Like a puppet on a string.

The Mighty World of Marvel #16

Week Ending 20th January 1973 

In the days before I write these weekly blogs I do my research on the issue I intend to do by quickly looking through a digital copy of the comic, picking out the items of interest and choosing the images I want to show in the final blog, coping, titling, cropping and pasting into a file on my MacBook. The lead image for these blogs will always be a scanned image from my own collection, hence the reason for the newsagent writing on the top of many issues. Why would I blog about something I've never read or owned? But come the Saturday I dig out my analogue copy and read the comic again from cover to back cover to get into my nostalgic head zone! The digital cover is fine, the colours are bright, maybe a little too bright. But when you hold the physical copy in your hands and see the matt finish on the newsprint paper, you see more depth, more texture, more richness in the colours. It smells better too, I could do a whole blog on the smell of old comics, but thankfully today I won't. Al Milgrom' art over Jim Starlin' layouts with inks by Joe Sinnott, looks very functional, yet this scene, the Hulk busting out of Tony Stark's hi-tech chains, never happened (the Hulk changed back to a smaller Banner form and slipped through the restraints,) and even if it did it all would have happened last week not this week. It's a little busy, especially with the five floating heads of the Hulks co-stars with headlines about their imminent  adventures but when you see it on the printed page it feels more warm and more inviting. You want to turn the page and consume all its contents. It's a guilty pleasure of a cover.

The  incredible Hulk "A titan rides the train!"

Writer: Stan Lee

Artist: Steve Ditko

Inker: George Roussos

This week we're properly introduced to last weeks mystifying Leader, a gamma radiation born contrast to the Hulk, whose's power of extreme intelligence was the polar opposite to the Hulk's child like intellect. His origin was shown very early on in this story. 

He'd been a simple, harmless labourer at a chemical research plant when a one in a million accident occurred, a gamma ray cylinder exploded, bombarding him with deadly radiation. His survival mystified medical staff as much as his new found hunger for knowledge. Then one day after a bout of painful headaches his final mutation occurred. His cranium enlarged to hold his evolved brain while his skin and hair turned a shade of glaucous green. He also developed massive bags under his eyes which was either from all that late night reading or just from the Steve Ditko' text book for "make me a look like monster" artwork.  

It's strange that the villain of the book is an ordinary man who gains super brainy powers, while his nemesis is a super intelligent scientist who loses his genus but gains brute strength instead. Yes it does have Super-man v Lex Luther vibes but it's the changes of "ego and might" in both that makes the dynamic unique. I imagine that a typical reader is less jock and more bookworm but which gamma power would they wish to gain?

Knowledge and information are the Leaders credo, manipulation of others to achieve his aims through a network of spies and agents like the Chameleon. Never one to get his hands dirty he devised a synthetic android he named a Humanoid, a sponge like construct that takes all the Hulk's heavy punches, while the Leader sits comfortably miles away in secret, controlling the Humanoid's actions via a hi-tech headset enhancing his powerful brain. Though a "spectroscopic transceiver" he watches his marionette fulfil his commands like a puppeteer without the awkward strings. His target is the latest nuclear device created by Banner, but his Humanoid runs into doctors alter-ego who saves the device but when the mistrusted scientist is found with the damaged device he's arrested and thrown in prison. Banner is questioned but he won't or can't answer. And so end this weeks Hulk exploit. Fine 10 pages of strip but pretty much standard for Hulk stories of this era. 

In the mail bag this week we hear from Jonathan Saulsman who would love to see a battle between the Thing and the Hulk but wonders how can Bruce afford new clothes after every transformation? May be there's a branch of Primark in New Mexico. David Cunningham asks who drew the covers for MWOM as he thinks is was John Buscema, we get the first official acknowledgement from the editor that big John did indeed draw cover of issue one and Jim Starlin handled many of the other covers. George Gardiner finds Marvel stories really interesting and ponders is the Hulk, FF and Spider-man real? The editor replies that Marvel characters have a life of their own but then lets George down to ground with a crash by adding "they don't really exist!" Ouch! Mario Giannotta from Sheffield rates the FF "squad" higher than Hulk or Spider-man. Finally Barry Daly from Tipperary in Ireland thinks that FOOM stands for "Federation Organisation Of Marvel"! Close Barry but it's not right. He'll have to wait and see till February to find out how close he is.

A Pin-up Page in full colour of old bashful Ben Grimm, originally from the Fantastic Four Annual #2 from 1964 by Jack Kirby. I adore this cheeky poster. It has been reprinted many times but it never fail to bring a smile to my face.

Spider-man "The return of the Vulture"

Writer: Stan Lee

Artist: Steve Ditko

Inker: Steve Ditko

After seven Spider-man stories the first villain to make a return visit is the Vulture, because we apparently demanded it. I can see why it would make a good rematch as in the last battle Spider-man defeated the old ex-con with the aid of a bit of hi-tech, this time our young hero will need to be more physical to get one over this old bird. Spidey has grown into his spandex over the last months, so it's time for a challenge. But wasn't the Vulture arrested and serving time in prison? But that never stopped keeping a good villain down, especially when he's got wings!

 When I read this, just before I started this blog, I felt something wasn't quite right. So I dug out my trusty copy of Marvel Masterworks Spider-man edition and sure enough I found out what had changed. For some reason the editors of MWOM had swapped the second page of this story for the fourth page. In the original Amazing Spider-man #7 after the opening slash page that hinted confrontation between the hero and villain at the Daily Bugle, a recap of the Vultures defeat followed on page two which lead into how the Vulture conducted his escape from prison before news got to Peter Parker of convicts break out. In the MWOM version page two shows the Vulture is seen flying over the prison wall, cutting out his back story, leading the reader straight to Peter Parkers part in the story at Midtown High school. The original page two now moved to page four as a sophisticated flashback. The text in the British version was changed to cover up that fact from "next day" to "One day" as why would a story start with next day? Page four (of the British version) had a more lengthier text edit done to change "Spider-man #2" to "Mighty Marvel #5" for obvious reasons, plus "it concerned his spectacular battle" was also adapted to "it featured Spidey's battle" to make the letter count fit. Marvel UK had not yet thought of abbreviating the Mighty World of Marvel to MWOM as this would have saved them space. The only reason for this page swap I presume was with just half of the original story appearing in a weekly comic the intension was to get to the star of the strip as soon as possible. In my first reading of this comic many, many years ago I never noticed it. My young self quite happy with the rhythm of the story, just enjoying it for what it is. Now I guess age has made me more cynical. What a surprise Peter's old "anti-magnetic inverter" device doesn't work on the Vulture this time, so it's back to good old fashioned fisticuffs. To be continued next week.

More "no-new-news" this week in the left half of the centre spread from Sue Storm and Ben Grimm. Well apart from FOOM is made up of four initials surprise. Barry Daly guessed that already. The right half of the centre spread, I'll leave that page till later for once.
 

A bonus feature of a dot-to-dot, or should that be a dot-to-Doom? I'm not sure who it's a picture of, as in my copy of MWOM#16 some one has cut out that page, possibly to colour in the dot-to-dot and stick it up on their wall, or more likely to stick up the Skrulls feature on the back of it, as a poster! May be they were a big Skrull fan. Damn you 70's child! No it wasn't me, mine is a second-hand copy. The "Halls of infamy" feature originally came from the Fantastic Four Annual #1 from 1963.

The Fantastic Four "Prisoners of the Puppet Master!"

Writer: Stan Lee

Artist: Jack Kirby

Inker: Dick Ayers

The Fantastic Four tale starts off with the Thing falling out with the rest of the group when Reed and the Storms won't allow him in to see what's being worked on. The usual bickering and puppy fighting endures, which leaves Ben going off in a huff. The Thing is so stubborn he doesn't realise, like most readers would, that Richards is working on something that will change him back to human. Sue goes after him. 

This is, as the title hinted, the first appearance of the Puppet Master and also the first time we see the blind future girlfriend of Ben Grimm, Alicia Masters. (Sorry I should have said "Spoilers" before mentioning that, oh well.) Alicia is the step daughter of the Puppet Master, she must have taken his surname when her mother remarried. I've just had a senior moment when I realised for the first time that his real name is also part of his villain alias. D'oh!! Phillip MASTERs the Puppet MASTER! D'oh! Well that was hidden in plain sight.
   

The Puppet Masters power stem from the use of radioactive clay found near his home village under the Wundagore mountain in Transia. Never mentioned in this tale, just me being informative. Once he moulds the clay into a figurine of his intended victim he can control that person, but only while he is holding the doll. He uses he powers to force a man to jump of a bridge to his death, only to have his victim rescued by the Human Torch. This forces Masters into a course of revenge on the FF using the Thing as his weapon. After subduing the Invisible Girl with sleeping gas, unbelievably fitted in a handy cylinder on his apartment wall (everyone should have some,) he realises that his step daughter look amazingly similar to the sleeping heroine. So after a quick fix of her hair he sends Ben and Alicia off for a surprise attack.  

The final page shows the Puppet Master starting another plan in which he causes havoc at a prison,
overcomplicating everything like every villain does. Stick to one plan lad, it easier in the long run. The final panel shows the mind controlled Thing attacking Johnny and a text panel that informs us that "Next week: the Puppet Master's diabolical plot moves into high gear. Be here, mates!" But is that how I would finish the comic?....Nope!

    

Well remember that centre spread I mention earlier? (see above.) I would have used it for the back page, move the FOOM page to next to the Mail Bag, then move the Thing Pin-up to the centre spread together with the Skrull "Hals of infamy" page leaving the extra colour page to be used on the second page of the Fantastic Four strip. With that the final page would entice reader to come back next week to see the Hulk taking on an army of Humanoids, Spider-man facing the Vulture in "Bedlam at the Bugle!" and the fabulous Fantastic Four as they battle the "mind bending machinations of the merely machiavellian Puppet Master!" Who says reading comics doesn't expand your vocabulary. All that and more in next weeks MWOM. So if you want to find out if it's really an action packed "atomic-powered issue" be here and read another blog from the Power Of the Beesting. Bring your copy of issue 17 with you too. Everything will make more sense. 

See you in seven.

Make Mine Marvel!