Essential Tomb of Dracula volume 4

Essential Tomb of Dracula volume 4 is a change from the norm, containing material in narrative rather than publication order from Tomb of Dracula Magazine #2 to #6, Dracula Lives! #1 to #13 and Frankenstein Monster #7 to #9. Bonus material includes some pin-ups from the magazines and also from a calendar, unused pencilled artwork from the multi-part story planned for Tomb of Dracula #70 to #72 before it was condensed into a single giant-size issue, and finally a couple of one-page stories. The Dracula stories are written by a wide range of writers including Marv Wolfman, Roger McKenzie, Peter Gillis, Gerry Conway, Doug Moench, Gardner Fox, Roy Thomas, Tony Isabella, Mike Friedrich, Jim Shooter, Steve Gerber, Len Wein and Rick Margopolous. The art is by Gene Colan, John Buscema, Neal Adams, Vicente Alcazar, Frank Robbins, Steve Gan, Sonny Trinidad, Yong Montano, Dick Ayers, Alan Weiss, Frank Springer, George Evans, Tony Dezuniga, Paul Gulacy, Rich Buckler, Jim Starlin, Alfonso Font, Mike Ploog, Frank Robbins, Alfredo Alcala, George Tuska, Val Mayerik and Ernie Chua. The Frankenstein Monster issues are all written by Mike Friedrich and drawn by John Buscema. With such a large number of creators there are not one but two separate labels posts.

One of the less often commented features about reprints is that they aren't always exactly the same as the original publication. Cutting pages or even individual panels to fit a smaller page count or different size format and modifying footnotes to reference other reprints are the best known but there's also a long history of amending dialogue and visuals to suit different sensibilities. Just to add to the confusion the state of the archives isn't always the best so the material available or ordered up is sometimes identical to the original printing, sometimes a modified version from a later reprint and occasionally an earlier prepublication one that was modified before it first went to the printers but with the unaltered version hanging around in the files. The Essentials have had a mixed record on source material over the years, with the earlier volumes often relying on other reprints whilst the later ones developed better techniques for going straight back to the source material. But even then some things were still changed. Usually these changes aren't too well documented but this volume, released almost at the mid point of the Essentials, has had some changes made to the artwork to cover up nudity, especially on the first story with Lilith.

Were this not known about it wouldn't affect readability at all - the changes focus on hiding nudity, mainly by extending existing clothing. (There are some comparisons between the original and modified panels at The Groovy Age of Horror: Censored Essentials? - be warned the nudity is clear.) Marvel of course has every legal right to do this (the US doesn't have the concept of creators' moral rights to object to tampering with the work) and whether this was the company's own decision or a response to the modern standards of distributors and booksellers is unknown, but the alternative may have been no reprint at all. But it's a pity that it was deemed necessary to make the modifications as it does ultimately mean this isn't quite an exact reprint (and that means even more when most of the material was in black and white to start with). And the market for reprints of old Dracula stories shouldn't have a problem with it. Certainly there's other material with pretty adult themes such as pirates attacking a village, including rape (the word is actually used) and their female captain is shown using sex to beguile and control her crew, with one crewmember shown being rewarded and later others promised "Hellyn's reward will be given to all who score with a thrust!" when facing Dracula. Yet despite this the story finds itself unable to say "bastard" and has to use the euphemism "fatherless dog".

As for what's actually been printed here, this is very much a mishmash collection of material. It starts off with a couple of tales from Tomb of Dracula Magazine, continuing where the last volume left off, before running through a whole set of historical adventures from the various magazines and another character's comic, then finishes off with the present day tales from Dracula Lives! magazine that ran parallel to the early issues of the Tomb of Dracula comic. The result of all this is that the volume jumps around. Reading between the lines it becomes clear that Marvel didn't really know what to do with the ongoing adventures of Dracula now that the 1970s horror fad had passed and Marv Wolfman had left the character (and was in the process of leaving the company altogether). Consequently it's unsurprising that the magazine ended after just six issues and there's nothing in the early stories that suggests any real direction with the most significant development being an ending of sorts as Lilith is separated from the body of Angel O'Hara and then finds she is unable to kill her father. The other early tale is a more typical piece of what is to come, with Dracula preying on an innocent woman, here a ballerina, and transforming her. She eventually commits suicide and is not the only female victim to do so in these pages.

The historic adventures of Dracula show no development at all, being just a succession of tales in different historic periods. Reordering them chronologically helps to disguise the lack of direction but it also exposes some inconsistencies in the basic vampire mythology, most notably as to whether a transformed victim needs to wait three nights or not before rising again, whether Dracula needs to spend the day in a coffin full of Transylvanian earth or not, and whether he needs to be invited in before he can enter a public dwelling. Each of these rules is both adhered to and broken throughout the course of these tales, with Dracula's precise vulnerability to crosses also fluctuating somewhat. This just reinforces the mess these tales are.

By and large the historic adventures either fill in the core history of Dracula, although the adaptation of the Bram Stoker novel is conspicuously absent, or else place the vampire in a particular period setting as he wanders across Europe and occasionally beyond, but always ultimately returning home. There's a variety of stock characters and situations including hordes of Turkish warriors, witches, pirates, court nobles, American Civil War soldiers, cowboys, gangsters and wartime Germans. And there are attempts to do more with the formula than simply preying on women and evading their menfolk. But something just doesn't feel right about these stories. Dracula is ultimately a late Victorian Gothic creation, even if he was named after a historical figure from the fifteenth century and has since had that historical character fused into the fictional one. Seeing him placed in other historical settings just doesn't feel right and few of the tales are able to really rise above the limitations. As a result the only historic stories of any real significance are the early ones which tell how Vlad the Impaler became a vampire in the first place and also how the centuries long war between Dracula and the Van Helsings began. There's also a particularly dark tale as Dracula encounters and brings down the notorious real life serial killer Countess Elizabeth Bathory, here depicted with all the gruesomeness of bathing in the blood of virgins to restore and maintain her youth. It's a particularly dark tale that shows Dracula up against a woman who is immune to his bite, forcing him to resort to more devious methods to bring her down, making for a good homage to what is believed to have been one of the influences upon Stoker. Otherwise these tales are really just back-up filler that don't work when collected together in their own right. Early on a text piece entitled "Bloodline: A Probable Outline Of The Career Of Count Vlad Dracula" summarises all the adventures and material from various flashbacks and that contains probably everything that could be needed to cover his historic career.

The three Frankenstein Monster issues are set in 1898 and appear to be Dracula's first appearance after the Stoker novel, which is given a very brief one page summary here. The issues show Frankenstein's monster on a search for the last of his creator's family and encountering a travelling gypsy circus on the way but one of the gypsies has ulterior motives. It leads to a rather dull conflict between two of the greatest horror creations who each deserved so much more. As is so often the case with these tales we get Dracula preying on innocent women in an isolated settlement and clashing with the local men, with some suspicious townsfolk thrown in who bring a gruesome fate to the gypsies. We also get what is becoming an increasingly routine occurrence whereby Dracula ends the story seemingly slain but his killer lacks either the knowledge or time to perform the necessary actions to destroy the corpse before the vampire can be brought back to life. Though we sometimes see Dracula resurrected, such as here when an old gypsy woman tricks the monster into unsealing a tomb, the succession of deaths and unexplained resurrections work to undermine the overall impact of the stories by disrupting the narrative flow and removing the impact of danger and destruction to Dracula.

The final part of the volume is only slightly more coherent, being taken up with the present day adventures from Dracula Lives! and so at least publication and chronological orders coincide. But apart from a vague narrative as Dracula comes to the States in an unsuccessful search for his old foe Cagliostro before heading back to Europe, this is much the same as before. Dracula wanders through a succession of scenarios, ranging from becoming addicted to drugs after biting a junkie to a battle with an eighteenth century man who has been transformed into a stone gargoyle that only comes to life at night. A visit to New Orleans sees the Zombie passing by but there's no interaction between the two horror characters and instead the focus is on an encounter with Marie Le Vau, the "Voodoo Queen of New Orleans". Elsewhere in Hollywood Dracula challenges a has-been actor who has been portraying him and suffering delusions that make him believe he is the actual vampire. Dracula's nastiest streak comes to the fore at times as he sets traps, especially when he bites a terrorist and sets him up to be exposed to sunlight without realising what will happen. A particularly favourite trick is to set a foe up by biting an expected acquaintance in advance who in turn becomes a vampire in time to attack. A number of women are drawn to Dracula over the course of these stories and he will sometimes be drawn to them in return but ultimately will never settle with any of them, leaving them lonely and, in one case, suicidal. The biggest addition to the mythology is the Montesi Formula, a spell that can destroy vampires permanently which leads Dracula to risk invading the Vatican in order to dispose of both Cardinal Montesi and the formula before it can be used permanently. Otherwise these tales are just more of the same.

This volume primarily serves as a companion piece to the three earlier ones, collecting together material from the supporting series and guest appearances that never fully fitted alongside the ongoing narrative in the monthly comic. And this patchwork shows even without being reordered into a chronological framework. There's no development or recurring cast beyond Dracula, whilst a lot of the situations bear a strong similarity to one another. All in all this volume is pretty inessential.

Essential Iron Man volume 5

Essential Iron Man volume 5 contains issues #62 to #75 & #77 to #87 plus annual #3. Bonus material includes the covers of the reprint issues #76, annuals #1 & #2 and Giant-Size Iron Man #1. Most of the writing is by Mike Friedrich with other issues by Bill Mantlo and Len Wein, with one plot by Barry Alfonso and a couple of scripts by Roger Slifer. The annual is written by Steve Gerber. The main artist is George Tuska with other contributions by P. Craig Russell, Arvell Jones, Keith Pollard, Chic Stone and Herb Trimpe with the annual drawn by Sal Buscema.

This volume sees a couple of changes to the costume, one of which is rather better known than the other, as well as the more general ongoing modifications to the weaponry to meet the latest threat. At one stage Tony replaces the collapsible set in his attaché case with a version that can become an ultra thin form worn beneath his clothing until a wrist gesture triggers it to expand out and cover the remaining portions of his body. There may be some attached technobabble but the whole process feels a little too close to a magic or fantastical costume better suited to less scientific heroes. The introduction of this mechanism is used as an opportunity to remove one of the more notorious changes made. This covers the entire period when Tony adds a nose to the helmet "to allow more expression to show". Although it does allow for the art to show more variety in the portrayal of his face, it does also look a bit silly and it's easy to see why it gets ditched as soon as a spurious explanation (that the new method of donning the costume requires the helmet to be symmetrical).

The major storyline in this volume is the "war of the super-villains" which runs from issue #68 until #81 in which the mysterious Black Llama manipulates a succession of super-villains into battling one another in order to obtain a special golden globe of power as the prize in their contest. The saga kicks off with a battle with Sunfire and the Mandarin, who now escapes the Unicorn's body, before the contest really gets going as the Mandarin battles the Yellow Claw in the first confrontation between Marvel's two biggest oriental masterminds with both deploying robots such as Ultimo. Other foes get drawn in as the saga continues, including Modok, the Mad Thinker, the Man-Bull, Melter and Whiplash but not all villains are attracted to an object that offers inner harmony as a precursor to success and we see a montage of big names like Doctor Doom, the Red Skull and Fu Manchu turn it down whilst others like Magneto are missing in action. There is also a trip to Vietnam as both Tony and Roxanne search for Eddie March's brother Marty, encountering both the Crimson Dynamo and a hidden civilisation. Eventually the final battle sees Iron Man overcome the Claw but then all to Firebrand, whom the Llama declares the victor and takes him to his own dimension with Iron Man in pursuit.

Issue #72 has an unusual setting as Tony finds himself with time to kill in San Diego and so opts to attend Comic-Con, using his own armour as a costume. It may be only 1974 but the fandom portrayed show all the familiar signs of people obsessing over first issues, arguing about who did what, arguing about the merits of certain costume changes, parading in fancy dress (the word "cosplay" wasn't in use back then) and generally having a good time with fellow fans. There are fans of other science fiction and fantasy present as well with some Star Trek fans petitioning for a revival. In addition, there are creators who are behind schedule (Roy Thomas, in his last issue credited as editor, is even handing over a pink slip to Mike Friedrich but saying it's just a formality) but still taking time to meet the fans. All in all it's a good affectionate portrayal of the early years of organised fandom. Amidst all this the clash at the convention with the Man-Bull, Melter and Whiplash, as part of the Black Llama's machinations, is very much of lesser interest.

Just as the war of the super-villains is approaching its ultimate climax, we get one of the worst cases of delays seen in any Marvel title of the era. In the space of four issues (#76 to #79) there are no less than three fill-ins, including a reprint and a flashback adventure that normally could be easily inserted into the ongoing sequence with minimal fuss but here it appears as Iron Man is travelling between dimensions and thus it's impossible to make it a sudden spurious flashback, particularly as it's already structured as a flashback to drive a decision in the present day. The tale sees Tony as both himself and Iron Man in Vietnam during the war, testing a satellite guided canon that inflicts devastation in a village in a clandestine operation that's in violation of international law. The result of the canon and the counter attack result in widespread devastation and very few survivors, leading Iron Man to blast "Why" atop a mass grave. It's a piece questioning the whole basis of the Vietnam War, albeit somewhat late in the day as it arrived on the newstands a couple of months after the Fall of Saigon that ended the war and a couple of years after the US had withdrawn its active troop presence. The other fill-in was more timely, being a classic house of horrors story as Tony rescues a couple whose car has broken down and they take refuge in a creepy isolated house occupied by strange beings including a scientist with a funny name who performs life changing experiments. This would have been on the shelves just as The Rocky Horror Picture Show was released though Doctor Kurakill isn't as memorable a character as Doctor Frank N. Furter. Still her henchman, Quasar the mutated ape, does feel like an appropriate homage to the ape obsession of the 1950s. But in general, even allowing for the fact that issue #76 is only represented by the cover and so not interrupting the flow in this edition, these issues show a massive letdown as the momentum on the main story slams to a halt. It should not be surprising that after all these fill-ins Friedrich writes only two further issues. The end of issue #81 may try to present it as a writer bowing out at the natural end of a good run, and I don't know how the contemporary letterspages presented it, but here it feels like a writer missing one deadline too many and consequently being deliberately let go of.

When the series eventually resumes the war of the super-villains story it takes a decidedly odd turn as the Black Llama, Firebrand and Iron Man arrive in a parallel universe in which the United States is covered by a patchwork of independent states and the Llama is the king of one of them. The Llama's actions are explained away as the consequence of madness brought about by a cosmic imbalance when people cross between dimensions and he's actually the rightful ruler who has returned just in time to face a revolt by his daughter & regent's main advisor and wife, who deploy a mechanical dragon. Although there's some good character work as Iron Man nearly succumbs to the madness of the cosmic imbalance, the whole thing is such a jarring contrast with the earlier issues that it feels like it was conceived for another series altogether. It's a very disappointing end to both a lengthy storyline and Friedrich's run, made worse by the extra delays and fill-ins.

There are other foes who show up over the course of the volume including an inconclusive battle with the villainous Doctor Spectrum, the Marvel homage of Green Lantern. Iron Man has at times been matched with Green Lantern in comparisons of Marvel's Avengers and DC's Justice League of America, but it's never been the easiest fit and feels more like a default of picking the most prominent male heroes after Captain America & Batman and Thor & Superman have been lined up. Consequently such a fight seems a mismatch and this one drags on over several issues, even dragging in Thor to battle Iron Man who's been possessed by the Power Prism that gives Spectrum his powers. The story also sees Tony's friend Eddie March don the armour only to be severely injured. His life is saved but at the cost of his ability to walk and in the process he's temporarily transformed into the monstrous Freak, a fate previously shared by Happy Hogan when undergoing special energy treatment.

One theme that pops up again and again throughout the volume are the different expectations of men and women in relationships. Happy Hogan takes some time to accept that Pepper is now a high flying corporate assistant and is not going to meekly head to the kitchen to play housewife; this causes some strain on their marriage and at one point Pepper turns to Tony. However the marriage is soon restored and they remain friends even after Happy impersonates Iron Man at a party and gets injured by being drawn into action when Tony is kidnapped. Whiplash also has expectations of his fiancée Vicki Snow who is the manager of a Stark Industries plant when the villain is working undercover as head of research. Tony's own attitude to Roxanne Gilbert is more respectful but her relationship with Tony is increasingly forgettable.

The last six issues see a quick succession of writers as the series tries to find its direction. There's a forgettable encounter with the Red Ghost and his super apes in which Happy is injured; the treatment sees him become the Freak once more but this is getting overused. An ongoing subplot involves police officer Michael O'Brien investigating the death of his brother Kevin back in issue #46, convinced that Tony has arranged a cover-up, but it's been so long since the death that it becomes hard to find the subplot that compelling. There's also a move to toughen up and make more serious one of Iron Man's earliest foes as Jack Frost returns but now using the name Blizzard.

The annual follows the formula of teaming up two heroes to fight a villain more usually associated with a third in a sequel to one of the last's stories. Here we get a meeting between Iron Man and the Man-Thing in the Florida swamps that follows up on an early Marvel Two-in-One story as the Molecule Man returns from the dead, along with further social commentary as the people of Citrusville react with suspicion and hostility as Stark International (renamed in the regular issues from Stark Industries in acknowledgement at diversification of holdings) sets about rebuilding Omegaville. However the latter thread doesn't really go anywhere and just feels like a jibe at small towns for the sake of it. The Molecule Man's resurrection may have seemed like exciting fantasy and psychological thriller in 1976, but today this tale of a grown man possessing the body of a nine year old girl feels extremely dodgey even though there's no overt hint of anything sexual in the situation. Beyond that the story suffers the problem that afflicts so many Man-Thing tales in that interaction between the monster and other characters is rather limited, resulting in him stumbling through the story including a needless encounter with Iron Man on the road before turning up at the climax to provide the ultimate containment for Molecule Man. All in all this annual is a fairly typical example of the forgettable tales that were commonplace in original 1970s annuals. It also feels more like a Man-Thing tale than an Iron Man one, with Gerber taking the opportunity to return to the character after his run and the original series had ended.

It's telling that the main thing anyone remembers about this era of Iron Man is the nose, a short-lived modification to the armour that doesn't last very long. Otherwise this is a very average volume with occasional bursts of momentum that get squandered amidst excessive fill-ins and bizarre conclusions. The foes are mainly so so and there's sometimes too much reuse of ideas such as one of Tony's friends donning the Iron Man armour, getting injured and then the treatment accidentally transforms him into the Freak. Little in this volume really stands out.

Essential Iron Man volume 4

Essential Iron Man volume 4 consists of issues #39 to #61 including a back-up in issue #44 featuring Ant-Man. The writing sees runs by Gerry Conway and Mike Friedrich plus other issues by Robert Kanigher, Gary Friedrich, Roy Thomas, Jim Starlin and Steve Gerber. Most of the art is by George Tuska with other contributions by Herb Trimpe, Barry Windsor-Smith and Jim Starlin. The Ant-Man tale is written by Roy Thomas and drawn by Ross Andru.

This volume comes from the early 1970s and sees a slow attempt to update the character at a time when real life events had made arms manufacturers not particularly popular in the States. At the same time it also tries to modernise the portrayal of some of the characters and roles, with the most notable success being Pepper Hogan who returns to her old job position but is now much more a strong executive assistant rather than the simple typist, telephone answerer and diary keeper she had been in earlier years. On multiple occasions the factory is surrounded by protestors, whether students protesting the manufacturing of weapons or the workers out on strike due to devious propaganda, and eventually this leads Tony to start diversifying the output. However it takes a while to assert full control.

The early issues see Tony facing a challenge in the boardroom as Simon Gilbert, the chairperson of the board of Stark Industries, tries to have Tony removed as president of the company, only to be threatened with his own removal as chairperson by Tony. The problem with this kind of corporate drama is that it relies on the reader having a clear knowledge of the basics of corporate governance in order to understand how such power is wielded when Tony holds the majority of shares. Boardroom drama can be exciting when the threat is obvious and the resolution dramatic but here it descends into two men in suits each trying to remove the other through the exercise of some undefined power or other. Eventually Tony succeeds in the boardroom leading to Gilbert hiring the Firebrand to blow up a munitions plant, only to die in the explosion himself. The Firebrand is revealed to be Gilbert's son, adding a new level to his enmity with Iron Man.

There's a protracted storyline involving Tony's engineer and friend Kevin O'Brien who adopts the Guardsman armour to protect Stark Industries but inexperience and paranoia overwhelm him, not helped by his jealousy of Tony over Marianne Rodgers. Partially egged on by Gilbert and other board members, Kevin winds up facing a group of students protesting over arms manufacturing and deploys his repulsors on them, apparently killing four of them. (We're subsequently told they were only injured but as it comes solely via dialogue and captions it feels like emergency editing to tone down the storyline.) This leads to a confrontation between Iron Man and the Guardsman over their respective methods and ends in tragedy when Kevin is caught in a tank explosion. The funeral leads to soul-searching on Tony's part and triggers an issue mainly devoted to recounting the origin, which also supplies the cover, used for the volume as a whole.

Marianne Rodgers is probably the best woman that Tony's yet been involved with. She has a degree of Extra Sensory Perception that leads her to heightened concern for Tony, and also leads her to realise that he and Iron Man are one and the same, but contrary to his long standing fears she doesn't reject them. Instead they grow ever closer, to Kevin's disappointment, and soon get engaged. However her ESP leads her to visions of Iron Man's doom if she stays with him and after a battle with the Super-Adaptoid that leaves Tony desperate for help in recharging his power, Marianne instead deserts him. When the final confrontation comes with the Adaptoid in its new form of the Cyborg Sinister, rebuilt by Tyrr and Jarr from a microworld called Bast, Iron Man ultimately defeats the prophecy by overwhelming it with acid and then destroying it but trust has broken down between Tony and Marianne, leading them to call off the engagement. Marianne goes off to work but finds her ESP wreaks havoc in the workplace and she is subsequently hospitalised. Meanwhile Pepper Hogan returns to Tony's life when she accepts once more the job of his personal secretary but amidst the jet setting it becomes clear Tony still has feelings for her even though she is now married. Meanwhile Happy Hogan is getting more and more jealous of the situation, especially when the newspapers start assuming Tony and Pepper are an item, and soon announces he is leaving by means of a telegram.

The early part of the volume sees a string of incredibly forgettable foes, whether introduced here or reused from another series. Those in the former category include the White Dragon, a Chinese scientist and inventor with troops who feels all too like a Mandarin knock off, the Slasher and Demitrius, a pair in silly costumes, Mikas the Soulfather, an android with ESP powers who believes himself to be an all powerful mutant, a robot copy of the Night Phantom, Raga, the "Son of Fire", a cult leader with the ability to control flames, and his teacher, the Black Lama. There's also an encounter with Princess Python, temporarily solo from the Circus of Crime, and her pet snake Precious. All in all it's a very dull set, made worse by several being agents of the mysterious "Mr Kline", who also appears in the contemporary Daredevil. Unfortunately that seems to be the main place for explaining and dealing with him, with the result that in this volume he's just a shadowy figure responsible for some events but ultimately left unexplained.

Towards the end we get two issues that have the biggest impact on long term Marvel continuity although their impact on Iron Man is rather less. Issue #54 sees the introduction of the space travelling Madame MacEvil, later better known as Moondragon, who takes control of Iron Man's armour remotely and pits him against Sub-Mariner as part of scientific investigations into human hybrids. She's the kind of character who appears to have a large unrevealed backstory that explains her actions but all we get here is an amoral scientist who swears vengeance when her plans come to nothing. The following issue is much better known as it sees the introduction of both Thanos and Drax the Destroyer. And also of the Blood Brothers but they don't get talked about so much. The issue debuts a powerful alien conqueror foe with a strong backstory and a pre-existing nemesis, making for a memorable confrontation and it's hard to deny the significance of this issue given that Thanos has been incredibly successful for Marvel in the long run. The tale as a single piece is quite strong and leaves the reader wanting more. But, as is often the case with big cosmic events and particular those involving Thanos, the host title can wind up feeling a rather odd place for the event. Iron Man does not generally get caught up in interplanetary conflict and this story would probably be more at home in Fantastic Four or Thor or Avengers. And when read with the issues around it, it feels like part of a general ream of randomness near the end of this volume as the writers struggle to find a new direction and purpose for the title.

As they search we get an odd confrontation with the "menace" of Rasputin, a magician with poor powers who brings a statue to life. Then we get a strange tale that starts off with the Mandarin in disguise fomenting unrest amongst the Stark Industries workforce but which diverts into a tale of a search for new power rings and sees the Mandarin and Unicorn temporarily swap bodies. There's a return by a vengeance seeking Firebrand and then finally a clash with Daredevil's old foe the Masked Marauder. None of these tales feels in any way spectacular and the result is just a drudge through the end of the volume.

There are some signs of further developments for Tony with the situation of him crawling away from a successful fight in search of a power recharge now starting to get tired (though read in an era of fast draining smartphones it feels even more familiar now than over forty years ago), and towards the end there are signs that he is increasingly able to survive for periods without a functioning chest plate pacemaker, suggesting that his transplanted heart is finally being accepted by his body. I have no idea how scientifically plausible this scenario is, but the signs are encouraging that Tony is finally conquering his main physical weakness and showing hope for the future in spite of the stunted series around him.

One possibility for diversifying things up a bit would have been to introduce a back-up strip featuring a second hero, as happened in a number of other comics at this time, though mainly over at DC. Issues #43 & #44 contain first an Ant-Man reprint and then an original tale respectively at a time when Marvel expanded the size and cost of the comics, only to contract them back after a couple of months. The original tale is included here but it's a rather forgettable piece of a sweet shop owner attempting an insurance scam through arson whilst Hank Pym encounters the intelligent Scarlet Beetle once more, with his foe coming to an extremely undignified end. It doesn't leave the reader desperate for a regular series of Ant-Man back-ups and suggests the subsequent reversion to normal sized issues was wise and Marvel heroes don't generally prosper when hiding in the back of others' titles.

In general this is a rather slight and disappointing volume. In spite of the ongoing threads involving Marianne Rodgers, Simon Gilbert, Kevin O'Brien or Mr Kline, overall the whole thing feels slow and disjointed. The first half or so of the volume does make an effort to find a direction and stick with it even though it's not the most exciting thing, but the latter half shows a series just floundering about and trying all manner of situations and foes in the hope that something will eventually stick. This is not the series at its best.

Essential Captain Marvel volume 2

Essential Captain Marvel volume 1 contains issues #22-46 of the original Captain Marvel series plus Iron Man #55 and Marvel Feature #12. Issue #36 is a reprint with a framing sequence that is included here. The Iron Man issue is a prologue to a storyline in the main series whilst the Marvel Feature issue ties in with that and is also part of the try-out for Marvel Two-in-One. Bonus material includes a map of Titan from issue #27 plus the covers, pin-ups and extra pages from the reprint series The Life of Captain Marvel. The writing on the main series is primarily by Mike Friedrich, Jim Starlin and Steve Englehart either solo or in various combinations with Al Milgrom co-plotting some issues and a few by Gerry Conway, Marv Wolfman and Chris Claremont. The art is mainly by Jim Starlin, Al Milgrom and Wayne Boring with an individual issue by Alfredo Alcala. Friedrich and Starlin also co-produce both the Iron Man and Marvel Feature issues.

Although the numbering begun in 1968 is continued, this volume represents the third attempt to launch an ongoing Captain Marvel title in less than five years. Once again this perseverance is almost certainly down to a desire to maintain the trademark at a time when DC had obtained the licence for the Fawcett Captain Marvel and would soon relaunch him on the world in his own title. US trademark law is big on the "use it or lose it" principle so Marvel Comics couldn't just rely on a registration but had to actively use the mark "Captain Marvel" in order to prevent others using it. This shows in the first few issues as we get a fairly generic superhero series with the only real twist being Rick Jones increasingly resenting sharing his physical space with Mar-Vell and resisting transformation no matter how dire the situation. The villains consist of Megaton the Nuclear Man and Dr Mynde, both men affected by radiation. Megaton has mutated into a solid form but is set to explode whilst Mynde is an ambitious scientist whose body succumbed to radiation poisoned so he transplanted his head onto a robotic body. Neither foe is terribly exciting and both die at the end of their first encounter. There's yet another change to Captain Marvel's set-up as his powers are altered so he is now reliant on solar energy for his powers and is noticeably weaker at night. A supporting cast is grown in the form of musician Lou-Anne Savannah and her uncle scientist Benjamin but all in all this is a series still searching for a purpose beyond trademark protection.

On first encounter Iron Man #55 seems an odd choice for inclusion as it doesn't feature Captain Marvel or any of the characters from his series. Instead we get the introduction of a new villain and his opponent. But that villain is Thanos and the opponent Drax the Destroyer, with the issue serving as a prologue to the best known storyline in this volume. Over no less than nine issues, with bimonthly publication making it last eighteen months, we get an extended tale of Captain Marvel's battle with Thanos, establish the Titan as one of the mega-villains of the Marvel universe. The epic spread beyond the pages of Captain Marvel itself, with Iron Man teaming up with the Thing to battle Thanos's minions the Blood Brothers in Marvel Feature #12, Moondragon being aided by Daredevil and the Black Widow in their own series and the Avengers taking on Thanos's armed forces in their series. Only the Marvel Feature issue is included but it isn't very critical to the ongoing plot and doesn't justify its presence here whilst other tie-in issues are ignored. I suspect the reason is that this inclusion/exclusion pattern appears to have been followed by all the reprints of the storyline going right back to the mid 1980s series The Life of Captain Marvel.

This storyline presents with a truly cosmic epic with a well developed backstory and characters. Over the course of these issues Captain Marvel battles first with Thanos's recruits such as the Super Skrull and the Controller, before eventually taking on the Titan himself. We get a broad scope reminiscent of Greek epics as we learn the history of the civilisation on Titan from its founding by A'Lars, brother of Zeus, under the name of Mentor, through to Thanos's rise, recruitment of an army and conquest of the moon and then sweeping outwards. We learn of how steps have been taken to stop them but they are not enough. And we see the effects as Thanos turns his attention to Earth in pursuit of the Cosmic Cube to further his ends. The Cube offers immense power but its ramifications aren't explored too much beyond a notable 35 panel page in which Drax is subjected to a reality warping experience. Captain Marvel steadily steps up to the point where his heroism allows him to triumph.

We get many new characters who have gone on to perform significant roles through the Marvel Universe and beyond into the films. There's Thanos himself, his brother Eros (later to use the alias "Starfox"), their father Mentor, Isaac the super-computer and Drax the Destroyer. Each is carefully sketched out as a distinctive being who advances the story in their own way. And there are the more cosmic entities. The mighty Kronos is introduced though like Eros he bears limited resemblance to the character from Greek mythology. From afar he has created Drax the Destroyer out of Moondragon's dead father. Even more mysterious is Eon, a blob that appears to be a hybrid of two separate entities and which summons Mar-Vell to transform him from soldier to cosmic protector. And then there's Death, a silent skeletal female figure in a robe who appears at Thanos's side. There are some status quo changes as well, with Benjamin Savannah killed off at the start but more substantial is Mar-Vell's transformation under the guidance of Eon. Now an even more powerful cosmic being with "cosmic awareness" of what is happening in the universe he bursts forward with a new light stream tail of photon energy. Unfortunately the other main visual change is his hair turning from silver to blond, a change that is impossible to notice in a black and white reprint. And it's my main irritation with an otherwise fantastic storyline that we get yet another change in the main character's powers. It seems it may be impossible for any intellectual property protection to resist constant tinkering.

Issue #34 is probably the best known single issue in this volume, featuring Captain Marvel taking on new villain Nitro to stop him stealing an experimental nerve gas with consequences that would be returned to in later years. Nitro is a villain with an interesting power, that of being able to blow himself up and then reconstitute himself. I suspect that in the 1970s it was possible to present a living bomb as a character without the wider connotations of suicide bombers (and it still was over a decade later when one of the last of the original Masters of the Universe toys was Blast-Attak, with very much the same character basis) but nowadays it would be much more daring to create such a being.

Also a sign of the times is the drug use on the music scene. Rick's new singing partner Rachel "Dandy" Dandridge gives him a capsule that she jokingly claims contains "Vitamin C". When Rick takes it in the Negative Zone, it causes him to hallucinate and through the mind link it also affects Captain Marvel. However this affects a process whereby their minds have been converging. Rick has previously discovered the ability to control Mar-Vell's body when the latter is unconscious and the two are finding themselves ever more drawn together with the implication they may be merging. The drug taking seems to have the effect of empowering them to ultimately separate and merge at their own choosing. Again it's highly doubtful such a cause would be used today. Equally brushed over more than would be the case today is a scene where, in a brief guest appearance, the Wasp tampers with the Living Laser's equipment resulting in his weaponry killing him. Some of these ideas were clearly slipping past during one of Marvel editorial's most turbulent periods.

However out of that turbulence comes another epic as Captain Marvel battles elements of the Kree across multiple worlds, culminating in a showdown on the Kree homeworld with the Supreme Intelligence who has been manipulating things all along. During the course of the epic Mar-Vell and Rick briefly go their separate ways but reunite after Rick discovers his music act is out of touch with modern audience expectations. Both men find their powers developing thanks to the Nega bands with each learning from the other about how to use the powers in new and imaginative ways. The two are finally separated but able to reunite when needs be, allowing them to more easily travel through space and enhance their fighting skills. Towards the end their minds are on the brink of merger, resulting in a showdown to re-establish their separate egos. Against this personal conflict comes an array of adventures, ranging from confrontations on Earth with agents of the "Lunatic Legion" such as Nitro and the Living Laser to a showdown on the Moon with the Legion revealed as blue Kree racists led by old foe Zarek in search of purity. There's a trip to the Watcher's homeworld, battles with Annihilus in the Negative Zone and a more personalised conflict with a creature possessing the body of Una, Mar-Vell's former romantic interest. A more whimsical tale takes Mar-Vell and Rick to a plant very like the American Old West where they have a showdown with the Stranger - but all is not what it seems. There's a return appearance by an angry Destroyer, now angry that his purpose in life has been destroyed by Captain Marvel. Then there's a world with a war between cyborgs and giant Kree robots called Null-trons, before the climax with the Supreme Intelligence. The later parts see first Rick and then Mar-Vell aided by a mysterious woman known only as Fawn, a manifestation of Rick's mental powers. This is a story with a big vision and scope, providing one of the earliest intergalactic Marvel epics, but it's also a quite personal tale about the relationship between Mar-Vell and Rick, showing how intertwined the two are and how each benefits the other.

Overall this volume shows some of the telltale signs of the character's origin as a trademark protection, with continuing changes to the powers and status quo, but by the second half of the volume it feels like actual character development rather than an endless search to find something that will work to keep the trademark in use. But beyond that there's finally a clear long-term idea as to what this series is about and it survives a change of writer. Rather than an alien operating amongst humans or a detached observer of humanity we get a strong series on a cosmic scale, with a mixture of menaces that threaten the whole universe and those that focus upon Marvel himself. The Thanos epic is the peak of the volume, even with the needless inclusion of the Marvel Feature issue, and shows a self-confidence that had been lacking for years. After that there are some questionable moments where the series shows its age with accidental killing of villains without consequences, drug taking and suicide bombers all being elements that would be unlikely to appear today. Whilst the second epic may ramble a little overall it still has breadth and imagination, putting the characters through a critical personal journey. The result is a series finally on the up and more than justifying its existence to its readers rather than just intellectual property lawyers. This volume is definitely the series at its highest so far.

Essential Marvel Horror volume 2 - creator labels 1

We have a volume with a huge number of creators, so here's a separate post to carry the labels for some of them.

Essential Werewolf by Night volume 1 - creator labels

Once more we come across a volume with many creators, so here is the usual separate post to carry the labels for some of them.

Essential Captain America volume 4

Essential Captain America volume 4 consists of Captain America and the Falcon #157-186. The writing covers most of Steve Englehart's run and just touches on the start of John Warner's brief one with scattered contributions by Steve Gerber, Roy Thomas, Tony Isabella and Mike Friedrich. The art covers the bulk of Sal Buscema's run, the start of Frank Robbins's and individual issues by Alan Weiss and Herb Trimpe.

This volume sees the series go on an uptick, having finally found a strong writer for the long run who directly tackles a number of problems and criticisms related to the character. A common jibe is that Captain America is physically not the most powerful of heroes; an early issue here sees him gain super strength when the Super Soldier Serum in his blood reacts with the venom of the original Viper. The result is an incredibly powerful Cap, though as time passes the strength is shown and referenced less and less. His gaining enhanced strength puts another strain on his partnership with the Falcon, who feels an inferior costumed athlete as a result. This leads to some soul searching, during which he finally gets together with Leila albeit in his costumed identity (though he seems to have revealed his identity to her, albeit it's not explicitly clear that she knows until much later), and a search for enhanced abilities that leads him to Wakanda where the Black Panther gives him his wings. Meanwhile Cap goes through some major soul searching in this volume as he faces a series of events that force him to reconsider some of his world views. Early on comes the revelation that a police officer is crooked, a sign of how corruption can be found even in places not traditionally expected, but worse is to come.

The highlight of the volume comes in the middle section with the Secret Empire storyline. In this Cap faces challenges on many fronts, starting when he's depicted as a dangerous vigilante by a hostile advertising campaign run by the Viper and Quentin Hardeman of the Committee to Regain America's Principles. Next he's framed for the murder of the Tumbler and faces being replaced by new hero Moonstone (later Nefarius), actually an agent of the Committee. Cap is arrested and seems all alone, with the Falcon away in Africa getting his wings and taking on the mobster Stoneface. However help comes in the form of "America's Sanitation Unit" of high tech vigilantes who break into his cell. This forces Cap to decide whether to break the law or turn down the only chance to clear his name, though the decision gets made or him when he's overwhelmed by the Unit's gas and taken away. Discovering that they too are agents of the conspiracy against him. With the Falcon now returned to the States and branded an accomplice, he and Cap are forced to go on the run in search of the clues to clear their names, and get attacked by the Banshee, still a foe rather than an ally of the X-Men. This brings another reversal of fortunes as they wind up allying with the handful of the X-Men who haven't been captured by the conspiracy. (This appearance came a year before the X-Men's relaunch and seems to have been designed to wrap up loose plot threads from the Beast's solo series in Amazing Adventures.) The group clashes with S.H.I.E.L.D., before learning the true foe is the shadowy organisation called the Secret Empire. Once more Steve and Sam are forced to take action they wouldn't normally do by stealing a device in order to gain the confidence of the Secret Empire in their civilian guises. This brings them to the heat of the operation where the organisation is planning to conquer America, using the ever growing popularity of Moonstone as a way to convince the people to surrender when the Secret Empire's flying saucer, powered by the brainwaves of captured mutants(!) , lands in Washington. However in the climax Cap and the others manage to escape execution thanks to the inside help of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents Gabriel Jones and Peggy Carter, and they destroy the equipment then take down Moonstone who confesses to the whole conspiracy. All the living members of the conspiracy are soon arrested, though Number One flees and commits suicide.

At a distance of some decades it's not always easy to spot the targets of some of the more overt political satire. To some the Committee to Regain America's Principles is merely a shock that Marvel would print such a name or a source of hilarity for the acronym "CRAP". But the name was clearly based on the Committee to RE-Elect the President; similarly Quentin Hardeman's name is evocative of Nixon's first Chief of Staff H. R. Haldeman. This tale of a secret conspiracy to take over the country by destroying confidence in existing institutions and systems and replacing them with the creations of political propaganda was reflective of the turbulent times the story was written in, but it also makes Cap face a changing world.

More so than any previous storyline, the Secret Empire tale forces Captain America to face up to the conflict between his ideals and loyalties. As he finds his reputation damaged and his actions bringing conflict with the police, he's left with little choice but to go beyond the law, even if this vindicates the attack campaign that portrays him as a vigilante. Up until now, Captain America has always been a hero of the establishment, acting for authority that was assumed inherently benign and having no doubt about what "serving my country" means. But now he finds himself in a much greyer world, where established symbols, positions and systems can't always be trusted, where venerated figures can turn out to be crooks, where public opinion can quickly turn against a dedicated symbol and where sometimes the only way to achieve results is to go outside the law. 1974 was the year in which both the Punisher and Wolverine debuted and, whilst neither may have been intended to go on to become major stars at the time, they both symbolised the way in which the presentation of morality in superhero comics was changing away from the simplicity of the Golden and Silver Ages. It was inevitable that Captain America would have to face the blast of change. And it comes in one of the most dramatic, and potentially libellous, ways imaginable. On the final page of issue #175 Captain America pursues Number One into the White House and unmasks him in the Oval Office, recognising the face beneath. We're not shown the face but dialogue states he holds "high political office" but "my power was still too constrained by legalities!" Could there be any doubt who it was meant to be? Perhaps this famous South Park dialogue could have been applied:

I knew it was you all along, Richard Nixon!

So Marvel in the summer of 1974 all but named the President of the United States as a crook. Who would have thought that Richard Nixon could be anything but squeaky-clean? I'm amazed that something so daringly libellous could have been put out and got away with. Today there would no doubt have been an outrage.

However, this may not have always been the plan. In the preceding issue Number One mentions "the fortuitous Watergate scandal! Ah, if only we'd known that was coming! How much simpler it has made our work." True it could be a red herring but it also might indicate how last minute the revelation was decided upon. It's not the only revelation that doesn't quite fit with what's come before, with Sergeant Muldoon turning out to be the Cowled Commander, trying to whip up public opinion to reform the police force on tougher lines. This sits uneasily with his actions after suspension in which he investigated Steve and seemed to believe the rookie cop was the Commander. It's not the only sudden revelation that comes out of nowhere in this volume.

But regardless of how far in advance the shock ending was planned, it leads to a dramatic follow-up as for a whole issue Cap fights no foes but reflects upon how he came to be, how the world has changed since the Second World War and how he can no longer serve an America that is much changed and where the government has been shown to be self-serving. His friends and allies try to dissuade him, but he decides to abandon the costume. And he doesn't quickly resume it.

For the next seven issues we have a world in which Steve Rogers is no longer Captain America. At first this pushes the Falcon into centre stage, but it becomes increasingly clear that Steve can't stay out of the action, much to both the Falcon and Sharon's annoyance, and Hawkeye forces the point by posing as the Golden Archer and attacking him, so Steve eventually adopts a new costumed identity as Nomad - the Man without a Country. Meanwhile a succession of other men decide they have what it takes to be the next Captain America, but each soon learns they don't. Eventually one is killed by the Red Skull and this brings a catharsis as Steve realises the things he fights for are not out of date. He fights not for a government but for the "American Dream" and against all threats to it, whether from without or within. As a result he resumes the costume. It's amazing that he was kept out of it for so long but by the end it's become clear - Captain America is not just a costume that anyone can put on; he is far, far more. He is not an agent of the US government but a servant of the whole country, dedicated to a set of ideals. It's a powerful storyline and statement that gets to the heart of the character and defines him for the long run.

Elsewhere this run finally resolves the loose ends relating to Cap's wartime sweetheart whose name he hasn't even known until now. Having lived in shock for three decades, Peggy Carter is a more personal reminder of how much the world has grown and changed since the Second World War, being now a middle aged woman who has suffered amnesia and been kept in isolation until the intervention of Dr Faustus causes her to relive events and come to her senses. I wonder just how much research into psychiatric issues was actually undertaken for this storyline. The reunion is touching, but Steve and Sharon deliberately try to avoid telling Peggy that the man she has waited so long for is now with her sister, resulting in some awkward dancing round the point. Although it's not addressed directly here, this does raise a question about Sharon's ethics and conduct in keeping Peggy and Cap in the dark about each other whilst taking up with the latter. Over time Peggy comes to realise what she and Cap had is long gone and instead she and S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Gabriel Jones are drawn to each other. One irritation I find with Peggy's return is the inability to decide if her hair is light or dark, with it changing across issues.

Outside of the Secret Empire and Nomad sagas, the villains in the volume are somewhat limited, with the original Viper fairly prominent in the early run, at first working for the Cowled Commander both solo and in combination with other foes as the group "Crime Wave" which also contains the Porcupine, the Eel, the Scarecrow and Plantman. The Viper and the Eel then form the Serpent Squad with the Cobra; later on they are joined by both Princess Python and Madame Hydra, with the latter killing the Viper and taking his name before putting the group into an alliance with the Atlantean warlord Krang. Elsewhere there are return appearances by Dr Faustus and the Harlem crimelord Morgan and from the X-Men comes Lucifer. The Yellow Claw also clashes with Cap and the Falcon for the first time, allied with new foe, the female scientist Nightshade. Unfortunately her impact is somewhat diminished when her serum temporarily turns the Falcon into a were-wolf. Equally weak is Solarr, who has the power to absorb and discharge solar energy. Another new foe who initially seems to be a mere one-off is the Phoenix, the vengeance seeking son of Baron Zemo. Coming in an outlandish costume and falling into a vat of corrosive chemicals, not to mention being in a fill-in issue with a different writing team, it's surprising that anyone would or could bring him back, but he's gone on to do many things as Baron Zemo II.

The very end of the volume sees the quality take a sudden nosedive thanks to three separate developments. Frank Robbins takes over on the art but his style feels completely wrong for the series and just looks awful. The Red Skull returns but there is a shift in his aims away from seeking to conquer the world and more towards spreading fear and destruction. Unfortunately this turns him into a Joker clone and at times he's practically chewing the scenery. And there's a very awkward retcon about the Falcon, changing his past completely to make him a crook and pimp who had crashed on the island where Cap first met him. The Red Skull had used the Cosmic Cube to completely change his personality, memories and the world around him in order to provide the perfect partner for Cap, then eventually use the Falcon as a sleeper agent in reserve in case other plans failed. For this he has enhanced Sam with mental powers to communicate with the falcon Redwing (resulting in the brief assumption that the Falcon is a mutant, a point that would curiously dog the character for many years to come) and also made him completely responsive to the Skull's orders, no matter how humiliating the command. The whole thing appears to be motivated by a desire to paper over the previous backstory of ex-Axis agents hiding on a seemingly deserted island advertising for a falconer who arrived by regular freighter, but rather than just shrugging off a bit of Silver Age silliness the Falcon is instead twisted into becoming a cliché, as though no black in America can be allowed to be free of crime. It's also absurd long-term planning by the Skull - and at this point in 1975 the series was still setting events in real time so Cap had been revived in 1964 and known the Falcon for six years - and a very bizarre use for the Cosmic Cube. All in all this feels like a 1970s version of the Avengers saga "The Crossing".

It's unfortunate that the volume should end on such a mess when so much of it has been so bold and memorable. By taking on the main problems both the series and the main character have had, not to mention the changing attitudes to "America" and patriotism, the result is a bold uptick that makes this a strong and decisive volume. There are some odd moments but overall a lot of development has been done. Although the Falcon has taken steps both forwards and back, Captain America is much the stronger character as a result.

Essential Warlock volume 1 - creator labels

Once again we have a volume with a lot of creators, so here's a separate post to carry the labels for some of them.

Essential Marvel Horror volume 1 - writer creator labels

We have a volume with a huge number of creators, so here's a separate post to carry the labels for the writers.

Essential Marvel Two-in-One volume 1

Given the success of Marvel Team-Up, it's not surprising that another team-up title was launched less than two years later, even if the series was first tested in the pages of the last couple of issues of Marvel Feature. But it's interesting that the character who headlined the series was none other than the Thing, rather than a hero with their own solo series. Still this offered the opportunity for a little more development than Spider-Man got in Marvel Team-Up.

Essential Marvel Two-in-One volume 1 contains the try-out issues Marvel Feature #11-12 then issues #1-20 & #22-25 plus Annual #1 of the regular series, and also Marvel Team-Up #47 and Fantastic Four Annual #11; both of which carry crossovers with the main series. Issue #21 is missing due to the guest star being Doc Savage who Marvel no longer has the rights for.

The Marvel Feature issues are written by Len Wein and Mike Friedrich, and both are drawn by Jim Starlin. The main series is primarily written by Steve Gerber and Bill Mantlo, with other issues and/or plots from the likes of Chris Claremont, Roy Thomas, Roger Slifer, Len Wein, Jim Shooter, Marv Wolfman and Tony Isabella. Both the Two-in-One and Fantastic Four annuals are written by Thomas, whilst the Team-Up is by Mantlo. The art is by a mix, with Sal Buscema drawing the most, including the Two-in-One annual, Ron Wilson drawing the next largest and also the Team-Up, and other issues by Gil Kane, George Tuska, Herb Trimpe, Bob Brown, Arvell Jones, Marie Severin and Pablo Marcos. The Fantastic Four annual is drawn by John Buscema. Because that's such a large number of credits, I've created a separate post to carry some of the labels.

As per usual for team-up titles, here's a list of the guest stars in each issue. Note that the Thing was a headline character in every issue so there's no need to list him each time.

Marvel Feature 11. The Incredible Hulk
Marvel Feature 12. Iron Man
1. The Man-Thing
2. The Sub-Mariner
3. Daredevil
4. Captain America
5. The Guardians of the Galaxy
6. Doctor Strange
7. Valkyrie
8. Ghost Rider
9. The Mighty Thor
10. The Black Widow
11. The Golem
12. Iron Man
13. Power Man
14. The Son of Satan
15. Morbius
16. Ka-Zar, Lord of the Hidden Jungle
17. Spider-Man
(Marvel Team-Up 47. Spider-Man)
18. The Scarecrow
19. Tigra
(Fantastic Four Annual 11. The Invaders)
Annual 1. The Liberty Legion
20. The Liberty Legion
22. The Mighty Thor
23. The Mighty Thor
24. Black Goliath
25. Iron Fist

The absence of issue #21 is slightly noticeable because it's followed up on in the next couple of issues as the Thing and the Human Torch seek medical treatment for a man wounded there. As a result it's now slightly unfortunate that issue #23 includes the caption "2-in-1 #21 wherein Tom Lightner became temporarily merged with his own father in a freak time-fusion accident. Where were you? -- Arch." However other than this the absent issue is reasonably self-contained and so we're not thrust into the second part of a conflict without the first.

The series starts out heavily focused on the classic Silver Age characters but as time goes on more and more newer characters and teams appear (and for the record I consider the Invaders a newer team even if many of the individual characters had appeared back in the Golden Age), including many from the horror titles Marvel had so much success with in the early 1970s. Note that there are none of the X-Men, a reminder that there was a time when they weren't all prominent across the Marvel line. But also it's telling that outside of their annual none of the rest of the Fantastic Four are billed guest stars and so we don't get any issues that frankly could have been told in that title.

But also it seems clear that the Fantastic Four was still the title in which all the major developments in Ben Grimm's life happened. This is most obvious towards the end of this volume when Ben is suddenly back to being an ordinary human and wearing a special exo-skeleton to resemble his previous rocky form. However this is only explicitly shown in the Invaders/Liberty Legion storyline in the two annuals and issue #20. In the rest of the issues in this period there's no clear indication as to whether he's an ordinary human in the exo-skeleton or his more traditional transformed self. In issue #25 he may be attending a baseball match with Alicia, but traditionally she's been drawn more to his rocky form and so for all we know he may be wearing it to please her. Ben's relationship with Alicia is similarly not really developed here and she largely appears just to set the scene, much as Peter Parker's relationships aren't actually developed in Marvel Team-Up.

This is actually quite a disappointment as the resulting title is once again an add-on for a lead character rather than an opportunity to allow one who didn't have their own solo title to thrive and develop. A character appearing in a team-up book and a team title may be an odd combination but it would be a way of spreading them around without the overexposure of also having a solo series, which is why a Fantastic Four member was a better choice than, say, Captain America, Iron Man, Thor or the Hulk, all of whom had both solo and team titles. But given the dynamics of the Fantastic Four it's probably not possible to have one of the members additionally starring in anything more than an add-on series, a lesson probably true whether we consider this series, the 1960s Human Torch tales or the Thing's 1980s solo series. Either the additional series would remain purely a set of extra adventures or the character development would be uneven or the character would have to be taken out of the Fantastic Four for a time.

One of the few recurring sub-plots in the early issues involves the discovery of Wundarr, an alien adult who has spent his whole life to date inside a rocket. He has both incredibly enhanced strength and the knowledge & emotional outlook of an infant. Stories see the Thing, Namorita and others looking after him and tying to explain the world around him to him. He disappears after issue #9, along with writer Steve Gerber. After a few writers on one or two issues it's not until issue #15 that Bill Mantlo becomes a permanent feature until near the end, barring an issue by Roy Thomas to finish up the story from the annual after that overran. All this suggests a title in a degree of flux, and there are other signs that editorial didn't always know what they were doing. The boxes at the end of a number of issues also point to editorial chaos by promising things in the next issue that don't appear. Issue #8 ends promising the next issue will feature "one of the most-requested team-up sagas of all" - the Thing and Iron Fist. Instead issue #9 brings Thor and Iron Fist doesn't appear until #25. Issue #14 promises the next issue will feature Ka-Zar but that doesn't happen until #16 and instead in the meantime we get Morbius. Issue #11 promises "The Most Unexpected Team-Up of All!!! The Thing and -- Who?" I seriously doubt this was meant to apply to Iron Man. And issue #16 ends with a declaration that the story continues in Marvel Team-Up #47. In actual fact the story continues in Two-in-One #17 and Team-Up #47 is the second part of the crossover. When combined with the fact that the regular artists on the two series seem to have swapped titles for the crossover and the Two-in-One opening reads as though it's the next part of the continuing saga in Team-Up then it seems somebody got the order of publication muddled up when planning the crossover and hurriedly switched the two parts round to compensate. A similar thing happens with the annual crossover - issue #19 announces the appearance of the Liberty Legion in "Giant-Size Two-in-One #1 on sale June 22nd!". Instead the story begins in Fantastic Four annual and June 22nd actually saw a Marvel Two-in-One annual, with the Giant-Size format now abandoned. None of this detracts from the readability of the volume but it does hint at a somewhat haphazard approach to the title that doesn't always engender confidence that it has a clear direction.

The result is a set of stories that are largely a collection of individual tales in which the Thing and whichever guest star take on various villains. Now this criticism can be made of almost any team-up series but many manage to overcome it in various ways, whether by presenting particularly dramatic adventures, or by showing some big developments in the lives of one of the guest stars or even just by having a good strong lead to base the series around. And after reading this volume I've found myself to not be a particularly big fan of the Thing. In this era he's largely progressed beyond the tragedy of being trapped in his rocky body, now being rather at ease with it and there aren't any real developments in his life here. He just goes through a succession of adventures that are mostly inconsequential to all involved.

That's not to say there aren't some dramatic stories though or that the villains aren't memorable. New foes include the Mortoid, a robotic assassin, the Sword of Judgement terrorist group, including their leader Agamemnon, Braggadoom, a monster produced by an accident of genetic engineering, Volcanus, a man hoping to use volcanic energy to make him all powerful, the Cougar, a criminal who can transform into a cat-man, Sky Shark, a Nazi pilot and engineer, and Slicer, his ally from Japan, the Devourer, a monster from amongst the Egyptian deities, and General Chonga, a renegade warlord from the island of Kaiwann in east Asia. However many of the foes encountered in these stories come from other series, often those featuring one or other of the banner heroes. Starting with those previously seen in the pages of Fantastic Four we see foes such as Kurrgo, the Molecule Man (who is confusingly replaced by his near identical "son", an artificial construct with the same powers who gets killed off in his first appearance), the Miracle Man, the Puppet Master and Prester John. Then beyond there we get Thanos and his henchmen the Blood Brothers, originally from Iron Man but at the time staring in a major epic in Captain Marvel, the Leader, from the Incredible Hulk, the Dakkamites and the Badoon, both alien races from the original Silver Surfer series, the Enchantress, the Executioner and Seth, all from Thor, the Black Spectre, Nekra Sinclair and the Mandril, all tying into a storyline in Daredevil though the latter two debuted in Shanna, the She-Devil, Kaballa, from the Golem's strip in a revived Strange Tales, Kthara, from the Son of Satan's strip in Marvel Spotlight, the Living Eraser and the Hijacker, both from Ant-Man/Giant-Man's strip in Tales to Astonish and Kalumai, from the Scarecrow's strip in Dead of Night. The crossover with Marvel Team-Up see the Thing and Spider-Man fight Basilisk, who had previously battled Spider-Man, Captain Marvel and Mr Fantastic in a couple of earlier Marvel Team-Ups. Meanwhile the annual crossover with Fantastic Four pits up a variety of Nazi foes including the older Baron Zemo, from the early issues of the Avengers, and then various foes first seen in the Invaders, such as Brain Drain, Meranno, also known as U-Man, and Master Man.

But the adventures themselves are mostly routine. The Invaders/Liberty Legion encounter does stand out a bit because it involves two trips back in time to 1942. Unfortunately it falls into a problem that a lot of Marvel time travel stories suffer from, in that it's not entirely clear just what the rules of time travel are and whether the past can be altered or not. Some stories follow a rule that the past is fixed and travel back in time only creates an alternate timeline. Others act as though the past can be changed, with consequences in the present, or even use the time travel to establish involvement in a key incident in history. Here we get examples of two of these, as Mr Fantastic deduces that the reason Namor and Captain America have never mentioned meeting the Fantastic Four during the war is because it was "a different time continuum". However the Four's encounter leads to the infamous moment when Captain America and Baron Zemo fight and the latter is hit by the adhesive that seals his hood to his face. Including that moment itself feels like excessive continuity for the sake of it, as part of Roy Thomas's great project to integrate the Golden Age comics into the Marvel universe and tie them in with everything that the Silver Age had already established. But it adds to the confusion and leaves one wondering if there was ever really a threat at all.

The rest of the series gives us a good sample of Marvel in the mid 1970s and it's nice to go straight from a team-up with a big name hero like Spider-Man to an ultra obscure one like the Scarecrow, showing the flexibility on the format. And both the writing and art are at least confident or even very good, especially Sal Buscema's work. But I just feel the problem is one has to really, really like the Thing in the first place for this series to work as otherwise it's just a set of add-on adventures that fail to take advantage of being the sole book with "the Thing" on the cover. Since the series lasted one hundred issues (now collected in three more Essential volumes), it's possible later issues managed to address some of the problems but here at the start this is a rather disposable series.