The main topic of today’s post is Avengers #141, which kicked off the last major story arc of one of the series’ defining writers, Steve Englehart — and also featured the debut on the series of one of its most celebrated artists, George Pérez. But given that the last issue of the title we looked at on this blog was #137, back in April — and that that one ended on a fairly large cliffhanger, with the Wasp having just been seriously injured by the enigmatic alien known as the Stranger — we’ll have some catching up to do in regards to the three intervening issues before we can move on to the latest doings of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes, circa August, 1975.
Art by Gil Kane and Mike Esposito.
So let’s go ahead and get things going with a quick recap of Avengers #138 (written by Englehart, with art by George Tuska and Vince Colletta), in which the team sought to locate and defeat the Stranger. They were ultimately successful, though in the process they discovered that their enemy wasn’t who’d he appeared to be at all… rather, he was the Toad, a charter member of Magneto’s Brotherhood of Evil Mutants who’d last been seen in Avengers #76 (May,1970). The Toad had used technology pilfered from the Stranger’s planet (where he and Magneto had once been held prisoner) to pose as the Stranger, all in an attempt to get close to the object of his long-unrequited affection, the Scarlet Witch — an attempt that of course ended in abject failure, as the Witch, vacationing on a remote South Pacific island with her new husband, the Vision, never even knew she’d been in jeopardy prior to her teammates taking the Toad to the cleaners.
Art by Gil Kane (pencils) and either John Romita or Frank Giacoia (inks).
The following issue, produced by the same team of Englehart, Tuska, and Colletta, saw the Avengers return to the hospital where the Wasp, aka Janet van Dyne Pym, remained in critical condition. As if things weren’t already bad enough, the Whirlwind — one of the oldest enemies of Jan and her husband Hank, aka Yellowjacket — attempted to kidnap Jan from her hospital bed. The villain was foiled, but only after Yellowjacket was forced to make liberal use of his size-changing powers, shooting up to Giant-Man/Goliath proportions as well as doing his OG shrinking shtick. This put an enormous strain on Hank Pym’s body, which was already under stress from a microbe that had trapped him at Ant-Man size for a run of Marvel Feature issues a year or so back.
Elsewhere in this issue, our storytellers introduced a new subplot involving a mysterious woman with an interest in one of the Avengers’ newest recruits, the Beast…
… and also checked in with the team’s two honeymooners, the Vision and the Scarlet Witchas they discussed the topic of their…
Art by Gil Kane and Mike Esposito.
Whatever her reservations, Wanda Maximoff eventually acquiesced to her new husband’s wishes; and so it was that the couple would make it back to New York just in time to help out with the new crisis faced by the Avengers in issue #140. That crisis kicked off in the book’s opening scene, as Yellowjacket finally succumbed to the strain he’d placed on his system via his recent spree of size-changing; first collapsing onto the street right in front of the hospital, then beginning to slowly, but inexorably, grow. The Beast intuited that a mutation-curing formula he’d been working on for the Brand (rhymes with RAND) Corporation in his identity of Henry McCoy might be the solution to his fellow Hank’s problem — unfortunately, he’d been canned from Brand sometime after the conclusion of the Beast’s run in Amazing Adventures, which meant he’d have to break into his old workspace to retrieve his work. He did so, and despite running into some interference from Brand’s security guards, was in the end successful in his mission. Returning to the hospital, the Beast then made the needed adjustments to the formula for it to (hopefully) cure the still-unconscious Yellowjacket, who by now measured roughly 150 feet from head to toe. As depicted on the book’s cover, the life-saving serum was ultimately delivered into YJ’s bloodstream by the Vision, in a turnabout-styled tribute to the classic sequence in Avengers #93 (Nov., 1971) in which Hank Pym, as Ant-Man, had taken a “fantastic voyage” into the Vision’s injured synthetic body to perform micro-surgery (or, if you prefer, repairs).
Meanwhile, the mystery woman from last issue showed up on the doorstep of Avengers Mansion, only to find no one at home but their butler, Jarvis:
The red-headed stranger declared that she would just hang out on the Avengers’ front porch until the Beast returned — and as she proceeded to take a seat, a caption opined that at this point, all the readers of the old “Beast” series in Amazing Adventures should have been able to guess who she was. (As one of those readers, your humble blogger would like to think that his younger self was that astute, but half a century on, who knows?)
Elsewhere, another subplot that had been set up in Avengers #137, involving Hawkeye heading off to try to use Dr. Doom’s time machine to retrieve the Black Knight from the 12th century, took a dramatic turn. After the Battling Bowman had failed to return within a reasonable amount of timel, Iron Man — joined by the Avengers’ other new recruit, Moondragon — had gone looking for him at Doom’s castle (mistakenly identified in Englehart’s script as the arch-villain’s main digs in Latveria, rather than the spare HQ he’d set up in the Adirondacks)…
Back in NYC, the Beast’s adapted formula successfully competed its job of whittling Yellowjacket down to size — just in time for the team to receive some very welcome news in regards to the Wasp, who’d been comatose throughout these last three issues…
As indicated by the bottom-of-the-page “Next” blurb, Avengers #140 marked the end of veteran artist George Tuska’s five-issue stint as Avengers penciller. On the letters page of that very issue, in response to a couple of correspondents who’d expressed less than full satisfaction with Tuska’s art for #135, Marvel was remarkably candid; after noting that “group books are traditionally the hardest of all to draw”, the anonymous letters-answerer (whom the Grand Comics Database pegs as Steve Englehart himself) went on to say: “Personally, we feel George Tuska made a noble attempt at THE AVENGERS, but after years with single-character books, he never quite got the feel of this title.” After duly offering Tuska “our heartfelt thanks”, the responder then moved on to introduce his replacement: “another George — Perez by name”.
George Pérez — twenty-one years of age at the time Avengers #141 was published — had first entered the comics industry a couple of years earlier, as an assistant to artist Rich Buckler. His very first credited professional work had been a 2-page humor strip that ran in Marvel’s Astonishing Tales #25 (Aug., 1974) behind the debut of Buckler and Doug Moench’s new “Deathlok the Demolisher” feature; that had been quickly followed by a single story for the 8th issue of the black-and-white anthology Monsters Unleashed, after which Pérez picked up his first series assignments: “Sons of the Tiger” in another B&W title, Deadly Hands of Kung Fu, and “Man-Wolf” in the color Creatures on the Loose. Most recently — just one month prior to the release of Avengers #141, in fact — he’d begun another new regular series, collaborating with Moench on Marvel’s new Inhumans title; a book which, like Avengers, featured multiple costumed characters in its cast. That might have seemed daunting to a young and still relatively untried artist, but here was the thing: George Pérez liked drawing team books.
Almost three decades later, in Modern Masters Volume Two: George Pérez (TwoMorrows, 2003), the creator indicated his understanding of why team books weren’t for every artist, especially in the mid-Seventies era:
At the time when there were no royalties to be had from the sales of a book, an artist would earn the same page rate for drawing a page with a single character as he would a page with a dozen characters. Books like the Avengers were not exactly desirable for the people working under that system. And because I loved it so much I could do it as fast, if not faster, than drawing a single character book. I was in tune with it and so hungry to be known in the business that of course I was going to take a high-profile book like the Avengers.
Behind a cover by Gil Kane and John Romita — one which rehashed the familiar trope of two lines of super-people charging at one another, albeit in an entertaining way — the opening splash page of Avengers #141 gave us readers of August, 1975 our first glimpse of George Pérez’s artwork for what would ultimately prove to be one of the signature titles of his career:
Continuing on as inker from George Tuska’s brief run was Vince Colletta, whom, Pérez would later admit to Modern Masters editor Eric Nolen-Weathington, wasn’t exactly one of his all-time favorite finishers:
Vince Colletta was the old workhorse and everyone ended up being inked the same way, which meant getting it done on time, getting rid of any extraneous detail —
MM: And sometimes non-extraneous detail.
GEORGE: Exactly, sometimes important stuff would disappear…
While I was never much of a Vince Colletta fan (with the notable exception of his work on Thor, as well on Jack Kirby’s “Fourth World” titles for DC Comics), by 1975 I was certainly used to him — and, if I recall correctly, his inks over Pérez’s pencils did little to nothing to diminish their impact (any more than had those of Frank Chiaramonte’s on Inhumans #1, which, not counting Astonishing Tales #25, was likely my only prior exposure to Pérez’s art). Rather, the young penciller’s unconventional layouts, varied camera angles, and decorative background effects all combined first to grab my attention, and then to quickly gain my admiration.
Stepping away from the artwork for a moment, however, I can’t proceed from this page without commending Steve Englehart for the impressive pop-culture double-reference he delivers in its first two panels, having the Beast allude to both Warner Brothers’ “Tweety” cartoons and George Herriman’s Krazy Kat comic strip in the same panel. Although, thinking about it a little more, Englehart’s verbal cleverness dovetails nicely with the exhilarating effect of Pérez’s visuals to demonstrate what makes this run on Avengers so special: both creators were clearly having a great time.
As of August, 1975, Steve Englehart had been off Captain America for five months, and he was sorely missed on the title. For that reason, if no other, my younger self was delighted to have Steve Rogers show up in this issue, even if it wasn’t immediately clear if he’d be sticking around just for this storyline or was truly back for the long haul. (For the record, it was the latter, as the Star-Spangled Avenger — who hadn’t been a regular in this book since issue #126 — wouldn’t miss more than a handful of issues at a stretch from this point all the way up to Avengers #350, in 1992.)
As we discussed five months ago in our post about Captain America #186, Steve Englehart’s leaving following that issue wasn’t originally supposed to be the permanent departure it turned out to be. Presumably, at the time he’d introduced the subplot concerning the mysterious doings of Roxxon Oil’s Hugh Jones, he’d expected to resolve it in the pages of Captain America itself — but since it was by now clear that he wouldn’t be returning to that title anytime soon, if ever, Avengers was clearly the most logical place to pick up that thread.
Cap may be all business, but he does pause long enough to at least say “hi” to his old teammates the Pyms before dragging Thor, Vizh, and Wanda away…
And that’s one last clue to the identity of our mystery woman, who did indeed appear in Fantastic Four Annual #3, a full ten years before the publication of our present story (though Stan Lee and Jack Kirby failed to record for posterity her face-to-face encounter with Hank and Jan, alas).
I’m sure that there were fans fifty years ago who were just as exasperated as the Vision seems to be by the imminent return of Kang the Conqueror; after all, counting the second through fourth issues of Giant-Size Avengers (and discounting the all-reprint Avengers #136), he’d appeared in seven of the last fifteen Avengers stories. All I can say is, I wasn’t one of those readers. I not only thought Kang was a great villain, but I also believed that he still had plenty of narrative-driving potential, even if the long-running “Celestial Madonna” saga (in which he’d played a dominant role) was all over and done with now.
While I hate to have to break in in the middle of a Big Reveal, I feel it’s important to take note of Moondragon’s self-description of herself as a “god” in the first panel above — the first time she’s claimed divinity, as best as I can determine, though of course it will be far from the last. Honestly, it’s a bit of a stretch, since although the former Heather Douglas was raised on Titan — whose population in this era was still depicted as an offshoot of the actual Greek gods, rather than of their Eternal analogues — her birth parents had been completely normal humans of Earth. Maybe if Moondragon had won the Priests of Pama’s little competition to become the Celestial Madonna, she’d have more of an argument — but that particular prize had of course gone to Mantis, instead.
And so our enigmatic redhead stands revealed at last as Patsy Walker — who, given that her first appearance dates all the way back to Miss America Magazine #2 (Nov., 1944), has been around longer than any other character we’ve yet seen in this comic, save for of course Captain America (and I guess also the Vision, if we want to count his “past life” as the original Human Torch).
Patsy had discovered the Beast’s secret identity back in the Steve Englehart-scripted Amazing Adventures #15 (Nov., 1972), and had made a bargain with him at the time not to rat him out . We didn’t learn just what Patsy was supposed to get out of their deal in that story, and we don’t find out for sure in this issue, either — although one can certainly make some inferences from the Beast’s dialogue with Captain America, above.
As we’d learned during the “Celestial Madonna” saga, although Immortus had originally been created by Stan Lee and Don Heck as his own unique bad-guy self back in Avengers #10, he’s actually a future iteration of Kang — and, to hear him tell it, Kang’s final future iteration. If this really is going to be the Avengers’ last showdown with Kang (and Thor, at least, seems pretty damn serious about this little mission, as he will make even more explicit a couple of pages from now), it makes a lot of sense for Immortus to be on hand. (UPDATE, 8/16/25. 1:00 pm: The original version of this post listed Jack Kirby as Immortus’ co-creator, rather than Don Heck. My thanks to Blake Stone at the Marvel Collected Editions forum for catching the error.)
In the Beast’s solo series in Amazing Adventures, the Brand Corporation hadn’t come across as particularly evil — at least, not those parts that hadn’t been infiltrated by the definitely sinister Secret Empire — and there had of course been no mention of a connection of Roxxon, which wouldn’t be created by Steve Englehart until a couple of years later. But tying the two corporations together was both clever and efficient on Englehart’s part, allowing him to simultaneously resolve both the long-hanging Patsy Walker subplot from AA and tie up the loose ends regarding Roxxon from Captain America in a single storyline.
Patsy’s ex-husband, Col. Buzz Baxter, has a history going back just as far as hers, having been introduced as her boyfriend in the very same issue of Miss America Comics where Patsy made her own debut. To this date I still haven’t read any old “Patsy Walker” comics stories, so I can’t speak to what kind of personality Buzz displayed either as a teen-humor character in the Golden Age, or a romantic leading man in the Silver Age. But in his two Amazing Adventures appearances, he’d been portrayed as something of an uptight jerk — though he still hadn’t taken the outright heel turn his behavior in this scene implies has happened since then.
Given that I hadn’t bought the two issues of Avengers where the Squadron Supreme had made their only previous appearance — at least not when they’d first come out, back in 1970 — it’s possible that this was my first full encounter with the team. On the other hand, I might have picked up Avengers #85 and #86 as back issues by this time (I would eventually, in any event). But whatever the case, I know I already understood the basics: these were the alternate-universe heroic counterparts to the villainous Squadron Sinister (whom the Supremes were mislabeled as on the cover of #141, just as they had been on #85) — though there were more of them that there were of the Sinisters, whose original lineup of Justice League of America-parodying bad guys had been composed only of Hyperion (a riff on Superman), Nighthawk (same for Batman), Doctor Spectrum (Green Lantern), and Whizzer (Flash).
Nighthawk is of course absent from the group of five we see above (perhaps to avoid confusion, due to his Sinister doppelgänger having gone straight and joined the Defenders in recent years) — but, given the Squadron Supreme’s larger roster, the trio of Hyperion, Dr. Spectrum, and Whizzer has quite reasonably been buttressed by Black Canary knockoff Lady Lark, and Green Arrow clone the Golden… wait, now. That can’t be right.
And you know just what I’m talking about, don’t you, Cap?
Had Steve Englehart had any idea when he first introduced the OG Golden Archer back in Captain America #179 that, both in name and in appearance, he’d make a much better satirical stand-in for DC Comics’ premiere bow-slinger than the “Hawkeye” drawn by John Buscema in Avengers #85? I have no idea, but whenever and however the writer made the decision to combine those two ideas, it works beautifully.
And with that tantalizing tease, we’ll have to take our leave of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes for this month. I hope you’ve enjoyed this first chapter of the seven-issue story arc which, for sheer entertainment value, still stands out amongst over sixty years’ worth of classic Avengers epics as The One to Beat, at least as far as your humble blogger is concerned. I look forward to sharing its future installments with you in the months to come.
https://tombrevoort.com/2020/08/22/bhoc-avengers-141/
Prior to getting this issue 50 years ago, the Avengers was already among my top 3 favorite comics, along with Spider-Man and Fantastic Four, but this mag was a genuine feast for my eyes. For someone still so young, Perez was already proving himself a master of comics art. Yeah, he’d get even better in later years, but as far as I was concerned, with this issue he ranked among the best artists to render our favorite Assemblers. Not even whatever deletions Colletta may have made while inking could detract from that.
Loved the story too. I’d missed Patsy’s prior appearances in the Beast’s solo stories and otherwise, I’d only previously seen her in Fantastic Four Annual #9 from 1973, which reprinted the third annual, featuring Reed & Sue’s wedding. I thought she was a fun addition to the group while she lasted in the mag. Was also glad to see Cap return and get right back into the swing of things. Englehart was upping the ante on Moondragon’s haughty arrogance, somewhat more like her first appearance as Madame MacEvil and misguided and manipulated “villain” in Gerber’s Terrax story in Daredevil than her more heroic stance in Starlin’s first Thanos epic in Captain Marvel. I wonder if Englehart had any long-range plans for her if he had stayed on the Avengers longer than was the case.
This was also my introduction to the Squadron Supreme — I’d already seen their evil equivalents in the Defenders and at least had read references to them in some letters pages previously. So I wasn’t utterly baffled by them, thinking Hyperion, Whizzer & Dr. Spectrum were the same characters I’d seen in the Defenders and Iron Man a few years earlier. And the quips Englehart wrote for the Whizzer seemed intent on minimizing any confusion.
Overall, a grand start to Englehart’s last epic on the title and enjoyed your overview of the mag, Alan.
Great run. I recently scored this issue in VF cond. Fits nicely between 140 & 142!! Masterful art, a classic cover IMO.
As a kid, the Avengers had been the one Marvel book I bought semi-regularly. After I started buying Marvel’s Doc Savage (HUUUUGE fan) I figured now that I was buying Marvel again, I’d pick up Avengers. I wound up with the start of Englehart’s Space Phantom story and instantly became a fan.
This arc had what I think of as one of Englehart’s signature traits, making use of forgotten characters such as Patsy, the Squadron Supreme and the Serpent Crown (though of course he’d already introduced two of the three in earlier writing). As I never picked up the Beast’s strip I had no idea who Patsy Walker was but as usual with Englehart I didn’t find myself confused. Though I think the story works better now that I know what a big star she’d been at Marvel at one point.
Perez was a vast improvement over Tuska, though I didn’t appreciate how good he was at the time. I have a better eye for art now.
I didn’t know about the Squadron Supreme until I read this issue. Having started my comics reading with the original Earth-Three story, “superheroes who are parallel world counterparts of supervillains” wasn’t at all hard to grasp.
“Phantom Empire” may have been a pop culture reference — it was a Gene Autry science fiction Western movie serial back in the 1930s (I’d learned about it from The Great Movie Serials though I wouldn’t see it until PBS’ Matinee at the Bijou a few years later). The mouse-with-a-brick joke meant nothing to me at the time and even though I’ve become a big Krazy Kat fan since, I doubt I’d have made the connection if you hadn’t said it — the Beast’s absurdist babble didn’t have to make much sense to be fun.
IIRC the coming Kang in the Old West plotline was slated for the next issue of Giant Size Avengers but then that got canceled.
From what I’ve heard, it was actually the Assassin storyline in Avengers #145-146 that was supposed to have run in an issue of Giant-Size Avengers. But I could be wrong.
I totally missed Beast’s Krazy Kat reference!
No, you are right about it.
I remember reading the first appearances of both Squadron Supreme and Sinister. It was confusing. I hadn’t read this one, though.
I hate the coloring on the covers and interiors. Everything is candy color BRIGHT. Pull out some Marvel covers from the 1960s up until the early ’70s. What a world of difference! Not only was there some blending (airbrushing?) of hues on the covers, but there were varieties of VALUES (lights and darks) and SATURATIONS (a variety from dull to intense) in the colors themselves. They were rich and very pleasing to the eye.
This has nothing to do with a switch to cheaper printing methods. I believe it was editorial policy at DC and Marvel from the top down, thinking that gaudy colors will attract the kiddies.
Ironically, Jim Steranko and Neal Adams introduced a richer, even more varied color possibilities to comics, due to their outside commercial art experience….and a few years later this is what was being churned out.
No thanks.
This was yet another reason I largely left the Big Two at this time (except for buying golden and silver age copies secondhand) and went over to the magazines like Warren, Mad, etc. The shrinking page count, the cheaper quality printing, and the garish colors — besides a mass exodus of favored artists like Steranko, Adams, Wrightson, etc. — were enough to make me move on as well.
Alan:
What a wonderful start to an examination of a storyline I still remember especially fondly, and which colored (perhaps I should write “married”) my reaction to Inza Nelson’s turn as Dr. Fate a decade or so later.
That stemmed from Moondragon’s interaction with Thor (Roy Thomas has a less “egalitarian God of Thunder in *Giant-Size Avengers* #1, doesn’t he? His teammates have “mortal eyes,” and he doesn’t even give an exception to the Vision…whose non-human aspects prevented Ares from controlling him in *Avengers* #98), and if I can fault any part of your commentary, it was in your not noting that Iron Man hit on Moondragon here and it did not go well. (Sing “Pablo Picasso” for Tony Stark, Jonathan Richman. You can join in if you like, Matt Murdock.)
As for Buzz Baxter prior to his arrival in the proper Marvel Universe…
I’ve read a lot of *Patsy Walker* stories (thanks to rradcomiconline.), and my feeling is that we had a series genderflipping Archie (like Mr. Andrews, Miss Walker is a redhead), where the emphasis was on Patsy (a Betty if ever there was one) and her rapport with her rival/frenemy Hedy Wolfe (a definite Veronica!), and that while both were eager to claim Buzz (real name Robert, by the way…whether his full name is Robert Bruce Baxter I cannot say), the stories are more interesting for how they get along (with a third girl in the mix in Nan Brown, who doesn’t really have an *Archie* counterpart: she’s basically a variation on *Millie the Model’s* Toni Turner, the good girl/gal pal who occasionally is the peacemaker). When we turn to Buzz, we see someone like Jim O’Connor in Tennessee Williams’s *Glass Menagerie,* a nice, ordinary young man. He’s a prize worth winning, to be sure, but whether he’d be worth keeping is another story.
Thank you for your time (and your attention to this matter, as someone might tweet), and keep the analyses coming!
Thank you as always, Alan, for an enjoyable and informative piece.
Avengers wasn’t distributed in the UK during this period, to avoid competing with Marvel UK’s own reprint weekly, so this is the first time I’ve seen this issue. I can certainly see why George Perez made such an impact on you – right from the beginning he pretty much had it all. I particularly like his page designs in the “timey-wimey” sequence with Thor and Moondragon.
That said, I think poor George Tuska got something of a raw deal, not for the first or the last time. He was a very underrated artist, not as flashy as some, but a terrific storyteller, very versatile and utterly dependable. By all accounts Stan Lee and John Romita Sr thought very well of him.
Agreed. I’ve always loved Tuska’s work. A particular high spot is those Iron Man stories from the late 60s, especially as inked by Johnny Craig. Solidly dynamic storytelling.
I’ve always regarded George Tuska as one of those good, solid, underrated artists who knew how to lay out a clear story. I’m not a huge fan of his work, but I appreciate his professionalism. I find his work on Avengers in the mid-1970s to be perfectly serviceable, but unfortunately somewhat marred by Vince Colletta’s underwhelming inking. Having said that, George Perez’s pencils were definitely a step up in quality.
I know giants like Kirby really respected George Tuska and it was probably out of line to knock him on the letters page but that barrel chested honeymooning Vision still bugs me all these decades later.
Colette’s romance comic chops meant a not too bad Wanda at least…
The flipped Vizh inside Hank was such a terrific comic booky idea, again it begged for the enthusiasm a young Perez could have brought to it. Alas!
As I’ve mentioned before to my chagrin, I never read the Avengers much as a kid. I’d taken an instant dislike to most of the OG Avengers in their solo books and was determined not to like them as a team, simply because they weren’t the JLA I was so much more familiar with. By 1975, thanks to the influence of a couple of friends who were serious Marvel fans, I’d begun reading some Marvel books, but the Avengers was not among them, so I missed this story fifty years ago.
Which is a shame, because it’s really quite good. Englehart and his new penciller, Mr. Perez did a bang-up job on this issue, though it would have been nice to have an inker who enhanced Perez’s pencils, rather than just cover them up or erase them away. It’s a bit jarring to hear Perez and Tom Breevort speak critically of Vinnie, no matter how warranted. Like you, Alan, I liked his inking on Kirby and the Fourth World books (and Thor, I suppose though I didn’t read those). Still, in hindsight, especially knowing how much Perez would be revered in the future, it’s awkward to look at these Avengers pages and to immediately recognize who inked them, but to not be able to identify the penciller without a trip to the creators’ box at the top of the story.
Speaking of the story, there was a lot going on here. If I have one complaint about Englehart it’s his tendency to over-stuff his stories with story threads from his work on other books. It’s almost as if Steve was afraid that if he didn’t wrap up all of his stories right away, he’s never get the chance. Anyway, there’s a lot of interesting stuff here, even if I still, to this day, don’t care for Moondragon and never cared for Patsy Walker until she became Hellcat (so obviously, Hank’s plan fails). Putting Thor and Moondragon in the American Old West doesn’t seem like a comfortable fit either, but I haven’t read the book yet, so I suppose I’ll have to wait until next month to know for sure. Thanks, Alan!
God, I loved Englehart’s run and he sure went out with a bang! Hs take on Beast was fantastic and it still bothers me they just switched him to a Reed Richards clone when the X-Office stole him back. Patsy as Hellcat was a treat as well!
George Tuska and Vince Colletta meshed so well that they should be regarded as one of comicdom’s (and newspaperdom’s) best art teams.
I liked them on Iron Man in the early 1970s.
I was one of the few who actually liked George Tuska’s work on the Avengers. That said, I was already fully aware of George Perez’s talents and within two pages, the new George had me totally forget about the “old George.” Even with Coletta’s tendencies, this art raised the bar several notches – adding much to Englehart’s engaging story. Best of all – in terms of the art – this was Perez’s roughest showing on the book. He would only improve with each subsequent issue. It’s a shame this team had less than ten issues remaining. And of course, my compliments on an outstanding summation of this and the previous Avenger’s issues.
Tuska’s pencils always feel off to me — I’ve never been able to get into his work.
Golden Archer’s allegedly British accent here is appalling. The comics equivalent of Dick Van Dyke in Mary Poppins.
Odd. He is also wearing a ‘Van Dyke.”
Yes that struck me, too – including the Dick Van Dyke reference! Reminds me of the deliberately terrible accent Grant Morrison used as a joke for John Constantine in an issue of DOOM PATROL.
The last great storyline of Steve Englehart’s first run on The Avengers. Thanks for taking us through this Alan. It brings back some great memories for me. I really enjoyed this series of stories (Avengers 141-144, 147-149), and my first experience with George Perez’s art. I had missed Inhumans 1 in July 75 and was unaware of any his previous work, but soon George Perez would be everywhere, including the following week on FF 164. It’s interesting…I remember reading 137-138 at the time and just going along with the story but now it seems kind of ridiculous that The Toad, even with the Stranger’s weaponry could have given the Avengers such a hard time. As for the art in 137-140, I was probably not the biggest Tuska fan (although I did like his art on Iron Man as noted above when inked by Johnny Craig several years earlier), I believe it was the inking by Vince Coletta that actually made me ok with the art in those issues. So I was fine with Coletta inking Perez on 141, but now when I look at this issue, 50 years later, I know there are better inkers to come for Perez. What’s also fascinating is that Perez seemed to grow by leaps and bounds very quickly and by Avengers 149 his work was looking really great and that was still just the beginning.
I actually liked that Englehart packed so much story into this issue with two separate storylines. Also, I never thought of this until now, but only Moon Dragon and Thor went off to search for Hawkeye. That’s a pretty small grouping to deal with a villain as dangerous as Kang, with Moon Dragon not even an official Avenger. And yes Immortus joined them and took them to the past but in the end did not do much else to help them. It’s also interesting that Englehart was planting little seeds to make us realize that Moon Dragon was not really suitable for the Avengers no matter how powerful she was.
It was indicated that there were some general plans for 142-143 to be GSA 6 but that never really came close to happening. It was different for 145-146 which was intended to be GSA 5 and had to split into two issues. Similarly with the FF, FF 158-159 were intended to be GSFF 5 and FF 164-165 were intended to be GSFF 6 and both stories were split into two issues.
Apparently Marv (or whoever was in charge of covers) made the same mistake on another cover (perhaps 147) and still referred to “The Squadron Sinister” instead of the Squadron Supreme. Oh well, it is a good name.
In addition to this month being the 50th anniversary of George Perez’s debut on the Avengers, it is also the 45th anniversary of the debut of the New Teen Titans by Marv Wolfman and George Perez. And it is the 45th anniversary of, to a very limited extent, of my slow return to DC comics. I was such a fan of Mr. Perez by this time that I very gladly picked up a copy of New Teen Titans 1 (I had not read a Teen Titans book since 1971), as well as JLA 184, with Perez and Darkseid (I had left JLA behind in 1973).
I guess it’s also worth mentioning that this month is the 40th anniversary of the death of the Flash in Crisis on Infinite Earths 8 and last month was the 40th anniversary of the death of Supergirl. But of course both of those characters are back so maybe I shouldn’t’ve mentioned it..but I couldn’t resist.
Thanks for another great review Alan!
Alan, I’ve been waiting enthusiastically for your review on Avengers # 141 for a number of reasons. My JLA subscription had run out with issue # 123, and instead of renewing it I had opted for a year’s worth of the Brave and the Bold (little knowing I made such a wise choice given the next year’s worth of mediocre JLA stories to come). So around the same time, I was intrigued to encounter a special subscription that Marvel ran that would involve about ten issues of different comic books that would come out in a single month, and I happily cut up one of my precious comics to send in my money, wondering excitedly which titles I would get. By the time August rolled around, I received Cap # 189, Spidey # 149, Marvel Premiere # 26 (with Hercules), Defender # 29, Jungle Action # 18, Captain Marvel # 41, FF # 164, Iron Man # 80, Marvel Team-Up # 39 and Avengers # 141. I’d be curious to know if any of the rest of you remember this subscription and the way it was formatted.
Another iconic Gil Kane cover, kind of another super-team clash in the vein of JLA # 56 and JLA # 108, and in a way a nice bookend to Gil’s cover of Defenders # 13 with the Squadron Sinister proper. The palette of colors was pretty awesome for this 9-year-old; I know I definitely would have bought this right off the old spinner rack if not for my subscription copy.
I wasn’t as well-versed as you more mature readers in analyses of the pencillers and inkers, but I definitely knew what I didn’t like. I definitely did not like the George Tuska/Vinnie Colletta pairing in Avengers # 135 and 139, so I found the art in 141 to be way better. The name George Perez was unknown to me, but I also got FF # 164 and liked his work there (hoping you review that one, Alan).
I’ve always been curious about Jan and Hank’s recollection of meeting Patsy Walker at Reed and Sue’s wedding. While there was indeed a panel showing Patsy in FF Annual # 3, I seem to remember that Giant-Man and the Wasp were conspicuously absent, as this fell during their hiatus between Avengers # 16 and 26. Of course I loved all of the characters in this issue, between the Avengers proper, their new affiliates Beast, Moondragon and Patsy, the Squadron Supreme, as well as Immortus and Kang.
Lastly, I recently attended the Terrificon at the Mohegan Sun Casino in Montville, CT, and was pleased to see many artists and writers in the panels and behind long lines in the main convention room. So I could hardly believe it when I came across a fellow sitting alone at an empty booth, and it turned out to be Steve Englehart himself. I lost total track of time while I spoke with him about his runs on the Avengers, Captain America, the Defenders, JLA and the West Coast Avengers. I had always assumed that Wonder Man’s return at the end of Avengers # 151 was written by Gerry Conway since he wrote the next four issues revolving around Simon’s resurrection, but Steve told me that it was his idea. I totally forgot that this blog about 141 was right around the corner, or I would have asked him questions specifically about the whole Squadron Supreme storyline. Oh well, maybe next summer I’ll be able to chat with him about more detailed reminiscences from his JLA run ahead of your blogs covering those fabulous issues.
I’m afraid I won’t be blogging about FF #164, Jay, but I’m sure a Pérez FF will be showing up here eventually.
And how cool is it that you got to chat with Steve Englehart one-on-one for an extended period? I’m envious!
I Find it hard to believe from this example that George Perez would go on to become the artist most associated with Avenger greatness (he did, and I’m the first to admit it, but Big John B was always my favourite Avengers artist).
The art is original and imaginative, but it does look like there is definite room for improvement: I’m glad that as Rich Buckler’s former assistant (and reference-sourcer, by his own admission) Perez wasn’t tempted to rework/reimagine old issues and tried something new, but some of this shows signs of not quite ready for prime-time. Vince Colletta, as usual, did nothing to help and there were any number of inkers, even in the near future, who highlighted Perez’s art to better effect.
Englehart’s story doesn’t impress as much as it did at the time, but I’m finding that with a lot of his work nowadays.
Maybe I’ll comment more when I get time. Currently in Spain, visiting my future in-laws, so I can’t post as long as I might like to.
Just sidebar curiosity here, Alan, and you might have mentioned this before, but I was wondering if you get the on-sale dates of the comics you review from the GCD, or diary entries, or just an approximate 3 months ahead of cover date calculation.
My primary source is Mike’s Amazing World of Comics, which in turn uses sources like Library of Congress copyright records and old issues of The Comics Reader for its data. I sometimes turn to the GCD as a backup — usually when something looks a little off in Mike’s info (e.g., three months between release dates of a bimonthly comic).
I read this storyline in the Avengers: The Serpent Crown collection that Marvel published in 2005. I agree that early George Perez, even with him paired with inkers such as Vince Colletta, Sam Grainger & Mike Esposito who were not especially well-suited to him (at least in my opinion), still showed a great deal of promise & energy.
As to the Vision/YJ story, I sense both Englehart and Gerber were trying to up date Hank Pym into a viable (and powerful) second tier character in 1975.
However, Jim Shooter’s story (probably accidentally) about 6years later damaged that permanently. Since both Englehart and Gerber were on their way out, there was no one to advocate for this formerly “plank-holding” character during this 6 years.
In his West Coast Avengers stories, Englehart tried to make the character over into “Hank Pym, Scientific Adventurer” (but readers still saw him as “Hank Pym, Spouse Abuser.”
I thought the first few George Perez jobs were “a Rich Buckler tribute Band” but he came a long way in a short time.
He might have been the most influential artist if the 2980s and 1990s.
Shooter did a much better job turning Hank into a villain in 161-2. As Jan explains it, his money-making projects have flopped, he’s under financial stress, resents her for having money, all of which made him susceptible to Ultron brainwashing him. Ultron erases his memory post Ant-Man so he can’t recognize most of the Avengers (Vision, Scarlet Witch, some guy who got Iron Man’s armor wrong, some fake Captain America) and attacks them to save Jan (part of Ultron’s plan to create Jocasta). It ends with Hank still insane and vowing revenge.
It didn’t quite work (sorry, Ant-Man ain’t tough enough to flatten the entire team) but it was way more plausible than Shooter’s more infamous handling of Hank a few years later. Apparently someone higher up hated it because it was never mentioned again — next time we saw Hank he was normal, no explanation ever offered IIRC.
In the early 1980s George Perez on DC’s Teen Titans and John Byrne on Marvel’s X-Men were the highest paid artists in US comics, earning several hundred thousand dollars per year, due to royalties. I’m not a fan of their art, but their success in the comics industry was quite remarkable.
Hi, Alan,
“the last major story arc of one of the series’ defining writers, Steve Englehart ”
Sigh – you WOULD have to start with that, wouldn’t you?
Anyway, thanks for doing the rapid wrap-up on issues #138-140, which had their moments, even if they weren’t peak stuff. I remember thinking that the Vision going into Hank’s body (echoing the classing AVENGERS #93) could have a terrific sequence if not for two things: the shorter page count and the fact that George Tuska-Vince Coletta are – to put it politely – not Neal Adams-Tom Palmer. I always thought how fortuitous it was that issue #93 should be the extra-long issue, given that it allowed Adams to just KILL the “Journey to the Center of the Android” sequence.
But the deep dive into #141 gave me a chance to revisit several of the reasons why Englehart’s run on this title so delighted me – and still holds up, at least to me. I’m glad you pointed out the Tweety/Krazy Kat references early on. I always felt that Englehart brought the Beast into this title because he missed writing dialogue like that, and because the Beast’s allusive sense of humor (dubbed “intellectual irreverence” in a letter column in AMAZING ADVENTURES) added a different texture to the team.
Also, throughout there were littles touches in the dialogue and in the captions that made me appreciate Englehart as a scripter. There were the grace notes that you would find in an Englehart script that you wouldn’t find in most other writers. The deadpan humor of the Vision’s “Again? This is getting monotonous.” Iron Man’s polite “Miss, we already knew that” reply to Patsy’s “revelation.” The use of “recital” in reference to Lady Lark’s knockout “song” at the end. About the only false note, really, was the horrific Cockney accent used for Golden Archer. Was Englehart hijacked by Dick Van Dyke for those pages???
As for George Perez, there’s nothing I can add that other people haven’t already said here. But I can’t help but note just HOW MUCH story was packed into this issue. And even at the beginning of his time on the book, Perez showed an understanding of the distinctive character work AND storytelling chopes that you need in a team book. It makes me even sadder that the Englehart-Perez team never really had the chance to mature beyond this one extended arc.
So thanks for this one, Alan. I’m looking forward to revisit subsequent issues in this story – which would eventually include one of my all-time favorite puns! (Any guesses?)
I’m afraid I’m blanking at the moment, Bill, but maybe it’ll come to me later! 🙂
“I can’t help but note just HOW MUCH story was packed into this issue.” I miss the eras when comics gave us packed stories.
50 years ago I received the amazing COMIX comic history book by Les Daniel, which contained so many amazing examples of US comic books. Amongst these was a Lev Gleason Crime Does Not Pay strip by George Tuska ( Baby face Nelson vs USA), which is gorgeous. Tuska also did a really fabulous turn on Avengers #48 ( cover and art). His Iron Man was very dynamic. Some of his issues, particularly around the death of Janice Cord, are very dramatic. Even so, I preferred Johnny Craig’s version, but his Iron Man was too ‘quiet’ for Stan.
Re Perez: I had seen his art in Creatures on the Loose #36, and was already a fan. For the rest of the decade, I would buy anything with art by Perez and Byrne ( who I first saw in FOOM, then on Iron Fist then on Star Lord). Happy days.
To think…Perez was 21….so young but already so proficient. Either Marvel must have been very sure of him….or desperate! And this was a time when some old pros could not get much work from Marvel….for example Dick Ayers, and before him Syd Shores and Werner Roth. For them sad days unfortunately.