Fantastic Four #3 (Dec 1961) comes with some more world-building with Marvel’s new set of super-heroes given some snazzy uniforms (reminiscent of the Challengers of the Unknown), a Fantasticar, and an official headquarters (though the building is not yet named). This issue, the FF are up against “The Miracle Man”, who (spoiler alert) turns out […]
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In Tales to Astonish #27 (Sept 1961), a one-shot quickie sci-fi / horror tale “The Man in the Ant Hill!” establishes the second major character in the fledgling Marvel universe: Hank Pym! Despite being mocked by the scientific community, Hank develops a serum that can shrink things. Okay. After trying it on a chair, he […]
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In Fantastic Four #2 (Sept 1961), Marvel starts to gradually expand its mythos by introducing a shape-shifting alien race about to conquer Earth: The Skrulls! Four Skrulls establish a beach-head of tarnishing the FF’s reputation by masquerading as the superheroes and stealing jewelry or destroying property. The plan is to discredit the superheroes and then […]
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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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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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Well, June 1961 brings back some wacky Marvel monster names including Zzutak, Klagg, and Moomba!
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Well Marvel Comics is finally here, and by May 1961, all comics by Atlas Comics have the “MC” insignia. I also notice a distinct lack of kooky monster names this month. Other than a revisit of Grogg, Marvel seems to have switched to more descriptive names like “Sandman”, the return of Colossus, and “The Crawling […]
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I’m going to call April 1961 the month when Atlas Comics finally FINALLY became Marvel Comics, since some of their comic books on sale that month had a very distinctive “MC” insignia box on the covers: Journey into Mystery #69 and Strange Tales #86. Farewell Atlas Comics! I, for one, welcome our overlords Stan Lee, […]
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A fun letter appears in the Justice League of America #5 (Apr 1961), in which Bob Cherry of Detroit, Michigan calls on DC comics to up their crossover type events and weave their characters much more tightly together. Clark (Superman) Kent, Lois Lane and Iris West interview Carol Ferris and Hal (Green Lantern) Jordan on […]
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