What If... Essential Invaders volume 1?

Starting my brief tour of hypothetical Essential volumes this one is fairly easy to envisage. It's the same contents as Invaders Classic: The Complete Collection volume 1

Essential Invaders volume 1 would contain Giant-Size Invaders #1 which launched the team then Invaders #1 to #22 & Annual #1 plus Marvel Premiere #29 to #30 which crossover to introduce the Liberty Legion and, as a bonus, Avengers #71 with a prototype of the idea and an unusual crossover. As a bonus, we can throw in a number of letterspages that contain essays by Roy Thomas on the characters, the inspiration and some of the artists. These issues also make up the contents of Invaders Classic volumes 1 & 2 bar #22, which is in volume 3 (a minor reshuffling to add an extra issue to Complete Collection volume 2). Everything is written by Roy Thomas with Ed Summer providing plot assistance on one issue. The Giant-Size is drawn by Frank Robbins who becomes the main artist on the regular series with individual issues drawn by Rich Buckler and Jim Mooney. One issue reprints an old story from Captain America Comics #22 drawn by Al Avison (no writer is credited) with a new framing sequence added. Two other issues reprint old Sub-Mariner stories from Marvel (Mystery) Comics #1 and #10 by Bill Everett. The annual unites Robbins with Alex Schomburg, Don Rico and Lee Elias. The Marvel Premiere issues are drawn by Don Heck and the Avengers issue is drawn by Sal Buscema. Due to the large number of credits the labels for the reprints are in a separate post.

(In the digital edition at least, Invaders Classic: The Complete Collection volume 1 places all the non-regular issues at the rear despite the Marvel Premiere issues incorporating a crossover and the annual explicitly saying it's set between issues #15 and #16. As part of the What If?ery we can correct that.)

Even without knowledge of Roy Thomas's long championship of the Golden Age heroes it's clear that this was a very special and personal project for him. The series goes monthly with only its second issue, but drops back to bimonthly after the following issue only to go back to monthly publication again with issue #8. A spin-off series was conceived even before the original had launched and was given a crossover with a try-out title to set it up (and given a further boost in the Marvel Two-in-One annual for that year) though it didn't take off. Such a commitment to a series not set in the present day and starring characters whose fates were already set is extraordinary. But this series was riding a wider trend of Second World War nostalgia, which at this time produced a lot of fiction set then such as the first season of the Wonder Woman television series. It also saw old Marvel characters revived but everything was not quite as it came before.

There is a longstanding belief that Marvel has always maintained a single continuity and never turned whole characters, series or runs into alternate universes or made into fiction within fiction or just abandoned them altogether, in contrast to DC. That's only really true if all you read are superhero comics from 1961 onwards. Continuity was much laxer in other corners of Marvel's output, whether that was the original Two-Gun Kid being turned into a fiction the second one read about or the multiple & contradictory retellings of how Millie the Model's career started or the awkward relationship with chronology in many war comics. Or there were various superhero revivals that ignored what had come before, especially when it came to sidekicks or just how long the heroes had been out of action. The Marvel superhero output from 1961 onwards sought to present a coherent whole out of the new material (although it's had its share of continuity errors, retcons and "it was all a dream" moments over the years) but even it has been less than faithful to older and non-superhero material when incorporating the characters. And Invaders maintains this tradition, as explained in an essay by Roy Thomas on the letters page for the initial Giant-Size issue. The Golden Age comics are a source of inspiration and some individual stories will be referenced or reprinted but the overall continuity of the comics, such as it existed in the 1940s, is not going to be adhered to - indeed one issue shows Bucky and Toro devouring a collection of comics and commenting on how their published exploits don't reflect what they've been up to lately although this explanation has to be reinforced to explain how Captain America's secret origin came to be published. Other changes are more mixed - a retelling of Toro's origin generally seeks to add to what was shown in the 1940s but the Destroyer's identity and original published origin are dismissed as theories published in comics. More generally the series doesn't try to navigate periods when the individual heroes were shown based in other countries. Nor are costumes sacrosanct - Namor wears his modern swimming trunks rather than the simpler version he originally wore, which actually becomes a plot point later on, whilst the costumes of some of the Liberty Legion members have been modified from the original or assembled as a composite of various appearances. Overall this approach to continuity allows the new stories to move forward easily, taking the assumption that in the 1970s there would be very few readers who had read the original stories and would be put out by this revisionist approach. In an era of collected editions when some of the Golden Age series are now just as accessible as the Invaders themselves this may not be the best assumption but both sets of stories were written for their time and not since.

The biggest retcon of all is the existence of the team; back in the Golden Age the "Timely"/Marvel heroes didn't form a team until after the Second World War and the All-Winners Squad only managed a couple of (awkwardly numbered) issues. Since the All-Winners Squad had no official origin it wouldn't have stretched things too far to show them as having operated during the war itself but the name is rather lousy and a bolder incarnation was a better approach and doable with a looser regard for 1940s continuity. It also allows for a different approach to the members, keeping the Whizzer and Miss America in the States as part of the Lethal Legion and allowing the Invaders to organically grow additional members. But the core is always the "Big Three" heroes of Captain America, the Human Torch and the Sub-Mariner, together with the first two's sidekicks, Bucky and Toro.

These five are the logical starting point as "Timely"'s biggest heroes, with all three adults either revived in the present day or replaced by a newer incarnation. There are strong tensions amongst the group with Namor and the Torch traditional rivals, the Torch feeling somewhat inferior as an android compared to Captain America, Namor harbouring resenting of the surface world but agreeing to ally against the Axis powers and both Bucky and Toro being over-enthusiastic at times. But it's also clear that the five are all willing to work with and trust one another in the heat of danger, reinforcing the team. All of them get their chance to shine though Toro's biggest issue is mainly told in flashback whilst he's being rushed to hospital. The team noticeably lacks a woman at first, an especially surprising omission as women had been part of nearly all the Marvel teams going right back to Miss America in the All-Winners Squad, but this is soon corrected with the introduction of Spitfire, an original British hero who gains powers after a transfusion from the Torch. She also brings a degree of romantic tension with the Torch falling for her but she has eyes only for Captain America who is oblivious to all this. Also added to the team is the British hero Union Jack, initially a peer of the realm and veteran of the First World War but after he's crippled in battle he retires the identity and it's later picked up by another who has previously used the identity of the Destroyer.

But the heroes don't stop there with a second team created via a crossover with Marvel Premiere. The Liberty Legion is comprised of seven lesser known heroes from the Golden Age, assembled when Bucky is the sole Invader to evade capture by the Red Skull. Sending out a radio broadcast he brings together the Patriot, the Whizzer, Miss America, the Red Raven, Jack Frost, the Thin Man and the Blue Diamond. Being more obscure heroes there's greater scope to modify their appearances a little, as detailed in a text piece at the end of the second Marvel Premiere issue. They demonstrate promise in holding their own against the mind controlled Invaders and the Red Skull and are assigned the task of battling enemy agents operating in the United States itself. However the market probably wasn't ready for endless retroactive Second World War adventures and so it's not surprising that they didn't take off in their own title.

As well as the Liberty Legion there's a third team introduced in these pages albeit with inspiration from elsewhere. The Crusaders are a group of six heroes who are based on the Freedom Fighters from DC/Quality Comics. This was part of an unofficial joint homage with the Freedom Fighters around this time also encountering a group called the Crusaders, who were thinly disguised versions of the Invaders. Unlike the earlier Squadron Supreme/Champions of Angor, not as much has been done since with either version as a whole though here one member, Dyna-Mite (based on Doll Man), is used to good effect in the following story. The others are more generic, being given their powers and equipment on a one-off basis by a Nazi agent. The Spirit of '76 is an America hero based on Uncle Sam but the others are all British including Captain Wings (Black Condor), Ghost Girl (Phantom Lady), Thunder Fist (Human Bomb) and Tommy Lighting (the Ray). They serve their purpose but don't make too much of a mark. The only other hero introduced at this stage is the Golem, here incarnated around a Polish Jew trying to survive in Warsaw.

The original tales show a strong degree of research with Frank Robbins proving especially knowledgeable about fighter aircraft and his art has a suitable retro style that captures the slightly awkward feel of the era. The writing is also strong on the big picture, with some missions even tying into real history such as Winston Churchill's early 1942 visit to Canada and the United States. But the devil is in the detail. The portrayal of the UK at war does its best but at times it does slip into clichés with a few too many characters talking in either Cockney or an exaggerated upper class dialect that nobody actually speaks and the attempts to have the Crusaders speaking a range of dialects from across society is an admirable aim but not really achieved. And whilst Americans coming to the UK during the war understandably had more important things to learn than the finer details of aristocratic titles or how to address & refer to the Prime Minister, British characters have no such excuses and it's a surprise to see things like Union Jack saying "Mr Prime Minister" or the Falsworths and their butler's sloppy use of titles. There are other odd moments such as Ghost Girl using the metric system in 1942 (the UK didn't move to adopt it for another generation) though significantly Spitfire doesn't. And George VI wears a rather flamboyant uniform to launch a ship, rather than the more standard naval uniform he often appeared in during the war. Also there's the impression that Thomas isn't too clear about what the Home Guard's actual function was, although in fairness the Home Guard largely carved out its role and forced it upon officialdom.

The series takes the heroes back and forth across the Atlantic and English Channel, fighting a range of Nazi foes and even taking the fight to Hitler's doorstep. There's a partial attempt to build up counterparts, starting with Master Man, a Nazi equivalent of Captain America with less skill and charisma. Namor is countered by U-Man, a renegade Atlantean, whilst Spitfire's counter comes in the form of Warrior Women, a German agent who gains size and strength by accident and whose costume and whip are a Comics Codes Authority compliant version of bondage fetishism - it's amazing how much Marvel got away with her look. There's also the usual assortment of mad scientists like Brain Drain, whose life has been preserved in a mechanical body, or the Blue Bullet, a scientist in a hulking armoured form, or Colonel Dietrich, who shrank Dyna-Mite down, and officers like Colonel Krieghund or Colonel Eisen aka "The Face" after being caught in an explosion. Teutonic mythology supplies the identities for four aliens, Donar, Froh, Loga and Brünnhilde, who get used by Brain Drain as unwilling agents. Much more willing a monster is Baron Blood, a vampire who has had special surgery to partially overcome some of the traditional weaknesses. And there are the biggest Nazi villains of all, the Red Skull and Adolf Hitler. Each seems to be on a private mission to chew as much scenery as possible with Hitler portrayed as a cowardly monster. On top of all this are various enemy agents such as Agent Axis and old foes like the Hyena, the Shark and the Asbestos Lady. The series doesn't pull its punches with a number of important villains and number of lesser troopers killed along the way.

The annual feels very awkward and artificially constructed. As explained in a text feature at the end, it serves two main purposes. One is a pure exercise in nostalgia as three Golden Age artists - Alex Schomburg, Don Rico and Lee Elias - return to characters they drew decades earlier by providing the solo chapters for a traditional format story that separates the main heroes before reuniting them at the end. The other is to jump through a number of hoops to explain the presence and appearance of Cap, Namor and the Torch in Avengers #71 when three of that team, the Vision, Black Panther and Yellowjacket, were transported to Paris 1941 as part of the Grandmaster's tournament with Kang the Conqueror. Although the name "Invaders" was not used, the three 1940s heroes shouted "Okay, Axis, here we come!" and two had been differentiated from their modern appearances by featuring Captain America's original shield, even though he only used it in one issue, and Namor's 1940s swimming trunks. (Such an approach of digging out early differences and using them for longer than they had originally appeared had been standard practice over at DC with the Earth 2 Justice Society of America characters.) Plus this appearance was set before the formation of the Invaders. Now we get a complicated tale of two old and obscure Golden Age villains, the Hyena and the Shark, plus new creation Agent Axis, a strange being who is the lightning induced fusion of German, Italian and Japanese spies, being sent to obtain a sample of the Torch's blood, Cap's shield and Namor's swimming trunks to help the German war effort. This results in Cap and Namor's appearances changing just before all three get taken out of time (the other Invaders are on missions elsewhere) to take part in the Avengers issue and we get the battle from the Invaders' perspective. It's an awkward hybrid of Golden Age nostalgia and strained Bronze Age retroactive continuity and the result as a whole is less than satisfactory.

The reprints are a curious mix. Issue #10 comes as the Invaders rush Lord Falsworth and Jacqueline to hospital and during the flight Captain America thinks about the shadow of the Grim Reaper, causing him to reminisce about an adventure that will have a "basically true" account printed. Cue the reprint of "Captain America battles the Reaper! (The man the law couldn't touch!)" in which he battles a villain called the Reaper who carries a scythe but otherwise there's no death imagery and instead it's a tale of a Nazi agent who rabble rouses people against authority. The moral of the story that we should trust our leaders and not listen to trouble making rabble rousers is one that just hasn't aged well at all and would have been especially hollow in the post-Watergate States. Later on we get reprints of two old Sub-Mariner stories, including his very first appearance (with the eight page version) with both stories helping to explain why he has grievances against the surface world, though it's a little disquieting to see Namor and others of his race (here they are all called "Sub-Mariners") talk of war against the "white men" as though he's an aquatic noble savage.

Is Invaders a title that would have been worth an Essential volume? In principle yes, although the existence of the Classic tradepaperbacks may have led to market saturation though the Complete Collection is practically the colour version of an Essential volume. Overall this is a series with a strong sense of adventure and a determination to not merely weave around the "Timely" Golden Age tales but to take the elements and come up with something strong and lasting. The decision to overwrite the original 1940s continuity, such as it ever actually existed, may not be to everyone's taste but it's generally done to allow greater flexibility in pulling the various teams together, although the decision to rewrite the Destroyer's origin, identity and background and then to merge the character into a new incarnation of another hero feels rather wasteful. But beyond that this is a series that brings to life the writer's passion for the heroes of the 1940s and finds good things to do with them, developing the mythology well beyond what had been there before.

Essential Iron Man volume 1

Monday sees the release of Iron Man 3 on DVD and Blu-ray. So it's a good time to take a look at his earliest adventures.

Essential Iron Man volume 1 contains the Iron Man strips from Tales of Suspense (another anthology series that later also featured Captain America) #39-72. All but one of the issues are at least plotted by Stan Lee who scripts most of them, with the debut issue scripted by Larry Lieber followed by seven scripted by "R. Burns" (Robert Bernstein) and a couple later on by "N. Korok" (Don Rico). Issue #68 is the Lee-less exception, written by Al Hartley. Most of the art is by Don Heck with three issues by Jack Kirby and two others by Steve Ditko. A bonus feature at the end highlights a couple of earlier versions of covers that were either used on different issues from the ones they seem to have been commissioned for or else which saw the villain's name changed, probably to comply with the Comics Code Authority.

Of all the main early Silver Age Marvel characters, Iron Man has long been one of my least favourites. I only seemed to pick up his series because of various crossovers and the "family" grouping of various titles and it often failed to inspire me. He was also absent from the main Avengers for some years when I started reading it. Perhaps it's because without the tragedy of Tony Stark's heart being kept going by a chestplate - and in those years he'd solved it with a transplant - and with his drinking problems largely conquered, what was left was a successful playboy businessman who had it all but suffered an obnoxious attitude. Now that may be a caricature but we are talking about the era of Force Works and the Crossing (I must have been one of the few readers of that latter saga whose biggest gripe was that Iron Man felt like an intruder on the current Avengers). However there must have been something that made the character popular in the first place and this volume was a revelation in showing what that was.

Who created Iron Man? It seems to be another case of multiple parties involved in coming up with the first issue and cover and most of them having bad memories. Jack Kirby drew the first cover and designed the armour; this seems to have predated the drawing of the actual strip which was entirely by Don Heck. Stan Lee came up with the plot but deadlines prevented him from scripting the issue. But all of that doesn't state for sure where the basic idea came from out of whatever conversations between whichever combination of Heck, Kirby or Lee. However Lee and Heck are the main forces on these early adventures, a rare series from the time without much involvement by Kirby or Steve Ditko. It's common to talk of Kirby and Lee as the Lennon and McCartney of Marvel comics. Does that make Ditko the George Harrison? Martin Goodman the Brian Epstein? (After all both Goodman and Epstein negotiated some terrible deals that paid the artists little.) And if such comparisons hold up, does this make Don Heck the Ringo Starr? Heck's artwork is often overlooked but he brings a clear distinctive style that manages to simultaneously show Iron Man's armour as big and tough but also dynamic enough to move and fight as needs be.

Has any Marvel Silver Age origin dated more than Iron Man's? It's relatively easy to fudge a minor detail in some of the others - the Fantastic Four could have any particular goal in space or the Hulk could be the product of weapons testing for any purpose (although replacing Communist agents with Skrull agents is perhaps not the best solution to one aspect) - whilst others are even more timeless - an arrogant surgeon trying to heal his hands by any means possible or a doctor discovering aliens and a magic weapon whilst on holiday just don't date at all. But Iron Man is different. It's hard to fudge away the jungle war Tony Stark is producing weapons for, or transform the Vietnamese guerrilla leader Wong-Chu into a non-Cold War figure. Later retellings have done what they can, but reading the original story it's much harder to filter out the dated elements. The story itself is straightforward though I do wonder why the North Vietnamese aren't monitoring Tony and Professor Yinsen more closely. It also shows a ruthless side to Iron Man that would be later toned down (give or take certain stories such as the Crossing) when he uses his oil and fire tools to ignite an explosives store and kill Wong-Chu. Now yes there is an armed conflict going on - I'm hesitant to use the term "war" for the United States's role during this period in Vietnam (early 1963) - but here we see the approach of a de facto soldier rather than the more traditional morality of a hero aided by a writer who usually finds some accident to permanently end such a foe.

However Iron Man's portrayal and personality is much more sympathetic than I was expecting. Tony Stark's life shown here focuses very much on his business and scientific concerns, with the playboy element rather sidelined, and the character is much more likable as a result. He may have his moments where he can appear dismissive or cruel to others, but we're never left in any doubt that this is because of his dedication to doing right as Iron Man and preserving his identity. But I do have to wonder if Stan Lee grew up being cruel to women as his well-meaning way of putting them off, as this is yet another series where the hero tries to discourage a woman's interest in him by pretending to be a nasty piece of works. It is repeatedly emphasised that Tony is trapped by the damage to his heart and reliant on his chest plate which could give out at any moment. When the strip began, the world's first heart transplant operation was over four years away and pacemaker technology was in its early stages. So it was credible that Tony had no real option but to rely on his chestplate to support his damaged heart (ignoring the science fiction and magic that meant the Marvel universe contains many healers who could have fixed it, though none appear here). Though the adventures were published in a time when comics were more chaste than now, the problem facing Tony if he ever wants to be intimate with somebody are all too clear.

After the first several issues feature no real supporting cast at all, issue #45 introduces the first two other significant cast members in the series - "Happy" Hogan and "Pepper" Potts. Happy Hogan is an ex-boxer who saves Tony's life when a racing car crashes, and is given a job as Tony's chauffeur. He rapidly proves quite loyal to Tony and is drawn to Pepper, but at first she has eyes elsewhere. Pepper Potts is another example of the working woman who falls for a man in her office, but is frankly rather cliched. In her first appearance on her first page she tells Happy of her attraction to Tony even though he doesn't know it "but some-day he will ... and then he'll give up all his actresses and debutantes... and I'll become Mrs. Anthony Stark!" By today's standards it's not exactly the best ambition to give the leading female character. It gets silly in one issue when she lies to Tony's date for the evening and pretends he's stood her up, in the hope he will take out Pepper instead. (He doesn't - he instead gives the tickets to Happy to take her.) Issue #50 sees her get a makeover in the hope of getting Tony to notice her. Is the message that a woman is only worth her looks? Pepper is freckled, a trait I share, yet her makeover includes covering them up. Again this is not the best message to send. We get a romance triangle between the three, a not uncommon arrangement, but on this occasion the hero feels he cannot have the woman and does what he can to push her Happy's way, even though it hurts him when he realises how much Happy means to Pepper. The volume ends with the situation reaching a climax when Happy, who has deduced Iron Man's identity, is nearly killed getting a vital weapon to him. Tony's absence and seeming disinterest upset Pepper and it seems she will finally choose Happy. The other main supporting cast member is Senator Byrd, presumably no relation to any real life Senators with that surname. A strong critic of Stark, he feels a playboy is unsuited for essential defence contracts and assumes the sabotage at the plants is the work of Stark himself, who may be a communist spy. A more minor character introduced at the end of the volume is Stephanie, the Countess De La Spiroza, one of Tony's many old flames who is angry at being stood up.

The early issues contain some surprising contradictions from other Marvel titles of the time. We get a character called Dr Strange - but he's a villain and no relation. We discover that Atlantis had sunk into the seabed and become an underground kingdom - rather than existing on the seabed as in the Fantastic Four stories. Maybe Robert Bernstein was Marvel's answer to Bob Haney, never letting continuity get in the way of a good story. Or maybe the concept of the Marvel Universe as an integrated whole didn't come together until a little later, and we're seeing the older pattern, more often associated with DC, of each individual series developing its own continuity and mythology without due regard for the rest of the line. Stan Lee's prolific scripting would have served to limit many of the differences (although he wasn't above forgetting individual points), but other scripters may have not felt bound to match series they weren't writing. The first sign of the wider Marvel Universe comes in issue #49, after Lee has taken over the full scripting, when we get a fight between Iron Man and the Angel of the X-Men with the rest of the team appearing. This is also the fist issue to reference Iron Man's membership of the Avengers. The first villains from another series to appear are the Chameleon and Kraven in the Hunter (both from the Amazing Spider-Man) in issue #58, followed by the Black Knight (from the Giant-Man strip in Tales to Astonish and also the Avengers), Attuma (from the Fantastic Four but also appearing in a number of other titles by now), Count Nefaria (from the Avengers) and the Mad Thinker (from the Fantastic Four).

But the series also debuts many new villains, though quite a few of them have been largely forgotten. Wong-Chu is generally only recalled for his role in the origin and others include Gargantus, the aforementioned Dr Strange, the Red Barbarian, the Actor, Kala Queen of the Netherworld (well actually an underworld), King Hatap the Mad Pharaoh, Mr Doll, the Phantom and Weasel Wills. But there's also the debut of several of Iron Man's better known foes including Jack Frost (although he would later adopt a different codename), the Crimson Dynamo (no less than two incarnations appear here), the Melter, the Mandarin, the Scarecrow, the Unicorn, Morgan Stark and the Titanium Man. We also get the first appearances of two villains who would soon switch sides. The Black Widow starts off as a femme fatale using her wits and looks to secure her objectives rather than an Emma Peel type female action agent, though after a year's worth of issues she undergoes intense training and becomes much closer to her more familiar modus operandi. Meanwhile Hawkeye begins life as an entertainer who is inspired to put his skills to other uses by seeing Iron Man, an origin detail shared with the Scarecrow, but on his first attempt to foil a crime he is mistake for an accomplice by the police and flees, then gets recruited as an ally by the Black Widow.

Amongst these foes there are a number of stock types seen in many other early Silver Age Marvel stories. Gargantus is a robot used by this series's set of aliens seeking to conquer Earth, and as with so many of their counterparts they decide again after assuming the hero they encounter is a typical example of the planet's inhabitants. The Actor is a master of disguise who can fool anybody, although he has more developed powers than the Chameleon did at the time. Kala is the ruler of a civilisation beneath the Earth's surface. Meanwhile the Mandarin conforms to a stereotype from broader fiction - the tall, specially skilled, evil Oriental criminal mastermind - at one point Iron Man even calls him an "imitation Fu Manchu". And he's not the first Marvel supervillain in this mould though I doubt many of the original audience could remember the Yellow Claw who had a very briefly lived series some seven years earlier. Another influence may be the Bond villain Dr No - both he and the Mandarin have half-Chinese, half-European parentage and, in the Bond novel at least, were raised by aunts. And, this time as in the film, the Mandarin is explicitly stated to be an independent operative with little care for the political conflict around him (though he's not adverse to working for hire for the Chinese Communists) so he has the potential to outlast the Cold War. There are indications that the Mandarin will become Iron Man's archenemy but at this stage he has to outlast a surprising competitor.

The origin story may have dated badly but so too has another aspect of this story. There is a lot of anti-Communism, on a scale far greater than just about any other Marvel series. Both the Soviet Union and China are behind a number of villains and there are many attempts made to neutralise either Tony and/or Iron Man. Maybe it was natural that a hero who is a successful businessman and weapons manufacturer would be the automatic counterpoint, but there's very little actual explanation as to what Communism actually is beyond a banner unifying the Soviets and Chinese. Occasionally the words "freedom" and "democracies" are used to describe the West but otherwise the Communists could frankly be just about any state declared the enemy of the day. Khruschev himself appears in the strip from time to time, although he's not explicitly named when appearing on panel but sometimes referred to or called "Comrade K" or "the 'Mr. Big' of the Iron Curtin". Was this a way of sidestepping legal action? Whatever the reason, the leading Communist is shown personally ordering actions against Stark and/or Iron Man, threatening the Black Widow's parents in order to bring her loyalties back in mind and worrying about any agents growing in popularity. Issue #64 demonstrates one danger of this approach as it appears to have been drawn before Khruschev's fall but was scripted afterwards and has to establish that the Black Widow was given her training and orders before the change in the Soviet leadership. Wisely Brezhnev is never shown after this.

How come almost nobody figures out Iron Man's identity? It isn't until issue #56 that it's established he has the role of Tony Stark's bodyguard. Before then Iron Man is presented as a friend of Tony's but he shows up all too quickly whenever the factory is attacked. Iron Man is very free with first person pronouns when speaking about Tony's property, but nobody picks up on this. Happy eventually guesses why Iron Man and Tony are never seen at the same time, a coincidence that eludes everyone else, but is wounded before he can explain just how he spotted it.

Overall I was surprised at how enjoyable this series is. It may be heavily dated with all the Communists and references to Vietnam, and I'd be fascinated to see how latter day retcons and reimaginings have tackled that problem, but the central character is a much more sympathetic and likeable person than he's been portrayed at times in later years. Nor does he come across like a Batman clone - they may both be rich playboy businessmen but very different aspects are emphasised and so Iron Man feels like a legitimate alternate take on the archetype rather than a knock-off. Don Heck has been unfairly neglected but this volume shows how good his work was and together with the writing the series holds up quite well today.