nation, Coates & Stelfreeze see T’Challa reclaim the throne ceded to his sister before global catastrophe, economic collapse and consecutive invasions wrought havoc amongst the Wakandans.

As he strives to reassure his aggrieved subjects at the Great Mound, a moment of indiscipline from his guards sparks disaster. As T’Challa faces striking miners, a gesture is misinterpreted and his security team fires into the crowd. Only the Black Panther’s senses detect the presence of another influence shaping emotions and triggering an escalating clash that explosively erupts. Meanwhile, in Burnin Zana: The Golden City of Wakanda another crisis brews. A member of his elite Dora Milaje acts beyond her station; punishing a local chieftain’s abusive treatment of wives and daughters with uncompromising finality. Now, for taking the law into her own hands, Aneka must die…

Near the Nigandan Border, super-powered rebels take stock. “The People” are fomenting violent change in Wakanda using ancient sorcery, unsuspected connections to the palace and the fervent dream of a new nation. Aneka’s resolve to face her fate bravely is challenged and swiftly withers when comrade-in-arms and lover Ayo explosively breaks her out of jail. Wearing stolen Wakandan cybernetic war-armour, the women head into the wilds, seeking nothing but freedom but all too soon are diverted by the plight of abused women they continually encounter.

As the furious fugitives punish the awful ravages of malevolent bandits, rogue chiefs and typical husbands, emancipated women flock to their bloody banner. Wakanda’s growing civil war finds itself faced with a third passionate, deadly faction ready to die for their cause…

And in a place supposedly far removed from the cares of the world, recently deceased Queen Shuri is challenged by a mysterious stranger in The Djalia. Shuri is not destined for peace or rest but has a task to finish if the spirits of her ancestors are to be believed…

Tragically, as the opposing forces and ideologies converge in a very earthly hiding hole, the extremely rich white man funding much of the chaos gloats and further refines his grand scheme and T’Challa acts at last to resurrect his sister…

Jumping to #8 and following the defeat of the plotters – thanks to aid from Luke Cage, Misty Knight,  teleporting mutant Manifold and estranged wife/former queen Storm – the King completes his interrupted task, recalling Shuri back from ancestral heaven in time to jointly end the rebellions, crush the threat of The People and usher in a new era of democracy and constitutional monarchy. Of course, as deliciously delineated by Chris Sprouse, Karl Story, Walden Wong, Goran Sudžuka, Roberto Poggi & Laura Martin, that struggle for the heart soul and consensual governance of the reunited tribes of Wakanda is spectacular and costly…

Ending the mystery history tour is the last half of 2018 miniseries Black Panther: Long Live the King (2018), with #3-4  – ‘Keep Your Friend Close parts 1 & 2’ – spanning cover-dates May 2005 to March 2018. A revised peek at T’Challa’s formative years by Aaron Covington, illustrator Mario Del Pennino, and colourist Chris O’Halloran, it sees the siblings united and the nation endangered by old friends, rogue robots and the White Gorilla cult…

With covers by Esad Ribi?, J. Scott Campbell & Edgar Delgado, Mike Del Mundo, Brian Stelfreeze & Laura Martin, Khary Randolf & Emilio Lopez, plus variants by Ken Lashley, Paul Neary & Paul Mounts, Mitch Breitweiser, Stephanie Hans, Alex Ross, Olivier Coipel and Ryan Sook, this is a large but slight, immensely readable introduction to a rich, vast and complex world: a full-on rollercoaster ride no fan of Fights ‘n’ Tights fantasy can afford to be without.
© 2016 MARVEL. All rights reserved.

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Fantastic Four Epic Collection volume 9: The Crusader Syndrome – 1974-1976


By Gerry Conway, Roy Thomas, Len Wein, Tony Isabella, Steve Englehart, Marv Wolfman, Chris Claremont, Rich Buckler, John Buscema, George Pérez, Sal Buscema, Bob Brown, Joe Sinnott, Jim Mooney, Joe Staton, Frank Giacoia, Mike Esposito, Chic Stone, Vince Colletta with Stan Lee, Dick Ayers, Paul Reinman & various (MARVEL)
ISBN 978-1-3029-4875-7 (TPB/Digital edition)

Monolithic modern Marvel truly began with the adventures of a small super-team who were as much squabbling family as coolly capable costumed champions. Everything the company is now stems from the quirky quartet and the groundbreaking, inspired efforts of Stan Lee & Jack Kirby…

Cautiously bi-monthly and cover-dated November 1961, Fantastic Four #1 – by Stan, Jack, George Klein & Christopher Rule – was raw and crude even by the ailing company’s standards: but it seethed with rough, passionate and uncontrolled excitement. Thrill-hungry kids pounced on its dynamic storytelling and caught a wave of change starting to build in America. It and succeeding issues changed comics forever. As seen in the premier issue, maverick scientist Reed Richards, his fiancée Sue Storm, their close friend Ben Grimm and Sue’s bratty teenaged brother Johnny survived an ill-starred private space-shot after Cosmic Rays penetrated their ship’s inadequate shielding.

All four permanently mutated: Richards’ body became elastic, Sue became (even more) invisible, Johnny Storm burst into living flame and tragic Ben shockingly devolved into a shambling, rocky freak. After the initial revulsion and trauma passed, they solemnly agreed to use their abilities to benefit mankind. Thus was born The Fantastic Four.

Throughout the 1960s it was indisputably the key title and most consistently groundbreaking series of Marvel’s ever-unfolding web of cosmic creation: a forge for new concepts and characters. Kirby was approaching his creative peak: continually unleashing his vast imagination on plot after spectacular plot, whilst Lee scripted some of the most passionate superhero sagas ever seen. Both were on an unstoppable roll, at the height of their powers and full of the confidence only success brings, with The King particularly eager to see how far the genre and the medium could be pushed… which is rather ironic since it was the company’s reticence to give the artist creative freedom which led to Kirby’s moving to National/DC in the 1970s.

Without Kirby’s soaring imagination the rollercoaster of mind-bending High Concepts gave way to more traditional tales of characters in conflict, with soap-opera leanings and super-villain-dominated Fights ‘n’ Tights dramas. This stripped-down, compelling compilation gathers Fantastic Four #147-167, Giant-Size Fantastic Four #2-4 and Avengers #127: collectively covering June 1974 to February 1976 and heralding a change of pace and partial return of The King – even if only on covers…

Fantastic Four #147 offers action-tinged melodrama with Gerry Conway, Rich Buckler & Joe Sinnott in how ‘The Sub-Mariner Strikes!’ as long-sidelined and neglected Susan Richards starts divorce proceedings against Reed whilst seemingly taking comfort in the arms of long-time admirer/stalker Prince Namor of Atlantis. When Reed, Johnny, Ben and Inhuman substitute teammate Medusa try to “rescue” her, the Atlantean ruler thrashes them before Sue sends them packing…

To add insult to injury, the dejected men return home to find the Baxter Building once more invaded by the Frightful Four and are forced to fight a ‘War on the Thirty-Sixth Floor!’ Sadly The Sandman, Wizard and Trapster have no idea their newest ally Thundra is secretly smitten with the Thing. FF #149 resolves the scandalous Sub-Mariner storyline as the undersea emperor invades New York in ‘To Love, Honour, and Destroy!’ Happily, his awesome attack is merely a cunning plan to trick Sue into reconciling with her husband. It almost works…

Courtesy of Conway, John Buscema & Chic Stone, Giant-Size Fantastic Four #2 reveals a time-twisting ‘Cataclysm!’, wherein cosmic voyeur The Watcher warns of a hapless innocent who has inadvertently altered history, thanks to Dr. Doom’s confiscated time platform. Once again the supposedly non-interventionist extraterrestrial expects the FF to fix a universal dilemma…

With more than one temporal hot-spot, Reed and Johnny head for Colonial America to rescue the Father of the Nation in ‘George Washington Almost Slept Here!’, whilst Ben and Medusa crash into the “Roaring Twenties” and save the time-lost wanderer from being rubbed out by racketeers in ‘The Great Grimmsby’. Thinking their mission accomplished, the heroes are astounded to then find themselves trapped in timeless Limbo, battling monstrous giant Tempus before escaping to their restored origin point in ‘Time Enough for Death!’

For months lovelorn Johnny had fretted and fumed that his first true love Crystal was to marry super-swift mutant Quicksilver. That plot-thread finally closed in a 2-part crossover tale opening in Avengers #127 (September 1974). Crafted by Steve Englehart, Sal Buscema & Joe Staton, ‘Bride and Doom!’ sees the Assemblers travel to Attilan (hidden homeland of the Inhumans) for the wedding of aforementioned speedster Pietro to elemental enchantress/Royal Princess, only to meet an uprising of the genetic slave-race designated Alpha Primitives. Once again, sinister robotic colossus Omega has incited revolt, but this time it isn’t insane usurper Maximus behind the seditious skulduggery but an old Avengers enemy who reveals himself in the concluding chapter from in Fantastic Four #150.

‘Ultron-7: He’ll Rule the World!’ (Conway, Buckler & Sinnott) finds both teams joining Black Bolt’s Inhumans against the malign A.I., but only saved by a veritable Deus ex Machina after which, at long last, ‘The Wedding of Crystal and Quicksilver’ finally closes events on a happy note – for everybody but the Torch, that is…

The dramatic tensions resume with Giant-Size Fantastic Four #3 as plotter Gerry Conway, scripter Marv Wolfman and illustrators Rich Buckler & Joe Sinnott deliver an epic tale of global import. The extra-special quarterly Giant-Size range was devoted to offering blockbuster thrills, and herein reveal ‘Where Lurks Death… Ride the Four Horsemen!’ as cosmic aliens arrive, intent on scourging the Earth.

Forewarned after the team stumble across the first horror in ‘…There Shall Come Pestilence’, our harried heroes split up with Inhuman stand-in Medusa and Johnny striving against international madness in ‘…And War Shall Take the Land!’ whilst Reed and Ben fight to foil the personification of Famine in ‘…And the Children Shall Hunger!’, before all reunite to wrap up the final foe in ‘…All in the Valley of Death!’

In FF #151 Conway, Buckler & Sinnott begin revealing the truth about the mysterious “Femizon” stalking the Thing. ‘Thundra and Lightning!’ introduces male-dominated alternate Future Earth Machus and its brutal despot Mahkizmo, the Nuclear Man, who explosively invades the Baxter Building in search of a mate to dominate and another world to conquer…

Inked by Jim Mooney, #152 exposes ‘A World of Madness Made!’ with the team captive in the testosterone-saturated side-dimension whilst Medusa seemingly flees, whilst actually seeking reinforcements from the diametrically-opposed Femizon future/alternity, resulting in two universes crashing together in the concluding ‘Worlds in Collision!’ by Tony Isabella, Buckler & Sinnott.

Rapidly reworked by Len Wein, Fantastic Four #154 featured ‘The Man in the Mystery Mask!’: a partial reprint from Strange Tales #127 in which Stan Lee, Dick Ayers & Paul Reinman pitted Ben and Johnny against ‘The Mystery Villain!’. Here, however, Bob Brown, Frank Giacoia & Mike Esposito’s revisions depict how Reed’s early lesson in leadership has been hijacked by another old friend with explosive and annoying results…

Meanwhile over in Giant-Size Fantastic Four #4, Wein, Chris Claremont, John Buscema, Chic Stone & Sinnott unite to introduce ‘Madrox the Multiple Man’: a young mutant who grew up on an isolated farm unaware of the incredible power he possessed. When his parents pass away, the kid is inexplicably drawn to New York City, where the hi-tech suit he wears to contain his condition malfunctions. Soon the boy devolves into a mobile fission device that can endlessly, lethally replicate himself. Thankfully the FF are aided by mutant Moses Charles Xavier who dutifully takes young Jamie under his wing…

A minor classic from Wein, Buckler & Sinnott follows s seen in Fantastic Four #155-157 when the long dormant Silver Surfer resurfaces in ‘Battle Royal!’ – apparently a murderous thrall of Doctor Doom. The Iron Dictator commands the Stellar Skyrider because he holds the alien’s lover Shalla Bal –-even cruelly threatening to take her in marriage. However, as seen in ‘Middle Game!’ (with Roy Thomas joining as co-writer and Editor) the Surfer cannot kill and merely delivers the defeated FF as prisoners to the Devil Doctor’s citadel. Naturally, there are schemes within schemes unfolding and Doom is playing a waiting game whilst covertly siphoning the Surfer’s “Power Cosmic” to fuel a deadly Doomsman mechanoid…

With Thomas in full authorial control ‘And Now… the Endgame Cometh!’ sees the heroes fight back to conquer the Lethal Latverian, blithely unaware the entire charade has been a crafty confection of malignly manipulative demon-lord Mephisto…

The furore is followed by another nostalgia-tinged 2-part epic beginning with FF #158’s ‘Invasion from the 5th (Count it, 5th!) Dimension’ by Thomas, Buckler & Sinnott. When one of the Torch’s earliest solo scourges returns to occupy the homeland of the Inhumans, extra-dimensional dictator Xemu opens his campaign of vengeance by dispatching Quicksilver to lure his sister-in-law Medusa back to Attilan. The intention is to force defiant King Black Bolt to utilise his doomsday sonic power on the invaders’ behalf, for which the conqueror needs the silent king’s true love as a bargaining chip. However, when the FF accompany her into the blatant trap, they bring a hidden ally who turns the tables on Xemu, unleashing ‘Havoc in the Hidden Land!’, coincidentally and at last reuniting the First Family of comic book fiction…

More pan-dimensional panic ensues when a multiversal conflict is cunningly concocted by a hidden mastermind orchestrating Armageddon for a trio of dimensionally-adjacent planets for ‘In One World… and Out the Other!’ Devised by Thomas, John Buscema & Stone, the initial chapter sees shapeshifting Reed Richards sell his patents to a vast corporation, even as in the streets his counterpart from another universe is kidnapped by barbarian warlord Arkon the Magnificent. That abduction is investigated by a very Grimm Thing who has uncomfortable suspicions about what’s occurring…

With Buckler & Sinnott doing the depicting ‘All the World Wars at Once!’ expands the saga as Johnny Storm visits the recently liberated 5th Dimensional Earth to discover it under assault by androids from yet another slightly different one. As the Thing teams up with his other-earth counterpart to quell a dinosaur invasion, “our” world is assaulted by an army from the 5th dimension led by the Torch. With each realm believing itself provoked by trans-terrestrial aggressors, the divided team only knows one thing: each invading force is using weaponry invented by Richards…

The crises peaks in ‘The Shape of Things to Come!’ as the mastermind is exposed and the scheme to annihilate three worlds come close to fruition, necessitating a voyage to a cosmic nexus point and a devastating battle with yet another twisted alternate-reality hero to save existence in a spectacular and poignant ‘Finale  #163.

A new direction began with #164 (part 1 of a reconditioned yarn originally intended for Giant-Size Fantastic Four), courtesy of Thomas and then-neophyte illustrator George Pérez, backed up by Sinnott. ‘The Crusader Syndrome!’ sees the team battling a veteran superhero gone bad since his last outing as Atlas-Era champion Marvel Boy. Now as The Crusader he wages savage war on financial institutions whose self-serving inaction doomed his adopted Uranian race in the 1950s. However, his madness and savagery are no match for the FF and #165’s ‘The Light of Other Worlds!’ details his apparent demise. It also sparks many successful additions to Marvel Continuity, such as new hero Quasar, the 1950s Avengers and Agents of Atlas whilst introducing Galactus’ herald-in-waiting Frankie Raye as Johnny’s new girlfriend…

This formidable high-tension Fights ‘n’ Tights tome terminates in a titanic tussle as Vince Colletta inks #166 as ‘If It’s Tuesday, This Must be the Hulk!’ as the team hunts the Gamma Goliath with a potential cure for Bruce Banner. Sadly, aggressive and insulting military treatment of their target enrages fellow-monster Ben Grimm who unites with The Hulk to menace St. Louis, Missouri as ‘Titans Two!’ (with Sinnott back on inks). Following a mighty struggle with his old friends and constantly bathed in Hulk’s Gamma radiation, Ben is permanently reduced to human form and contemplates a whole new life…

To Be Continued…

With covers by Buckler, Gil Kane, John Romita, Ron Wilson, Kirby, Sinnott and more this power-packed package also includes the covers to all-reprint Giant-Sized Fantastic Four #5 & 6 and the original unused cover for GSFF #5 (which contents became FF #158-159); house ads and the new material from The Fabulous Fantastic Four Marvel Treasury Edition #2 (December 1975). This bombastic oversized tabloid edition featured a bevy of classic yarns and is represented here by front-&-back cover art from John Romita, a Marie Severin frontispiece and Stan Lee Introduction, contents page and double-page pin-up of the team and supporting cast by John Buscema & Giacoia.

Also on view are extracts from F.O.O.M. #8-10 (comedic exploits of Doctor Foom by Charley Parker), pertinent pages by Buckler & Sinnott from The Mighty Marvel Calendar 1975, cover plus splash page by Dave Cockrum & Sinnott from November 1977’s Marvel Super Action #4 which reprinted Marvel Boy stories from the early 1950s and a gallery of original art pages and a colour guide.

Although Kirby had taken the unmatched imagination and questing sense of wonder with him on his departure, the sheer range of beloved characters and concepts he had created with Lee carried the series for years afterwards. So once writers who shared their sensibilities were crafting the stories a mini-renaissance began. Although the “World’s Greatest Comics Magazine” didn’t quite return to the stratospheric heights of yore, this period offers fans a tantalising taste of the glory days. These honest and extremely capable efforts will still thrill and enthral the generous and forgiving casual browser looking for an undemanding slice of graphic narrative excitement.
© 2023 MARVEL.

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Golden Age Marvel Comics Masterworks volume 1



By Carl Burgos, Bill Everett, Paul Gustavson, Ben Thompson, Ed Wood/Fred Schwab, Al Anders, Tomm Dixon/Art Panajian, Steve Dahlman, Stockbridge Winslow/Bob Davis, Irwin Hasen, Ray Gill, David C. Cooke, Charles J. Mazoujian, Paul Lauretta, Harry Ramsey, Alex Schomburg & others (MARVEL)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-1609-7 (HB/Digital edition) 978-0-7851-5052-7 (TPB)

There are many comics and strip anniversaries this year and this title ranks among the most significant, containing not one but two superstar launches and a few minor milestones too…

After a rather shaky start and inauspicious in 1936, the fledgling comic book industry was saved by the invention of Superman two years later. His iconic innovations launched a new popular genre and paved the way for explosive expansion. By 1939 the new kids on the block were in a frantic flurry of creative frenzy with every publisher trying to make and own the Next Big Thing.

Martin Goodman’s pulp fiction outfit leapt into the turbulent marketplace and scored big with initial offering Marvel Comics, released late in the year before inexplicably switching to the marginally less euphonious Marvel Mystery Comics with the second issue. During those early days, novel ideas, raw ambition and sheer exuberance could take you far and, as most alternative means of entertainment escapism for kids were severely limited, it just wasn’t that hard to make a go of it as a comic book publisher. Combine that with a creative work-force which kept being drafted, and it’s clear to see why low and declining standards of story and art didn’t greatly affect month-to-month sales during the years of World War II.

However, once hostilities ceased a cascade-decline in superhero strips began even before GI boots hit US soil again. Those innocent kids had seen a lot and wanted something more than brashness, naivety and breakneck pace from their funnybooks now…

Both The Human Torch and Sub-Mariner quickly won favour with the burgeoning if fickle readership, but the remaining characters were soon acknowledged to be B-listers and subject to immediate replacement if a better idea presented itself. Still, 2 out of 7 was pretty good: Action and Detective Comics only had one super-star apiece at the outset. Another holdover from the pre-comics, pulp fiction era of the company was its tendency to treat instalments as serial chapters; always promising more & better if you’d just come back next month…

Before the year was out Timely’s “Big Two” would clash – frequently and repeatedly battling like elemental gods in the skies above Manhattan. Goodman apparently favoured Ka-Zar and The Angel: both characters devolving from his own stable of pulp genre stars. Sadly, neither generic jungle adventures of the company’s premiere Tarzan knockoff nor the thud-&-blunder crimebusting rogue’s potboilers – which owed so much to Leslie Charteris’ iconic dark knight The Saint – appeal to kids like the spectacular graphic histrionics of anarchic Fire and Water anti-heroes did…

An editorial policy of rapid expansion was quickly adopted: release a new book filled with whatever was dreamed up by the art-&-script monkeys of the comics “shop” (freelancers who packaged material on spec for publishing houses: Martin Goodman bought all his product from Lloyd Jacquet’s Funnies Inc.), keep the popular hits and ditch everything else. Timely Comics, or Red Circle as the company occasionally called itself, enjoyed a huge turnover of characters who only minimal appearances before vanishing, thereafter un-seen again until modern revivals or recreations produced fresh versions of characters like Angel, Ka-Zar or Electro.

This volume – available in hardback, softcover and eBook editions – kicks into high gear following a knowledgeable and informative scene-setting introduction by Golden Age Guru Roy Thomas. The landmark Marvel Comics #1 sported a cover by pulp illustrator Frank R. Paul, and after spot gag page ‘Now I’ll Tell One’ (by “Ed Wood” – AKA Fred Schwab) introduces to the gasping populace Carl Burgos’ landmark conception ‘The Human Torch’…

The Flaming Fury led off a parade of wonderment, bursting into life as a malfunctioning humanoid devised by Professor Phineas Horton. Igniting into an uncontrollable blazing fireball whenever exposed to air, the artificial innocent was condemned to entombment in concrete but escaped to accidentally imperil the city until falling into the hands of a gangster named Sardo. When his attempts to use the gullible android as a terror weapon backfire, the hapless newborn is left a misunderstood fugitive, like a modern-day Frankenstein’s monster. Even his creator only sees the flaming waif as a means of making money…

Crafted by Paul Gustavson (Human Bomb, Fantom of the Fair, Man O’ War), the opening episode of ‘The Angel’ owed a litigiously large debt to 1938 Louis Hayward film The Saint in New York. Although dressed like a superhero, the globetrotting do-gooder offered a blend of Charteris’s iconic valiant scoundrel and The Lone Wolf (Louis Vance’s urbane 2-fisted hero who was subject of 8 books and 24 B-movies between 1917 and 1949). However, the four-colour paladin’s foes soon tended towards only the spooky, the ghoulish and the just plain demented. He also seemed able to cast giant shadows in the shape of an angel. Not the greatest aid to cleaning up the scum of the Earth, but he coped in his initial enterprise when tasked with cleaning up New York’s gang problems and dealing with the deadly depredations of a crime syndicate dubbed ‘The Six Big Men’…

Bill Everett’s contribution ‘The Sub-Mariner’ was actually an expanded reprint of a beautiful black-&-white strip from Motion Picture Funnies. Prince Namor was scion of an aquatic civilisation living under the South Pole. These technologically advanced merfolk had been decimated by American mineral exploration a generation previously, and Namor’s future mother Fen had been dispatched to spy upon them. She had gotten too close, fallen pregnant by one of the interlopers. Twenty years later her amphibious mutant-hybrid son was bent onto exacting revenge on the air-breathers – which he began by attacking New York City…

Cowboy Jim Gardley was framed by ruthless cattle-baron Cal Brunder and found the only way to secure a measure of justice was to become ‘The Masked Raider’: dispensing six-gun law. Al Anders’ Lone Ranger riff was competent but uninspired, lasting until Marvel Mystery #12. Offering a complete adventure, ‘Jungle Terror’ by Tomm Dixon (aka Art Panajian) follows gentlemen explorers Ken Masters and Tim Roberts (pictorially patterned on Caniff’s Pat Ryan and Terry Lee) battling savages in the Amazon to find cursed diamonds. After a brief prose vignette – a staple of early comics – detailing Ray Gill’s racing car drama ‘Burning Rubber’ the aforementioned ‘Adventures of Ka-Zar the Great’ begins with Ben Thompson (The Masked Marvel, Hydro-Man) adroitly adapting Bob Byrd’s pulp novel King of Fang and Claw to strip serial form. In the first chapter, South African diamond miner John Rand and his wife crash their plane into the Belgian Congo where their son David grows up amidst jungle splendour to become brother to King of Lions Zar. An idyllic life is only marred years later when murderous explorer Paul De Kraft kills old John, leaving young David to seek vengeance…

Behind a Charles J. Mazoujian Angel cover, the abruptly re-titled Marvel Mystery Comics #2 (December 1939) again offered ‘The Human Torch’ by Burgos, wherein the fiery fugitive attains a degree of sophistication and control before stumbling onto a murderous racing car racket. Here gangster Blackie Ross ensures his drivers always win by strafing other contestants from an airplane, until the big-hearted, outraged Torch steps in…

Gustavson despatched ‘The Angel’ to Hong Kong to stop museum researcher Jane Framan falling victim to a curse when the perils of The Lost Temple of Alano prove to be caused by greedy men, not magical spirits, but ‘The Sub-Mariner’ himself is the threat in Everett’s second chapter, as the Marine Marvel goes berserk in a NYC powerhouse before showing his true colours by chivalrously saving a pretty girl caught in the ensuing conflagration. Anti-heroism gives way to traditional nobility as Anders’ ‘Masked Raider’ then breaks up an entire lost town of outlaws, after which the debuting ‘American Ace’ (by Paul Lauretta and clearly based on Roy Crane’s soldier of fortune Wash Tubbs) finds Yankee aviator Perry Wade flying straight into danger when the woman who caused the Great War returns to start WWII by attacking innocent European nations with her hidden armies…

‘The Angel’ stars in an implausible, jingoistic prose yarn (by David C. Cooke illustrated by Mazoujian), single-handedly downing a strafing ‘Death-Bird Squadron’ whilst Thompson introduced fresh horrors – including a marauding, malicious ape named Chaka – to plague young David in more ‘Adventures of Ka-Zar the Great’ before the issue ends with gag pages ‘All in Fun’ by Ed Wood and ‘Looney Laffs’ from Thompson.

Cover-dated January 1940 and sporting an Alex Schomburg Angel cover, Marvel Mystery Comics #3 saw ‘The Human Torch’ evolving into a recognisable superhero series as he battles a ruthless entrepreneur trying to secure the formula for a super-explosive he can sell to Martian invaders, whilst ‘The Angel’ confronts a bloodthirsty death-cult sacrificing young women. Next ‘The Sub-Mariner’ takes a huge leap in dramatic quality after policewoman Betty Dean entices, entraps and successfully reasons with the intractably belligerent subsea invader. With global war looming ever closer, opinions and themes constantly shifted and Everett reacted brilliantly by turning Namor into a protector of all civilians at sea: preying on any warlike nation sinking innocent shipping. Naturally, even before America officially joined the fray, that meant primarily Nazis got their subs and destroyers demolished at the antihero’s sinewy hands…

When gold and oil are discovered under ranch land, ‘The Masked Raider’ steps in to stop greedy killers driving off settlers in a timeless tale of western justice, whereas current events overtook the ‘American Ace’, who faded out after his tale of blitzkrieg bombings in a picturesque Ruritanian nation. Even Cooke & Everett’s text thriller ‘Siegfried Suicide’ was naming and shaming the Axis directly in a yarn of a lone Yank saving French soldiers from German atrocity, before neutrality resumes as, under African skies, the ‘Adventures of Ka-Zar the Great’ sees the boy hero rescue his animal friends from a well-meaning zoo hunter in a tale revealing hints of a Jungle Book style congress of animals…

The final inclusion – Marvel Mystery Comics #4, February 1940 – opens with a Schomburg cover depicting Sub-Mariner smashing a Nazi U-Boat before another inflammatory Burgos ‘Human Torch’ epic sees the android create secret identity Jim Hammond and return to New York to crush a criminal genius terrorising the city with warriors cloaked in lethal, sub-zero ‘Green Flame’…

‘The Angel’ too is in the Big Apple, hunting a small time hood manipulating a monstrous hyper-thyroid case named ‘Butch the Giant’. Impervious to pain and able to punch through brick walls, this slavish meal ticket is eventually overcome, after which ‘The Sub-Mariner Goes to War’ as the passionate Prince rallies his Polar people, employing their advanced technology in a taskforce enforcing his Pax Namor upon the surface world’s war mongers…

Even by its own low standards ‘The Masked Raider’ tale of claim-jumping is far from exemplary, but prose crime puzzler ‘Warning Enough’ (Cooke & Harry Ramsey) is a genuinely enthralling change of pace tale.

Rendered by Steve Dahlman, ‘Electro, the Marvel of the Age’ introduces brilliant Professor Philo Zog who constructs an all-purpose wonder robot and forms an international secret society of undercover operatives who seek out uncanny crimes and great injustices for the automaton to fix. The first case involves retrieving a kidnapped child actress…

Another debut is ‘Ferret, Mystery Detective’ by Stockbridge Winslow (Bob Davis) & Irwin Hasen, following the eponymous crime-writer and his faithful assistants as they solve the case of a corpse dropped on the authors doorstep. Proceedings culminate with another winner in the ‘Adventures of Ka-Zar the Great’ as despised villain De Kraft returns to face the beginning (but not the end: that’s frustratingly left to the next issue …and volume) of the jungle lord’s just vengeance…

Despite many problems – especially its regrettable populist tendencies and desperately dated depictions of race, class, ethnicity and gender – I’m constantly delighted with this substantial chronicle, warts and all, but I can fully understand why anyone other than a life-long comics or Marvel fan might baulk at the steep price-tag in these days of grim austerity, with a wealth of better quality and more highly regarded comics collections available. Nevertheless, value is one thing and worth another, and the sheer vibrantly ingenious rollercoaster rush and vitality of these tales, even more than historical merit or cultural obsolescence, is just so intoxicating that if you like this sort of thing you’ll love this sort of thing.

If anything could convince the undecided to take a look, later editions also include numerous tantalising house ads of the period and a full colour cover gallery of Marvel Mystery Comics’ pulp predecessors: Marvel Science Stories, Marvel Tales, Marvel Stories, Ka-Zar, The Angel Detective, Uncanny Tales, Mystery Tales, Dynamic Science Stories and Star Detective Magazine by illustrators Norman Saunders, Frank R. Paul, H. W. Wesso and John W. Scott. Upping the ante, further bonuses comprise the second print cover of Marvel Comics #1, a sample of Norman Saunders’ original painted art, Everett Sub-Mariner pages and unused cover roughs, a Mazoujian-pencilled Angel cover reworked into the never-printed Zephyr Comics ashcan cover and a Burgos watercolour sketch offering a partial redesign of The Human Torch.

Although probably not to the tastes of most modern fans, for devotees of superheroes, aficionados of historical works and true Marvel Zombies there’s still plenty to enjoy here, and as always, in the end, it’s up to you…
© 1939, 1940, 2004, 2017 Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Marvels (25th Anniversary Edition)


By Kurt Busiek & Alex Ross, with Steve Darnall, Mark Braun, Richard Starkings, John Roshell & various (MARVEL)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-4286-7 (TPB) 978-0-7851-1388-1(HC/Digital edition)

Every so often in mainstream comics something comes along that irrevocably alters the landscape of our art-form, if not the business itself. After each such event the medium is never quite the same again. One such work was 4-issue Prestige Format Limited Series Marvels by jobbing scripter Kurt Busiek and just-breaking illustrator Alex Ross. This year that landmark game-changing graphic collection turns 30…

I’m usually quite reticent in suggesting people read stuff I know damn well they’ve almost certainly already seen, but apparently every day is somebody’s first, and as years pile up and more stuff gets made, even certified bona fide “unmissables” get shuffled into touch and forgotten…

This tale is all about history and human perspective, following the working life of photo-journalist Phil Sheldon, whose career paralleled the double dawning of the heroic era; when science, magic, courage and overwhelming super-nature give birth to an Age of Marvels…

The saga opens with Alex Ross’ brief, preliminary retelling of the origin of the Golden Age Human Torch as first seen in Marvels #0 (co-written by Steve Darnall and produced in classicist pic-&-text block format) before the story proper opens in ‘A Time of Marvels’. In 1939 a gaggle of ambitious young newspapermen discuss the “War in Europe”. Brash up-and-comer J. Jonah Jameson is trying to dissuade his shutterbug pal Phil from heading overseas, claiming there’s plenty of news to snap in New York…

Unconvinced, Sheldon heads to his next assignment: a press conference with scientific crackpot Professor Phineas T. Horton. The photographer’s head is filled with thoughts of journalistic fame and glory on distant battlefields and he almost misses the moment Horton unveils his artificial man: a creature that bursts into flame like a Human Torch…

From that moment on Sheldon’s life is transformed forever. His love-hate fascination with the fantastic miracles which rapidly, unceasingly follow in the inflammatory inhumanoid’s fiery wake is used to trace the rise of superhumanity and monstrous menace which comprises the entire canon of what we know as the Marvel Universe….

Soon the android is accepted as a true hero, frequently battling aquatic invader Sub-Mariner like elemental gods in the skies above the city whilst seemingly-human vigilante supermen like The Angel constantly ignore the law and daily diminish Phil’s confidence and self-worth. It’s as if by their well-meaning actions these creatures are showing that mere men are obsolete and insignificant…

Feelings of ineffectuality and inadequacy having crushed the camera jockey’s spirit, Phil turns down a War Correspondent assignment and descends into a funk. He even splits up with fiancée Doris Jaquet. After all, what kind of man brings children into a world with such inhuman horrors in it? Nevertheless, Sheldon cannot stop following the exploits of the singular human phenomena he’s collectively dubbed “Marvels”…

Everything changes with the arrival of patriotic icon Captain America. With the Land of Liberty in World War II at long last, many once-terrifying titans have become the nation’s allies and secret weapons, turning their awesome power against the Axis foe and winning the fickle approval of a grateful public. However, some were always less dutiful than others. When tempestuous Sub-Mariner again battles the Torch, Prince Namor of Atlantis petulantly unleashes a tidal wave against Manhattan. Phil is critically injured snapping the event…

Even after losing an eye, Phil’s newfound belief in Marvels never wavers and he rededicates himself to his job and Doris; going to Europe where his pictures of America’s superhuman Invaders crushing the Nazi threat become part of the fabric of history…

The second chapter jumps to the 1960s where Sheldon, wife Doris and daughters Jenny and Beth are – like most New Yorkers – at the epicentre of another outbreak of metahumanity… a second Age of Marvels…

Two new bands of costumed champions operate openly: A Fantastic Four-some comprising famous scientist Reed Richards and test pilot Ben Grimm plus Sue and Johnny Storm. Another anonymous team who hide their identities call themselves The Avengers. There are also numerous independent mystery men streaking across the skies and hogging headlines, which Jonah Jameson – now owner/publisher of the newspaper he once wrote for – is none too happy about. After all, he has never trusted masks and is violently opposed to this new crop of masked mystery-men. Phil is still an in-demand freelancer, but has a novel idea, signing a deal for a book of his photos just as the first flush of popular fancy wanes and increasing anxiety about humanoid mutants begins to choke and terrify the man in the street…

When the mysterious X-Men are spotted, Sheldon is caught up in a spontaneous anti-mutant race riot: appalled to find himself throwing bricks with the rest of a deranged mob. He’s even close enough to hear their leader dismissively claim “They’re not worth it”…

Shocked and dazed, Sheldon goes home to his nice, normal family, but the incident won’t leave him, even as he throws himself into work and his book. He worries that his daughters seem to idolise Marvels. “Normal” people seem bizarrely conflicted, dazzled and besotted by the celebrity status of the likes of Reed Richards and Sue Storm as they prepare for their upcoming wedding, yet prowl the streets in vigilante packs lest some ghastly “Homo Superior” abomination show its disgusting face…

Events come to a head when Phil finds his own children harbouring a mutant in the cellar. During WWII, Phil photographed the liberation of Auschwitz, and looking into the huge deformed orbs of “Maggie” he sees what he saw in the faces of those pitiful survivors. His innate humanity wins out and Phil lets her stay, but can’t help dreading what friends and neighbours might do if they find such a creature mere yards from their own precious families…

Hysteria keeps growing and the showbiz glitz of the Richards/Storm wedding is almost immediately overshadowed by the catastrophic launch of anthropologist Bolivar Trask’s Sentinels. At first the mutant-hunting robots behave like humanity’s boon but when they override their programming and attempt to take over Earth, it is despised and dreaded mutants who save mankind.

Naturally, the man in the street knows nothing of this and all Phil sees is more panicked mobs rioting and destroying their own homes. In fear for his family, he rushes back to Doris and the girls, only to find Maggie has vanished: the unlovely little child had realised how much her presence had endangered her benefactors. They never see her again…

The third chapter focuses on the global trauma of ‘Judgement Day’ as the shine truly starts coming off the apple. Even though crises come thick and fast and are as quickly dealt with, vapid, venal humanity becomes jaded with the ever-expanding metahuman community and once-revered heroes are plagued by scandal after scandal. Exhausted, disappointed and dejected, Phil shelves his book project, but fate takes a hand when the skies catch fire and an incredible shiny alien on a skyborne surfboard announces the end of life on Earth…

Planet-devouring Galactus seems unstoppable and the valiant, rapidly-responding Fantastic Four are humiliatingly defeated. Phil, along with the rest of Earth, embraces the end and wearily walks home to be with his loved ones, repeatedly encountering humanity at its best and nauseating, petty, defeated worst. However, with the last-minute assistance of the Silver Surfer – who betrays his puissant master and suffers an horrific fate – Richards saves the world, but within days is accused of faking the entire episode. Disgusted with his fellow men, Sheldon explodes in moral revulsion…

Phil’s photobook is finally released in concluding instalment ‘The Day She Died’. Now an avowed and passionate proponent of masked heroes, humanity’s hair-trigger ambivalence and institutionalised rushes to judgement constantly aggravate Phil even as he meets the public and signs countless copies of “Marvels”.

The average American’s ungrateful, ungracious attitudes rankle particularly since the mighty Avengers are currently lost in another galaxy defending Earth from collateral destruction in a war between rival galactic empires – the Kree and the Skrulls – but the most constant bugbear is old associate Jameson’s obsessive pillorying of Spider-Man. Phil particularly despises a grovelling, ethically-deprived young freelance photographer named Peter Parker who constantly curries favour with the Daily Bugle’s boss by selling pictures deliberately making the wallcrawler look bad…

Phil’s book brings a measure of success, and when the aging photographer hires young Marcia Hardesty as a PA/assistant whilst he works on a follow-up, he finds a passionate kindred spirit. Still, everywhere Sheldon looks costumed champions are being harried, harassed and hunted by hypocritical citizens and corrupt demagogues, although even he has to admit some of the newer heroes are hard to like…

Ex-Russian spy Black Widow is being tried for murder, protesting students are wounded by a Stark Industries super-armoured thug and in Times Square a guy with a shady past is touting himself as a Hero for Hire. When respected Police Captain George Stacy is killed during a battle between Spider-Man and Doctor Octopus, Jameson is frantic to pin the death on the webspinner, but hero-worshipping Phil digs deeper. Interviewing many witnesses – including the murderously malign, multi-limed loon himself – Phil consequently strikes up a friendship with Stacy’s daughter Gwen, a truly sublime young lady who is inexplicably dating that unscrupulous weasel Parker…

One evening, hoping for another innocuous chat with the vivacious lass, Phil sees her abduction by the Green Goblin and, desperately giving chase, watches as his vaunted hero Spider-Man utterly fails to save her from death. Her murder doesn’t even rate a headline; that’s saved for industrialist Norman Osborn who is found mysteriously slain that same night…

Gutted, worn out and somehow betrayed, Sheldon chucks it all in, but seeing Marcia still has the fire in her belly and wonder in her eyes, leaves her his camera and his mission…

Although this titanic tale traces the arc of Marvel continuity, the sensitive and evocative journey of Phil Sheldon is crafted in such a way that no knowledge of the mythology is necessary to follow the plot; and would indeed be a hindrance to sharing the feelings of an ordinary man in extraordinary times.

One of Marvel’s – and indeed the genre’s – greatest tales (but you probably already know that and if you don’t what are you waiting for?), I count at least four separate versions available currently and suggest if you have any money left you opt for the 25th Anniversary edition that comes heavily annotated with numerous articles and extras. These include aforementioned prequel ‘Marvels Book Zero’, and the ‘Marvels Epilogue’ short story. The bonus section comprises a 39-page, panel-by-panel comparison of original 1960s Marvel material with the reinterpretations of #0-4 compiled by Jess Harrold: followed by ‘Marvels: The Proposals’ as Ross & Busiek pitched their big idea: four shots to get it just right, aided by an abundance of glorious ‘character studies’ incorporating a vast cast, and supplemented by text articles on the finished product from November 1993’s Marvel Age #130.

Busiek’s full scripts for #1-4 and a wealth of ‘layouts, pencils & Original Art’ (11 pages) follow, before diving deeper in with a 6-page peek ‘Inside Alex Ross’ Marvels Epilogue Sketchbook’. More commentary follows with recovered Introductions, Busiek’s in-story prose pieces ‘Marvels: The Articles’; 8 pages of Ross’ contribution via ‘Marvels: The Artistic Process’, and Harrold’s popular press features courtesy of ‘The Story of Marvels’, ‘Modern-Day Marvels’, ‘Understanding Marvels by Scott McCloud’, ‘McLaurin’s Mark on Marvels’.

Next comes a ‘Mahvels Parody’ by Darnall, Busiek, Ross & artist Mark Braun, accompanied by ‘Posters, Art & Homage Covers’, Ross’ ‘Marvels Collected-Edition Cover Gallery’, and material seen in previous collections, including an ‘Annotated Cover Gallery’; a selection of ‘Marvels 25th Anniversary Variants’, ‘Marvels 25th Anniversary Tributes Variants’ and ‘Marvels Epilogue Variants’: with 5- full page contributions from Paolo Rivera, Michael Cho, Gabriele Dell’Otto, Stephanie Hans, Daniel Acuña, Mark Brooks, David Mack, Julian Totino Tedesco, Mico Suayan & Brian Reber, Inhyuk Lee, Carlos Pacheco, Leinil Francis Yu & Sunny Cho, Adi Granov, Alan Davis, Mark farmer & Matt Hollingsworth, Nick Bradshaw, Gerlad Parel, Greg Smallwood, Marcos Martin, Tomm Coker, Yasmine Putri, Clayton Crain, Phil Noto, Simone Bianchi, Dave Johnson, Ron Lim & Dean White, Remsy Atassi, Dave Cockrum & Edgar Delgado, Fred Hembeck & Felipe Sobreiro, Skottie Young and more.

The epic history lesson ends with a list of ‘Marvels Sources’, citing where each re-envisioned scene first appeared in comics continuity before closing with Stan Lee’s Marvels TPB (1994) Introduction, full Acknowledgements and a final Afterword from Kurt Busiek & Alex Ross.

A truly groundbreaking achievement, Marvels – in whatever form you see it – is a comics tale you must not miss.
© 2020 MARVEL.

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Avengers versus X-Men Compendium


By Jason Aaron, Brian Michael Bendis, Ed Brubaker, Matt Fraction, Jonathan Hickman, John Romita Jr., Olivier Coipel, Adam Kubert, Frank Cho & various (MARVEL)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-518-5 (B/Digital edition)

Despite all of us being sick as dogs, can we let this anniversary year end without revisiting Marvel’s one big idea in perfect execution? Enjoy this prime example of what made Marvel great – heroes pummelling other heroes…

The mainstream comics industry is now irretrievably wedded to blockbuster continuity-sharing mega-crossover events: rashly doling them out like epi-pens to Snickers addicts with peanut allergies, but at least these days, however, if we have to endure a constant cosmic Sturm and extra-dimensional Drang, the publishers take great pains to ensure that the resulting comics chaos is suitably engrossing and always superbly illustrated…

Marvel’s big thing was always extended clashes between mega-franchises such as The Avengers and X-Men, and this one began in Avengers: X Sanction when time-lost mutant Cable attempted to pre-emptively murder a select roster of the World’s Greatest Heroes to prevent an even greater cosmic tragedy.

Hope Spalding-Summers was the first mutant born on Earth after the temporarily insane Avenger Scarlet Witch used her reality-warping powers to eradicate almost all mutants in existence. Considered a mutant messiah, Hope was raised in the future before inevitably finding her way back to the present where she was adopted by X-Men supremo Scott Summers AKA Cyclops. Innumerable signs and portents had indicated that Hope was a reincarnated receptacle for the devastating cosmic entity dubbed The Phoenix…

This mammoth collection gathers the core 12-issue fortnightly miniseries (April – October 2012) which saw humanity and Homo Superior go to war to possess this celestial chosen one, and also includes prequel Avengers vs. X-Men #0 which laid the plot groundwork for the whole blockbusting Brouhaha.

Necessarily preceded by a double-page scorecard of the 78(!) major players, the story begins with a pair of Prologues (by Brian Michael Bendis, Jason Aaron & Frank Cho) as now-sane and desperately repentant Scarlet Witch Wanda Maximoff tries to make amends and restore her links with the Avengers she betrayed and attacked. However, even after defeating an attack by manic mutate MODOK, and a personal invitation from Ms. Marvel to come back, the penitent mutant is sent packing by her ex-husband The Vision and other male heroes she manipulated.

Meanwhile in Utopia – the West Coast island fortress housing the last 200 mutants on Earth – an increasingly driven Cyclops is administering brutally tough love to adopted daughter Hope. She is determined to defy her apparently inescapable destiny as eventual host for the omnipotent Phoenix force on some far future day by regularly moonlighting as a superhero. Sadly, she’s well out of her depth when she tackles the sinister Serpent Society and daddy humiliatingly comes to her rescue.

… And in the depths of space a ghastly firebird of life and death comes ever closer to Earth…

In the first chapter (by Bendis, John Romita Jr. & Scott Hanna) the catastrophically powerful force of destruction and rebirth nears our world and the perfect mortal host it hungers for and needs to guide it, frantically preceded by desperate harbinger of doom Nova, who almost dies delivering a warning of its proximity and intent. Soon, The Avengers and the US government are laying plans, whilst in Utopia Scott Summers pushes Hope harder than ever. If The Phoenix cannot be avoided, perhaps he can make his daughter strong enough to resist being overwhelmed by its promise of infinite power…

At The Jean Grey School for Higher Learning, ex X-Man and current Avenger Wolverine is approached by Captain America and regretfully leaves his position as teacher to once again battle a force that cannot be imagined…

With even his fellow mutants questioning his tactics and brutal pushing of Hope, Cyclops meets Captain America for a parley. On behalf of the world, the Sentinel of Liberty wants to take Hope into protective custody but the mutants’ leader – distrustful of human bigotry and past duplicity – reacts violently to the far-from-diplomatic overtures…

Jason Aaron scripts the second instalment as frayed tempers lead to all-out battle on the shores of Utopia, with past personal grudges fuelling a brutal conflict. As the metahuman war rages, Wolverine and Spider-Man surreptitiously go after hidden Hope, but – even far off in deep space – The Phoenix force has infected her and she blasts them…

Meanwhile in the extra-solar void Thor, Vision, War Machine and a select team of Secret Avengers confront the mindlessly onrushing energy construct…

Scripted by Ed Brubaker, Chapter 3 begins with the recovering Wolverine and Wallcrawler considering how to catch missing hyper-powerful Hope with both Avengers and recently departed X-Men chasing her. When the feral mutant clashes over tactics with Captain America, the resulting fight further divides Avenger forces. In episode 4 (authored by Jonathan Hickman) as the easily defeated space defenders limp back to Earth, Hope and Wolverine meet at the bottom of the world and devise their own plans for her future…

All over Earth heroes are hunting the reluctant chosen one, and clashes between mutants and superhumans are steadily intensifying in ferocity, but the fugitive pair evade all pursuit by stealing a rocket and heading to the ancient “Blue Area of the Moon” where revered mutant Jean Grey first died to save the universe from The Phoenix.

When the former Marvel Girl was originally possessed by the fiery force she became a hero of infinite puissance and a cataclysmic champion of Life, before the power corrupted her and she devolved into Dark Phoenix: a rapacious wanton god of planet-killing appetites…

In a valiant act of contrition, Jean permitted the X-Men to kill her before her rapacious need completely consumed her in the oxygen-rich ancient city on the lunar surface (of course that’s just the tip of an outrageously long and overly-complicated iceberg not germane or necessary to us here: just search-engine the tale afterwards, OK?… or just buy one of many collections of The Dark Pheonix Saga).

When Hope finally reaches the spot of her predecessor’s sacrifice she finds that she’s been betrayed and that the Avengers are waiting – and so are mutants Cyclops, Emma Frost, Colossus, Magik and Namor the Sub-Mariner. With battle set to begin again, the battered body of Thor crashes into the lunar dust and the sky is lit by the blazing arrival of the Phoenix avatar…

Matt Fraction scripts the 5th chapter as the appalling firebird attempts to possess Hope, who realises she has completely overestimated her ability to handle the ultimate force, even as Avengers and X-Men again come to blistering blows.

Some distance away super-scientists Tony Stark and Henry Pym deploy a last-ditch anti-Phoenix invention but it doesn’t work as planned, and when the furious light finally dies down, infernal energy has possessed not Hope but the five elder mutants who turn their blazing eyes towards Earth and begin to plan how best to remake it…

Olivier Coipel & Mark Morales begin a stint as illustrators with the 6th – Hickman scripted – instalment as, 10 days after, old comrades Magneto and Charles Xavier meet to discuss the paradise Earth has become – especially for mutants. Violence, disease, hunger and want are gone but Cyclops, Emma, Sub-Mariner, Magic and Colossus are distant, aloof saviours at best and the power they share incessantly demands to be used more and more and more…

Myriad dimensions away in the mystical city of K’un Lun, kung fu overlord Lei Kung is warned an ancient disaster is repeating itself on Earth and dispatches the city’s greatest hero Iron Fist to avert overwhelming disaster, even as fearful humanity is advised their old bad ways will no longer be allowed to despoil the world. Naturally the decree of a draconian “Pax Utopia” does not sit well with humanity, and soon the Avengers are again at war with the last few hundreds of mutantkind. This time, however, the advantage is overwhelmingly with the underdogs and their five godlike leaders…

A desperate raid to snatch Hope from Utopia goes catastrophically wrong until the long-reviled Scarlet Witch intervenes and rescues the Avengers and Hope. Astounded to realise Wanda’s probability-altering gifts can harm them, the “Phoenix Five” declare all-out, total war on the human heroes…

In the 7th, Fraction-scripted, chapter Avengers are hunted all over the planet and the individual personalities of the possessed X-Men start clashing with each other. As Iron Fist, Lei Kung and Stark seek a marriage of spiritual and technological disciplines, Sub-Mariner defies the Phoenix consensus to attack the African nation of Wakanda…

Adam Kubert & John Dell handle the art from issue #8 with Bendis’ script revealing how an army of Avengers and the power of Wanda and Xavier turn the tide of battle… but not before a nation dies. Moreover, with Namor beaten, his portion of Phoenix-power passes on to the remaining four, inspiring greedy notions of sole control amongst the possessed…

In #9 (by Aaron, Kubert & Dell) as the hunt for heroes continues on Earth, in K’un Lun Hope is being trained in martial arts discipline by the city’s immortal master, and schooled in sheer guts and humanity by Spider-Man. When Thor is captured, the Avengers stage an all-out assault and by a miracle defeat both Magik and Colossus. Tragically, that only makes Scott Summers stronger still and he comes looking for his wayward daughter…

Brubaker writes the 10th chapter as Cyclops invades K’un Lun with horrific consequences whilst on Earth Emma Frost succumbs to the worst aspects of her nature: enslaving friends and foes with her half of the infinite Phoenix force. Simultaneously, Captain America and Xavier lay plans for one last “Hail Mary” assault…

And in the mystic city, Hope finally comes into her power – blasting Cyclops out of that other reality and back to the moon where the tragedy began…

Bendis, Coipel & Morales craft the penultimate instalment as Phoenix’s rapacious destructive hunger causes Cyclops to battle Frost, even as the unifying figure of Xavier unites X-Men and Avengers against the true threat, as with issue #12 (Aaron, Kubert & Dell) Cyclops finally descends into the same hell as his beloved, long-lost Jean by becoming a seemingly unstoppable, insatiable Dark Phoenix with only the assembled heroes and the poor, resigned Hope prepared to stop him from consuming the Earth…

The series generated a host of variant covers (I lost count at 87) by Cho, Jason Keith, Jim Cheung, Laura Martin, Stephanie Hans, Romita Jr., Ryan Stegman, Carlo Barberi, Olivier Coipel, Morales, Skott Young, Arthur Adams, Nick Bradshaw, Carlo Pagulayan, Sara Pichelli, J. Scott Campbell, Jerome Opeña, Mark Bagley, Dale Keown, Esad Ribic, Adam Kubert, Alan Davis, Humberto Ramos, Leinil Francis Yu, Adi Granov and Billy Tan which will undoubtedly delight and astound the artistically adroit amongst you…

Fast, furious and utterly absorbing – if short on plot – this ideal summer blockbuster (don’t you wish movie lawyers moved as fast as comics folk and this was screen ready by now?) remains an extreme Fights ‘n’ Tights funnybook extravaganza that delivers a mighty punch without any real necessity to study beforehand: a comics-continuity both veterans and film-fed fanboys alike can relish.
© 2012 Marvel.

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The X-Men Omnibus volume 1


By Stan Lee & Jack Kirby, Roy Thomas, Werner Roth, Alex Toth, Jack Sparling, Paul Reinman, Dick Ayers, John Tartaglione, & various (MARVEL)
ISBN: 978-1-3029-3289-3 (HB/Digital edition)

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Incomparable Strangers Bearing Gifts … 9/10

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 (including hot-off-the-presses Iron Man) together as the Avengers, launching a decidedly different war comic in Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos and creating a group of alienated heroic teenagers who gathered together to fight a rather specific, previously unperceived threat to humanity.

Those halcyon days are revisited in this splendid but weighty compilation: gathering from September 1963 to April 1967, the contents of X-Men #1-31, pertinent letters pages, sundry historically pertinent extras and a trio of Introductions by Lee and Roy Thomas culled from previous Marvel Masterworks collections.

Issue #1 introduced Cyclops, Iceman, Angel and the Beast: very special students of wheelchair-bound telepath Professor Charles Xavier who has dedicated his life to brokering peace and integration between the masses of humanity and the emergent off-shoot race of mutants dubbed Homo Superior. The story opens as the students welcome newest classmate Jean Grey, a young woman with the ability to move objects with her mind. No sooner has the Professor explained their mission than an actual Evil Mutant, Magneto, single-handedly takes over American missile base Cape Citadel. Seemingly unbeatable, the master of magnetism is nonetheless driven off – in under 15 minutes – by the young heroes on their first mission…

It doesn’t sound like much, but the gritty dynamic power of Kirby’s art, solidly inked by veteran Paul Reinman, imparted a raw energy to the tale which carried the bi-monthly book irresistibly forward. With issue #2, a Federal connection was established in the form of FBI Special Agent Fred Duncan, who requests the teen team’s assistance in capturing a mutant who threatens to steal US military secrets in ‘No One Can Stop the Vanisher!’.

These days, young heroes are ten-a-penny, but it should be noted that these were Marvel’s first juvenile super-doers since the end of the Golden Age, so it’s perhaps unsurprising that in this tale of a terrifying teleporter the outmatched youngsters need a little adult supervision…

Issue #3’s ‘Beware of the Blob!’ displays a rare lapse of judgement as proselytising Professor X invites a sideshow freak into the team only to be rebuffed by the fully felonious mutant. Impervious to mortal harm, The Blob incites his carnival cronies to attack the hidden heroes before they can come after him, and once again it’s up to teacher to save the day…

With X-Men #4 (March 1964) a thematic sea-change occurs as Magneto returns, leading ‘The Brotherhood of Evil Mutants!’ Intent on conquering a South American country and establishing a political powerbase, he ruthlessly dominates Mastermind, Toad, Quicksilver and The Scarlet Witch, who are very much unwilling thralls in the bombastic struggle that follows. From then, the champions-in-training are the prey of many malevolent mutants.

As well as beginning letters page ‘Let’s Visit the X-Man’, #5 reveals ‘Trapped: One X-Man!’ as an early setback in that secret war sees Angel abducted to Magneto’s orbiting satellite base Asteroid M, where only a desperate battle at the edge of space eventually saves him, after which ‘Sub-Mariner Joins the Evil Mutants!’

The self-explanatory tale of gripping intensity is elevated to magical levels of artistic quality as the superb Chic Stone replaced Reinman as inker for the rest of Kirby’s tenure. The issue also incorporates a stunning ‘Special Pin-up page’ starring “Cyclops” before genuine narrative progress is made in ‘The Return of the Blob!’ as their mentor leaves on a secret mission, after appointing Cyclops team leader. Comedy relief is provided as Lee & Kirby introduce Beast and Iceman to a Beatnik-inspired “youth scene” whilst a high action quotient is maintained courtesy of a fractious teaming of Blob and Magneto’s malign brood…

Another and very different invulnerable mutant debuted in ‘Unus the Untouchable!’: a wrestler with an invisible force field who attempts to join the Brotherhood by offering to bring them an X-Man. Also notable is the first real incident of “anti-mutant hysteria” after a mob attacks Beast – a theme that would become the cornerstone of X-Men mythology – and added delight ‘Special Pin-up page – ‘The Beast’.

X-Men #9 (January 1965) is the first true masterpiece of this celebrated title. ‘Enter, The Avengers!’ reunites the youngsters with Professor X in the wilds of Balkan Europe, as deadly schemer Lucifer seeks to destroy Earth with a super-bomb, subsequently manipulating the teens into an all-out battle with the awesome Avengers. This month’s extra treat is a Marvel Masterwork Pin-up of ‘Marvel Girl’.

This is still a perfect Marvel comic story today, as is its follow-up ‘The Coming of Ka-Zar!’: a wild excursion to Antarctica, featuring the discovery of the Antediluvian Savage Land and a modern incarnation of one of Marvel/Timely’s oldest heroes (Kazar the Great was a pulp Tarzan knock-off who migrated to comics pages in November 1939’s Marvel Comics #1).

Dinosaurs, lost cities, spectacular locations, mystery and action: it never got better than this…

After spectacular starts on most of Marvel’s Superhero titles (as well as western and war revamps), Kirby’s increasing workload compelled him to cut back to just laying out most of these lesser lights whilst Thor and Fantastic Four evolved into perfect playgrounds and full-time monthly preoccupations for his burgeoning imagination. The last series Jack surrendered was still-bimonthly X-Men wherein an outcast tribe of mutants worked clandestinely to foster peace and integration

His departure in #11 was marked by a major turning point. ‘The Triumph of Magneto!’ sees our heroes and the Brotherhood both seeking a fantastically powered being dubbed The Stranger. None knew his true identity, nature or purpose, but when the Master of Magnetism finds him first, it signalled the end of his war with the X-Men…

With Magneto gone and the Brotherhood broken, Kirby relinquished pencilling to others, providing loose layouts and character design only. Alex Toth & Vince Colletta proved an uncomfortable mix for #12’s tense drama ‘The Origin of Professor X!’: opening a 2-part saga introducing Xavier’s half-brother Cain Marko and revealing that simplistic thug’s mystic transformation into an unstoppable human engine of destruction.

The story concludes with ‘Where Walks the Juggernaut’: a compelling, tension-drenched tale guest-starring The Human Torch, most notable for the introduction of penciller Werner Roth (as “Jay Gavin”). He 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 industry veteran, working for the company in the 1950s on star features like 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 of the period, it was DC commitments (mostly romance stories) that forced him to disguise his moonlighting until Marvel was big enough to offer full-time work.

From issue #14 and inked by Colletta, ‘Among us Stalk the Sentinels!’ celebrated the team’s inevitable elevation to monthly publication with the first episode of a 3-part 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 their builder’s, 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 only to became ‘Prisoners of the Mysterious Master Mold!’ before crushing their ferrous foes with ‘The Supreme Sacrifice!’ Dick Ayers had joined as inker with #15, his clean line blending perfectly with Roth’s crisp, 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 battle – 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 genuine apprehension as Xavier Mansion was taken over by an old foe who picked them off one by one until only the youngest remained to battle alone in climactic conclusion ‘If Iceman Should Fail..!’

Lee’s last script was ‘Lo! Now Shall Appear… The Mimic!’ in #19: the tale of troubled teen Cal Rankin who possesses the ability to copy skills, powers and abilities of anyone in close proximity. Scripting fell to Thomas in #20, who promptly jumped in guns blazing with ‘I, Lucifer…’: an alien invasion yarn starring Xavier’s arch-nemesis plus Unus the Untouchable and Blob. Most importantly, it revealed in passing how Professor X lost the use of his legs.

With concluding chapter ‘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 increasingly made X-Men a welcoming read for any educated adolescent …like you or me…

As suggested, X-Men was never one of young Marvel’s top titles but it found a dedicated following, with the frantic, freakish energy of Kirby’s epic dynamism comfortably transiting into the slick, sleek attractiveness of Roth as the fierce tension of hunted, haunted juvenile outsider settled into a pastiche of college and school scenarios so familiar to the students who were the series’ main audience.

A crafty 2-parter then resurrected Avengers villain Count Nefaria who employed illusion-casting technology and a band of other heroes’ minor foes (Unicorn, Porcupine, Plantman, Scarecrow and The Eel, if you’re wondering) to hold Washington DC hostage and frame the X-Men for the entire scheme. ‘Divided… We Fall!’ and ‘To Save a City!’ comprise a fast-paced, old-fashioned Goodies vs. Baddies battle with a decided sting in the tail. Moreover, the tale concludes with Marvel Girl yanked off the team when her parents demand she furthers her education by attending New York’s Metro University…

By the time attitudes and events in the wider world were starting to inflict cultural uncertainty on the Merry Mutants and infusing every issue with an aura of nervous tension. During the heady 1960s, Marvel Comics had a vast following among older teens and college kids, and youthful scribe Thomas spoke and wrote as they did. However, with societal unrest everywhere, those greater issues were being reflected in the comics. A watered-down version of the counter-culture had been slowly creeping into these tales of teenaged triumph and tragedy, mostly for comedic balance, but they were – along with Peter Parker in Amazing Spider-Man – some of the earliest indications of the changing face of America…

Illustrated by Roth with Dick Ayers inking, the action opens with college girl Jean visiting her old chums to regale them with tales of life at Metro University. Her departure segues neatly into a beloved plot standard – Evil Scientist Grows Giant Bugs – when she meets an embittered, recently-fired professor, leading her erstwhile comrades to confront ‘The Plague of… the Locust!’ X-Men #24 isn’t the most memorable of the canon but still reads well and has the added drama of Marvel Girl’s departure crystallizing a romantic rivalry for her affections between Cyclops and Angel: providing another deft sop to the audience as it enabled many future epics to include Campus life in the mix…

Somehow Jean managed to turn up every issue even as ‘The Power and the Pendant’ (#25, October 1966) found the boys tracking new menace El Tigre. This South American hunter was visiting New York to steal the second half of a Mayan amulet which would grant him god-like powers. Having soundly thrashed the mutant heroes, newly-ascended – and reborn as Kukulkan – the malign meta returns to Amazonian San Rico to recreate a lost pre-Columbian empire with the heroes in hot pursuit. The result is a cataclysmic showdown in ‘Holocaust!’ which leaves Angel fighting for his life and deputy leader Cyclops crushed by guilt…

Issue #27 saw the return of old foes in ‘Re-enter: The Mimic!’ as the mesmerising Puppet Master pits Calvin Rankin against a team riven by dissention and ill-feeling, before ‘The Wail of the Banshee!’ sees Rankin join the X-Men in a tale introducing the sonic-powered mutant (who eventually became a valued team-mate/team-leader) as a deadly threat. This was the opening salvo of an ambitious extended epic featuring the global menace of sinister, mutant-abducting organisation Factor Three. John Tartaglione replaced Ayers as regular inker with bright and breezy thriller ‘When Titans Clash!’, as the power-duplicating Super-Adaptoid almost turns the entire team into robot slaves before ending Mimic’s crime-busting career.

Jack Sparling & Tartaglione illustrated ‘The Warlock Wakes’ in #30 as old Thor foe Merlin enjoys a stylish upgrade to malevolent mutant menace whilst trying to turn Earth into his mind-controlled playground. and the Costumed Dramas pause for now as Marvel Girl and the boys reunite to tackle a deranged Iron Man wannabe who is also an accidental atomic time bomb in Roth & Tartaglione illustrated ‘We Must Destroy… The Cobalt Man!’

Once the stories pause the extras start with essays Dawn of the Marvel Mutants: The X-Men of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby by Jon B. Cooke and Bruce Canwell’s A Mutant By Any Other Name, supplemented by a tee-shirt design by Kirby & Stone, unused covers.

As well as original art and House ads, there are covers for reprint comics Marvel Tales #2, Marvel Super-Heroes #21-27 & 21, Amazing Adventures #1-14 (with additional bridging art by Ron Wilson, Al Milgrom &Carmine Infantino) and X-Men: The Early Years, plus previous collections’ covers by Bruce Timm, Alex Ross, Kirby, Roth & Dean White.

These tales perfectly display Marvel’s evolution from quirky action tales to the more fraught, breast-beating, convoluted melodramas that inexorably led to the monolithic X-brand of today. Superbly drawn, highly readable stories are never unwelcome or out of favour though, and it must be remembered that everything here informs much of today’s mutant mythology. These are unmissable stories for the dedicated fan and newest convert.
© 2022 MARVEL.

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Captain Marvel Omnibus volume 1 (Captain Mar-Vell Omnibus volume 1)


By Stan Lee & Gene Colan, Roy Thomas, Arnold Drake, Gary Friedrich, Archie Goodwin, Gerry Conway, Marv Wolfman, Jim Starlin, Mike Friedrich, Steve Englehart, Don Heck, Dick Ayers, Frank Springer, Tom Sutton, Gil Kane, John Buscema, Wayne Boring & various (MARVEL)
ISBN: 978-1-3029-4865-8 (HB/Digital edition)

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Behold A New Star… 9/10

After years as an also-ran and up-&-comer, by 1968 Marvel Comics was in the ascendant. Their sales were catching up with industry leaders National/DC Comics and Gold Key, and they had finally secured a distribution deal allowing them to expand their list of titles exponentially. Once the stars of “split-books” Tales of Suspense (Iron Man & Captain America), Tales to Astonish (The Hulk & Sub-Mariner) and Strange Tales (Doctor Strange & Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.) all won their own titles, the House of Ideas just kept on creating. One dead-cert idea was a hero named after the company – and one bringing popular cachet and nostalgic pedigree as well.

After the notorious decade-long DC/Fawcett court case that began in 1940, the title Captain Marvel disappeared from newsstands. In 1967, during the superhero boom and “camp” craze generated by the Batman TV show, publisher MLF seemingly secured rights to the name and produced a number of giant-sized comics. Their star was an sapient alien robot who could fly, divide his body into segments and shoot lasers from his eyes. Despite a certain quirky charm, and being devised by comics veteran Carl (Human Torch) Burgos, he failed to attract a following. On its demise, the name was snapped up by expansionist Marvel Comics Group.

Marvel Super-Heroes was new: formerly reprint title Fantasy Masterpieces, it combined monster mystery tales with Golden Age Timely Comics classics, but from the 12th issue it added an all-new experimental lead section for characters without homes – The Inhuman Medusa, Ka-Zar, Black Knight and Doctor Doom -whilst premiering original concepts like Guardians of the Galaxy, Phantom Eagle and – to start the ball rolling – an alien spy sent to Earth from the Kree Galaxy. He held a Captain’s rank and his name was Mar-Vell.

Assembled here, accompanied by three Introductions by Roy Thomas from previous Marvel Masterworks collections and pertinent letters pages are that origin adventure from MS-H#12-13 plus the contents of Captain Marvel #1-33, Invincible Iron Man #55 and a comedy gem from Not Brand Echh #9 collectively spanning cover-dates December 1967 to July 1969…

Crafted by Stan Lee, Gene Colan & Frank Giacoia, the initial 15 page-instalment ‘The Coming of Captain Marvel’ devolved directly from Fantastic Four #64-65 wherein the quartet defeated a super-advanced Sentry robot left behind by a mythical alien race, only to be attacked by a high official of those long-lost extraterrestrials in the very next issue…

After defeating Ronan the Accuser, the FF heard no more from the far from extinct Kree, but the millennia-old empire was certainly interested in Earth. Dispatching a surveillance mission, the Kree wanted to know everything about us. Unfortunately, the agent they chose was a man of conscience; whilst his commanding officer Colonel Yon-Rogg was a ruthless rival for the love of the ship’s medical officer Una. No sooner has the good captain made a tentative planet-fall and clashed with the US army from the local missile base (often hinted as being Cape Kennedy) than the first instalment ends. Stan & Gene had set the ball rolling but it was left to Roy Thomas to establish the basic ground-rules in the next episode.

Colan remained, with Paul Reinman inking as ‘Where Stalks the Sentry!’ sees the alien spy improving his weaponry before an attempt by Yon-Rogg to kill him destroys a light aircraft carrying scientist Walter Lawson to The Cape. Assuming Lawson’s identity, Mar-Vell infiltrates the base but arouses the suspicions of security Chief Carol Danvers. He is horrified to discover the Earthlings are storing the dormant Sentry on base. Sensing opportunity, Yon-Rogg, reactivates the mechanoid. As it goes on a rampage only Mar-Vell stands in its path…

That’s a lot of material for 20 pages but Thomas & Colan were on a roll. With Vince Colletta inking, the third chapter was not in Marvel Super-Heroes but in the premiere issue of the Captain’s own title (May 1968). ‘Out of the Holocaust… A Hero!’ is an all-out action thriller, which still made space to establish twin sub-plots of “Lawson’s” credibility and Mar-Vell’s inner doubts. The faithful Kree soldier is rapidly losing faith in his own race and falling under the spell of the Earthlings. With this issue fans also enjoyed letters page ‘Mail it to Mar-Vell’.

The Captain’s first foray against a super-villain came over the next two issues as we learn that the Kree and the shapeshifting Skrulls are ancient intergalactic rivals, and the latter now want to know why there’s an enemy combatant stationed on Earth. Sending their own top agent in ‘From the Void of Space Comes… the Super Skrull!’, the resultant battle almost levels the entire state before bombastically concluding with the Kree-man triumphant after coming back ‘From the Ashes of Defeat!’

Issue #4 saw the secret invader clashing with fellow antihero Sub-Mariner in ‘The Alien and the Amphibian!’ as Mar-Vell’s superiors make increasingly ruthless demands of their reluctant agent and order him to steal deadly bacteria from a human spaceshot after it crashes off New York Harbor and really ticks off the already fractious Prince of Atlantis.

Captain Marvel #5 saw Arnold Drake & Don Heck assume the creative chores (with John Tartaglione on inks) in cold-war monster-mash clash ‘The Mark of the Metazoid’, wherein a mutated Soviet dissident is forced by his militaristic masters to kidnap Walter Lawson (that’s narrative symmetry, that is). Then  #6 finds the Captain ‘In the Path of Solam!’: battling a marauding sun-creature before being forced to prove his loyalty by unleashing a Kree bio-weapon on an Earth community in ‘Die, Town, Die!’ However, all is not as it seems since Quasimodo, the Living Computer is also involved and pulling some unseen strings…

The romantic triangle subplot was wearing pretty thin by this time, as was the increasingly obvious division of Mar-Vell’s loyalties, so a new examination of Dr Lawson, whose identity the Kree man purloined, begins in #8’s ‘And Fear Shall Follow!’. Another alien war story is revealed as Yon-Rogg is injured by rival space imperialists the Aakon. In the battle Mar-Vell’s heroism buys him a break from suspicion but all too soon he’s embroiled with a secret criminal society and the robot assassin apparently built for them by the deceased Lawson. Trouble escalates when the surviving Aakon stumble into the mess in #9’s ‘Between Hammer and Anvil!’…

The war of nerves with Yon-Rogg had intensified to the point that the colonel was openly planning murder and the romantic bond to Una was fractured when Carol Danvers began making her own overtures to the heroic Marvel. Thus, when Ronan orders Mar-Vell to make allies of Lawson’s super-scientific criminal syndicate – at the cost of Carol’s life – the war-hero ignores his orders and pays the penalty. Arrested by his crewmates he faces a firing squad in #10’s ‘Die Traitor!’ and is only saved by an ambush perpetrated by the survivors of the Aakon ship Yon-Rogg had previously targeted in #11’s ‘Rebirth!’

Illustrated by new penciller Dick Ayers, the attack’s aftermath sees the Kree colonel trap his despised rival on a missile hurtling into infinity and assuming his problems are over. During the battle Drake took the opportunity to kill off – as nobly as possible – insipid Medic Una, giving staunch Mar-Vell justifiable reason to openly rebel against his entire race and be reborn under the tutelage of a cosmic entity known only as Zo! who saves the trapped hero from death in the intergalactic void…

Moribund for months, this new beginning with the honourable, dutiful soldier remade as a vengeful vigilante was a real shot in the arm, but it was still clear Captain Marvel the comic was struggling to find an audience. ‘The Moment of… the Man-Slayer!‘ (Drake, Ayers and the great Syd Shores) sees a reconstituted hero gifted with a whole new power set by Zo! and return to Earth.

He is hunting Yon-Rogg but soon distracted by a marauding synthetic assassin at The Cape, in a taut thriller with The Black Widow in deadly guest-star mode. ‘Traitors or Heroes?’ concludes the Man-Slayer storyline with Gary Friedrich, Frank Springer & Vince Colletta as creative team, with the Captain finally confronting Yon-Rogg. The villain escapes by threatening Carol…

In #14’s ‘When a Galaxy Beckons…’ Mar-Vell clashes with a Puppet Master-controlled Iron Man as part of an early experiment in multipart crossovers (Sub-Mariner #14 and Avengers #64 the other parts of a triptych) before leaving Earth… forever, he believes. The going gets all cosmic in #15 (magnificently illustrated by Tom Sutton & Dan Adkins in a boldly experimental manner) as ‘That Zo Might Live… A Galaxy Must Die!’ sees Mar-Vell return to his home world on a mission of total destruction that wraps up the first career of Captain Marvel in spectacular style.

Beguiled and grateful, the hero revisits his homeworld determined to obliterate it for his almighty sponsor only to uncover an incredible conspiracy before the awesome truth is exposed in #16’s ‘Behind the Mask of Zo!’ by Archie Goodwin, Heck & Shores. This yarn is the first great “everything you know is wrong” story in Marvel history and captivatingly makes sense of all the previous issues, supplying a grand resolution and providing a solid context for the total revamp of the character to come. That’s how good a writer Archie Goodwin was. And when you read Thomas’s aforementioned Introduction, a clandestine creative secret is finally revealed…

Captain Marvel #16 is a magical issue and I’m being deliberately vague in case you have yet to read it, but I will tell you the ending. After saving the entire Kree Empire, Mar-Vell is flying back to Earth in his new red-&-blue costume, when he is suddenly sucked into the antimatter hell of the Negative Zone…

It’s probably best to think of everything previously discussed as prelude, since Captain Marvel as we know him really begins with #17 when Thomas, Gil Kane & Dan Adkins totally retooled and upgraded the character. ‘And a Child Shall Lead You!’ sees the imperilled Kree warrior inextricably bonded to voice-of-a-generation/professional side-kick Rick Jones who – just like Billy Batson (the boy who turned into the original Fawcett hero by shouting “Shazam!”) – switched places with a mighty adult hero when danger loomed by striking together a pair of ancient, wrist-worn “Nega-bands”. This allowed them to temporarily trade atoms: one active in our universe whilst the other floated, a ghostly untouchable, ineffectual voyeur to events glimpsed from the ghastly Negative Zone.

As thrilling, and as revolutionary as the idea of a comic written from the viewpoint of a teenager was, the real magic comes from Kane’s phenomenally kinetic artwork and whose mesmeric staging of the perfect human form in motion rewrote the book on superhero illustration with this series.

With pinch-hitting pencilling from John Buscema for the last nine pages, CM #18 at last categorically ended the Yon-Rogg saga and started Carol Danvers on her own superhero career as the Mar-Vell swore ‘Vengeance is Mine!’ The next issue embraced the “Relevancy Era” (where realism and themes of social injustice replaced aliens and supervillains as comics fodder) with a crazed sociologist and too-benevolent landlord revealed as ‘The Mad Master of the Murder Maze!’.

And that’s when the series was cancelled.

As happened so often during that tempestuous period, cutting edge, landmark, classic comic-books just didn’t sell. Silver Surfer, Green Lantern/Green Arrow and many other series modern readers consider high points of the form were axed because they couldn’t find enough of the right audience, but Captain Mar-Vell refused to die. Six months later, CM #20 was released, and the quality was still improving with every page. ‘The Hunter and the Holocaust’ has Rick attempt to free his trapped body-and-soulmate by consulting old mentor Bruce Banner. En route out west, a tornado destroys a town and Mar-Vell first renders assistance and then fights off resource-looters The Rat Pack. With the next issue Cap and Rick’s mentor finally meet, in ‘Here Comes the Hulk!’ but that’s just a garnish on this tale of student unrest and manipulative intolerance. The book was cancelled again after that… only to return some more!

Captain Marvel returned again in the summer of 1972 for another shot at stardom and intellectual property rights security. It all begins rather inauspiciously with Captain Marvel #22 wherein scripter Gerry Conway and artists Wayne Boring & Frank Giacoia reintroduce the cosmic crusader. ‘To Live Again!’ sees Mar-Vell still bonded to Rick by the uncanny Nega-bands, having languished in the Negative Zone for a seeming eternity. Jones had been trying to carve out a rock star career and relationship with new love Lou-Ann, but eventually his own body betrays him and the Kree Captain is expelled back into our reality…

Luckily, Lou-Ann’s uncle Benjamin Savannah is a radical scientist on hand to help Rick’s transition, but as the returned Marvel unsteadily flies off, across town another boffin is rapidly mutating from atomic radiation victim to nuclear threat and #23 (by Marv Wolfman, Boring & Frank McLaughlin) sees the Kree Warrior calamitously clash with rampaging maniac Megaton, resulting in ‘Death at the End of the World!’.

Wolfman, Boring & Ernie Chan then deal ‘Death in High Places!’ as Jones is targeted by murderous Madame Synn and felonious cyborg Dr. Mynde. They need Mar-Vell to help them plunder the Pentagon…

After seemingly running in place, perpetually one step ahead of cancellation (folding many times, but always quickly resurrected – presumably to secure that all important trademark), the Captain was handed to a newcomer Jim Starlin who was left alone to get on with it…

With many of his friends and fellow neophytes he began laying seeds (particularly in Iron Man and Daredevil) for a saga that would in many ways become as well regarded as Jack Kirby’s epochal Fourth World Trilogy which it emulated. However, the “Thanos War”, despite superficial similarities, soon developed into a uniquely modern experience… and what it lacked in grandeur it made up for with sheer energy and enthusiasm.

The first foray came in Iron Man #55 (February 1973) with Mike Friedrich scripting Starlin’s opening gambit in a cosmic epic that changed Marvel itself. ‘Beware The… Blood Brothers!’ (inked by Mike Esposito) introduces haunted humanoid powerhouse Drax the Destroyer, trapped by alien invader Thanos under the Nevada desert and in dire need of rescue. That comes when the Golden Avenger storms in, answering a enigmatic SOS…

A month later in Captain Marvel #25, Friedrich, Starlin, & Chic Stone unleashed ‘A Taste of Madness!’ and the alien outcast’s fortunes changed forever. When Mar-Vell is ambushed by a pack of extraterrestrials, he must finally concede that his powers are in decline. Unaware an unseen foe is counting on that, Rick manifests and checks in with Dr. Savannah, only to find himself accused by his beloved Lou-Ann of the scientist’s murder. Hauled off to jail, he rings in Mar-Vell who is confronted by a veritable legion of old foes before deducing who in fact his true enemies are…

CM #26 sees Rick freed from custody and confronting Lou-Ann over her ‘Betrayal!’ (Starlin, Friedrich & Dave Cockrum), before he and Mar-Vell realise they are targets of psychological warfare. In fact she is being mind-controlled whilst Super Skrull and his hidden “Masterlord” are manipulating them and others in search of a lost secret. When a subsidiary scheme to have Mar-Vell kill The Thing is foiled the true manipulator appears banishing Mar-Vell and capturing Rick because his subconscious conceals the location of an ultimate weapon.

Rick awakes to find himself ‘Trapped on Titan!’ (Pablo Marcos inks) not realising the villain has already extracted the location of a reality-altering Cosmic Cube from him. Rescued by Thanos’ father Mentor and brother Eros, the horrified boy sees first-hand genocide the death-loving monster has inflicted upon his own birthworld and summons Captain Marvel to wreak vengeance…

Following a comprehensive cutaway ‘Map of Titan’ from #27, a return to Earth sees still-enslaved Lou-Ann warning the Mighty Avengers before summarily collapsing. By the time Mar-Vell arrives she lies near death. Inked by Dan Green, ‘When Titans Collide!’ reveals another plank of Thanos’ plan. As the heroes fall to psychic parasite The Controller, Mar-Vell is assaulted by bizarre visions of an incredible ancient being. Fatally distracted, he becomes the massive mind-leech’s final victim…

Al Milgrom inks ‘Metamorphosis!’ as the Kree captain’s connection to Rick is severed as he is transported to an otherworldly locale where 8-billion year old Eon reveals the origins of life whilst overseeing the abductee’s forced evolution into the ultimate warrior: a universal champion gifted with the subtly irresistible power of Cosmic Awareness…

Returned to Earth and reconnected to his frantic atomic counterpart, the newly-appointed “Protector of the Universe” goes after The Controller, thrashing the monumentally powerful parasite in a devastating display of skill countering super-strength in #30’s ‘…To Be Free from Control!’

Much of this saga occurs in other titles and for the full picture you will need to hunt down more comprehensive compilations but here and now, the story continues in Captain Marvel #31 with ‘The Beginning of the End!’ (inked by Green & Milgrom) wherein the Avengers – in a gathering of last resort – are joined by psionic priestess Moondragon and Drax – one of the Mad Titan’s many victims resurrected by supernal forces to destroy Thanos…

The Titan is revealed as a lover of the personification of Death and he wants to give her Earth as a betrothal present. To that end, he uses the Cosmic Cube to turn himself into ‘Thanos the Insane God!’ (Green) and with a thought captures all opposition to his reign. However, his insane arrogance leaves the cosmically aware Mar-Vell with a chance to undo every change; brilliantly outmanoeuvring and defeating ‘The God Himself!’ (inked by Klaus Janson)…

Wrapping up the comics in this first volume is a burst of light relief from Marvel’s sixties parody comic Not Brand Echh – specifically # 9’s ‘Captain Marvin: Where Stomps The Scent-ry! or Out of the Holocaust… Hoo-Boy!!’ as Thomas, Colan & Frank Giacoia wickedly reimagining the origin. It’s either funny or painful depending on your attitude…

With covers by Colan, Colletta, Heck, Tartaglione, John Romita, Marie Severin, John Verpoorten, Barry Windsor Smith, Herb Trimpe, Springer, Shores, Kane & Adkins, Frank Giacoia, Joe Sinnott, Starlin, Marcos, Milgrom & Janson, the bonus section begins with the December 1967 Marvel Bullpen Bulletins page advertising a new hero and includes a wealth of pencilled pages and sketches from Colan and Kane plus many of their original art pages. Also on show is a tee-shirt design and unused Severin cover, covers, endpieces and Milgrom Captain Marv-Al intros from 1980s reprint series The Life of Captain Marvel, redesigned pages used to bridge issues in that series and Milgrom’s lengthy text introduction. Wrapping up is a selection of previous collection covers by Colan, Starlin & Richard Isanove.

Mar-Vell (and Carol Danvers) have both been Captain Marvel and starred in some of our art form’s most momentous and entertaining adventures. Today’s multimedia madness all started with these iconic and evergreen Marvel tales, and it’s never too late for you to join the ranks of the cosmic cognoscenti…
© 2023 MARVEL.

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Avengers Omnibus volume 1


By Stan Lee & Jack Kirby, Larry Lieber, Paul Laiken, Larry Ivie, Don Heck, Dick Ayers, Paul Reinman, George Roussos, Chic Stone, Mike Esposito, Wally Wood, John Romita, Frank Giacoia, Sam Rosen, Art Simek, Morrie Kuramoto & various (MARVEL)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-5846-2 (HB/Digital edition)

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Ironclad Guarantee of Total Wonder… 10/10

Probably Marvel’s biggest global franchise success, The Avengers celebrated their 60th anniversary in September 2023, so let’s close that Birthday Year with acknowledgement of that landmark event and one more grand adventure…

After a period of meteoric expansion, in 1963 the burgeoning Marvel Universe was finally ready to emulate the successful DC concept that had cemented the legitimacy of the Silver Age of American comics. The concept of putting a bunch of all-star eggs in one basket which had made the Justice League of America such a winner also inspired the moribund Atlas outfit – primarily Stan Lee, Jack Kirby & Steve Ditko – into inventing “super-characters” of their own. The result – in 1961 – was The Fantastic Four.

Over 18 months later, the fledgling House of Ideas generated a small but viable stable of costumed leading men (but only sidekick women) so Lee & Kirby assembled a handful of them and moulded them into a force for justice and soaring sales. Seldom has it ever been done with such style and sheer exuberance. Cover dated September 1963, The Avengers #1 launched as part of an expansion package which also included Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos and The X-Men…

Faithfully compiling the groundbreaking tales from #1-30 of The Avengers (spanning March 1963 to September 196???) and including contemporary pin-ups, letters pages and other hidden delights as well as trio of Stan Lee Introductions from earlier Marvel masterworks collections, the suspenseful action kicks off with ‘The Coming of the Avengers!’ Instead of starting at a neutral beginning Stan & Jack (and inker Dick Ayers) assumed buyers had at least a passing familiarity with Marvel’s other heroes and so wasted no time or space on introductions.

In Asgard, immortal trickster Loki is imprisoned on a dank isle, hungry for vengeance on his noble half-brother Thor. Whilst malevolently observing Earth, the malign god espies the monstrous, misunderstood Hulk and mystically engineers a situation wherein the man-brute seemingly goes on a rampage, simply to trick the Thunder God into battling the monster.

When the Hulk’s teen sidekick Rick Jones radios the FF for assistance, devious Loki scrambles and diverts the transmission and smugly awaits the blossoming of his mischief. Sadly for the schemer, Iron Man, Ant-Man and The Wasp also pick up the redirected SOS. As the heroes all converge in the American Southwest to search for the Jade Giant, they realise that something is oddly amiss…

This terse, epic, compelling and wide-ranging yarn (New York, New Mexico, Detroit and Asgard in 22 pages) is Lee & Kirby at their bombastic best, and remains one of the greatest stories of the Silver Age (it’s certainly high in my own top ten Marvel Tales) and is followed by ‘The Space Phantom’ (Lee, Kirby & Paul Reinman), wherein an alien shape-stealer almost destroys the team from within.

With latent animosities exposed by the malignant masquerader, the tale ends with the volatile Hulk quitting the team in disgust, only to return in #3 as an outright villain in partnership with ‘Sub-Mariner!’ This globe-trotting romp delivers high-energy thrills and one of the best battle scenes in comics history as the assorted titans clash in abandoned World War II tunnels beneath the Rock of Gibraltar.

Inked by George Roussos, Avengers #4 was a groundbreaking landmark as Marvel’s greatest Golden Age sensation returns for another increasingly war-torn era. ‘Captain America joins the Avengers!’ has everything that made the company’s early tales so fresh and vital. The majesty of a legendary warrior returned in our time of greatest need: stark tragedy in the loss of his boon companion Bucky, aliens, gangsters, Sub-Mariner and even subtle social commentary and – naturally – vast amounts of staggering Kirby Action. It even begins with a cunning infomercial as Iron Man unsuccessfully requests the assistance of the company’s other fresh young stars, giving readers a taste of the other mighty Marvels on offer to them.

Reinman returned to ink ‘The Invasion of the Lava Men!’: another staggering adventure romp as the team battle incendiary subterraneans and a world-threatening mutating mountain… with the unwilling assistance of the ever-incredible Hulk. That issue also started a conversion with fans as letters column ‘All About The… Avengers’ began…

However, even that pales before the supreme shift in artistic quality that is Avengers #6.

Chic Stone – arguably Kirby’s best Marvel inker of the period – joined the creative team just as a classic arch-foe debuts. ‘The Masters of Evil!’ reveals how Nazi super-scientist Baron Zemo is forced by his own arrogance and paranoia to emerge from the South American jungles he’s been skulking in since the Third Reich fell, after learning his despised nemesis Captain America has returned from the dead.

To this end, the ruthless war-criminal recruits a gang of previously established super-villains to attack New York City and destroy the Avengers. The unforgettable clash between valiant heroes and vile murdering mercenaries Radioactive Man, Black Knight and The Melter is an unsurpassed example of prime Marvel magic to this day.

Issue #7 found two more malevolent recruits for the Masters of Evil as Asgardian outcasts Enchantress and The Executioner ally with Zemo, just as Iron Man is suspended due to misconduct occurring in his own series. This was the dawning of the close-continuity era where events in one series were regularly referenced and even built upon in others. The practise quickly became a rod for the creators’ own backs and lead to a radical rethink…

It may have been ‘Their Darkest Hour!’, but #8 delivered the team’s greatest triumph and tragedy as Jack Kirby (inked with fitting circularity by Dick Ayers) relinquished his drawing role with the superbly entrancing invasion-from-time thriller which introduced ‘Kang the Conqueror!’ Riffing on the movie The Day the Earth Stood Still, the tale sees an impossibly powerful foe defeated by the cunning of ordinary teenagers and indomitable spirit of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes…

Whenever Kirby left a title he’d co-created, it took a little while to settle into a new rhythm, and none more so than with these collectivised costumed crusaders. Although Lee and the fabulously utilitarian Don Heck were perfectly capable of producing cracking comics entertainments, they never had The King’s unceasing sense of panoramic scope and scale which constantly sought bigger, bolder blasts of excitement.

The Avengers evolved into an entirely different series when the subtle humanity of Heck’s vision replaced Kirby’s larger-than-life bombastic bravura. The series had rapidly advanced to monthly circulation and even The King could not draw the massive number of pages his expanding workload demanded. Heck was a gifted and trusted artist with a formidable record for meeting deadlines and, progressing under his pencil, sub-plots and character interplay finally got as much space as action and spectacle. After Kirby, stories increasingly focused on scene-stealing newcomer Captain America: concentrating on frail human beings in costumes, rather than wild modern gods and technological titans bestriding and shaking the Earth…

Inked by Ayers, Heck’s first outing was memorable tragedy ‘The Coming of the Wonder Man!’, wherein the Masters of Evil plant superhuman Trojan Horse Simon Williams within the heroes’ ranks, only to have the conflicted infiltrator find deathbed redemption by saving them from the deadly deathtrap he creates…

Another Marvel mainstay debuted with the introduction of (seemingly) malignant master of time Immortus, who briefly combined with Zemo’s devilish cohort to engineer a fatal division in the ranks by removing Cap from the field in ‘The Avengers Break Up!’ A sign of the Star-Spangled Sentinel’s increasing popularity, the issue is augmented by a Marvel Masterwork Pin-Up of ‘The One and Only Cap’ courtesy of Kirby & Ayers…

An eagerly-anticipated meeting delighted fans in #11 as ‘The Mighty Avengers Meet Spider-Man!’ A clever cross-fertilising tale inked by Stone, it features the return of time-bending tyrant conqueror Kang who attempts to destroy the team by insinuating a robotic duplicate of the outcast arachnid within their serried ranks. Accompanied by Heck’s Marvel Master Work Pin-up of ‘Kang!’ it’s followed by a cracking end-of-the-world thriller with guest-villains Mole Man and The Red Ghost doing their best avoid another clash with the Fantastic Four.

This was another Marvel innovation, as – according to established funnybook rules – bad guys stuck to their own nemeses and didn’t clash outside their own backyards. ‘This Hostage Earth!’ (inked by Ayers) is a welcome return to grand adventure with lesser lights Giant-Man and The Wasp taking rare lead roles, but is trumped by a rousing gangster thriller of a sort seldom seen outside the pages of Spider-Man or Daredevil, premiering Marvel Universe Mafia analogue The Maggia and another major menace in #13’s ‘The Castle of Count Nefaria!’

After crushingly failing in his scheme to frame the Avengers, Nefaria’s caper ends on a tragic cliffhanger as Janet Van Dyne is left gunshot and dying, leading to a peak in melodramatic tension in #14 – scripted by Paul Laiken/Larry Ivie & Larry Lieber over Stan’s plot – where the traumatised team scour the globe for the only surgeon who can save her.

‘Even Avengers Can Die!’ – although of course she doesn’t – resolves into an epic alien invader tale with overtones of This Island Earth with Kirby stepping in to lay out the saga for Heck & Stone to illustrate. This only whets the appetite for the classic climactic confrontation that follows as the costumed champions finally deal with the Masters of Evil and Captain America finally avenges the death of his dead partner.

‘Now, By My Hand, Shall Die a Villain!’ in #15 – laid-out by Kirby, pencilled by Heck and inked by Mike Esposito – features the final, fatal confrontation between Cap and Zemo in the heart of the Amazon, whilst the other Avengers and the war-criminal’s cohort of masked menaces clash once more on the streets of New York City…

The battle ends with ‘The Old Order Changeth!’ (broken down by Kirby before being finished by Ayers) presaging 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 found 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 substitute-sidekick Rick Jones fight their way back to civilisation, The Avengers institute changes. The big-name stars retire and are 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 at that time it featured adventures set during WWII), evolved into another squabbling family of flawed, self-examining neurotics, enduring extended sub-plots and constant action as valiant underdogs; a formula readers of the time could not get enough of and which still works today…

Acting on advice from the departing Iron Man, the neophytes seek to recruit the Hulk to add raw power to the team, only to be sidetracked by the Mole Man in #17’s ‘Four Against the Minotaur!’ (Lee, Heck & Ayers), after which they then fall foul of a dastardly “commie” plot ‘When the Commissar Commands!’ – necessitating a quick trip to thinly-disguised Vietnam analogue Sin-Cong to unwittingly battle a bombastic android…

This brace of relatively run-of-the-mill tales is followed by an ever-improving run of mini-masterpieces: the first of which wraps up this initial Epic endeavour with a 2-part gem providing an origin for Hawkeye and introducing a roguish hero/villain.

‘The Coming of the Swordsman!’ sees a dissolute and disreputable swashbuckler – with just a hint of deeply-buried flawed nobility – seeking to force his way onto the highly respectable team. His immediate rejection leads to him becoming an unwilling pawn of a far greater menace after being kidnapped by A-list would-be world despot The Mandarin.

The conclusion comes in the superb ‘Vengeance is Ours!’ – sublimely inked by Wally Wood – wherein the constantly-bickering Avengers finally pull together as a supernaturally efficient, all-conquering super-team…

By this time the squad – Captain America, Hawkeye, Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch – was a firm fan-favourite. with close attention to character interplay and melodrama subplots, leavening action through compelling soap-opera elements that kept readers riveted.

In Avengers #21 Lee, Heck & Wally Wood – without pausing for creative breath – launched another soon-to-be big name villain in the form of Power Man. ‘The Bitter Taste of Defeat!’ depicted his creation and a diabolical plan hatched with evil Asgardian witch Enchantress to discredit and replace the quarrelsome quartet. The scheme was only narrowly foiled by sharp wits and dauntless determination in the concluding ‘The Road Back.’

An epic 2-part tale follows as the team are abducted into the far-future to battle against and eventually beside Kang the Conqueror. ‘Once an Avenger…’ (Avengers #23, December 1965 and, incidentally, my vote for the best cover Kirby ever drew) is inked by John Romita (senior), pitting the heroes against an army of fearsome future men, with the yarn explosively and tragically ending in ‘From the Ashes of Defeat!’ by Lee, Heck & inker Ayers. The still-learning team then face their greatest test yet after being captured by the deadliest man alive and forced to fight their way out of the tyrant’s kingdom of Latveria in #25’s ‘Enter… Dr. Doom!’

Since change is ever the watchword for this series, the next two issues combined a threat to drown the world from subsea barbarian Attuma with the return of old comrades. ‘The Voice of The Wasp!’ and ‘Four Against the Floodtide!’ (pseudonymously inked by Frank Giacoia as “Frank Ray”) is a superlative action-romp but is merely a prelude to #28’s return of founding Avenger Giant-Man in a new guise as ‘Among us Walks a Goliath!’ This instant classic introduced the villainous Collector whilst extending Marvel’s pet theme of alienation by tragically trapping the size-changing hero at a freakish 10-foot height… seemingly forever…

Avengers #29 features ‘This Power Unleashed!’ and brings back Hawkeye’s lost love Black Widow as a brainwashed Soviet agent attempting to destroy the team. She recruits Power Man and Swordsman as cannon-fodder but is foiled by incompletely submerged feelings for Hawkeye, after which ‘Frenzy in a Far-Off Land!’ sees dispirited colossus Henry Pym embroiled in a futuristic civil war amongst a lost south American civilisation. The conclusion threatened to end in global incineration but that’s a denouement you’ll have to wait for…

To Be Continued…

Augmenting the narrative joys is an abundance of behind-the-scenes treasures such as contemporary house ads, a dozen original art pages and covers by Kirby, Ayers, Heck & Wood, production-stage pencilled page photostats and a fascinating sequence of “tweaked” cover-corrections. Covers for reprint comics Marvel Tales #2, Marvel Super-Heroes #1 & 21 and Marvel Triple Action #5-24, plus 16 previous collections front-&-back covers by Stuart Immonen and Arthur Adams. Still more extras include earlier Kirby Avengers collection covers modified by painters Dean White and another by Alex Ross taken from the 1999 Overstreet Guide to Comics.

Unceasingly enticing and always evergreen, these immortal epics are tales that defined the Marvel experience and a joy no fan should deny themselves or their kids.
© 2019 MARVEL.

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Invincible Iron Man Omnibus volume 1


By Stan Lee & Don Heck, Jack Kirby, Larry Lieber, Robert Bernstein, Don Rico, Al Hartley, Steve Ditko, Roy Thomas, Gene Colan & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-1-3029-5358-4 (HB/Digital edition)

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Cast Iron Comics Cheer… 10/10

One of Marvel’s biggest global successes thanks to the film franchise, Iron Man officially celebrated his 60th anniversary in 2023, so let’s again acknowledge that landmark one last time…

Tony Stark is a super-rich supergenius inventor who moonlights as a superhero: wearing a formidable, ever-evolving suit of armour stuffed with his own ingenious creations. The supreme technologist hates to lose and constantly upgrades his gear, making Iron Man one of the most powerful characters in the Marvel Universe. There are a number of ways to interpret Stark’s creation and early years: glamorous playboy, super-rich industrialist, philanthropist, inventor – even when not operating in his armoured alter-ego.

Created in the immediate 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 employing Yankee ingenuity and invention to safeguard and better the World seemed inevitable. Combining that era’s all-pervasive belief that technology could solve any problem with the universal imagery of noble knights battling tangible and easily recognisable Evil, the proposition almost becomes a certainty.

Of course, it might simply be that we kids thought it both great fun and very, very cool…

This fabulous full-colour compendium of the Steel Shod Sentinel’s early days reprints all his adventures, feature pages and pin-ups from Tales of Suspense #39 (cover-dated March 1963 on newsstand from December 10th 1962) through #83 (November 1966), revisiting the dawn of Marvel’s rise to ascendancy.

The collection also offers Introductions by Lee and Tom Field from earlier collections (Marvel Masterworks volumes 1-3 & Son of Marvel Origins) and essays by Bob Layton (‘How Communism Changed My Life for the Better!’) and Nick Caputo (‘Just a Guy Named Don: An Appreciation of Don Heck’s Super Hero Art’) plus assorted other extras.

This period saw the much-diminished and almost-bankrupt former comics colossus begin challenging DC Comics’ position of dominance, but not quite yet become the darlings of the student counter-culture. In these tales, Stark is still very much a gung-ho patriotic armaments manufacturer, and not the enlightened capitalist liberal dissenter he would become…

Scripted by Larry Lieber (over brother Stan Lee’s plot) and illustrated by the criminally unappreciated Don Heck, Tales of Suspense #39 reveals how and why ‘Iron Man is Born!’, with engineering and electronics genius Stark field-testing his latest inventions in Viet Nam before being wounded by a landmine.

Captured by Viet Cong commander Wong-Chu, Stark is told that if he creates weapons for the Reds he will be operated on to remove the metal shrapnel in his chest that will kill him within seven days. Knowing Commies can’t be trusted, Stark and aged Professor Yinsen – another captive scientist – build a mobile iron lung to keep his heart beating. They also equip this suit of armour with all the weapons their ingenuity can covertly construct whilst being observed by their captors. Naturally, they succeed and defeat the local tyrant, but not without a tragic sacrifice.

From the next issue, Iron Man’s superhero career is taken as a given, and he has already achieved fame for largely off-camera exploits. Lee continues to plot but Robert Bernstein replaces Lieber as scripter for issues #40-46 and Jack Kirby pencils for Heck. ‘Iron Man versus Gargantus!’ follows young Marvel’s pattern by pitting the hero against aliens – albeit via a robotic giant caveman intermediary – in an action-heavy, delightfully rollicking romp.

‘The Stronghold of Doctor Strange!’ (Lee, Bernstein, Kirby & Dick Ayers) features a gloriously spectacular confrontation with a wizard of Science (not Lee & Steve Ditko’s later Mystic Master), after which Heck returns to full art for the espionage and impostors’ thriller ‘Trapped by the Red Barbarian’ before Kirby & Heck team again for science-fantasy invasion romp ‘Kala, Queen of the Netherworld!’

Heck goes it alone when Iron Man travels to ancient Egypt to rescue fabled and fabulous Queen Cleopatra from ‘The Mad Pharaoh!’ before new regular cast members – bodyguard “Happy” Hogan and secretary Virginia “Pepper” Potts – and the first true supervillain arrive as the Steel Sentinel must withstand ‘The Icy Fingers of Jack Frost!’ Stark then faces (and converts to Democracy) his Soviet counterpart ‘The Crimson Dynamo!’ after which Tales of Suspense #47 presaged big changes. Lee wrote ‘Iron Man Battles the Melter!’, and Heck inked the unique pencils of Steve Ditko in a grudge match between Stark and a disgraced corporate rival, with the big event coming in the next issue’s ‘The Mysterious Mr. Doll!’

Here Lee, Ditko & Ayers scrapped the old, cool-but-clunky golden boiler-plate suit for a sleek, gleaming, form-fitting red-and-gold upgrade to aid the defeat of a sadistic mystic blackmailer using witchcraft to get ahead. The new suit would – with minor variations – become the symbol and trademark of the character for decades to come.

Paul Reinman inked Ditko on Lee’s crossover/sales pitch for the new X-Men comic book when ‘Iron Man Meets the Angel!’, before the series finally found its feet with Tales of Suspense #50.

Heck became regular penciller and occasional inker as Lee delivered the Armoured Avenger’s first major menace and perpetual nemesis in ‘The Hands of the Mandarin!’: a modern-day Fu Manchu derivative who terrifies the Red Chinese so much that they manipulate him into attacking America, with the hope that one threat will fatally wound the other. The Mandarin would become Iron Man’s greatest foe and remains so even in a more evolved era far removed from the now abhorrent attitudes that were part and parcel of patriotic Americanism back then.

Our ferrous hero made short work of criminal contortionist ‘The Sinister Scarecrow’, and also the Red spy who appropriated a leftover Russian armour-suit to declare ‘The Crimson Dynamo Strikes Again!’ scripted – as was the next issue – by the enigmatic “N. Kurok” who was in truth Golden Age veteran Don Rico. That issue also premiered a far more dangerous threat in the slinky shape of Soviet Femme Fatale The Black Widow.

With ToS #53 she became a headliner when ‘The Black Widow Strikes Again!’: stealing Stark’s new anti-gravity ray but ultimately thwarted in her sabotage mission, after which ‘The Mandarin’s Revenge!’ began a 2-part tale of kidnap and coercion, concluding by disproving in #55 that ‘No One Escapes the Mandarin!’ It’s followed by a “Special Bonus Featurette” by Lee & Heck, revealing ‘All About Iron Man’: detailing how the suit works and even ‘More Info about Iron Man!’ including a ‘Pepper Potts Pin-Up Page’…

‘The Uncanny Unicorn!’ promptly attacked in ToS #56, faring no better as his power-horn proved pointless in the end, but segueing neatly into another Soviet sortie as Black Widow resurfaced to beguile a budding superhero. ‘Hawkeye, The Marksman!’ was gulled into attacking the Golden Avenger in #57 during his debut moment: briefly making him the company’s latest and most dashing misunderstood malefactor.

Another landmark occurred next issue. Formerly, Iron Man had monopolised Tales of Suspense but ‘In Mortal Combat with Captain America!’ (inked by Ayers) depicted an all-out battle between the Avengers allies resulting from a diabolical substitution by evil impersonator The Chameleon. It was a tasty primer for the next issue when Cap would begin his own solo adventures, splitting the monthly comic into an anthology featuring Marvel’s top two patriotic paladins.

Iron Man’s initial half-length outing in #59 was against technological terror ‘The Black Knight!’, and as a result of the blistering clash, Stark was rendered unable to remove his own armour without triggering a heart attack: a situation that hadn’t occurred since the initial injury. Up until this time he had led a relatively normal life by simply wearing the heartbeat regulating breast-plate under his clothes. The introduction of such soap-opera subplots were a necessity of the shorter page counts, as were continued stories, but this seeming disadvantage worked to improve both the writing and the sales. The issue was also notable for the debut of letter column Mails of Suspense which is included here with subsequent features appearing hereafter following each new instalment of IM’s shortened exploits.

With Stark’s “disappearance”, Iron Man was ‘Suspected of Murder!’, a tale boasting the return of Hawkeye & Black Widow, leading directly into an attack from China and ‘The Death of Tony Stark!’ (complete with a bonus pin-up of ‘The Golden Avenger Iron Man’). The sinister ambusher then provided ‘The Origin of the Mandarin!’ before being beaten by Stark’s ingenuity once again.

After that extended epic, a change of pace came as short complete yarns returned. The first was #63’s industrial sabotage thriller ‘Somewhere Lurks the Phantom!’ (by Lee Heck & Ayers), followed by the somewhat self-explanatory ‘Hawkeye and the New Black Widow Strike Again!’ (inked by Chic Stone and with the Soviet agent abruptly transformed from slinky fur-clad seductress into gadget-laden costumed villain), after which ‘When Titans Clash!’ (inked by Mike Esposito as “Mickey DeMeo”) sees a burglar steal the red & gold armour, forcing Stark to defeat his greatest invention with his old suit.

Mike stuck around to see subsea tyrant Attuma as the threat du jour in ‘If I Fail, a World is Lost!’ and crime-lord Count Nefaria use dreams as a weapon in ‘Where Walk the Villains!’ The Maggia’s master resurfaced in the next issue to attack Stark with hallucinations in ‘If a Man be Mad!’: a rather weak tale introducing Stark’s ne’er-do-well cousin Morgan. It was written by Al Hartley with Heck & Esposito in top form as always.

Issues #69-71 form another continued saga: a one of the best of this early period. Inked by Vince Colletta, ‘If I Must Die, Let It Be with Honor!’ sees Iron Man forced to duel a new Russian opponent called Titanium Man in a globally-televised contest national super-powers see as a vital propaganda coup. Both governments are naturally quite oblivious of the cost to the participants and their friends…

DeMeo inks ‘Fight On! For a World is Watching!’ amplifying intrigue and tension as the Soviets, caught cheating, pile on pressure to kill America’s champion if they can’t score a publicity win, and final chapter ‘What Price Victory?’ affords a rousing, emotional triumph and tragedy made magnificent by the inking of troubled artistic genius Wally Wood.

Tales of Suspense #72’s ‘Hoorah for the Conquering Hero!’– by Lee, Heck & Demeo – deals with the aftermath of victory. Whilst the fickle public fête Iron Man, his best friend lies dying, and a spiteful ex-lover hires diabolical super-genius the Mad Thinker to destroy Stark and his company forever before #73 picks up, soap opera fashion, on Iron Man, rushing to the bedside of his best friend Happy Hogan, who was gravely wounded in the battle against the Titanium Man, and is now missing from his hospital bed.

‘My Life for Yours!’ – by a veritable phalanx of creators including Stan Lee, Roy Thomas, Gene Colan & Jack Abel (in Marvel modes as “Adam Austin & Gary Michaels”), Sol Brodsky, Flo Steinberg and Marie Severin – pits the Armoured Avenger in final combat against the Black Knight to rescue Hogan. After this, the creative team stabilised as Lee, Colan & Abel, for ‘If this Guilt be Mine..!’, wherein Stark’s inventive intervention saves his friend’s life but transforms the patient into a terrifying monster.

Whilst in pitched battle against ‘The Fury of… The Freak!’ (who scared the stuffings out of me as a comic-crazed 7-year-old), Iron Man is helpless when The Mandarin attacks again in #76’s ‘Here Lies Hidden,,,…Unspeakable Ultimo!’

The epic expands in ‘Ultimo Lives!’ and closes as the gigantic android goes bombastically berserk in ‘Crescendo!’: dooming itself and allowing our ferrous hero to escape home, only to face a Congressional Inquiry and a battle crazed Sub-Mariner in ‘Disaster!’

The Prince of Atlantis had been hunting his enemy Warlord Krang in his own series, and the path led straight to Stark’s factory, so when confronted with another old foe, the amphibian over-reacts in his customary manner. ‘When Fall the Mighty!’ in #80 is one colossal punch-up, which carries over into Tales to Astonish #82, where Thomas & Colan begin the final chapter before the penciller contracted flu after only two pages. The inimitable Jack Kirby, inked by Dick Ayers, stepped in to produce some of the finest action-art of their entire Marvel career, fully displaying ‘The Power of Iron Man!’ as the battles rages on to a brutal if inconclusive conclusion.

Tales of Suspense #81 trumpeted ‘The Return of the Titanium Man!’ – and Colan – as the Communist Colossus attacks the Golden Avenger on his way to testify before Congress, threatening all of Washington DC in the Frank Giacoia inked ‘By Force of Arms!’ until ultimately succumbing to superior (Yankee) fire power in ‘Victory!’

With the comics wonderment completed, those aforementioned essays lead to bonus features including a house ad promoting two new titles out the same month – Tales of Suspense #39 and Amazing Spider-Man #1 – and another plugging all the heroes extant as of May 1963. That one also announced the company rebrand as “Marvel Comics Group”.

With covers throughout by Kirby, Heck, Ayers, Wood, Colletta & Colan, Abel, we close with a selection of pre-correction original art covers and pages: 17 wondrous treats by Kirby, Heck, Wood, Colletta & Ayers, and a 1965 T-Shirt design by Kirby and Chic Stone. Also on show are the covers of Marvel Collectors’ Items Classics #1, 3-28,and Marvel Super-Heroes #28, 29 (and its unused Marie Severin alternate Cover art), 30 & 37: reprint titles that kept Iron Man’s history alive and accessible to new readers, concluding with a gallery of previous collection covers from Bruce Timm, and classic Kirby covers modified by painters Dean White and Richard Isanove, plus variants by Adi Granov, Ryan Meinerding and Gerald Parel.

Iron Man developed amidst the growing political awareness and consequent social unrest of the Vietnam Generation who were the comic’s maturing readership. Wedded as it was to the American Industrial-Military 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 it remains such a thrilling romp of classic superhero fun is a lasting tribute to the talents of all those superb creators that worked it. The sheer quality of this compendium is undeniable. From broad comedy and simple action to dark cynicism and relentless battle, Marvel Comics grew up with this deeply contemporary series and so could you.
© 2023 MARVEL.

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Mighty Thor Omnibus volume 1


By Stan Lee & Jack Kirby, Larry Lieber, Robert Bernstein, Joe Sinnott, Al Hartley, Don Heck, Chic Stone, Frank Giacoia, Vince Colletta & various (MARVEL)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-8835-3 (B/Digital edition)

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: A Yule Jewel of Great Import… 9/10

Even more than The Fantastic Four, The Mighty Thor was the arena in which Jack Kirby’s restless fascination with all things Cosmic was honed and refined through dazzling graphics and captivating concepts. The King’s string of power-packed signature pantheons began in a modest little fantasy/monster title called Journey into Mystery where – in the summer of 1962 – a tried-and-tested comic book concept (feeble mortal transformed into god-like hero) was revived by the fledgling Marvel Comics to add a Superman analogue to their growing roster of costumed adventurers.

This monumental tome re-presents the pioneering Asgardian exploits from JiM #83-120 and Journey into Mystery Annual #1, spanning cover-dates August 1962 to September 1965 in a blazing blur of innovation and seat-of-the-pants myth-revising and universe-building.

It is lettered throughout by unsung superstars Art Simek, Sam Rosen, Ray Holloway, Terry Szenics and Martin Epp and sadly an anonymous band of colourists. As well as a monolithic assortment of nostalgic treats at the back, this mammoth tome is dotted throughout with recycled Introductions by Stan Lee, taken from the earlier Marvel Masterworks editions and includes editorial announcements and ‘The Hammer Strikes!’ newsletter pages for each original issue to enhance overall historical experience…

The eternal Edda unfolds with the lead feature of Journey into Mystery #83 (August 1962) which saw a brawny bold warrior jostle aside the regular roster of monsters, aliens and sinister scientists in a brash, vivid explosion of verve and vigour. The initial exploit follows disabled American doctor Donald Blake who takes a vacation in Norway only to encounter the vanguard of an alien invasion. Fleeing, he is trapped in a cave and finds an old, gnarled walking stick. When in his frustration he smashes the stick into a huge boulder obstructing his escape, his puny frame is transformed into the Norse God of Thunder, Mighty Thor!

Officially plotted by Stan Lee, scripted by his brother Larry Lieber and illustrated by Kirby and inker Joe Sinnott (at this juncture a full illustrator, Sinnott would become Kirby’s primary inker for most of his Marvel career), ‘The Stone Men of Saturn’ is pure early Marvel: bombastic, fast-paced, gloriously illogical and captivatingly action-packed. The hugely under-appreciated Art Simek was the letterer and logo designer.

It was clear that they whey were making it up as they went along – not in itself a bad thing – and that infectious enthusiasm shows in the next adventure. ‘The Mighty Thor Vs. the Executioner’ is a “commie-busting” tale of its time with a thinly disguised Fidel Castro wasting his formidable armies in battle against our hero.

The tale introduced Blake’s nurse Jane Foster: at this point a bland cipher adored from afar by the Norse superman’s timid alter-ego. The creative team settled as Dick Ayers replaced Sinnott, and with #85’s ‘Trapped by Loki, God of Mischief!’, the final element fell into place with the “return” of a suitably awesome arch-foe – the hero’s half-brother. This evil magician and compulsive trickster escaped divine incarceration and his first thought was to bedevil Thor by causing terror and chaos on the world of mortals he was so devoted to.

Here, a new and greater universe was revealed with the first tantalising hints and glimpses of the celestial otherworld and more Nordic gods…

JiM #86 introduced another recurring villain. Zarrko, bristling at the sedentary ease of 23rd century life, travels to 1962 to steal an experimental “C-Bomb”, forcing the Thunderer into a stirring sortie through time and inevitable clash with super-technology ‘On the Trail of the Tomorrow Man!’ With his return, Blake became a target of Soviet abductors: the sneaky spies even managed to make Thor a ‘Prisoner of the Reds!’ before he eventually emerged unscathed and triumphant…

JiM #88 saw ‘The Vengeance of Loki’ as the malevolent miscreant uncovered Thor’s secret identity and naturally menaced Jane whilst ‘The Thunder God and the Thug’ offered drama on a human scale as a gang boss runs riot over the city and roughshod over a good woman’s heart, giving the Stormbringer a chance to demonstrate his sympathetic side by crushing Thug Thatcher and freeing poor abused Ruby from his influence.

Issue #90 was an unsettling surprise as the grandeur of Kirby & Ayers was replaced by the charming yet dynamism-free art of Al Hartley, who illustrated Lee & Lieber’s stock alien-invasion yarn ‘Trapped by the Carbon-Copy Man!’ A month later the Storm Lord took on ‘Sandu, Master of the Supernatural!’, with Sinnott pencilling and inking a thriller starring a carnival mentalist who – augmented by Loki’s magic – came catastrophically close to killing our hero. Sinnott limned JiM #92’s ‘The Day Loki Stole Thor’s Magic Hammer’ – scripted by Robert Bernstein over Lee’s plot – which moved the action fully to Asgard for the first time as Thor sought to recover his stolen weapon after Loki ensorcelled the magnificent mallet. Kirby & Ayers momentarily returned for Cold War/Atom Age thriller ‘The Mysterious Radio-Active Man!’ Again scripted by Bernstein it sees “Mao Tse Tung” unleash an atomic assassin in retaliation for Thor thwarting China’s invasion of India. Such “Red-baiting” fare was common for early Marvel, but their jingoistic silliness can’t mar the eerie beauty of the artwork. With this tale, rangy, raw-boned Thor completed his slow metamorphosis into the husky, burly blonde bruiser who dominated any panel he was in.

Sinnott returned for the next three (somewhat pedestrian) adventures. ‘Thor and Loki Attack the Human Race!’, ‘The Demon Duplicator’ and ‘The Magic of Mad Merlin!’, but these mediocre tales of magic-induced amnesia, science-generated evil doppelgangers and an awakened ancient mutant menace were the last of an old style of comics. Stan Lee took over scripting with Journey into Mystery #97 and a torrent of action wedded to soap opera melodrama began a fresh style for a developing readership.

‘The Lava Man’ in #97 was drawn by Kirby, with subtly textured inking by Don Heck adding depth to the tale of an invader summoned from subterranean realms to menace humanity at the behest of Loki. More significantly, a long running rift between Thor and his stern father Odin was established after the Lord of Asgard refused to allow his son to love mortal Jane.

This acrimonious triangle was a perennial subplot attempting to humanise Thor, because already he was a hero too powerful for most villains to cope with.

Most importantly, this issue launched a spectacular back-up series. ‘Tales of Asgard – Home of the Mighty Norse Gods’ gave Kirby a vehicle to indulge his fascination with legends. Initially adapting classic tales but eventually with all-new material particular to the Marvel pantheon, he built his own cosmos and mythology, which underpinned the company’s entire continuity. This first saga, scripted by Lee and inked by George Bell (AKA Jack’s Golden Age collaborator George Roussos), outlined the origin of the world and the creation of the World Tree Yggdrasil.

‘Challenged by the Human Cobra’ introduced the serpentine villain (bitten by a radioactive cobra, would you believe?) in a tale by Lee & Heck, whilst Kirby – with them in attendance – offered ‘Odin Battles Ymir, King of the Ice Giants!’: a short, potent fantasy romp which laid the groundwork for decades of cosmic wonderment of years to come.

The format held for issues #99 & 100 with the lead story (first 2-parter in the run) introducing the ‘Mysterious Mister Hyde’ – and concluding a month later with ‘The Master Plan of Mr. Hyde!’ The modern yarn featured a contemporary chemist who could transform into a super-strong villain at will who framed Thor for his crimes whilst in primordial prehistory Kirby detailed Odin’s war with ‘Surtur the Fire Demon’, and latterly (with Vince Colletta inking) crafted an exploit of the All-Father’s so different sons in ‘The Storm Giants – a Tale of the Boyhood of Thor’ (Paul Reinman inks). As always, Lee scripted these increasingly influential histories…

Breaking for another recycled Lee Introduction, the modern myth-making resumes with JiM #101 (entirely inked by Roussos) which saw Kirby finally assume pencilling on both strips. In ‘The Return of Zarrko, the Tomorrow Man’ Odin halves Thor’s powers for disobedience just as the futuristic felon abducts the Thunderer to conquer the 23rd century. Another 2-parter, it’s balanced by another exuberant tale of boy Thor. ‘The Invasion of Asgard’ sees the valiant lad fight a heroic rearguard action introducing a host of future villainous mainstays such as Rime Giants and Geirrodur the Troll.

Epic conclusion ‘Slave of Zarrko, the Tomorrow Man’ is a tour de force notable for Chic Stone’s debut as inker. To many of us dotards, his clean, full brush lines make him The King’s best embellisher ever. The triumphant futuristic thriller is balanced by brooding Reinman-inked short ‘Death Comes to Thor!’ as the teen tyro faces his greatest challenge yet. Two women who would play huge roles in his life premiered in this 5-pager: young goddess Sif and Hela, Queen of the Dead.

Lee, Kirby & Stone introduced more memorable misanthropes in ‘Menaced by The Enchantress and The Executioner!’: ruthless renegade Asgardians resolved to respectively seduce and destroy the warrior prince in the front of JiM #103 whilst the rear revealed ‘Thor’s Mission to Mirmir!’ and how the gods created humanity. That led one month later to a revolutionary saga when ‘Giants Walk the Earth!’.

At last Kirby’s imagination was given full play as Loki tricks Odin into visiting Earth, and subsequently liberates ancient elemental enemies Surtur and Skagg, the Storm Giant from Asgardian bondage to ambush the absent All-Father…

This cosmic clash saw noble gods battling demonic devils in a new Heroic Age, with the greater role of the Norse supporting cast – especially noble comrade-in-arms Balder. This was reinforced by a new Tales of Asgard backup feature focussing on individual Gods and Heroes. ‘Heimdall: Guardian of the Mystic Rainbow Bridge!’ was first, with Heck inking.

Issues #105-106 teamed two old foes in ‘The Cobra and Mr, Hyde!’ and ‘The Thunder God Strikes Back!’: another continued story stuffed with tension and spectacular action, proving Thor was swiftly growing beyond the constraints of traditional single issue adventures. Respective back-ups ‘When Heimdall Failed!’ (Lee, Kirby & Roussos) and ‘Balder the Brave’ (Lee, Kirby & Colletta) further fleshed out the Asgardian pantheon deviating by more and more from the classical Eddas and Sagas.

JiM #107 premiered a petrifying villain ‘When the Grey Gargoyle Strikes!’: a rare yarn highlighting the fortitude of Dr. Blake rather than the Thunder God who was increasingly reducing his own alter-ego to an inconsequentiality. Closing the issue, the Norn Queen debuted in ‘Balder Must Die!’: a quirky reinterpretation of myth by Kirby & Colletta.

After months of manipulation, the God of Evil once again took direct action in ‘At the Mercy of Loki, Prince of Evil!’, With Jane Foster a victim of Asgardian magic, the willing assistance of new Marvel star Doctor Strange made this a captivating team-up must-read, whilst ‘Trapped by the Trolls!’ (Colletta inks) showed the power and promise of tales set solely on the far side of the Rainbow Bridge as Thor liberates Asgardians from subterranean bondage.

Journey into Mystery #109 was another superb infomercial adventure and a plug for a recent addition to the Marvel roster. ‘When Magneto Strikes!’ pits Thor against the X-Men’s greatest foe and his Brotherhood of Evil Mutants in a cataclysmic clash of fundamental powers, but you couldn’t really call it a team-up since the heroic mutants are never actually seen. Tantalising hints and cropped glimpses are fascinating teasers now, but the kid I then was felt annoyed not to have seen these new heroes – Oh! wait… maybe that was the point?

Young Thor feature ‘Banished from Asgard!’ is an uncharacteristically lacklustre effort as Odin and Thor enact a devious plan to trap a traitor in Asgard’s ranks. This issue also saw the launch of the letters page The Hammer Strikes and a Special Announcements Section, all included from here on for your delectation…

By #110 the ever-expanding world of Asgard was fully established: a mesmerising milieu for Thor’s earlier adventures and exotic setting for fresh wonders all hinting at a forthcoming era of cosmic fantasy to run beside the company’s signature Manhattan-based superhero sagas. ‘Every Hand Against Him!’ (Lee, Kirby & Stone) combines both, as Loki has earthly miscreants Cobra and Mr. Hyde kidnap and wound nigh unto death Thor’s mortal beloved Jane, even as Odin again overreacts to Thor’s affections for the human.

Following a stunning Kirby & Stone Thor Pin-up, and balancing that tension-drenched clash of Good and Evil, is a crafty vignette of Young Thor describing ‘The Defeat of Odin!’ in an old and silly plot sweetened by breathtaking battle scenes. It’s followed by another Lee Introduction before the concluding clash with Cobra & Hyde redefining ‘The Power of the Thunder God!’ With a major role for Balder the Brave and further integrating “historical” and contemporary Asgard in a spellbinding epic of triumph and near-tragedy, it’s complimented by a Loki Pin-up and precedes a fable co-opting a Greek myth (Antaeus if you’re asking) as ‘The Secret of Sigurd!’ (inked by Colletta).

Journey into Mystery #112 gave readers what they had been clamouring for with ‘The Mighty Thor Battles the Incredible Hulk!’: a glorious gift to all those fans who perpetually ask “who’s stronger…”? Arguably Kirby & Stone’s finest collaborative moment, it details a private duel that apparently appeared off-camera during a free-for-all between in The Avengers #3 when the heroes battled Sub-Mariner and the eponymous Green Goliath. The raw aggressive power of that clash is balanced by an eagerly anticipated origin in ‘The Coming of Loki!’ (Colletta inks): a retelling of how Odin adopts the baby son of Laufey, the Giant King.

In #113’s ‘A World Gone Mad!’ the Thunderer – after saving the Shining Realm from invasion – again defies Odin to court Jane:  a task made hazardous by the return of the Grey Gargoyle. A long-running plot strand – almost interminably so – was the soap-opera tangle caused by Don Blake’s love for his nurse – a passion his alter ego shared. Sadly, the Overlord of Asgard could not countenance his son with a mortal, in another heavy-handed example of that acrimonious triangle.

The mythic moment at the back then exposed ‘The Boyhood of Loki!’ (inked by Colletta), a pensive, brooding foretaste of the villain to be, before JiM #114 opened a 2-part tale starring a new villain of the kind Kirby excelled at: a vicious thug who suddenly lucked into overwhelming power.

‘The Stronger I Am, The Sooner I Die!’ finds Loki imbuing hardened felon Crusher Creel with the ability to duplicate the strength and attributes of anything he touches, but before Creel endures ‘The Vengeance of the Thunder God’ (inked by Frank Giacoia as “Frankie Ray”) we’re graced with another Asgardian parable – ‘The Golden Apples!’…

Issue #115’s back-up mini-myth ‘A Viper in our Midst!’ sees young Loki clandestinely cementing relations with the sinister Storm Giants, before a longer Thor saga began in #116, with Colletta becoming regular inker for both lead and support features. ‘The Trial of the Gods’ disclosed more aspects of Asgard as Thor and Loki undertake a brutal ritualised Trial by Combat, with the latter cheating at every step, after which ‘Into the Blaze of Battle!’ finds Balder protecting Jane even as her godly paramour travels to war-torn Vietnam seeking proof of his step-brother’s infamy.

These yarns are supplemented by stellar novellas ‘The Challenge!’ and ‘The Sword in the Scabbard!’, wherein Asgardian cabin-fever informs an official Quest instituted to expose a threat to the mystic Odinsword, the unsheathing of which will destroy the universe…

Journey into Mystery #118’s ‘To Kill a Thunder God!’ ramps up the otherworldly drama as Loki, to cover his tracks, unleashes an ancient Asgardian WMD – The Destroyer. When it damages the mystic hammer of Thor and nearly kills The Thunderer in ‘The Day of the Destroyer!’, the God of Mischief is forced to save his step-brother or bear the brunt of Odin’s anger.

Meanwhile in Tales of Asgard The Quest further unfolds with verity-testing talisman ‘The Crimson Hand!’ and ‘Gather, Warriors!’ as a band of literally hand-picked “Argonauts” join Thor’s flying longship in a bold but misguided attempt to forestall Ragnarok…

With The Destroyer defeated and Loki temporarily thwarted, Thor returns to America and then Asgard ‘With My Hammer in Hand…!’ only to clash once more with the awesome Absorbing Man in the start of another multi-part saga that will continue in the next volume…

However, before that bombastic battle there’s not only the next instalment of the Asgardian Argonauts who boldly ‘Set Sail!’ but also the superb lead story from Journey into Mystery Annual #1, wherein in undisclosed ages past the God of Thunder fell into the realm of the Greek Gods for a landmark heroic hullabaloo ‘When Titans Clash! Thor vs. Hercules!’

This incredible all-action episode is augmented here by a stunning and beautiful double-page pin-up of downtown Asgard – a true example of Kirby magic – plus one last Lee Intro essay.

There’s a relative paucity of bonus material here but it’s all first rate: including unretouched original artwork, house ads and a full run of covers from Marvel Tales #1, 3-27 and Special Marvel Edition #1-2 from the 1960s where his early exploits were first reprinted. Closing the section is the cover art for this collection by Olivier Coipel, Mark Morale & Laura Martin.

These early tales of the God of Thunder show the development not only of one of Marvel’s core narrative concepts but, more importantly, the creative evolution of perhaps the greatest imagination in comics. Set your common sense on pause and simply wallow in the glorious imagery and power of these classic adventures and revel in what makes comic book superheroes such a unique experience.
© 2022 MARVEL.