Mischief makers.

Week Ending 3rd March 1973

A little bit of tiding up from last weeks blog, I mentioned that I was surprised to find out that Doctor Doom had used a technique developed by the alien race called the Ovoids to swap bodies with Mr. Fantastic as seen in MWOM #20 and #21 , as I believed he had used a machine instead. Also I could have sworn that John Byrne had reused the concept again in another FF story but couldn't recall in which story. Paul Lynch quite rightly pointed out (via Facebook group UK Marvel in the Seventies,) that in Fantastic Four #260 (When titans clash) Doctor Doom did indeed use the same technique to escape death when his armour fused during a battle with Tyros or Terrax the tamer as he's sometimes known. This plot was never explained in that issue but later revealed in  #287 (Prisoner of the flesh) and #288 (Full circle). The story from #260 never saw print in a Marvel UK comic, but strangely enough the stories from #287 and #288 did appear in Secret Wars II #68 and #69 a Marvel UK comic from October 1986, (we've got a long way to go with these Marvel UK reviews to get up to those comics.) which are the issues that I remember reading! So a big thanks to Paul and a "Power of the Beesting" No-prize is yours.  

The Mighty World of Marvel #22

Another Jim Starlin layout that Al Milgrom finished off the pencil artwork and Mike Esposito completed the cover by adding the inks. The headline banner give away what was to be a surprise hinted at last week, "Marvel Mini-Poster!" As the Hulk was the main feature of this cover he gets a slightly "over-wordy" text panel, stating "At last the incredible Hulk..face to face with the murderous mind force of the Leader!" adding that it was a contest of "brawn against brain in the battle of of the century!" Let's find out if it was.

The Incredible Hulk "Trapped in the lair of the Leader!"

Writer: Stan Lee

Artist: Jack Kirby

Inker: Mike Esposito 

Originally published in Tales to Astonish #69

Cover date July 1965

(Published in April 1965)

Well was it the battle of the century? Well no, not really, The Leader only confronted the Hulk in around 10 panels and most of those they were obscured by smoke, so the battle of brawn and brain never materialised. The story seemed to be retreading over the same ideas, "Banner is a traitor," "the Leader wants to steal Banner's latest creation," "Rick Jones has to keep Banners secret" and "Major Talbot is a dick!" As the Hulk stories had to share billing with another hero in Tales to Astonish (at this point it was Giant-man and the Wasp, later it would be the Sub-Mariner.) the story lengths would only be 10 pages long. The short punchy tales should have lead to tighter plots, but instead we get a period of repeated plots. I kind of think that at the time Stan and his artists were more interested in other heroes and less on the Hulk. In the final panels the Hulk is shot at through a wall of smoke, then seconds later Banner is found injured, hardly breathing. In the cliffhanging final panel he's declared dead! You can bet next issue will have him recover before you know it and the whole routine starts again. You were almost shouting at the page to get a move on! The sooner everyone knew Banner was the Hulk the better it would be. But don't worry things would improve soon.

A third of this weeks Mighty Marvel Mail Bag is taken up by a note from the Marvel Bullpen, thanking all the thousands who sent in cards or letters about MWOM and the new companion comic Spider-man Comics Weekly. "Keep them coming" they add. Ian MacDonald from Clydebank did just that, saying that he has been reading the original Marvel mags for years and would love to see Daredevil in MWOM. Well he got his wish. Phil Castlefields from Shrewsbury writes in congratulating Marvel on an impressive first issue of MWOM, that he hopes will "spread the mighty Marvel word across the country", to "help people realise that this is a true art form!" The final letter in this weeks Mail Bag comes from A. Moseley from Hebburn-On-Tyne who has bought 40 back issue of MWOM number 1 so that he could use the Hulk transfers to decorate his racing teams t-shirts and overalls. The car he and his friends are building is going to be called "THE INCREDIBLE HULK" and they intend to drive the car at the Santa Pod drag way. He hoped they would win the "best dressed team competition. They intend to add a large poster of the Hulk to the car and have the name of the car down each side. I wonder what quarter mile time did they get? Did anyone remember them at Santa Pod in 1973/74? 

Daredevil "The evil menace of Electro!"

Writer: Stan Lee

Artist: Joe Orlando

Inker: Vince Colletta

Originally published in Daredevil #2

Cover date June 1964

(Published in April 1964)

"The origin of Daredevil!" story has been my favourite strip in Marvel UK in the last two weeks. I can quite easily describe it as a tour de force from Stan Lee and Bill Everett. It was a high bar that other strips from MWOM and SMCW couldn't reach, even though in many cases those strips were brilliant, Daredevil was absolutely amazing. Could this weeks Daredevil live up to those dizzy heights? Well even from the first page I can tell the answer is no! Well where to start? The first thing that I notice was the look of the artwork. Joe Orlando and Vince Colletta are capable artists, Orlando is well known for his work on EC comics, DC comics and Marvel, while Colletta worked with Kirby for many years at Marvel and later DC but neither don't suit this strip. Lets just put Colletta quickly to one side for a minute, Colletta does have a reputation taking short cuts with his inking, either rubbing out the pencilers detailed work or blacking over it with ink. But you can't over look that he's also got a reputation for being efficient, and always hitting the deadlines. Some types of comic stories like the romantic style of noble Asgardians really suits him, I really love his work with Jack Kirby on Thor, but I've seen evidence that some of Kirby's artwork was even better before Colletta had inked it. But I don't feel that's the case with this strip. I feel the original art that came from Orlando didn't quite live up to what followed before. When Everett drew Matt Murdock you could tell he was a blind man. Take a look at Matt on the splash page above, he doesn't look anything remotely like the character from the last two weeks. Dark glasses do not make him a blind man. He's jovial without any sadness, or darkness that comes with the brooding vigilante. Yeah I know DD does spit wisecracks from time to time but there should always be a sad, deeper side to his character. Gene Colan draws him like that, Frank Miller does too. Murdock doesn't look like a well educated lawyer, in Orlando's artwork he looks like a yuppie moron. The posing Daredevil looks contemptible and not noble. As for Electro his less of an evil menace and more of a gurning fool. 

Electro is an unusual guest villain, in Marvel UK time he had only just appeared a week ago in Spider-man, in the US there had only been five months between his first appearance, that ended with his imprisonment and this story. I'm blaming Stan for this one, did he break out of prison, was he released? How soon does he set up a grand theft auto gang? His character just doesn't feel the same. I don't feel that Orlando read that issue of the Amazing Spider-man or Daredevil #1 for that matter, Foggy Nelson and Karen Page look nothing like they did last week. The Thing makes a guest appearance this week too, with the plot devise that the FF need a lawyer to give their lease for the Baxter Building a going over. Again I doubt that Orlando has ever seen a Fantastic Four comic. By far the worst interpretation of Ben Grimm I can ever recall seeing. 

I don't want to fill this blog with aversion to Joe Orlando, I never want to be thought of as a hate monger. This strip doesn't suit him or may be he never felt interested in the comic. Orlando is well known for humour and horror strips, at least in this story he got to stretch his artistic legs with a gag scene at Electro's garage chop shop. In itself that looked the best part of the strip.

The garage fight scene is fun but even that does get a little out of hand as Daredevil stops an oncoming truck with an engine catapulted from a car tyre. Far fetched is putting it mildly. Again I wonder should that one be levelled at Stan's writing. 

As DD busts the gang their leader looks to try other lines of criminal profit, when he hears on the news that the Fantastic Four will be out of town for a day or two. Electro thinks there's got to be lots of secrets in the Baxter Building he can sell to a hostel nation. As fate would have it Matt Murdock is on his way to go over the buildings lease details, leading to a clash of hero and villain. Electro renders Daredevil unconscious and plans to dispose of the body by sending him into space inside of the FF's own rocket, as you do! To be continued next week. 

 

One last thing about this weeks DD strip, it reveals the new Fantasti-Car. This Mark II version will make its premier appearance in the Fantastic Four story "The Incredible Hulk" in just two weeks time. This story was published 15 months after after this one in the US. But here Marvel UK readers get to view it for the first time.

As it was spoiled on the front cover, the free gift you was invited to guess at last issue is a Marvel Mini-poster! Well it's better than a blank panel like the one we was teased about last week. The first mini-poster is the Incredible Hulk! As a kid in the early 70's I would love it, but my boring grumpy old man self in 2023 feels a little deflated with it. I do miss that 70's kid. Sharing the centre pages is an in house advert for Spider-man Comics Weekly #3, showcasing the return of Doctor Octopus. Steve Ditko drew this panel as it originally was part of the cover for the Amazing Spider-man #11. Also this page finishes with an advert for FOOM!

 Here's the cover of Amazing Spider-man #11, it's pretty much the same but with slight changes to back ground colours and the colour of Doc Ocks pants. Although is it me, or does it look like Doc Ock has lost his glasses? Why would they do that?  Without them he looks like a cross between Herman Monster and Elvis!

Another Fantastic Four's Hall of Infamy that previews next weeks guest antagonist, the Impossible Man. Drawn by Jack Kirby and inked by Sol Brodsky this is another feature originally from the Fantastic Four Annual #1 cover dated September 1963. It's a weird likeness of Impy but for a shapeshifter what is normal? 

"Somebody wake up the artist!" It's a find the error puzzle page. Ive no idea who drew it, I imagine that this feature was made especially for Marvel UK. What I do know is I got up to counting twenty different mistakes, then give up. Did I miss any?

The Fantastic Four "A visit with the Fantastic Four"

Writer: Stan Lee

Artist: Jack Kirby

Inker: Dick Ayers

Originally published in Fantastic Four #11

Cover date February 1963

(Published in November 1962)

It may be fair to say that some of the strips lately haven't filled me with joy, that may come from in 2023 I know what great stuff is coming. I don't mean to sound down on the current batch of strips,  readers in the 60's (when these tales were originally created probably got a massive kick out of them and so did 70's kids too. May be I'm being too critical. I should chill out a bit. How here's a story to relax with. Full of charm and humour. Above the title of this strip Stan informs us that it's a "Special bonus to our readers!" "The type of story most requested by your letters and post cards," well that would be a massive battle royal between the Fantastic Four, Doctor Doom, the Sub-Mariner and the incredible Hulk. Errr, am I being an old grump again, it's not that. Instead we get a pleasant look into the civilian life of our four heroes. You kind of imagine this story would be a page filler in an annual but no this was featured first before the main story, that we'll see in full next week.

 

The Fantastic Four pop to the shops to pick up the latest copy of "Mighty Marvel", by that they probably mean "The Mighty World of Marvel" but the letter bodger couldn't fit that into the gap in the speech balloon left by the removal of the words "Fantastic Four". Stan and Jack have really gone meta, with the FF buying their own comic to read stories about themselves. Have a closer look at the kid with his copy, shouting "I've just got the latest copy and my letter's on the fan page!" In the US version it was the Fantastic Four Fan Page, but the British version we get to see the Mighty Marvel Mail Bag page. Nice touch.

If you zoom in on the police officer next to Ben you'll see he was reading a magazine with the logo of the Fantastic Four. In the Marvel UK version you got what looks like the Mighty World of Marvel logo. 

The cue for the shop is to big so the foursome give it a miss, I imagine Reed Richards has made a future viewer gismo that can connect to the future internet from 2023 so they'll check out my blog to find out what happened in the MWOM and what I thought about it. Four kids are roll playing their heroes as the FF pass by. After a quick "play safe kids" the FF head home. Was that scene written so that readers wouldn't copy any of the dangerous feats that the FF do everyday. 

 

We get the first appearance  of Willie Lumpkin, the post man to the Baxter Building, with his incredible wiggling ears! I should say it was Willie's first Silver Age appearance, as he had made regular appearances during the Golden Age in his own syndicated comic strip by Stan Lee and legendary artist Dan DeCarlo (know for Sabrina the teenage witch, Josie and the Pussycats for Archie Comics and Millie the model for Marvel Comics).

The plot goes that Willie Pumpkin has delivered a sack full of fan mail to the FF, with questions from fans. So as a way to explain Ben and Reeds friendship we get Reed and Ben breaking the fourth wall by explaining directly to the readers how they meet at college, creating a friendship that would last, only to be put on hold after their graduation as they in their separate ways fought in World War 2. Ben as a fighter pilot and Reed as a freedom fighter in France working for the O.S.S. That's the Office of Strategic Services, a wartime intelligence agency the predecessor to the C.I.A. In the 1960's that war wasn't that far gone, but in the 1970's it was almost three decades later, making Ben and Reed in their 50's. A stretch in credibility but not as bad as when the 1980's and 1990's came. Thank goodness for Marvel's sliding timescale! It's a mine field, as a kid in the 70's I didn't care and now I still don't care. Why let trivial things like timescale get in the way of a good story? That kind of thing has always been easy to suspend my disbelieve for. James Bond has always been in his 40s so why can't Reed and Ben?

At one point during the letter opening session Sue becomes up set with a number letters from correspondents who feel that she doesn't contribute enough to the team, even some who suggest that the FF would be better without her. To which Reed points to a bust of Abraham Lincoln and paraphrase him by saying "All that he was--all that he ever hoped to be--he owed to her." The actual quote attributed to Lincoln is "All that I am, or hope to be, I owe to my angel mother." Reed also points out that Sue has many times more than aided them in their adventures. I feel that Stan was addressing points made in genuine letters and maybe he felt that his writing of her character had played some outdated tunes. He was guilty of having her input trivialised and at times nothing more than a damsel in distress. It was the 60's when this story was written, women's lib was starting to grow in the 70's, those antiquated concepts would fade away, times they were a changing. May be Stan Lee and the Marvel Revolution was part of that change. The Lincoln quote did paint her as a mother/house wife figure but to my mind she was the First Lady of Marvel and so much more than a stereotype. 

An alarm goes off in the vehicle workshops, its coming from the Xantha saucer, (the Skrull looking space ship recovered from Kurrgo the ruler of Planet X,) where we find Sue's brother Johnny with a gigantic surprise birthday cake for Sue. She's so choked up, declaring herself to be speechless, to which the Thing says "First time I ever heard a female admit a thing like that!" Well that feminism revolution might take a bit longer.

Jack Kirby delights many an adolescent Marvelite with this attractive pin-up of the beautiful Invisible Girl. Originally printed in the Fantastic Four Annual #2 from 1963 but here it graces the back page or may be some kids bed room wall.

Spider-man Comics Weekly #3

Jim Starlin and Al Milgrom now have to produce another cover every week, it's no wonder they've started doing them with Starlin on layouts and Milgrom finishing of the pencil work. Mike Esposito helps out by inking the final artwork. Jim or Al gives Betty a very short mini skirt in the cover, that's something that was completely out of character for her. As far as I can recall Steve Ditko would never dress any of his female characters wearing one. Thor, God of Thunder clashes with Loki, God of Evil in one fifth of the cover, Marvel UK was very happy to include all the guest content have their bit of cover fame. I don't know if Starlin or Milgrom drew it, the style does look slightly different from the Spider-man/Doctor Octopus part but I wouldn't like to say either way.

Spider-man "Turning point"

 

Writer: Stan Lee

Artist: Steve Ditko

Inker: Steve Ditko

Originally published in the Amazing Spider-man #11

Cover date April 1964

(Published in January 1964)

It's a really great splash page from Ditko, suggesting Betty Brant is pretty angry with Spider-man, to which this impression may hold some truth to that feeling. I love the menacing shadow of Doctor Octopus in typical Ditko style. Stan Lee teases us with text a box that ups the anticipation by asking us to see; "diabolical Doctor Octopus, more dangerous than ever before"; "the secret of Betty Brant...revealed"; "Spider-man's greatest victory...and his most bitter disappointment!" With an opening page like that the rest of the story has to be great! 

Doctor Octopus has served his full prison sentence! There's got to be problems with the American justice system, not only did Electro get out of prison in no time at all but so has Doc Ock! In Britain it's weeks between incarceration and release, in America its months, it could just be Marvel's sliding timescale again, but either way super villains do tend to get very short sentences! Which is great from us action hungry readers, less so for the American general public!

 

Spider-man argues against Doc Oaks release with the Municipal prison warden, to no avail. So Peter develops a transistorised tracking device to keep an eye of the villainous Doctor. Basing it on a spider we get the first view of a Spider Tracker which appears regularly in Spider-man stories, though in those stories Spider-man can use his spider-sense to follow the signal. In this story he has a small portable receiver to trace the signal.  

Peter's girlfriend, Betty Brant, looking like a gangsters mole, picks up Doctor Octopus when he is released from prison. We find out that she is working for Blackie Gaxton a gangster who serving time in prison, as favour to her brother, Bennett Brant, who owes a large debt to Gaxton so works as his lawyer. Gaxton wants to hire Doc Ock to spring him.

Doc Ock does indeed break Gaxton out of a Philadelphia prison. Soon Gaxton, his gang, Doctor Octopus, Bennett and Betty meet on a ship that the crook plans to flee the country on. Bennett has fulfilled his part of their bargain and want to be freed from his debt, Otto Octavius has also fulfilled his part and wants paying and Spider-man who has followed his spider-tracker arrives at the dock side, which leads to a confrontation with our hero and the villains. Bennett gets shot by Gaxton in a struggle with Spider-man. The police arrive too, leading to a boat chase, but Doc Ock escapes once the boat with himself and the web-slinger crashes.

With Blackie Gaxton and his gang arrested by the police and Betty's innocents in the whole affair admitted by Gaxton everything seems to to be wrapped up except for Octavius escape and Betty' deep sorrow with the loss of her brother. 

Peter tries his best to comfort Betty as she explains that Bennett was too headstrong and got involved with bad company. In shock she had blamed Spider-man for causing her brothers death but she later admitted that it wasn't Spider-mans fault, that he was only trying to help. But Spider-man still reminds her of it and she never wants to see him again. 

It's a great story with lots of ideas and plot lines that have been brewing nicely and also sets things up for future issues. I did notice that Ditko seems to have rushed some panels towards the end, see the last panel as Peter walks off into the night with the spectre of Spider-man above him, but some of the human drama scenes are beautifully crafted. Was it because of a looming deadline, or did Ditko enjoy drawing people and not drawing webbing on costumes as much. Still it's the best story of this week by far.

Yet again the colour pages in SMCW aren't in the centrefold, why this occurs is anyones guess, it's always in the centrefold in MWOM. Another surprise free gift give away is advertised, with readers asked to collect coupons for eight weeks, much like the poster give away in early MWOM. As with that give away the reader would be teased every week with a clue to what the surprise is. This weeks clue no.1 is "It's a real swinger!" Now knowing what the gift was from the first ten issues of MWOM, this clue could well be a poster of Spider-man, either that or it's a pet monkey! You might notice that the image of the first page is slightly curved. As regular readers of this blog may recall apart from the comic covers, which are scans of my own copies, all the other scans are taken from digital copies due to speed and ease. But my digital copy of SMCW#3 had the coupon removed before scanning, which doesn't show you what the coupon look like. My physical copy is thankfully fully intact. As for the curved page, there's no way I'm going to crease my copy for anyone! The opposite page carries a half page in house advert for MWOM #23 by showing a scene from that issues Hulk story, with the lower half an advert for FOOM.   

The Mighty Thor "Trapped by Loki, the God of Evil!"

Writer: Stan Lee, Larry Lieber

Artist: Jack Kirby

Inker: Dick Ayers

Originally printed in Journey into Mystery #85

Cover date October 1962

(Published in August 1962)

After the first tale Stan Lee gives the mighty Thor a subtle change in direction, were in that first Thor retained the mental id of Doctor Donald Blake, while the second tale Thor could be said to form more of a personality. Here in this story more of that comes to the surface as the writer notices that Thor and his Asgardian heritage brings a wonderful amount of plot to play with. I say writer, as no credits were listed on either British or American versions many would assume that Stan Lee was the sole writer, but no, Marvel.fandom.com states that Stan's younger brother, Larry Lieber co-wrote this story. As the title predicts we get see for the first time an Asgardian God other than Thor, Loki the God of Mischief. This is his first Silver Age appearance as Loki did appear in the Timely comic Venus #6 from August 1949, in a story where Venus the Greek/Roman Goddess of love, who works at a beauty magazine, gets involved in an adventure in which Loki turns up as the Lord of Hades! The writer plays fast and loose with mythology. Stan was the editor on that comic and probably was responsible for that Olympian and Norse mix. 

The God of Mischief has been imprisoned in a tree for punishment to some unknown crime and can only be released if an inhabitant of Asgard weeps for him. Loki says that for centuries he has been imposing his will on the tree, an exaggeration as some thirteen years have passed since he was last seen in the Venus comic! God of lies too may be. Loki commands a leaf from the tree to fall into the eye of a passing Heimdall, the guardian of the Bifrost. Who looks nothing like Idris Elba from the MCU films, nor anything like later versions drawn by Kirby. With Heimdalls tears Loki is released and plans to seek revenge on his half brother Thor.

We get to see Asgard in its glory as Loki takes the Bifrost to Earth, but where is Heimdall now? Well may be he was trying to get that leave out of his eye while looking for a tissue to dry his watering eyes. On Earth Loki confronts Thor after creating mayhem to flush the God of thunder out. Which leads me to question as does Donald Blake or Thor conscious inhabit the body of Thor as in one scene when Loki reveals himself Thor seems to recognise him, but as the scene unfolds on the next page a thought balloon from Thor seems to only recall the Loki myth from legend not as someone he knows. There is a good chance that this is part of a long plot that sees Thor recovering his memories from the past that have been hidden by Odin when he decided that it was time Thor learned humility by surrendering his hammer and sending him to Earth in the mortal guise of a crippled Donald Blake, stripping him of his memory. Loki's appearance might just have been the catalyst to recover them.  

Loki leads Thor on a merry dance around New York with tricks and traps.

Eventually Thor over comes the God of mischief and sends him back to Asgard on the back of his hammer to face punishment from Odin and the other Norse Gods. I must take it that at this time Thor has fully covered his memories as he knows the direction of Asgard and that Mjolnir can travel Earth to Asgard and back in just under a minute. 

In the Web and the Hammer this week Mark Tipping from Burley says that these comics are MARVEL-ous but has one question, what happens to Spider-mans webs after he's spun them? With Mark being concerned that the city would be cluttered up with them. Very green Mark is. John McNeill from Castleford in Yorkshire writes that Spider-man is the greatest. The time when Spider-man fought the Lizard left him shaking! Finally Peter Brole from Cardiff after reading the Mighty World of Marvel immediately put in for a regular order. He also wishes he was bitten by a radioactive spider but knowing the chances of that happening he properly is best sticking to reading history and science at school.  

After last weeks advert for posters and patches which I thought was more aimed at American teenagers, this weeks unproductive titled "Thro'way posters" comes with a more UK friendly fair, with Bowie, Elton John, Marc Bolan and Rod Stewart joining British bands like Slade, Lindisfarne and Mott the Hoople on the advert. A 70's rock festival am sure you'll agree.

The back page is used to preview next weeks Spider-man Comics Weekly as Spider-man is unmasked by Doc Ock! That must come as a shock to Betty Brant and Jonah Jameson. It's pretty shocking for Peter too! While Thor will encounter the mysterious Tomorrow Man! 

This weeks round up of Marvel UK may have felt like there's not a lot worth reading from my point of view, but in truth warts and all there's lots to love. Comics like life, feels better if you don't take them too seriously. Seriously this weeks I've had a ball. Same again next week? Yeah why not, I better start early there's lots to read.

See you in seven.

Make Mine Marvel.

Big Man, little Humanoids, miniature Doom!

 Week Ending 24th February 1973

British Marvelites now had two weeklies to enjoy. Did readers remain loyal to MWOM or were they enticed into swapping Marvel for Spider-man? How many were lucky enough to get both? Side by side on the newsstand makes a difficult choice. The number of heroes gracing MWOM's cover makes it a tempting purchase. I've always preferred the MWOM logo to be in red and blue colours, that may not be a deal clincher to many but still, I'm a nerd so it does have some appeal to me. While with the SMCW the offer of a free gift creates more allure. The artwork, even though its quite basic and simple looking is bright and attractive. SMCW does also offer a complete Spider-man story which probably swings it for me, even though I love variety. Can't I just have both? 

  

The Mighty World of Marvel #21

Jim Starlin penciled the basic outlay for this cover with Al Milgrom finishing off the pencil work and Mike Esposito completing the whole process by adding the inks. Two Doctor Dooms wasn't factually correct but it represents the Fantastic Four story from inside of the comic quite well.    

The incredible Hulk "Back from the dead!"

Writer: Stan Lee

Artist: Jack Kirby

Inker: Mike Esposito

Originally printed in Tales to Astonish #68

Cover date June 1965

(Published March 1965)

Major Glen Talbot fails to notice Banner changing into the Hulk yet again right at the beginning of this story, as they both fall to their doom. Sometimes I think that Talbot is the worst head of security the US Air Force has ever had in its service. The Hulk rescues the Major in mid-fall who also fails to notice this as he blacks out! At no point in the story does he wonder how he survived or how Banner too survived and returned to the US. Even after reporting Banner to the President of the USA he doesn't become suspicious in any way that Banner and the Hulk are one and the same. 

Jack Kirby returns to drawing the Hulk in this issue and starts a long run on the title. Even though Kirby created the look for the Hulk and his iconic artworks still used to this day on merchandise, his version of the Hulk from this period doesn't feel right. Kirby's first run on Hulk before Steve Ditko took over was great, but I've really go used to Ditko over the past weeks. May be it's Mike Esposito's inks that are putting me off the artwork. Then again give me some more weeks with the Kirby/Esposito and I might change my mind.

 Last week I mentioned the geography of the Marvel UK world, with Bodavia surrounding Mongolia to the North and South (Bodavia being the fictional name for both Russia and China in Marvel UK world, it's a long story see FOOM Day cometh!) this week I have a little problem with the points of the compass. The Hulk is said to head "West" on his way back to the United States, which from Mongolia must be towards Europe and then over the Atlantic. But as it says in the second text box of the second panel shown above, "Even the broad Pacific itself poses no problem." Yeah I get it, from Mongolia across the Pacific would be the quickest route but isn't that east? I'll just take my "No-prize" and place it along side my others in my trophy cabinet.  

There seems to have been a reset with this weeks story, Banner is back in the US and the President orders Major Talbot to escort him back to Astra Isle to complete the testing of the "Absorbatron", which was interrupted by the Leader and his army of Humanoids, just before Banner was kidnapped by Bodavian soldiers back in  issue 17 and issue 18. This time it's the Leader and his army of miniature Humanoids who invade the island in a quest to steal the "Absorbaton"! Is it me or is the Hulk story stuck in a time loop? The Leaders plan is to use microscopic Humanoids to sneak on to the island, (I'm doing it too, this time looping plot must be catching!) then enlarge them when the time is right.

Another thing about the miniature Humanoids, they remind me of Kang's Growing Man robot, (who and what? Keep reading these blogs and eventually we'll get to them,) may be Kang stole the technology from the leader. But the internet says that an extra-dimensional race called the Kosmosians created the Growing Man  robot for Kang so may be not.

Daredevil "Vengeance for a champion!"

Writer: Stan Lee
Artist: Bill Everett
Inker: Bill Everett, Steve Ditko and Sol Brodsky

Originally printed in Daredevil #1 
Cover date April 1964
(Published February 1964)










The second part of Daredevil's origin story uses the cover from the American issue with the man without fear leaping over a handful of thugs, with a fresh story title and new text boxes. This image has already been used last week for the opening splash page minus the thugs. After a brief re-cap of last weeks events Daredevil finally meets the sinister Fixer and his henchmen.

The Fixer and his associates seem to come straight out of an old black and white gangster movie. This might date the whole story a bit but I rather like it. Bill Everett draws each scene with style and Lee peppers the dialogue with racketeer, cigar chewing dialogue. It's really a stylish comic strip. 

The Fixer says he has an alibi for the murder of Battling Murdock but Daredevils super sensitive hearing acts like a lie detector making him the prime suspect for arranging the hit. Slade confesses to murder as he pushes DD out of a high window to his death. Thanks to a flag pole and DD's incredible acrobatic skill DD survives. The thugs make their escape with DD in pursuit. Cornering them in a subway station the gangsters split, Daredevil chases the Fixer who has a heart attack. As a very young kid I always felt that the Fixer's death was very dark, this story didn't pull any punches. Using a subway train as a free ride DD catches up this Slade and tricks him into confessing the whole thing to the police.


Justice is served, with a dash of "just desserts". This origin story has been retold by Roy Thomas/Gene Colan, Roger McKenzie/Frank Miller and even Frank Miller by himself but this Stan Lee and Bill Everett version is by far the best! I love the final panel with Matt Murdock facing the sun from the window, hoping his father can now rest in peace, as a shadow is cast on the wall behind him in the outline of Daredevil. Perfect!

This weeks colour centre spread features another Stan Lee Sounds Off! Sadly missing from last weeks MWOM but present in SMCW's first issue. The British version of Stan's Soap Box never had the mature feel that the American counterpart had. Where Stan would discuss high brow topics. In Britain we got him sounding off about the Marvel UK range of comics, teases for merchandise and big plugs for FOOM! Still they did repeat some of the Soap Box pieces in later British comics. Stan Lee Sounds Off! was great at making you feel like you were part of a big family. Between Stan and the advert for FOOM Mister Fantastic questions what would go into that "awe-inspiring empty space?" I think I kind of remember what the answer is but I won't say here, we'll find out together next week. But this kind of page filler has the cheap taste of "here's a page that you can fill in", "draw your own hero page", or something along those lines, were the editors have a page to fill but no ideas to fill it. Don't worry it isn't that, or at least I think it isn't 

I wasn't sure last week if I should continue with reviewing the mail bag sections of these weeklies, as it would take up to much time now that I've got two comics a week to look at. But I felt that there still might be some interest in them, as it gives a feel of why Marvel UK comics are the same but different to their US counterparts and I could always dump them later on. Boy, am I glad I did continue doing them. In last weeks blog I mentioned a young correspondent, Gary Hosty, who through a Facebook page (Marvel UK Comics,) saw a post for my blog and read it. Gary, now at the age of 62 but still a 12 year old at heart, still wants to see a Hulk/Thing slugfest. Proof if anyone is interested that reading Marvel Comics keeps you young and the letters from these early comics weren't made up by the editors.

So may be Larry, Graham or Stuart from this weeks Mighty Marvel Mailbag maybe reading this blog and recall writing in. American student, Larry Weiss, who attends the University of Leeds, has been living and breathing Marvel comics for ten years but now is hooked on the Mighty World of Marvel with its wide variety of of Marvel characters. Graham Rankin from Northants comments that MWOM is a "royal comic" compared to other scrappy superheroes comics. Finally Stuart Lavender from Walsall questions how can a ten-foot that can hold the Hulk withstand an explosion from an atomic bomb? Marvel's reply was to send their "enchanting editor" Pippa Melling round to the Atomic Energy Authority to answer that question, what she learned was it is believed that a ten foot thick concrete wall below the surface of the earth would be able to withstand an atomic blast, providing it did not hit directly in the area. So that kind of clears it up...if you believe them. It's kind of cool that Pippa gets a name check, apart from the copyright panel and the odd mention in Stan Lee Sounds Off column many readers wouldn't know who she was.  

Fantastic Four "The end of Mr. Fantastic?"

Writer: Stan Lee

Artist: Jack Kirby

Inker: Dave Ayers

Originally printed in Fantastic Four #10

Cover date January 1963

(Published date October 1962)

The second part of "The return of Doctor Doom" starts off with three members of the FF attacking Doctor Doom, who unknown to them is in fact their friend and leader, Mister Fantastic, while the real Doctor Doom, in the body of Mister Fantastic, gloats them on. This comes ten issues into the Fantastic Four's first year of publication, I think that Stan and Jack have got into their stride of the comic and have a pretty good idea of what direction they want the book and its characters to go in, but this story seems to have been put together in a panic, with so many ideas thrown in, with many mostly just for laughs.

One of the weirdest things that spoils this story is how Kirby draws Reed Richards once Dr. Doom has possessed his body. Did none of Reed's teammates think what's wrong with his face? Or why does he look like a pantomime villain? Yeah I get it's more for the readers benefit and maybe meant more as a symbolic repetition of a possessed Reed Richards, but it spoils the story for me.

Another thing while we're on a moan, why would the rest of the FF accept imprisoning Doom in his own plexiglass prison, wouldn't he know the best way to escape it? Ben, Reeds supposed best friend, who's known him since their college days, doesn't question him on that, but does worry about how dangerous it might be for Doom.

Stretching credibility like Mr. Fantastic's limbs the three gullible members of the FF discover a menagerie of miniature animals running escaping from Reeds lab, there's even a headline on Ben's newspaper reading "zoo animals missing". They over look the fact that Reed has stolen for his 'reducing ray" experiment, because of the most flimsy story that by shrinking Ben, Sue and Johnny to a smaller size will increase their powers. Thank goodness Richards does escape the plexiglass prison and convince his teammates that Doom has switched bodies with him. These three dummies couldn't figure their way out of a paper bag, going by this weeks story!  

Once Doctor Doom is exposed as behind all the wrong doings, he and Reed return to their own bodies, simply because Doom relaxes his mental control over the process. Imagine if he'd done that when Reed was in his plexiglass prison he would have detained himself. I've always thought that Doom used an extravagant machine to perform the body swap, possibly built into his body armour. I could have sworn that John Byrne reused it in another Fantastic Four story, but I can't find out where. 

Doom falls victim to his own "reducing ray" which shrinks him to such a size he disappears into nothingness, when in fact he slips through the space between molecules into a Microverse as we'll discover later when Doom returns. Did you really think we've seen the last of Doom? Hey Microverse, that sounds like a great idea. Although I wouldn't call it the Microverse, that sounds like it would create copyright problems for me. I'd call it a Quantum Realm, that concept would make an amazing movie! I must write it down before someone steals it. Speaking of theft, although it isn't mentioned in this story Doom didn't invent the "reducing ray", he stole the idea from Otto Kronsteig (also known as Captain Axis,) a nazis scientist who fled Germany at the end of World War 2 to find refuge in Latveria, where he worked as an assistant to Doctor Doom. But that's a story for another time.  

Instead of a Mighty Marvel Pin-Up this week we get a colour in puzzle page. Colour in the spaces that have dots in them to reveal a Marvel super-star. Can you guess who that might be? Easy yeah? Even Ben, Sue and Johnny could do that without the help of Reed Richards! 

May be editors were worried about readers abandoning MWOM for Spider-man Comics Weekly so they printed a little form for you to cut out and give to your newsagent to reserve a copy. It's interesting to note that they used the short form of "Marvel" to represent the Mighty World of Marvel instead of MWOM. Either way I'm sure "Mr Newsagent" knew what they meant.

"More excitement from Mighty Marvel" with this full page colour in house advertisement for Spider-man Comics Weekly on the back cover. The perfect scenario was you filled the reserve form for MWOM, then finished the comic, looked at the back page, then went to the newsagents handed over the form but with that image in your mind you picked up the latest copy of SMCW too. 

Spider-man Comics Weekly #2

This cover is the first Marvel UK to re use the original American cover, all be it with a back ground colour change from light green to yellow and the inclusion of a panel from the Mighty Thor strip. So credits must go to Steve Ditko for the top half and Jack Kirby for the bottom panel. The yellow back ground does look more eye catching on bland British newsstands. Notice how the cover bodger has added more shadow to the Enforcers and given them speech balloons in the British version. The larger shadows are very fitting with the bright light yellow back ground and the balloon text looks great, giving a dramatic feel, even though the "We each have a deadly super power!" line isn't accurate as they are just highly skilled humans. But it is the dum Ox saying it so may be that's in character too. I really like this cover. The topper headline reads "Free: Inside! Your fabulous Spider-man tracer plane!" This weeks free gift was a cardboard plane in the shape of a spider. Like last weeks free gift I don't own one nor have I ever seen one in real life. I guess many were played to death with and eventually lost. 

Spider-man "The Enforcers!"

Writer: Stan Lee

Artist: Steve Ditko

Inker: Steve Ditko

Originally printed in The Amazing Spier-man #10

Cover date March 1964

(Published December 1963)

This story is the first appearance of the Big Man a mysterious gangster with his hard men Enforcers. In Typical early Spider-man style the opening splash page is a fictitious teaser with Stan boasting "With this classic tale, the Marvel age of comics reaches a new plateau of greatness!!" I'm not sure about that but it is a very enjoyable tale.

Crime boss Big Man wears a white china stage mask over a hood and a fedora hat to hide his identity, he's the brains of the gang, working out elaborate plans but leaving his crime syndicate and the Enforcers to do the hard grafting. Fancy Dan is a diminutive judo expert, who doesn't let his size get in the way of his fighting skills. Could be a bit of "little man syndrome" at play here, he feels capable of taking on Spider-Man in a fight. Power house Ox is the next Enforcer, he's too dum to feel pain, he may be slow but he puts a lot of muscle behind every punch. Finally we have Montana an expert rope man who can do the most amazing things with his lasso. They're a strange mix of characters but there's something quite appealing about them as villains. As Spider-man rogues they generally don't get used a lot, but they are better for that. Less is definitely more.

As the story focuses on Peter's personal life we get to see Aunt May as she recovers from her operation. Liz Allen and Flash Thomson call in the hospital to visit her. This is kind of unusual for these characters but it does lead you to believe Liz is very caring, with may be a fondness for Peter. Flash on the other hand plays it the hard man by suggesting he only came to keep Liz company. That may be so but I feel there was a slow but intended plot line to make Flash more of a likeable character. Possibly as a reaction to Peter coming out of his shell and his standing up to Flash, like the time he agreed to fight Flash in the boxing ring back in MWOM #18 . Aunt May's doctor asks Peter to give some blood to help his Aunt recover but Peter becomes worried how his spider irradiated blood might affect the old lady. Liz and Flash are concerned when he refuses the donation, this gives Peter a change of heart so he does gives her the blood transfusion. This story was written in 1963 were little was publicly known about blood transfusion safety, in fact its only been in the last 30 years since the identification of the human immunodeficiency virus [ HIV] and hepatitis C virus [ HCV] have made blood screening vastly important. But in this story Peter does mention that his blood is screened and checks out OK, so I assume that some checks were made back in the 60's. Another thing which as far as I know is never mentioned in the comics, but I wonder given Aunt May's incredible ability to recover from so many heart conditions and health problems and her apparent slow aging, does the radioactive spider blood give her improved healing powers? The amazing Aunt-May indeed.

The Enforcers confront Betty Brant about a loan she holds payment on, for reasons she won't tell Peter why. A mystery for another time. Peter sets up a trap for the Big Man by telling everyone he knows his real identity. Even Flash tells Peter that doing so is very dangerous. Peter is captured which eventually leads to Spider-Man defeating the Enforcers but the Big Man makes his escape. Throughout this story red herrings are dropped to make Spider-man and the reader believe that Jonah Jameson is the Big Man. Spider-man goes to the cigar chewing publisher's office to confront him, only to be surprised that the police are already there to arrest the Big Man. But it's not Jameson who they want to arrest, it's Frederick Foswell, the Daily Bugle's crime reporter, who uses padded suits and special built up shoes to disguise his size and height, which where discovered by the police in his car that they saw speeding away from the garage that the police had seen Spider-man fighting the Big Man's gang. It's always the quiet ones!

In this story Stan and Steve add a classic scene where we find out why Jameson hates Spider-man so much. Jonah is always thwarted, embarrassed and frustrated by Spider-man but the real reason is one of envy, even though he's a millionaire with high public standing he is jealous of how brave, powerful and unselfish Spider-man is. May be Spider-man shouldn't give JJJ so much of a hard time.  

SMCW colour inside pages (again this week they aren't located in the centre spread,) are used as house adverts. The first half to promote a "spectacular surprise gift" coming to SMCW as Spider-man visits the Marvel Comics London office. Not got a clue what it might be, but without trying to sound cynical I can't see it being all that spectacular, but I could be wrong. On the second half of the spread a house advert for the current issue of MWOM featuring the Fantastic Four's latest adventure and another FOOM form for the readers to fill out! Not quite the full page that Spider-man got in MWOM but still.

The Web and the Hammer is the name of the Spider-man Comics Weekly letter page. Many might not feel that it's a good title for a letter page, but I really love it. The logo looks good and it does what is says...kind of...with it being a web of information about readers thoughts and readers banging with the hammers on their typewriters. OK internet references mixed with antique typewriters doesn't work, but I've got nostalgic love for it anyway. A letter page after only a week is good, especially has there was no email in 1973, but obviously these letters were addressed to MWOM Mighty Mailbag, with content about Spider-man and Thor, making them relevant.

Stephen Bruff from Dunstable gets the honour of having the first letter to be printed in SMCW. He loves the heroes in MWOM but wants to see the Sub-Mariner and Thor. Well he got his wish. Paul Ware from Yorkshire is bothered by why J. Jonah Jameson hates Spider-man so much. See this weeks "The Enforcers" story for his reasons. Neil Farley from Middlesbrough writes that he cancelled his two regular comics delivery in exchange for MWOM. He doesn't mention what were the names of those two comics and I wonder did he beg for SMCW to be added to the delivery? E. Anaman from London, is that a spelling mistake? Should the second "a" really be a "t"? Anyway E. thinks that Peter should have go a spider's ability to create spider webs organically like a real spider. He must be a fan of the Toby Maguire Spider-man films. Plymouth's Stephen Morgan wonders why no-one can see the half Peter/half Spidey spider sense, the editor points out that "sturdy" Steve Ditko draws it like that as a symbolic reference to the fact that Spider-man's spider sense has detected something. But mostly it looks amazing on the page.

 We get a "Posters 'n' patches"  full page advert in SMCW this week. It's the kind of thing you'd regularly see in American comics in the 70's. I'm not sure British kids would love the content of the posters and patches with stars like "Mike" (that's Michael to you and me,) Jackson, Dave Cassidy, Donny Osmond, Alice Cooper and Olivia Newton-John featuring on the posters. May be I was too young to fully appreciate early 70's pop culture. They all seen to be very American orientated, although there is a Slade poster so may be I should "Cum on and feel the noise" and I see a Smilie patch decades before Acid raves re used them or before Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons dripped blood on one.

The mighty Thor "Vs the Executioner"

Writer: Stan Lee

Artist: Jack Kirby

Inker: Dick Ayers

Originally printed in Journey into Mystery #84

Cover date September 1962

(Published in July 1962)

 

This week the mighty Thor confronts the Executioner, no not the Asgardian warrior but a tin pot dictator of a Central American country. Bodavia (Russia to you and me,) is supplying weapons to the Executioner to maintain his hold on San Diablo, a fictitious country in the Marvel Universe. Doctor Don Blake and his nurse Jane, later to be fully named Jane Foster, go to the country as part of a Red Cross humanitarian aid party. When the ship carrying Doctors and nurses with medical supplies gets attacked by Bodavian backed San Diablo planes Blake changes quickly into Thor. 

You can easily spot the changes from the hammer and sickle to the British reader friendly lightning bolt. The usual changes in text are also made to hide any Russian/Communist reference too.

Thor battles tanks and ground troops but when Jane gets captured Thor changes back into the lame doctor, so that he can also be captured aiding in him getting closer to the Executioner. Blake is lined up against a wall ready for the firing squad. With perfect timing in a blinding flash he transforms into the god of thunder, over powers the Executioners men to rescue Jane. The greedy Executioner flees with bags full of money and gold to be gunned down by San Diablo's freedom fighters. And so ends this weeks tale, with promise of next weeks adventure will feature Loki, God of Evil. So till next time.

See you in seven.

Make Mine Marvel!