Magneto

Avengers #105 (November, 1972)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

Writing about Avengers #100 back in March of this year, I referred to the four issues that immediately followed that milestone as a “victory lap” for Roy Thomas, whose nearly-six-year tenure as the title’s writer was about to come to an end.   In characterizing Avengers #101-104 in such a fashion, I don’t mean to denigrate them; they’re not bad comics, by any means.  But coming directly upon the heels of the three-part “Olympus Trilogy” crafted by Thomas with Barry Windsor-Smith — and, right before that, the “Kree-Skrull War” epic by Thomas, Neal Adams, and Sal and John Buscema — these comics can’t help but seem somewhat anticlimactic by comparison.  I suppose there’s always been a part of me that kind of wishes that Thomas had just quit while he was ahead.  Read More

Avengers #95 (January, 1972)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

In October, 1971, Avengers #95 brought us what might be the most unusual installment yet in the ongoing epic of the Kree-Skrull War.  From one perspective, concerned primarily with the progress of the war and the Avengers’ role in it, it could quite reasonably be deemed the least consequential chapter in the entire saga.  From a different point of view, however — namely, that of the Inhumans — it might be the most significant of all.

That’s because Roy Thomas and Neal Adams took advantage of the opportunity Avengers offered not only to wrap up the story they’d begun telling in their most recent previous collaboration — the “Inhumans” strip in Amazing Adventures — but also to deepen the Inhumans’ mythos; especially that part of it wrapped up in the personal histories of the two royal brothers, Black Bolt and Maximus, whose animus had been the driver of most of the narratives Marvel Comics had produced concerning that hidden race ever since Stan Lee and Jack Kirby introduced them back in 1965. Read More

Fantastic Four #103 (October, 1970)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

As was discussed in last month’s post on Fantastic Four #102, that issue — featuring the final collaboration of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby on the title — also included a “Stan’s Soapbox” column informing Marvel Comics’ readers that Kirby was departing not just from FF, but from Marvel as a whole.  Though I didn’t mention this fact in the earlier post, the same Marvel Bullpen Bulletins text page that featured that announcement also included a relatively lengthy biography of John Romita — a creator who’d been a Marvel mainstay since 1966, and had been either the full penciller or the layout artist for Marvel’s other top title, Amazing Spider-Man, for most of that period.  By this time, then, he could hardly have been thought to be an unfamiliar figure to most regular Marvel readers; nevertheless, editor-in-chief Lee seemed to think it was a good idea to introduce (or re-introduce) Romita to the publisher’s True Believers in the wake of Kirby’s abrupt (and unexpected) exodus. Read More

Fantastic Four #102 (September, 1970)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

Jack Kirby was leaving Marvel for DC.

It was the comics industry story of 1970 — and if you were a hip, well-connected fan who subscribed to Don and Maggie Thompson’s newszine Newfangles, you learned about it not all that long after the industry pros did, in March:

If, on the other hand, you were just a run-of-the-mill, solitary comics-reading twelve-year-old like yours truly, you probably had no idea that this was happening until June, when you perused the Bullpen Bulletins page that ran in all Marvel’s comics cover-dated September, 1970 (including Fantastic Four #102), and read the stunning news in Stan Lee’s “Soapbox” column:  Read More

X-Men #60 (September, 1969)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

As regular readers of this blog may recall, I started picking up the Roy Thomas-Neal Adams-Tom Palmer run of X-Men with the second issue, #57, in which the book’s new creative team began their “Sentinels” storyline.  I managed to score the next issue as well, and so was on hand for the debut of Alex Summers’ costumed identity, Havok — but then, the following month, I missed issue #59,  and thus didn’t get to read the end of that storyline.  Read More

X-Men #58 (July, 1969)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

I feel pretty confident in making the statement that Neal Adams’ cover for X-Men #58, featuring the debut of Scott “Cyclops” Summers’ younger brother Alex in the costumed hero identity of Havok, is one of the most iconic of the late Silver Age at Marvel Comics.  But apparently, not everyone associated with that cover was, or is, completely happy with how it turned out — at least, not in the published version.

According to a 1999 article for the comics history magazine Alter Ego by the issue’s scripter (who was also Marvel’s associate editor at the time), Roy Thomas:

…Neal turned in a real beauty for X-Men #58, with a color-held overlay of Havok as the focal point.  Alas, Neal’s suggested color scheme wasn’t followed.  Instead of the blue that would have been the closest equivalent of the black in his costume inside, it was decided (by whom I dunno, but it wasn’t me, babe) that the Havok figure should be color-held in orange and yellow.  Bad idea.

Well, maybe.  I gotta say, though, that that orange-and-yellow has always worked for me. I mean, those colors really popped against the cover’s dark blue-gray background; and besides, blue ain’t black, after all.  Too bad we don’t have a “blue” version to compare the published version with… wait, what did you say?  We do, kind of?  Courtesy of the cover to the trade paperback edition of Marvel Masterworks – The X-Men, Vol. 6, featuring Adams’ art newly recolored by Richard Isanove?  Oh, okay then.  Read More

Silver Surfer #5 (April, 1969)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

My interest in Marvel Comics’ Silver Surfer series seems to have been somewhat sporadic in the first half-year or so of its original run.  As I’ve written in earlier posts, I bought the first issue in May, 1968, and though I liked that book a lot (at least, that’s how I remember things), I opted to pass on both the second and third issues (unless, of course, I never saw either of them on the stands, which is quite possible).  Issue #4, however, was most likely a no-brainer purchase decision for my eleven-year-old self, what with its absolutely iconic cover (by John and Sal Buscema) depicting the Surfer and the mighty Thor about to come to blows.  And considering how spectacularly that book delivered on its cover’s promise, my picking up the following issue when I saw it was probably a given, as well –even though its cover (by John Romita, according to the Grand Comics Database), while good, wasn’t quite in the same exalted class.  Read More

X-Men #45 (June, 1968)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

Last week I blogged about Avengers #53, a classic comic book featuring the titular super-team in battle with a second band of costumed heroes whom I hadn’t previously encountered as of April, 1968 — namely, the X-Men.  That issue was actually the concluding chapter of a story that was continued from X-Men #45, making it the first comics crossover I ever experienced*.  Unfortunately, I didn’t realize that the Avengers book was the second part of the crossover until after I’d already bought it and brought it home.  That didn’t stop me from going ahead and reading the book — but as soon as I got the chance, I headed back to the convenience store to see if I could score a copy of the first part.  Even though I already knew how the story ended, obviously, I still wanted to know how the heroes of both groups got themselves into the situation in which they found themselves at the beginning of Avengers #53 in the first place.  Read More

Avengers #53 (June, 1968)

Posted on by Alan Stewart

The first Marvel comic book I ever bought was Avengers #45, back in August, 1967, but even though I enjoyed that issue, I wouldn’t get around to trying another Avengers comic for another eight months.  By April, 1968, however, I’d begun buying both Amazing Spider-Man and Daredevil regularly, and I was ready to expand my Marvel-reading horizons a little further.  Avengers was already a known quantity, obviously, and issue #53 clearly had something else going for it, as well — the appearance of a whole other super-group, the X-Men.

I’m honestly not 100% certain that I even knew whether the X-Men were supposed to be heroes or villains at this point, though it seems likely I would have noticed their book on the stands at some point.  Assuming I did know that the X-Men were good guys, that would have been another strong selling point, as my younger self appears to have loved the idea of getting double the heroes (in this case, two hero teams) for the price of one — as attested to by the fact that in my first couple of years of comic book consumption, the only title I bought almost as regularly as Justice League of America was The Brave and the Bold, (which, of course, featured DC’s heroes teaming up with one another).  And the fact that the cover heralded a “vs.” situation wouldn’t have thrown me, either — even as a mostly-DC reader up to 1968, I knew that heroes fought each other sometimes.  After all, I was the proud owner of JLA #56, which featured what’s probably the first instance of the battle-lines-of-heroes-charging-each-other motif that informs Avengers #53’s cover (as it would many another cover through the years).  Read More