Fantastic Four 74 “When Calls Galactus!” Published Feb. 1968 Story: Stan Lee and Jack Kirby Script: Lee Pencils: Kirby Inks: Joe Sinnott Letters: Artie Simek Cover: Kirby and Sinnott
Synopsis
The Thing enters the apartment of his girlfriend, Alicia Masters, only to find the Silver Surfer there in a state of distress. When Ben, jealous, moves to confront the Surfer (in an echo of issue 55), he and Alicia explain the Surfer has been recalled by Galactus, indicating the planet-devourer must be desperate and that earth is in danger.
Galactus has sent the Punisher, the cyborg he used to attack the FF when he last visited earth, to bring back the Surfer. After blasting it with his cosmic power, the Surfer collapses and Ben and the Human Torch take on the Punisher, without much success
After again shunting the pregnant Invisible Girl aside, Mr. Fantastic joins the fight. The Punisher, however, vanishes, returning to its master in space, leaving the team to ponder Galactus’s next move.
What’s going on here?
Fantastic Four 74 is a place-setting issue, putting the pieces in place for a multi-issue arc, but it’s a pretty effective one. It reintroduces Galactus as an earth-destroying threat, and by once again using the Punisher as a foil, Stan and Jack emphasize Galactus’s power (if his minion can throttle the FF, what is Galactus capable of?)
After his appearance in a flashback in Daredevil 37 (discussed last week), in Thor 134, and now here, Galactus is by now pretty thoroughly integrated into the the Marvel Universe. Stan and Jack apparently hadn’t planned that—they wanted him to appear sparingly, to maintain his grandeur—but Stan, listening to fan requests, decided to bring him back. As a result, we got epic splash pages like this:
Incidentally, Jack liked that image so much he re-used it the next year, in Thor 160 (this time with inks by Vince Coletta):
About that name
The Punisher is a pretty cool concept.
Unfortunately it shared a name with a lot more important Marvel character, which probably is one reason it appears so infrequently. Here it is Thanos 4, from 2003, by Jim Starlin and Al Milgrom.
The sexist sixties
For the last few issues, Sue has been deliberately kept away from the action, ostensibly to protect her and her unborn baby. Her exclusion is taken to more ridiculous levels, when Reed won’t even tell her what’s going on and instead treats her like an invalid (and enlisting the similarly wasted Crystal to help him do his dirty work).
Follow that car!
Ben needs to take a cab to rejoin the action.
It reminded me of this dramatic scene when Ben was again in a cab, from Fantastic Four 259 (1883) by John Byrne.
Clobberin’ Time
Speaking of Ben, it’s been a few issues since we had one of these
He’s all grown up
Nice character developing scene here with the Torch, who is shown taking on more responsibilities despite still being a teenager. He too often gets written as a yahoo, and he has more maturity than that.
Fantastic Four 72 Published: December 1967 Story: Stan Lee and Jack Kirby Script: Lee Pencils: Kirby Inks: Joe Sinnott Letters: Sam Rosen Cover: Kirby and Sinnott
Synopsis
In the wake of last issue’s departure of Mr. Fantastic and the Invisible Girl from the team—prompted by Reed’s concerns about the pregnant Sue’s safety—the Thing, Human Torch and Crystal are moping around the Baxter Building, worried about their future. Suddenly, the Watcher appears—and once again violating his vow of non-interference—to warn them the Silver Surfer is on a rampage.
The Surfer, somehow how concluding the only hope for mankind is for it to unite around opposition to him, is destroying crops, levitating the Great Pyramids and flooding cities with tidal waves. When he arrives in New York, the Torch attacks him but he is quickly overwhelmed. Ben has better luck, engaging in a slugfest aboard the Surfer’s surfboard, but he too is defeated.
As the military prepares to launch its experimental sonic shark missile, the Watcher halts a train carrying Reed and Sue, and after Reed forbids Sue from joining him, Reed is whisked away.
Back in New York, Reed joins Ben and Johnny, and they pursue the Surfer in order to defend him from the missile, which uses “cosmic energy.” Johnny fails, but at the last minute Ben knocks it off course, where it explodes in the stratosphere. Weakened by the missile, the Surfer comes to his senses and apologies to the FF for his actions.
What’s going on here?
This is a fun one-and-done issue, maybe the best single-issue story since issue 51, the classic “This Man, This Monster.” FF 72 doesn’t have the pathos or drama of that story, but it has great pacing, compelling action and high-stakes. Interestingly, while the Surfer is nominally the villain, it’s really the US military that poses the greatest threat in this comic.
The Surfer’s big plan—by becoming a menace, mankind will unite around a common enemy—shows up in comics and science fiction from time to time. The immediate example I thought of was in Watchmen (spoiler warning!), where Ozymandias drops a giant fake squid-alien in New York to horrify the world and end the threat of nuclear war. I’m sure there are lots more examples.
Watchmen 12 (1987, Alan Moore/Dave Gibbons)
The Surfer’s swath of destruction is pretty extensive and, despite his noble intentions, might lead to some hard feelings about him by humanity. Yet I’m not aware of it ever coming up in subsequent issues, like Namor’s invasion of New York has been repeatedly held against him. Then again, I haven’t read many Surfer solo books, so if anyone out there knows, please let me know.
It’s not obviously clear what city the Surfer is flying over in that splash page, but it looks a lot like downtown Baltimore to me.
Keel hauled
Readers of this blog know I tend to obsess about random details. One of which is whether the Surfer’s board has a keel, like a real surfboard (a subject I delve into in his first appearance). Jack originally drew his board with a keel, but here he is keel-less.
Watching the Watcher
The watcher’s appearance also changes dramatically over Jack’s tenure on the FF. When he was introduced, he was much ore alien looking, with spindly limbs and a huge head. By issue 72, he’s drawn to more human proportions, and looks like he’s been hitting the gym.
Jack also upgraded his outfit. Check out the detail on the back of his tunic:
Also, just who is the Watcher referring to here? Jesus?
The sexist sixties
Once again, Sue is shunted aside by Reed. And Crystal is again completely absent from the action.
Weird science
The sonic-shark missile plays a pretty big role in this story for a device which is only explained in a footnote.
Dig that Kirby Krackle
I already posted a lot of great images, but here are a few more:
Also on the news stands
A Neal Adams hat trick was on sale December 1967:
Next issue: Dr. Doom, and guest stars Spider-Man, Daredevil and Thor!
Fantastic Four Annual 5 Published Aug. 1967 Cover by Jack Kirby and Frank Giacoia
Story 1 “Divide .. And Conquer!” Story: Stan Lee and Kirby Inks: Joe Sinnott Letters: Sam Rosen
Story 2 “This is a Plot?” Story and Pencils: Kirby Inks: Giacoia Letters: Gaspar Saladino (credited to L.P. Gregory)
Story 3 “The Peerless Power of the Silver Surfer” Story: Lee and Kirby Inks: Giacoia Letters: Art Simek
There’s a lot to cover in this annual, which is jam-packed with three original stories and a bunch of great pinups. We’ll tackle them one at a time
I should note I’m calling it an annual, although it’s called a King-Size Special on the cover, because it’s numbered according to the FF annuals and because it’s generally listed as an annual. It gets confusing down the road, when a separate run of Giant-Size Specials were printed in the 1970s, most (but not all) reprinting material from earlier annuals.
“Divide .. And Conquer!” synopsis
This story opens in media res, with the Invisible Girl in Mr. Fantastic’s arms, surrounded by the rest of the team, Alicia Masters and Crystal. She’s fallen ill, and it’s soon revealed to be morning sickness: She’s pregnant, and the rest of the team rejoices.
Meanwhile, a new villain soon unveiled as Psycho-Man is terrorizing a henchman who delivered “component five” to the wrong address. The package has been mistaken delivered to the home of Alicia Masters, and as she and the Thing try to make sense of it, he is attacked by Psycho-Man and his remaining henchmen. Psycho-Man uses his emotion-controlling powers to conjure a monster Ben fears, defeating him. The villains leave with the package.
The story then jumps to a tropical island, which the Black Panther has just purchased. The Inhumans Black Bolt, Medusa and Karnak are also on the island, and after a brief fight between T’Challa and Karnak, they team up to investigate a source of danger sensed by Black Bolt. It is the lair of Psycho-Man, where he is building the Mind Ray, and the Inhumans and Black Panther start fighting his henchmen.
The Thing, the Human Torch and Triton the Inhuman then appear, teleported by Lockjaw (Reed and the pregnant Sue stay behind), and the heroes are confronted with various manifestations of fear and doubt created by Psycho-Man. Eventually, Gorgon, who had been scouting the island, arrives and uses his hoof-striking power to shatter the illusions. Black Bolt destroys the Mind Ray and as Psycho-Man explains his origin—he is from sub-atomica, a tiny realm within our own—and his plans to destroy the heroes, the Black Panther, who had been hidden in a tunnel, pounces. He defeats Psycho-Man, who disappears into the armor he no longer can animate.
What’s going on here?
A lot! This is a fun story with a paper-thin plot that hangs on a couple of implausible coincidences. First, Psycho-Man only comes to the attention of the Fantastic Four because his package was delivered to the home of Alicia (yet another time she has been a victim of real estate — first the Dragon Man crashed into her apartment in issue 47, and then in issue 49, the Silver Surfer collapses on her roof).
Secondly, the Inhumans just happen to stumble on to the island just bought by the Black Panther—it’s not ever really explained what they are doing there, but Gorgon later suggests they might be scouting for a new refuge—and together they just happen to stumble on the Psycho-Man’s lair.
Despite the improbabilities, it’s a fun story that feels a bit like a reunion, drawing together a bunch of heroes introduced over the last few years. And it continues a recent tradition of stuffing annuals with guest stars.
Who is this guy?
This is the introduction of Psycho-Man, a second-tier villain who shows up every 10 years or so, mostly in the Fantastic Four but also (appropriately enough) in the Micronauts, as well as Captain Marvel, the Silver Surfer and Spider-Man. One interesting aspect of Psycho-Man is that he’s from sub-atomica, the micro-dimension accessible only by shrinking. It’s not really obvious why he needs to be from there—he could have just as easily been from another planet or dimension—but it’s an interesting twist.
My first encounter with Psycho-Man was in a chilling (perhaps even sadistic) story arc involving the mental manipulation of the Invisible Woman from John Byrne:
Fantastic Four 283 (1985, Byrne/Ordway)
Big news!
Annual 5 also marks the announcement that Sue is pregnant. It’s a fun scene when the rest of the team find out:
The baby turns out to be Franklin Richards, of course, who becomes a integral part of the Fantastic Four family, and later the team. He’s currently a mopey teenager in the current FF comic, but we occasionally get glimpses of his future as one of the most powerful characters in the universe.
Here he is single handedly punching out a bunch of insane Celestials and resurrecting a dead Galactus in the climax of Jonathan Hickman brilliant arc (all from 2012’s Fantastic Four 604, with art by Steve Epting and Rick Magyar):
We’ll have much more to say about Franklin later —the kid ain’t even born yet.
“This is a plot?”
The second story is a goof: a madcap romp through the Marvel offices with Stan and Jack as they are pursued by fans. It’s full of gags and in-jokes designed to delight the ardent Marvel fan.
I hesitate to read too much into it, given how slight and silly it is, but it does suggest that Jack considered he and Stan to be equals and co-collaborators and that, at least to some degree, he enjoyed taking part in the myth-making engaged in by Stan.
This sort of behind-the scenes story shows up occasionally, such as in Uncanny X-Men Annual 7, when the Impossible Man leads the X-Men on a scavenger hunt that includes the Marvel offices:
“The Peerless Power of the Silver Surfer”
Story three’s plot is also thin: The Silver Surfer hears the sentient computer Quasimodo, last seen in Annual 4, crying out in anguish as he is trapped in a machine. Using the power cosmic, the Surfer creates a new body for him, only for Quasimodo to lash out and attack him. The two battle before the Surfer imprisons Quasimodo as a statue on a clock tower.
The story is notable for two reasons. One, it’s an early Surfer story co-plotted by Kirby, and sort of hints at what Jack had in mind for the character. Two, the art is just stunning. Inked by Frank Giacoia, he really brings out the Surfer’s iridescence, and the effect is impressive.
In this story, Kirby also delivers what may be the ultimate Kirby Krackle panel as well. That’s a lot of dots!
But wait! There’s more!
FF Annual 5 also included an array of pinups, including one for every member of the Inhumans. Here are some of the best:
There’s also a great double-page splash of the FF:
Dig that Kirby Krackle
As if that wasn’t enough, Jack dropped gems all over this comic. Here are a few more:
Fantastic Four 61 “Where Stalks the Sandman!” Published: January 1967 Story: Stan Lee and Jack Kirby Script: Lee Pencils: Kirby Inks: Joe Sinnott Letters: Sam Rosen Cover: Kirby and Sinnott
Synopsis
With the conclusion of the Doom/Surfer story arc in the last issue, Fantastic Four 61 starts off with a bang, as Mr. Fantastic, the Invisible Woman and the Thing are attacked by the equipment (the “atom igniter,” among other devices) in Reed’s lab. Eventually their antagonist is revealed to be the Sandman, who has turned the FF’s devices against them, although it’s never really explain how. The FF and the Sandman battle, and are eventually joined by the Human Torch.
Meanwhile, in a pair of digressions, the Silver Surfer’s board returns to him with his powers, allowing him to escape Latveria, and the Inhuman Crystal teleports with Lockjaw to a Metro College football game in search of Johnny.
During the FF’s fight with the Sandman, the villain generates poisonous gasses. To escape, Reed opens the portal to the Negative Zone, and while Johnny and the Sandman escape, Reed is sucked into the other dimension. The issue end on a cliffhanger with Reed’s fate unknown.
What’s going on here?
This is an interesting issue. It starts off as a fairly pedestrian story, and one that felt a lot like issue 57, when the FF also fought the Sandman in the Baxter Building. But the story takes a surprising and dramatic turn when Reed opens the door to the Negative Zone and tumbles through, leading to a genuinely suspenseful ending and compelling pathos as the rest of the team watches him float away. The issue also has some stand-out pages from Kirby and Sinnott.
There are, of course, a whole lot of implausibilities in this issue, starting with how the Sandman, up until now a lunkhead, managed to hijack Reed’s devices. Then there’s the question why Reed’s devices are so vulnerable—at one point Sandman leans against a lever and threatens New York (this also happens to be an excel Joe Sinnott panel):
FF 61 also continues the almost sadistic torture of the Silver Surfer that began in issue 57. Oddly, while we saw his baord begin its return to him in the last issue, it didn’t arrive until this issue (“at that very moment”). The FF were able to fly across the Atlantic in the time his board crossed Latveria.
And like every issue for the last five or so, we have an obligatory Inhumans check-in. In this one, Crystal looks unusually curvy.
Who is that guy?
An unannounced (and unacknowledged) cameo from a certain Daily Bugle photographer.
Costume change
This issue also marks a new costume for the Sandman,a much more Kirby-esque getup than the striped shirt Steve Ditko gave him. You can almost sense Jack chafing at having to draw such a drab costume for some many issues up to now.
The sexist sixies
More gender-role conformity
Clobberin’ Time
This is a pretty good one, with it’s own font and everything.
Weird science
Watch out for those spectrum beams!
Crazy credits
They’ve been pretty tame the last few issues, but we get a bit of flourish here.
For sale
A computer for $4.99. It’s a great deal, because a similar device made by IBM in 1967 cost about $4 million.
Dig that Kirby Krackle
So much awesomeness in this issue! Like this sequence:
Fantastic Four 60 “The Peril and the Power!” Published: Dec. 1966 Story: Stan Lee and Jack Kirby Script: Lee Pencils: Kirby Inks: Joe Sinnott Letters: Sam Rosen Cover: Kirby and Sinnott
Synopsis
Fantastic Four 60 picks up where issue 59 left off, with Dr. Doom preparing to conquer Earth with the stolen power of the Silver Surfer. As the Thing rages in frustration, Mr. Fantastic urges patience as the Army is building a weapon he designed. But when Wyatt Wingfoot tells the team the Human Torch has gone after Doom on his own, the rest of the FF flies off in pursuit.
Johnny is defeated by Doom, and when the rest of the FF approach, he destroys their aircraft before battling the Thing in hand-to-hand combat. Doom and the FF then fight for most of the rest of the issue until Reed’s “anti-cosmic flying wing”—which we saw a glimpse of in the last issue—appears and stuns Doom. Doom then chases it into the stratosphere when he loses his powers, the result of the barrier Galactus placed around earth to prevent the Silver Surfer from escaping. This issue ends with the Surfer’s board heading back to the castle in Latveria where he was imprisoned.
What’s going on here?
FF 60 wraps up the four-issue arc start that started when Doom stole the Surfer’s powers in FF 57, and the 16 issue stretch, starting in FF 44 with the introduction of the Inhumans, that marks the apex of the Lee/Kirby run. To recap, in a bit more than a year, Stan and Jack introduced Gorgon, Crystal, Karnak, Triton, Lockjaw, Black Bolt, Maximus, Attilan, the Silver Surfer, Galactus, “the power cosmic”, the ultimate nullifier, Wyatt Wingfoot, Wakanda, the Black Panther, Klaw, Prester John, and Quasimodo, and along the way wrote FF 51, a one-shot many consider one of the greatest stand-alone comics of all time. It’s not that there weren’t great issues before and after, but every mountain has a peak, and FF 44-60 is Stan and Jack’s.
Given all that, FF 60 feels like a bit of a let down. The concept animating this arc—Doom stealing the Surfer’s power—is brilliant, and as I’ve said before, really cements Doom as a formidable villain. Up until this point he’d been crafty, but stealing the Surfer’s power added an element of ruthlessness and grandiosity that we’ll see again and again over the years. But the story’s end doesn’t live up to its beginning and middle: the business with the flying wing feels rushed, and when Doom is stripped of his powers, it happens basically off-camera and explained only in Reed’s narration.
The scene seems designed for a dramatic Kirby panel, with Doom crashing into Galactus’s barrier, so it’s a puzzle why we don’t see it. It’s possible Jack ran out of room to finish the story, something we have seen in earlier issues. Or maybe plans for another issue wrapping up the arc were dropped, meaning they had to cram the endinging into this one. In any event, it’s shame, because as a story-telling mechanism, it’s a great device: Doom, like Icarus, challenges the gods and is pushed for his hubris.
Who invited them?
FF 60 features a few odd cameo appearances. The Inhumans show up for a few panels, as the the royal family makes its way from its refuge. We’ve been following their story for a while now, so the subplot isn’t too surprising, but it is jarring when it appear in the middle of a the FF’s fight with Doom.
Stranger is the appearance of the Watcher, who observes the FF’s struggles, when (for once) obits his vow of non-interference and goes on to do something else. It’s a great excuse for Jack to draw some cosmic stuff but otherwise a peculiar insertion.
Hero time
Since most of the issue features the FF fighting Doom, there’s chance for each of the four to get a moment in the spotlight. In a rarity, Sue gets to use her powers creatively, and she rises to the occasion to take on Doom here.
Ben also battles Doom, and it’s another opportunity to showcase his tenacity and resolve.
Plus, we get an excellent …
Clobberin’ Time
This is one of the best matches between story, art and catch phrase to date.
They’re fighting again
The sexist sixties
It was probably too much to ask for a whole issue without a woman being demeaned. Here, in the Bullpen Bulletins, Stan manages to belittle Marie Severin while trying to praise her.
Oops
Not sure if this is a legit goof, ad Jack forgot to add the sound effects, or if Stan and Jack were just having fun.
Fantastic Four 59 “Doomsday!” Published: Nov. 1966 Story: Stan Lee & Jack Kirby Script: Lee Pencils: Kirby Inks: Joe Sinnott Letters: Artie Simek Cover: Kirby & Sinnott
Synopsis
After Dr. Doom’s defeat of the Fantastic Four in the previous issue, FF 59 is another stage-setting comic, where a number of storylines are advanced without any reaching their climax.
In the first, main thread, Mr. Fantastic, the Thing and the Invisible Girl are regrouping in the aftermath of Doom’s victory. Reed warns the nation’s of Earth to prepare for the menace of Doom, then, goaded by Ben, begins making plans to defeat him. Toward the end of the comic, we get a glimpse of what Reed’s working on: an explosive flying device that saps power from this it comment with.
Meanwhile, Doom is plotting his conquest of Earth. He dismisses an attack by (presumably) the Soviet Union, taunts the helpless Silver Surfer, a prisoner in Latveria, then circles the globe displaying his power, for example, by throwing cities into darkness for 24 hours.
In the third storyline, the Inhumans, trapped in their city behind a negative zone barrier for many issues now, finally break free after Black Bolt uses his voice to destroy both the barrier and the city. The Inhuman royal family then travels to help Crystal reunite with Johnny Storm.
And in the last storyline, the Human Torch decides he alone has the power to take on Doom, and despite his misgivings, his friend Wyatt Wingfoot joins him on his quest.
What’s going on here
This is a transitional issue, but a good one, enhanced by some of the best art on this book to date. Lots of character is developed here: Ben’s needling of Reed is revealed to be more cunning than buffoonery, Doom’s mania becomes more apparent, the Surfer’s resolve becomes more clear, and we finally see Black Bolt cut loose with his power. It had been hinted at for a few issues now, but we now understand why he is silent, breadcrumbs first dropped all the way back in issue 46.
It’s always a big deal when Black Bolt uses his voice, and comic book writers have generally been pretty sparing with it. Here’s a pretty good run down in Comic Book Resources of 20 times he used his voice, including in 2009’s War of Kings, where he uses it to defeat Vulcan (the crazy brother Cyclops and Havok never knew they had—it’s a long story) and then detonate a Terrigen bomb which tears a hole in spacetime. That’s a not-untypical use case for Black Bolt’s voice.
War of Kings 6 (2009, Pelletier, Magyar & Hennessy)
The F-Team
I may be dating myself here, but in the 1980s TV show The A-Team, there was invariably a sequence of rapid cuts where the team, having suffered some defeat, works energetically to build a device or hatch a plan to save the day as the theme music plays. That is what I thought of when Reed and Ben get busy working to defeat Doom.
The sexist sixties
Of course, while Reed and Ben are making their plans, Sue is in the kitchen, worrying.
They’re fighting again
It’s been a long time since we saw this kind of thing. It makes me nostalgic.
Red menace
Doom is attacked by .. it’s not exactly clear. It sure looks like the Soviet Union, but for some reason Stan is reluctant to say as much.
Ladies and gentlemen, Joe Sinnott
Every now and then Sinnott’s inks just jump out at me, like they do in this sequence
Weird science
It’s “a solar-beam gun”
Nice ride
Johnny’s Ferrari is apparently courtesy of a rich grandfather. I don’t think we ever learn more about him.
Dig that Kirby Krackle
This issue has so much great Kirby art that I could have picked something from virtually every page. I restrained myself, but it’s really an amazing issue.
Fantastic Four 57 “Enter Dr. Doom!” Published: Sept. 1966 Story: Stan Lee and Jack Kirby Script: Lee Pencils: Kirby Inks: Joe Sinnott Letters: Art Simek Cover: Kirby and Sinnott
Synopsis
The main story begins in the middle of the action (in medias res, if you want to be fancy), with the Fantastic Four (minus the Human Torch) fighting the Sandman and Wizard in a prison, as the Thing explains the team were summoned to the prison under a ruse. The Wizard is easily subdued but Sandman escapes. He eventually resurfaces at the Baxter Building, where Reed and Sue fight him (the Thing is off looking for him at this point) and eventually chase him away.
That plot line alternates with another, in which Dr. Doom lured the Silver Surfer to his castle in Latveria. After asking the Surfer to demonstrate his powers, Doom traps him in a devices that siphons his cosmic power to Doom.
Lastly, two other sub-plots are advanced: Johnny and Wyatt continue to teleport around the universe with Lockjaw—this time landing on a planet filled with monstrous creatures before escaping—and in the Inhuman’s city of Attilan, Black Bolt shows signs of life while Maximus the Mad reveals that he could speak the entire time (the powers of his voice has yet to be revealed).
What’s going on here?
Fantastic Four 57 is very much a transitional issue, as Stan and Jack continue to move their chess pieces around in advance of some bigger events. The only traditional story in this issue—one with a beginning, middle and end—concerns the fight with Sandman, and despite some nifty Kirby art, it feels like filler (and it can’t really be said to have a beginning, since it opens in the middle of the action). After seeing the FF fight Galactus, it’s hard to get too worked up about the Sandman.
The centerpiece is of FF 57 is the interaction between Doom and the Surfer. Doom is at his most duplicitous, lulling the Surfer into believing he is a benevolent monarch, then cruelly clamping him in a device that steals his power. It could be argued that this scene is where Doom really makes the leap from a generic bad guy into a truly fearsome villain. Certainly, nothing up to this point suggests he was capable of a plot as ambitious or nefarious as this.
It’s also an opportunity for Jack (and Joe Sinnott) to go absolutely nuts with the Kirby Krackle:
Years later John Byrne recreated this sequence in a flashback in 1983’s FF 258 when Doom once again tried to harness the power of a herald of Galactus, but in that case it was Terrax, not the Silver Surfer.
The sexist sixties
There’s some strange stuff going on with Sue in this issue. Early on, as the FF are recapturing the Wizard, she gives a very grim assessment of the FF’s status quo.
We then get a fairly typical sequence of Reed barking orders and Sue following them faithfully: Followed by some more worrying and fretting. Every time Stan and Jack’s characterization of Sue seems to have turned a corner, she reverts back to the wingeing, cringing dish towel. Blech.
The incredible Mr. Fantastic
A fun sequence:
It’s Clobberin’ Time
It’s been a few issues since we got one of these.
Let’s talk about us
Ben is watching “The Marvel Super Heroes Show,” a short-lived animated series that ran in syndication in 1966. The stories were taken directly from comics, and the animators used the original art by Kirby, Steve Ditko and Don Heck. You can check it out here.
Dig that Kirby Krackle
Lots of cool stuff in this issue, starting with this sandy sequence:
And this (there’s a bit of an oops in this panel, with Stan using the guard to explain what Reed’s doing):
Fantastic Four 55 “When Strikes the Silver Surfer!” Published: July 1966 Story: Stan Lee and Jack Kirby Script: Lee Pencils: Kirby Inks: Joe Sinnott Letters: Sam Rosen Cover: Kirby and Sinnott
Synopsis
Much like last issue, there are two parallel stories in FF 55. In one, the Human Torch and Wyatt Wingfoot continue their quest to rescue Crystal and the Inhumans from the negative zone that surrounds their city. Johnny and Wyatt travel to a valley in the Himalayas, where they encounter Lockjaw, the Inhuman’s teleporting dog.
The other story, which takes up most of the issue, revolves around the Thing, who after his trip to Wakanda, visits his girlfriend Alicia. Unbeknownst to Ben, the Silver Surfer has chosen that moment to visit (quite the coincidence!) and when Ben discovers the two together, he assumes the worst. The two spend most of the issue fighting before Mr. Fantastic and the Invisible Girl settle Ben down. Ben grudgingly apologizes and the Surfer chalks it up to the strange behavior of earthlings.
What’s going on here?
Not much! As a story goes, this issue is pretty thin. It moves some chess pieces around, setting up the eventual return of the Inhumans, and reintroducing the Silver Surfer, essentially establishing him as an ongoing character.
But most of the issue is devoted to the silly fight between Ben and the Surfer, all of which—like almost all super hero fights—is based on a misunderstanding that could have been cleared up in two seconds. To a certain extent, yes, it does reveal how plagued Ben is by his insecurities and fear of losing Alicia. But mostly it’s an excuse for a massive fight. Jack and Joe do not disappoint—the fight is full of amazing art—but it’s all pretty much in the service of nothing.
The fight kicks off with this great sequence, one of the best combinations of script, art and timing in the Lee/Kirby run:
Comic relief
There are more gags than usual in this issue, including this sequence:
And this rim-shot worthy line from Ben
Crazy Credits
Another Forbush mention:
Weird science
Reed seems to have invented a Ring home security system
Zit!
A fun sound effect, unless you’re a self-conscious teenager.
Joltin’ Joe
Check out Sinnott’s inking in these panels
Dig that Kirby Krackle
A lot to choose from, but here are some highlights:
Fantastic Four 50 “The Startling Saga of the Silver Surfer” Published: Feb. 1966 Story: Stan Lee and Jack Kirby Script: Lee Pencils: Kirby Inks: Joe Sinnott Letters: Same Rosen Cover: Kirby and Sinnott
Synopsis
Fantastic Four 50 picks up where issue 49 left off. The Silver Surfer, having the value of humantity revealed to him by Alicia Masters last issue, confronts his master, Galactus, who is preparing to drain the earth of its energy. As the Surfer and Galactus battle, the Watcher reveals his plans for the Human Torch to Mr. Fantastic, the Invisible Girl and the Thing. When the Torch arrives from his voyage across the cosmos, he delivers the Ultimate Nullifier to the Watcher. Reed then uses it to threaten Galactus with the destruction of the universe if he doesn’t abandon his plans to consume earth. Galactus concedes, but before he leaves earth, he strips the Surfer of his ability to travel through space.
As the FF dust themselves off, Alicia shows up to praise the Surfer for helping save the world, leaving Ben jealous and despondent.
FF 50 then pivots to a series of vignettes that set up future stories. The first introduces a nameless bald villain who, after reading news accounts of the FF’s victory, announces plans to destroy the FF. The second concerns an over-the-hill college football coach and his inability to rein in his hot-headed star quarterback. Finally, Johnny enrolls at Metro College, where he meets his new roommate, Wyatt Wingfoot, while still pining away for the Inhuman, Crystal.
What’s going on here?
This is a busy comic, and not just because of the epic resolution of the Galactus storyline. In another peculiar pacing decision similar to issue 48, the main narrative essentially ends halfway through the comic, with the rest of the issues devoted to subplots and foreshadowing. A contemporary comic would use all the space available for the main tale—if there’s ever a story deserving of a space-consuming double-page splash, this was it—and sprinkle the foreshadowing elements throughout the comic. As it is, the reader is raised to the crescendo of the FF’s triumph over Galactus, only to be handed a mystifying story about a football coach.
The climax of the Galactus arc, as brief as it is, gives Stan and Jack another opportunity to stretch their cosmic muscles. They make it clear here that larger forces are at work, and the Fantastic Four are mostly bystanders. Unlike most villains, Galactus isn’t defeated by Reed outwitting him or whipping up some gizmo, but by the Watcher’s machinations. Even Johnny, the ostensible hero of the story, is overcome by the scale of the universe and pretty much wrecked by his trip across the universe.
If the FF are secondary characters in their own comic, it’s also because the story of the Silver Surfer is so dramatic. After Alicia reconnects Norrin Rad to his lost humanity, he turns on Galactus to defend the earth. Galactus is surprisingly chill about the betrayal, at several points telling the Surfer how much he likes and respects him, and basically telling the Surfer he’s going through a phase.
Galactus claims he bears the Surfer and FF no malice, but still he strips the Surfer of his space-faring powers. It’s not obvious if at this point Stan and Jack anticipated the Surfer having his own series, but keeping him trapped on earth was a useful plot device when his solo book eventually launched.
The Ultimate Nullifier serves as a convenient deus ex machina that solves the problem of Galactus. It reappears on occasion over the course of Marvel’s history, usually in a story with some big stakes.
What’s up with Ben?
Ben has been his usual melancholic self over the past few issues—he had an introspective sequence when the FF was in Atillan—but it kicks into overdrive in FF 50. First, there’s this revealing “kidding-not-kidding” exchange with Sue, where he explains how he uses humor to deflect his trauma.
Then the Silver Surfer, who barely knows him, senses something is amiss.
That’s followed by Ben’s jealous reaction to Alicia greeting the Surfer, as Ben’s insecurity about his appearance kicks overwhelms him.
Finally, as Ben wanders the streets of New York, he startles a woman, sending him down a spiral of self-pity that will play out next issue.
Who’s the new guy?
As if there wasn’t enough going on, FF 50 introduces Wyatt Wingfoot, a longstanding supporting character and, notably, a Native American character who isn’t reduced to a bundle of cliche and stereotypes. Here, he and Johnny meet cute.
Crazy Credits
The usual modesty
The sexist sixties
Again, another sequence of Sue stamping her feet because Reed isn’t paying her enough attention. At least Reed apologizes.
Read all about it
A nice connected-universe swipe at J. Jonah Jameson here.
Dig that Kirby Krackle
After using this silly phrase for 50+ blog posts, we finally get some genuine Kirby Krackle. For the uninitiated, Kirby Krackle are the black dots Jack uses to illustrate the release of energy. A trademark effect of the King’s, it hasn’t really appeared until this issue. Now we can, indeed, dig that Krackle.
Here’s some more:
We also get a great panel of Galactus giving the ol’ stink-eye.
And Johnny tooling around campus in a sweet set of wheels.
Fantastic Four 49 “If This Be Doomsday!” Published: Jan. 1966 Story: Stan Lee and Jack Kirby Script: Lee Pencils: Kirby Inks: Joe Sinnott Letters: Sam Rosen Cover: Kirby and Sinnott
Synopsis
Fantastic Four 49 picks up where issue 48 left off, after Galactus makes his entrance, intent on draining earth of its energies. The Watcher urges Galactus to reconsider, and the FF confront him, but to no avail and he begins assembling his earth-energy-sucking machine on top of the Baxter Building.
Meanwhile, the Silver Surfer, reeling from his fight with the Thing, landed on the roof of Alicia Masters’ building. She nurses him back to health and begins to awaken him to the possibility earth might be worth saving.
After regrouping, the Fantastic Four again engage Galactus, save for Johnny, whom the Watcher singles out for a mission. As the rest of the team fight the Punisher, a creature Galactus dispatches to deal with vermin, Johnny travels through space and time to arrive at Galactus’s enormous space station.
Back on earth, as Galactus prepares to drain the earth’s energies, Alicia appeals to the Silver Surfer’s lost humanity and convinces him to confront Galactus to save the earth. The issue ends with the Watcher warning the reader that the Surfer may disrupt his own plans and doom the earth.
What’s going on here?
FF 49 is everything you want a Fantastic Four comic to be. It’s arguably the high point of the Lee/ Kirby partnership, and showcases both at the peak of their powers (aided significantly by Joe Sinnott’s inks, of course). In Galactus, Stan finally has an antagonist worthy of his bombast and grandiosity. After years of trying to convince us Diablo or the Thinker were threats to humanity, In Galactus Stan has a villain that lives up to his over-wrought writing. And in the Surfer, he has an alien hero who can philosophize while speaking in the lofty, faux-Shakespearian tones Stan loves so much.
Kirby rises to the occasion too. The story’s huge sweep and cosmic overtones gives him the freedom to produce amazing character designs for Galactus and the Punisher, an eye-popping panel of Galactus’s space station—it’s so big that planets orbit it—and stunning visual effects of Johnny confronting Galactus and traveling through space.
The whole story just feels big—big in its scope, big in its stakes, and big in its ambition
Who is this guy?
While Galactus technically made his first appearance last issue, this is really his debut. We don’t yet get the full story (more on his origin in a bit) but we get the basics, and the basics are more than enough: He’s a cosmic being of incredible power who is sustained by draining planets of their essence. Interestingly, while he has appeared in countless comics over the years, unlike other characters, he has changed very little. His costume design has remained essentially the same, and while his role in the Marvel universe has been explained and put into context, he acts pretty much as he does in his first appearance: traveling the universe looking for planets to consume.
The traditional account of Galactus’s invention is that Stan, searching for a story idea, said “let’s have them fight god.” Mark Evanier, in his biography Kirby: King of Comics, disputes that narrative and instead offers two alternative ideas. One is that Jack wanted to upend the conventional science fiction idea that if aliens arrived, they would engage with humans and exchange technology. What if they didn’t care about humans? Jack wondered, according to Evanier. What if they just wanted to eat our planet? The other idea reflects Kirby’s growing disillusionment with Marvel and the business of comics. In this interpretation, Galactus is a hostile company buying up smaller firms and draining them dry. (In the letters pages, readers projected a Vietnam metaphor on the story, with Galactus acting as hostile communist forces and the Silver Surfer as the US coming to the rescue of South Vietnam).
Galactus’s origin is relatively uncomplicated. In the original telling, revealed in a back-up story by Stan and Jack in Thor 169, Galactus was originally Galan, a citizen of an advanced planet called Taa. The planet is facing extinction by a plague, so Galan and three others decide to die as explorers and head into Taa’s sun. Galan survives and is eventually transformed into Galactus (as Brian Cronin notes in his Comics Should Be Good blog, this sounds like a mash-up of Superman and the FF’s origins.)
A few decades later, Marvel editor Mark Gruenwald decided to revamp Galactus’s origins. Instead of merely the last survivor of a planet, he became the last survivor of a universe, and he emerged from the Big Bang. Gruenwald basically took the Stan and Jack story, wrote over some of it with some new pages by John Byrne and Ron Wilson, and republished it in 1983 as Super-Villain Classics 1. Here are some relevant pages:
The notable thing about this origin is that establishes Galactus as a cosmic entity, a force of nature and not merely a villain, despite the destruction he causes. That tension became a major storyline during Byrne’s FF run, when Reed Richards begs Galactus to spare earth in FF 243, and Galactus basically says, “nothing personal, it’s just business.”
Reed, with the help of the Avengers, then saves Galactus’s life in FF 244, arguing they had a moral responsibility to prevent the death of a living thing.
Noble as it was, that decision didn’t sit well with the survivors of the worlds Galactus destroyed, and in FF 262 Reed is summoned to be tried for his crime of saving Galactus. Through Reed, Byrne makes the case of Galactus’s importance in the universe:
There’s a lot more to it, but it serves to anchor Galactus as a unique force in the Marvel universe. On a personal note, FF 262 was the third FF comic I ever read. My 12-year-old mind was blown.
About that outfit
In his first appearance, Kirby has Galactus wearing shorts with a big G on his chest:
Fortunately, he soon put on long pants and got rid of the G, but his appearance, with the elaborate headgear has remained pretty much the same ever since. Yet despite its visual appeal, it’s not obvious why he’s dressed that way, given that he is a cosmic force and not a run-of-the-mill bad guy. The Lee / Kirby origin in Thor provides one answer: He was given that outfit by a Watcher, who witnessed his emergence from his incubator and created “a unique body-suit which would help him regulate his awesome energies.”
Later, Byrne in FF 262, suggests only humans see Galactus as humanoid, and that he appears to other alien races in whatever form they take (I never much liked this explanation, since he’s never depicted as anything other than humanoid, and it makes more sense to me that he’s human-like because Galan of Taa was also human-like). It’s a pretty cool page though.
Wrong guy
Whaddya mean there’s another Punisher?
That sounds familiar
On his cosmic voyage, the Human Torch passed through “celestial barriers known as un-life” which sounds a lot like ‘anti-life,” a concept that became a big part of the Fourth World mythos Jack created at DC about five years later.
About that vow
On several occasions the Watcher references his vow not to interfere in human affairs while busily interfering in human affairs
Prime real estate
A few issues ago, Dragon Man crashed into Alicia’s apartment while fighting Ben and Johnny. Now, the Silver Surfer just happens to land on her roof.
Crazy credits
It’s clobberin’ time
One of the more ineffective attempts to clobber from Ben
Dig that Kirby Krackle
There’s a lot to choose from in this issue, but here are a few stand-out pages and panels, starting with the amazing splash page:
A very cool sequence:
And another amazing page:
Nextissue: The conclusion of the Galactus trilogy!
Percival Henry: The Fantastic Four and more 