Journey Into Mystery #87-90

As remarked by Thelonius Nick in the comments on the earlier Thor post, Stan Lee seemed unsure as to what to do with the Mighty Thor at first. The Thunder God was far too powerful and cosmic a character to waste against the usual crooks & mobsters. In Journey into Mystery #87 he defeats a plot by the communists to kidnap American scientists.

Loki returns in #88. Having learned of Thor's secret identity, he forces the Thunder God to choose between recovering the hammer and saving Jane Foster. Then Loki surrounds the hammer with a force field, preventing the now helpless Don Blake from recovering his powers. Fortunately Don tricks Loki into removing the force field and sends Loki back to Asgard.

In #89 Don and Jane are kidnapped by mobsters to operate on a wounded crime boss. In a classic example of Deus Ex Machina, he prays to Odin to intervene when he and Jane are about to be killed despite saving the mobster's life. Odin sends down a thunderbolt to save them. We also get a new power for Thor (that is never again mentioned); that of super-ventriloquism.

In #90, Thor again fights aliens. Ho-hum.

Lee still had not found the right format for the Mighty Thor in these issues. Nobody really seems able to handle the Thunder God, and so the plot often revolves around him somehow losing control of his hammer, despite its well-established tendency to return to him.

This is similar to the problems that DC had with Superman in the 1940s. DC had solved it by using deceptive villains like Mxyzptlk, the Prankster and Wolfingham; even Luthor was usually operating behind the scenes. But of course, this had the tendency to diminish the value of the powers that Superman possessed, which, after all, was what made the character different.

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Goldilocks

I've talked briefly about Thor in the past, but now it's time to discuss him in a little greater detail. Thor is the Norse god of thunder. His initial appearance in Marvel was in Journey Into Mystery #83. JIM was one of Marvel's horrible "horror" mags, which featured stories like "I Unleashed SHAGG Upon the World!" and "I Found RRO... The Thing from the Bottomless Pit!"

Don Blake, a lame physician, was on vacation in Norway when he discovers a plot by alien invaders from Saturn. He is spotted by the Stone Men, and runs into a cave. There he discovers a small staff, which is fortunate because he has lost his cane. But when he strikes the cane against a boulder blocking his way, he transforms suddenly into the Mighty Thor!



Thor has many powers. He is virtually invulnerable and fantastically strong. But even more important is his mighty hammer (the staff transformed), which makes it possible for him to fly and which destroys almost anything it's thrown against and returns automatically to his hand like a boomerang. It can also cause lighting and storms.

But of course with this power comes a weakness. If the hammer leaves Thor's hand for 60 seconds, he reverts to Don Blake, the lame physician. As always in the Marvel universe, there is also a love interest. Nurse Jane Foster secretly loves Dr Blake, and he adores her but worries that she could never love a weakling like him.

Initially Thor battles fairly traditional enemies for superheroes: Aliens intent on a hostile takeover, communist dictators and assorted crooks. But quickly a supervillain worthy of Thor's interest was discovered; his evil brother, Loki, the God of Mischief. Loki first appeared in JIM #85, and was returned quite often in the early issues: He is featured in JIM #88, 91, 92 and 94 as well as Avengers #1.

The characterization of Nurse Jane Foster in these early issues stinks. She's the typical 1960s Marvel eye-candy airhead. We see her thinking about how much she loves Don Blake, but she has an eye for Thor (not realizing that they are actually one and the same). And the first time Loki shows up, he's quite a prize as well:



This is all too typical of Marvel at the time. Girlfriends/love interests existed mostly as potential hostages for villains and were generally placed in traditional women's occupations: nurses like Jane Foster and secretaries like Karen Page, Betty Brant. Compare that with DC, which had Lois Lane as a reporter, Vicki Vale as a news photographer, Jean Loring a young attorney and Carol Ferris running an aircraft factory.

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Robby Reed Unveiled!

In the final (for now) post on Dial B for Blog. His blog is incredible; undeniably the finest comics blog on the net.

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More DC Scientofascism

As we have discussed in the past, if there was a religion in the DC Universe back in the Silver Age, it was science. In a way, this is probably a natural outgrowth of the postwar era, as it seemed that technology, government and industry were forging ahead to move us into the glorious future. But it looks just a tad creepy with the benefit of hindsight.

For example, consider this bit from Flash #153, the June 1965 issue. Professor Zoom, aka the Reverse Flash, aka Eobard Thawne has apparently reformed thanks to the "electro-reeducation" provided by prison authorities in the year 2465:



Of course as often happens in these stories, there is something wrong with the machine. In fact, Professor Zoom has tampered with the Cerebro-Scanner to make sure that he will pass the test despite not having gone straight at all. As was the case in Superman #132, once the machine is repaired, nobody stops to think, hey, maybe we shouldn't be setting murderous crooks free just on the basis of them passing a test.

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Number 50


Frankenstein Friday: Ghost Rider Vs Frankenstein!




Dick Ayers, one of the finest of the Golden Age artists, was also one of the finest Silver Age artists, and as far as I know, at age 82, is still drawing! The Ghost Rider was his strip, very popular in its time, killed by the Comics Code.

Ayers went on to Marvel Comics in the early 1960s, drawing and also inking. His bold inking made Jack Kirby's bold pencils on his late '50s monster strips really eye-popping. There was nothing else like them anywhere.

Ghost Rider was a combination western/fantasy/horror comic book, begun in 1950. It had fast moving stories and great art. (I probably don't need to mention that Marvel Comics also appropriated the name, if not the theme, of the Ghost Rider by creating its own character.)

The Ghost Rider Vs. Frankenstein story, from Ghost Rider #10, December, 1952, is widely regarded as one of the most memorable from the title. The cover alone is worth the price of the book.


If I have an objection to the story at all it's the cop-out ending. The rest of it is quite good, though.

Ghost Rider publisher, ME Comics, didn't really publish horror comics, but Ghost Rider was spooky enough in its own right. And it was due to the moody and evocative art of Dick Ayers.

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Challengers Part II

I didn't have the time or the inclination to read all of the Challengers series at this point, so I thought it might be entertaining to jump ahead five years and check the changes.

Challengers of the Unknown #31 contains a retelling of the Challengers' origin with new details. We learn that before the fateful flight, Rocky had defended his wrestling championship despite an attempt by the mob to influence the bout.

More unbelievably, Prof Haley was reintroduced as a rich delinquent. Uh, how did he get the nickname "Prof" then? He reforms after helping rescue an ancient statue from the deeps via his skin-diving ability.

Red Ryan, who had originally been introduced as a circus daredevil (only to have Kirby ignore that aspect of him), was now reincarnated as a mountain climber, and electronics expert. He builds a radio tower on a mountain with the money of a rich patron to educate the poor people of a valley in South America. However, it turns out that the patron really intended to use the tower to transmit propaganda and become a local dictator, fortunately prevented by Red.

Ace Morgan was a pilot who had contracted to carry high explosives for miners in his plane, but was forced to toss them out when they broke loose. He manages to hit the mountain in a place that reveals a vein of ore, so the miners are happy.

However, as the four men fly in Ace's plane, they feel like failures for one reason or another, especially when the plane conks out and they must crash land in a forest. Given a second chance, they feel like they are living on borrowed time, and resolve to do something more with this second chance at life.

This origin retelling is contained within a larger story where a mysterious stranger claims to have rescued the Challengers from their plane. Thus they were not really saved by "fate" as they had long believed. Their rescuer, a Mr Clayton, presents evidence. He is in a jam and needs the Challengers to help him reassemble an ancient statue. It turns out the statue's actually a giant robot that has two arms missing which when assembled will give him incredible power. But the Challengers eventually realize Mr Clayton did not really save them and defeat his robot.

Comments: Interesting but uneven origin retelling by DC.

Challengers of the Unknown #32 contains two stories. The first one features Volcano Man, who had previously appeared in Challengers #27. In the second story we learn that the Challs had picked up an alien pet whom they called Cosmo. He seems to have almost unlimited mental powers, so much so that he dwarfs the rest of the team. Looking back I see that Cosmo first appeared in Challengers #18, and had made a couple intermediate appearances. In this story, they discover his original alien owner, who is happy to let them keep the pet since it is proving of so much use. Perhaps typically for DC, this ended up being the last time Cosmo appeared in the Silver Age Challengers; probably for the reason noted above; he was just too powerful and made it too easy for them to get out of tight scrapes.

My previous article on the Challengers is here.

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Number 49


Bonnie Parker



Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow were 1930's Depression-era outlaws who earned 15 minutes of fame, which has now lasted over 70 years. This story from Crime Does Not Pay #57, November 1947, tells their story…sort of.

Bonnie wasn't really a cigar smoker. That was a prop she used for a photo. The Barrow Gang took a lot of pictures of themselves, and like most people, sometimes they gagged it up. In the end Bonnie and Clyde were killed by a hail of bullets, but it was in an ambush by lawmen, not because they blundered into a situation where they got killed for opening fire on unsuspecting cops. I suspect that even in 1947 when this story was published the editors didn't think a story with cops lying in wait to assassinate people was appropriate. Not even for a crime comic. After all, the idea of Crime Does Not Pay was to show that crime, well, doesn't pay, not that lawmen could sometimes get as down and dirty as the criminals they were hunting.

Bryan Burrough, who wrote the 2005 book, Public Enemies, didn't think much of Bonnie and Clyde. He said of them: "Murderous children who longed for the big time, Bonnie and Clyde have garnered an artistic and cultural relevance in death they never found or deserved in life."

George Tuska, longtime comic book artist, illustrated the story. Tuska worked for comics from the late '30s until the 1970s when he retired. He had an illustrative style perfect for this type of story. He ended his career drawing superheroes for Marvel Comics. I didn't think that was his forte, but I loved his work in Crime Does Not Pay.

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