110 – The First Cross-over!

A panel from the Sub-Mariner story in Marvel Mystery #7, March 1940
A panel from the Sub-Mariner story in Marvel Mystery #7, March 1940

Timely Comics (the company that later became Marvel Comics) continued to innovate by inventing the first superhero crossover. The above panel in Marvel Mystery Comics #7 (March 1940) is the first time comic book characters from different “strips” have hinted at a shared universe. The Human Torch and Namor, the Sub-Mariner would clash in the next issue and as a consequence make the mythos of superhero worlds way more richer for decades to come.

A panel from the Human Torch story in Marvel Mystery Comics #7 (March 1940)
A panel from the Human Torch story in Marvel Mystery Comics #7 (March 1940)

Marvel was the first to do it in comic books and the first to do it in feature films years later!

Also, Namor was a little bitch.