Tales of two Prince's and a would be Micro King!

 Week Ending 12th May 1973

A quick hand out of PotBeNoP 's (that's Power of the Beesting No-Prizes for those who forgot,) for last weeks "name the original artwork" question, which was answered by Rod Tough and Paul Linch who both correctly pointed out the the Hulk artwork featured in  the MWOM #31 colour centre spread was taken from Tales to Astonish #75 reprinted in issue 28 of the Mighty World of Marvel. 

The Mighty World of Marvel #32

Rich Buckler draws this weeks cover aided by Mike Esposito's inks. It's not great by any means but what it does have going for it is buckets full of functionality, showing the potential buyer what treats they can enjoy inside. A clash of the titans as the Hulk and Hercules battle, then under that a the Sub-Mariner shrugs off the Thing and the Human Torch, while to the right Doctor Doom lords it over miniature members of the Fantastic Four in a panel that takes inspiration from the cover of the Fantastic Four #16.

The Incredible Hulk "The titan and the torment!"

Writer: Stan Lee

Artist: Jack Kirby, Bill Everett

Inker: Bill Everett

Originally published in Tales to Astonish #79

Cover date May 1966

(Published in February 1966)

This weeks Hulk story continues straight off from last weeks climax at the Hulk is released from a pit by the manic Doctor Zaxon, who, with the aid of his specially built armour and "Organic Energy Attractor", plans to rob the gamma spawned monster of his strength. Pathetically the crazed scientists visions of glory crumble into dust as within the space of two pages the Doctor fires at the Hulk which only angers him more, causing him to strike the armoured Zaxon, knocking his weapon from his grip towards a wall that in turn causes the attractor to fire directly at the Doctor killing him instantly. These Hulk short stories don't hang about for development, the Hulk leaps away chased by the army who accuse him of murder. Before the third page has ended we're introduced to the Hulk's next opposition.

That new opponent would be Hercules, Prince of Power, Son of Zeus and Olympian Demi God, who was riding a train to Hollywood to take part in a film about himself. Stan loved crowbarring Hollywood and the movies into his early comic scripts, with the Fantastic Four, a solo Sue Storm, Spider-man, Thor and now Hercules getting wrapped up in that razzmatazz. Do you think Stan wanted to get into film even back then, either as a writer or actor? Who would imagine that Lee himself would "act" in so many movies in cameo roles. 

To readers of Marvel UK comics this was Hercules first appearance, although he had made a Golden Age appearance in Young Allies #16 cover dated June 1945 (published May 1945,) in a back up story about Tommy Tyme. Tommy journeys back to ancient Greece and encounters the Demi God. Hercules first Silver Age appearance would be his first encounter with Thor in  Journey into Mystery Annual #1 cover dated October 1965 (published June 1965,) which will see print in SMCW#78, however Hercules will appear next for British readers in the Thor strip in SMCW #52 just to confuse young (and old) Marvel UK continuity followers! If you stick with the blog we'll get round to that crazy continuity conundrum around February next year.

Of course if you are going to mess up continuity by introducing Hercules out of order he had better make himself useful and participate in a battle of the Titans. He does but in only eighteen panels just over two and a half pages. Not a lot of action may be, but that can't be helped as these Hulk stories came original from Tales to Astonish a comic book that the green goliath shared with the Sub-mariner from issues 70-101, having previously shared with Giant-man from issues 60-69. The page count of only 10 pages didn't leave much space to dilly or dally. Next weeks double length Hulk story will basically be two short Tales to Astonish stories back to back, but with the same problem as each story is restricted in page length. 

What also didn't help with the briefness of storytelling is a complete page missing from the story. I've shown the complete page in all its Tales to Astonish glory to the left. Five panels of Marvel Smackdown magnificence that may have thrilled pre teen Marvelites no end, so why was it left out? Well it could have been purely for reasons of space, removing this page wouldn't have made for any messy editing, the page before fits seamlessly with the page after. But in truth I think that's only part way the reason. In the final panel of the page Hercules mentions that "At last I begin to understand why the God of Thunder himself hath found this planet so to his liking!" A reference to Thor who he had meet perviously in an as yet unseen story (just wait for SMCW #52 and #78 Marvel UK fans). 

So if you're a Hulk fan you'll have to put up with these short but very sweet strips for a while.

The Human Torch and the Thing "The Sub-Mariner must be stopped!"

Writer: Stan Lee

Artist: Dick Ayers

Inker: Paul Reinman

Originally published in Strange Tales #125

Cover date October 1964

(Published in July 1964)

Daredevil's replacement for one week only is a little romp starring the Human Torch and the Thing from the fantastic Four fame. Were as the Hulk story was short but sweet this little folly is less sweet but not completely bitter. Stan basically writes a farce about super hero buffoonery, while Dick Ayers telephones in his worst Fantastic Four artwork. As a one week replacement for old DD, it would have been better to print the whole of this weeks Fantastic Four story instead.

 It starts off with the Torch and the Thing having a "lighthearted" fight, if you can call it that, over whatever the two usually fall out over,  when two journalists from the Daily Bugle turn up for an interview. The Thing gets mad when they explain that they've come to interview Mister Fantastic and the Invisible Girl not Johnny or Ben. As you can guess this story is played for laughs with the Sub-Mariner seen heading for New York in what looks like an attack but turns out to be a pre-arranged meeting with Reed Richards to discuss peace. Like many super hero encounters the two stars of this strip jump straight into a fight with the Sub-Mariner without any questions asked.

 Apart from the fights scenes there's very little to warm to with this story, to be honest even those are pretty forgettable. Lee script doesn't help, the most rememberable part is a horrible exchange between Sue and Reed. When Sue asks Reed "Do you thank that..?" he quickly cuts her off in a misogynistic snappy manner with "Quiet Sue!" It's no wonder that Sue has a crush on Namor, He doesn't act a dick like Reed does sometimes. This story is miles away from the quality of this periods Lee/Kirby Fantastic Four fare.

The colour pages of the issue brings news of next weeks format changes. The first is two Hulk stories every week and for Fantastic Four fans fear not the FF will still support the incredible one every week. The other bit of news is instead of one page of readers letters each week we'll start to get two pages. The Hulk panel is taken from the cover of Tales to Astonish #75 by Jack Kirby, cover dated January 1966 (published October 1965.) while the Fantastic Four panel is again by Jack Kirby from the classic Fantastic Four cover from #45 cover dated December 1965 (published September 1965.) with inks added by Joe Sinnott. The mail bag panel is by "who knows or even cares?"

The double size mail bag makes up for this week's missing Mighty Marvel Mailbag!

Marvel editors use the other colour page to display the "Magnificent Mini-poster ideas" from readers. The first is from Bob and Billy Hollingsworth from London, who used their mini-posters as targets for the Spider-man Tracer plane from Spider-man Comics Weekly issue #2. Pam Collins of Swansea used her mini-posters as a trendy neckless. Finally Bob McGuire from Dublin used them as postcards. 

 

The Fantastic Four "The Micro-World of Doctor Doom!"

Writer: Stan Lee

Artist: Jack Kirby

Inker: Dick Ayers

Originally published in Fantastic Four #16

Cover date July 1963

(Published in April 1963)

 There's not much surprise to who the big bad is in this weeks Fantastic Four tales. Doctor Doom not only hogs the title but takes centre stage of the symbolic opening splash page. Symbolic maybe but then again the mystery of the Micro-World may make some sense of it. We also get a cameo from this weeks guest star Doctor Henry Pym better known as the amazing Ant-man. 

The story starts off with the members of the Fantastic Four together and then shown in flashback, scenes of them individually shrunk down to the sizes of tiny toy figures.

Reed Richards concludes that the only person who can aid them is the astonishing Ant-man, but he doesn't know how to reach the miniature hero. When you look back at early FF stories I've always like to draw the conclusion that Reed does indeed knows of Doctor Pym, if only in my imagination. Back in Fantastic Four issue 7, in a story titled "Prisoners of Kurrgo, Master of Planet X" Reed Richards uses a shrinking gas to aid the fleeing inhabitants of Planet X, as seen in MWOM #14 and 15. but he was unable to create an enlarging gas. I hypothesised that he had discussed the use of Pym Particles in a gas form to shrink objects with Henry Pym. A group of ants hears of Reeds request for help and carry it to Doctor Pym who dons his super hero uniform and pays the Fantastic four a visit. 

  Reed uses a special "crystal magnifying amplifier" to hear and see Ant-man better. It's a smart if slightly silly idea from Stan and Jack but I kind of like it because I never understood how people talk to Ant-man when he's at ant size. Ant-man lends the FF some of his shrinking and enlarging gas. Before this issue is done a strange female voice warns them to beware of Doctor Doom! Remembering Doctor Doom was shrunk by his own weapon in MWOM #21, Reed orders the FF to take the shrinking formula and enter a microscopic world, where they find a Micro-World ruled by Doctor Doom. The story continues next week as the FF, Ant-man and Doctor Doom fight in a Micro-World at war!

"And now...here's what you've been waiting for!" the answers to the Amazing Spider-man LP competition from MWOM #26 and SMCW #7. 50 lucky winners received a LP record of Spider-man adventures entitled "Beyond the Grave" after answering five very easy questions. This competition caused a lot of controversy back in 1973 and still to this day some are quite rightly angry about the results. Just ask Gorki D Laughlin, a regular commentator on the Facebook page UK Marvel in the 70's. The particular bone of contention is the second question, "Peter Parker's best subject at college is?" The three possible answers are:- Art, Games or Science! Now every Spider-man fan knows in High School, College and University Peter has always studied Physics, so you would imagine that the answer many gave would have been "Science". Except the answer that was printed in MWOM #32 and SMCW #13 clearly states that the answer is Art! 

Gorki says he's "Smiling through the pain," but as a kid in 1973 it would've created major frustration. In trying to get an explanation of who thought that Art should be the correct answer I Tweeted the legendary writer, editor and creator Tony Isabella, who at the time would have been Marvel UK's American based editor, to get to the bottom of it. He kindly replied saying "No memory of this. It was likely either before or after my time producing those weeklies." I Imagine that this would have been during his time but this type of feature would have probably been dealt with by the British based editors. Back in March 1973, when the competition was first held, that would have been Pippa A Melling, but when this issue was published the editor would have been Petra Skingley under the pseudonym Peter L. Skingley. I guess the fault lays some where between. If this was a 2000AD comic the Mighty Tharg would blame Thrill Suckers, but it looks like simple human error. But I wonder if the 50 winners also gave Art as the answer. It may seem strange 50 years later but I bet many who did answer correctly feel they were cheated. The third question is also a little strange, they say that Doctor Doom is Spider-man's worst enemy, but I kind of think of Doom being the Fantastic Four's worst enemy even though he has fought Spider-man once. The Tinkerer did at the time confront Spidey once too. I imagine in future letter pages many writers will bring up these misgivings again.

This weeks back page is a magnificent Pin-up page featuring Prince Namor, the Sub-Mariner, taken from the front cover of Sub-Mariner #1 covered May 1968 (published February 1968,) by John Buscema and Sol Brodsky. The back ground scenes have been recoloured making it, quite honestly look majestic. 

Spider-man Comics Weekly #13

Another very busy cover from Rich Buckler and Mike Esporito, Like last weeks cover Buckler seems to be rushing it. It's not a patch on his other artwork from that time.

Spider-Man "Spidey strikes back!"

Writer: Stan Lee

Artist: Steve Ditko    

Inker: Steve Ditko 

Originally published in The Amazing Spider-man #19

Cover date December 1964

(Published in September 1964)

     

It's a title that might cause young readers to reminisce, it certainly did with George Lucas. In today cynical eyes some may call it a lazy title but in 1964 it was exactly what Spider-man needed to do to convince the general public and maybe comic readers that he still was a hero. As you can see from the opening splash page the Enforcers are back, with the Sandman as their forth member or possibly as their leader. Stan and Steve liked using these characters, they had appeared twice before in Spider-man stories, once under the leadership of the Big man and later lead by the Green Goblin. Stan had used the Ox in a Daredevil story too. Also appearing again was the Human Torch, Stan like to use the two teenage heroes as a comedy duo with a friends and rivals relationship.

 

Now that Aunt May has over come her illness Peter is back as Spider-man fighting criminals in an unexplainable increase in crime. During one fight a mobster escapes to inform his boss that the web-slinger is back. Elsewhere the Human Torch returning from fighting that increased crime wave is ambushed by the Enforcers and their new leader the Sandman. 

 Stan or Steve makes it look that the mobster who got away from Spidey was reporting to Jameson, but he's later seen reporting back to Sandman. These subtle hints will be recalled later as red flags for Jameson's later actions. 

Peter spots Fancy Dan and trails him as Spider-man to the Enforcers hideout, where he discovers Johnny Storm in a near air tight glass cylinder prison. Spider-man is really confident here taking on the Enforcers and their leader the Sandman while at the same time freeing the Torch so he can aid in the villains defeat. The only strange part of the fight scene is towards the end the teenage heroes get in each others way which allows the Sandman to escape, but only into the waiting arms of the law. The Sandman says he's tired but really can two police officers capture him that easily?

This story contains plenty of Peter's background story which not only fills out the plot but gives a welcomed human side to the hero. Peter's rival for Betty Brant is now revealed as Ned Leeds a Daily Bugle crime reporter. Peter seems OK with that, was Stan and Steve bored with Betty and already had fresh ideas for Peter's love life? More mystery is left to the very end as a silent stranger follows Peter and reports to a hidden employer. Who knows who they are and what their intensions may be? You and I will have to wait till next week to find out.

Stan Lee's column brings news that next week the letter pages will increase to two pages, because in his words the readers are the real editors. His "Sounds off!' column is basically a plea for more letters to fill those pages. Also in the colour pages a "Special Announcement!" if anyone hasn't already got the message, Mighty World of Marvel #33 will contain two Hulk stories. The artwork to promote it is taken from Tales to Astonish #101 cover dated March 1968 (published December 1967,) by Marie Severin and Jack Kirby with inks by Frank Giacoia. The opposite page features an in-house advert for this weeks Mighty World of Marvel and the usual FOOM membership ad.

The Web and the Hammer

John Burns from Nottingham raves about the latest run of super villains, saying Kraven the Hunter is a sensational super-baddie, while praising the development of an ordinary crook like "Thug" Thatcher into a villain who gives Thor a run for his money.

Kevin Willis from Rossendale thinks that Spidey is great and would like him to "give it to" Flash, by that I'm guessing he means a hiding. Peter Williams from Hamilton writes that Spider-man is even greater with longer stories. Finally Don Markus from Kingswood writes one of his favourite battles is between Spider-man and the Human Torch. I guess he must have loved this weeks Spider-man adventure. The reply from the editor hints at a Human Torch/Spider-man team-up coming soon in Spider-man Comics Weekly #15.

  

The Mighty Thor "Faces the menace of...the Demon Duplicators!"

 

Writer: Stan Lee and Robert Bernstein 

Artist: Joe Sinnott

Inker: Joe Sinnott

Originally published in Journey into Mystery #95

Cover date August 1963

(Published in June 1963)

"Demons and Angels" was a Red Dwarf episode where the crew of the Dwarf used a "Triplicator" to triplicate their food supplies. creating two copies of anything, one good and one bad. A freak accident occurs that causes the crew to be triplicated, the original crew, a second good crew and a third evil crew. Rob Grant and Doug Naylor, the writers of Red Dwarf, weren't the first to use the basic idea, Stan used the concept of a machine that could duplicate people and objects first in this story. It's a lot less funny than the Red Dwarf story and stretches believability to braking point. Professor Zaxton an evil scientist jealous of Doctor Blakes latest creation, an android with an IQ of 375, sabotages the artificial man and later creates a device that can duplicate people and objects. Zaxton uses the device to create an evil version of Thor under his command. Thor over comes his evil counterpart after a short battle. By accident Professor Zaxton duplicates himself but the duplicate isn't evil like the original Professor, who falls to his death while trying to save the duplicator. These old Thor stories are just about bearable. I can't wait for better Lee and Kirby classics to come. The second page of the original story was removed in this UK version. It only contained scenes of Thor in Asgard in which Odin requested Thor bring light rain storms to water Asgardian crops, to be honest it was something that you didn't miss. Also the final panel of the last page was changed, it was a call back to that missing page in which Thor returns to stop the rains and featured Odin again. In the British version this panel was used to promote next weeks adventure... the mighty Thor vs. Merlin the mad!

 This pin-up page is an adapted cover from Thor King Size Special #3 from January 1971 by Jack Kirby.

Finally for this issue and this week a back page poster featuring the Green Goblin from a Gallery of Spider-man's most famous foes! It originally appeared in the Amazing Spider-man Annual #1 cover dated October 1964 (published June 1964,) drawn by Steve Ditko. Text was removed from the original that stated that the Green Goblin had first appeared in the Amazing Spider-man issue 14, so as to not confuse British readers who may be unaware that US comics existed.

So there we have it, this weeks comics from Marvel UK for the week ending 12th May 1973. More of the same next week as we look at what the Mighty World of Marvel #33 and Spider-man Comics Weekly #14 have to offer. So till then...

See you in seven.

Make Mine Marvel.