In Superman #149 (Sept 1961), a memorable “imaginary tale” was published: “The Death of Superman”. It starts out kookily enough: Luthor suddenly seems to repent, synthesizing a serum to cure cancer from a meteorite he finds in a prison rockpile. Despite this, the justice system is skeptical of his reformation, and rightfully so, until Superman […]
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It’s important to remember that, just because Marvel launched their flagship Silver Age superhero comic this month, it was still basically an experiment and this superhero transition did not happen over night. Marvel continued to churn out wacky monster stores across all their other wacky supernatural/sci-fi titles with still wackier names: The Creature From Krogarr! […]
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Well, I talked about it for a long time, but we are finally here: the birth of the true Marvel Universe with The Fantastic Four #1 (Aug 1961). Stan Lee and Jack Kirby bring us a full book-length story here that introduces their first true super-heroes of the Silver Age named, of course, The Fantastic […]
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In Adventure Comics #289 (Aug 1961), Superboy is amazed when Pa Kent seemingly acquires super-powers. After several mis-adventures where Super-Pa becomes increasingly evil, he unmasks “Pa Kent” as a Kryptonian criminal, Jax-Ur (making his first appearance). Superboy spares little time in sending Jax-Ur back into the Phantom Zone. The epilogue of the story explains that […]
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In Action Comics #281 (Aug 1961), the fourth installment in the long-running, multi-month story arc continues as Lesla-Lar masquerades as a recently-re-powered Supergirl. She goes with Superman to the Fortress of Solitude, while the de-powered Supergirl continues to live out her best life with amnesia in the bottled city of Kandor. While there, Krypto sniffs […]
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Marvel brings us some more wacky monsters in July 1961: Monsteroso, The Glob, Bruttu, the Abominable Snowman, and Fin Fang Foom, an alien that resembled a dragon. Like Groot before it, Fin Fang Foom is later ret-conned into the Marvel superhero universe as a minor villain.
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The Atomic Knights return in Strange Adventures #132, July 1961. The story picks up where the previous one ended: the Atomic Knights have rescued seeds and fruits from the now-sunken, time-displaced island of Atlantis after their cobalt bomb went off in present-day 1990. Got all that? The scientists in Atlantis learn they have been displaced […]
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Green Lantern is whisked away into the year 5700AD to help the “Solarians” with some menace in Green Lantern #8 (July 1961). They do this by swapping his 20th century memories out and hypnotizing Hal Jordan into believe he is Pol Manning, famed asteroid explorer of the 58th century. It’s a neat little trick that […]
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Speaking of Machiavellianism, the long-running Supergirl story arc continues, as a de-powered Linda Lee, having recently been adopted by the Danvers, goes on a school field trip to visit Metropolis’ Daily Planet. There, she meets up with her cousin Clark Kent – I really like the way they depict Clark here, very casual without a […]
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We first met the super-brat Dev-Em last month and Adventure #288 (July 1961) is the conclusion to this tale. Having arrived on Earth, Dev-Em lures Superboy into his suspended animation vehicle where he imprisons Superboy in the Phantom Zone. Dev-Em then crafts a mask to resemble Superboy and goes about committing horrific deeds, like destroying […]
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