Lee and Kirby didn’t know it was the sixties

Tom Spurgeon worries at one of his artistic preferences:

for all that the Fantastic Four comics worked in the 1960s, I’m somehow not a big fan of placing the characters in the 1960s. That’s a nice picture and everything, I just don’t get a thrill out of seeing those characters “in their time” the way someone could surmise I might from my affection for the original Lee-Kirby run. What can I say? I’m complicated.

Actually, this makes perfect sense. There’s a huge difference between Lee and Kirby working on Fantastic Fourback in the sixties and somebody coming along forty-fifty years later and doing a pastiche or homage, drawing explicitily on our shared cultural conception of “the sixties”, like Alex Ross did with Marvels. In the latter case the pastichist is working in an aesthetic formula that has been retroactively defined as “sixties” and tries to adhere to this as best they can, working with a limited amount of both visual and storytelling cliches, at all times conscious of the desired impact on their readers. You can see that in the end product too: you get either the Leave it to Beaver/JFK Camelot, the Hippies and Summer of Love or the Vietnam/race riots/RFK version of the sixties.

Lee and Kirby had their own constraints of course, both unconscious and conscious ones (the comics code not being the least of them) but they lacked that creative straightjacket their modern day emulators willingly subject themselves to. They could evolve, while of necessity somebody like Alex Ross or Darwyn Cooke trying to place the Fantastic Four or the Silver Age DC characters in their own time has to remain static, consistent, recognisable.

For the reader, it’s the thrill of the familiar rather than the thrill of the new. Hence always disappointing and empty.

Fifty Essentials in Fifty Days 42: Essential Fantastic Four Vol. 06

cover of Fantastic Four Vol. 06


Essential Fantastic Four Vol. 06
Stan Lee, Archie Goodwin, Roy Thomas, John Buscema and friends
Reprints: Fantastic Four #111-137 (June 1971 – August 1973)
Get this for: The Fantastic Four within Kirby or Lee — three stars

Curse my luck! Just as with the Essential X-Men yesterday, I never managed to get volume five of Essential Fantastic Four either, which means I missed the end of the Lee-Kirby run. Instead volume six offers Big John Buscema on art duties, with Stan Lee, Archie Goodwin, then Lee again and finally Roy Thomas handling the writing. Good though these gents are, their work can’t compare to what Jack Kirby brought to The Fantastic Four. Even though Stan Lee himself is still around for a while here, the chemistry he had with Kirby is gone. Kirby and Lee could always spark ideas of each other, now Lee had to do it all himself.

It’s not all bad though. For a start, this volume contains the first Fantastic Four comic I ever read, #113, translated in Dutch as Vier Verdedigers Classics #59 which an uncle had in his collection — and I have now. That issue was the start of the Overmind saga and its cover is burned in my memory. It was not just the first FF comic I read, but must have been one of the earliest superhero comics I ever saw and it fascinated me. It’s a typical late Silver Age Marvel issue, continuing directly from the previous issue, with cameos from the Hulk and Agatha Harkness and a guest star appearance by the Watcher, while the action never stops, all drawn in that wonderful expressive, larger than life John Buscema style and it’s just crack to a certain kind of geek boy (or girl) like me. It may not have been half as good as what Lee and Kirby had been up to before, but I didn’t know anything about that.

The whole Overmind story showed that some of the creativity of that earlier run was still present in The Fanastic Four, as the Overmind turned out to be the last living survivor of an ancient alien race, the Eternals, scource of the cosmos, who had conquored all before them until they reached the planet Gigantus, which dwarved Galaxies and was their doom. As the Eternals’ own planet died beneath them, they put all their mental power into the Overmind and send him into the universe to sleep and wait until the time was right for the Overmind to come from beyond the stars and crush the universe! The Fantastic Four are helpless before him, even need to teamup with Doctor Doom to fight him but even that is not enough, though Doom does get his crowning moment of awesome as he fights an unequal battle with the Overmind but keeps standing for he is … DOOM! In the end though it’s the Stranger, revealed to be the combined might of the people from Gigantus who tames the Overmind.

The Overmind is however the only original villain to fight the Fantastic Four this volume, as for the most part they fight old enemies and even menaces originally introduced in other series. Diablo and Galactus return for rematches, they get involved with the Inhumans again, the Frightful Four come back with a new member, and so on. There are other changes in the status quo though. Roy Thomas lets Sue Richards quit the FF and makes Medusa of the Inhumans her replacement, while the relationship of Johnny Storm and Crystal also ends, as the latter falls for Quicksilver, the mutant Avenger. On the whole The Fantastic Four is much more soap opera orientated then before, less interested in exploration as well, more going for fighting “conventional” villains. It’s not as wild as the Lee-Kirby runs, but it’s far from bad either.

As for the art, John Buscema is as great as Kirby in his own right and I do like the grandeur he gives a character like the Watcher, as well as the body language he gives his characters. A more conventional artist than Kirby perhaps, but you can hardly fault him for that. I love how he poses his characters, the stances he gives them which betray their emotions and character. Every now and again, often in just some small throwaway panel I just have to stop and study his art, bask in it.

A letdown after the sheer mastery of the first four Essential Fantastic Four volumes? Perhaps, but Buscema’s art and the efforts of Lee, Goodwin and Thomas make up for a lot.

Fifty Essentials in Fifty Days 40: Essential Captain America Vol. 03

cover of Captain America Vol. 03


Essential Captain America Vol. 03
Stan Lee, Gary Friedrich, Steve Englehart, Gene Colan and friends
Reprints: Captain America #127-156 (July 1970 – December 1972)
Get this for: Captain America goes relevant — four stars

The previous volumes of Essential Captain America were heavy on the action, with Cap fighting enemies like the Red Skull and his Sleepers, Hydra, Baron Zemo, A.I.M. and Modok, often working together with Nick Fury and SHIELD. These were all fairly uncomplicated stories, but while the action continues in this volume, something does change as Captain America goes relevant. Stan Lee had dropped hints before that Cap was unhappy with his life and in #128 he went to find himself by touring America — somewhat of a cliche yes, but not so much when Cap did it.

And even on the road he’s not free of his old enemies, as he’s attacked by Batroc’s Brigade and runs into the Red Skull yet again. Nothing much changed there then, but like in Spider-Man at the same time, Lee does notice and comments on the changing attitudes of seventies America, having Cap interfere in a campus dispute and such, though as usual it turns out some supervillain was behind it. The same was of course the case with the return of Bucky Barnes. While Captain America has once again met with the disappointment of not having Bucky back, his next partner does stick around.

In issue 133 the Falcon, introduced in the previous volume, returns. The very next issue the series changed name to Captain America and the Falcon, showing how important this partnership was. The stories change again, becoming more gritty and streetlevel, centered on New York and Harlem though of course the supervillains are never far behind. Much of the background tension in the series at this point is provided by the race issue, as the Falcon has to find his place as what the world sees as a Black sidekick to a white man. It’s all very heavyhanded of course, both under Lee and his successor Gary Friedrich. So for example in #143 there’s the People’s Militia wanting to burn Harlem to the ground to “send a message to the honkies” that the Black man won’t be confined to the ghetto anymore, who turn out to have been manipulated by the Red Skull.

Old winghead goes through a lot of writers this volume btw. Starting with Lee for fifteen issues, then Gary Friedrich takes over for seven, then Gerry Conway gets to do four and ending with Steve Englehart for another four. Conway’s short run is the worst, with a complete mischaracterisation of Cap’s and Nick Fury’s relationship. Englehart starts strong, bringing back the fifties Captain America and Bucky as paranoid rightwing bigots. Friedrich was his usual self, a slightly hipper, with-it Stan Lee.

Artwise, this volume starts off well, with Gene Colan being a good match for Cap’s adventures. He’s succeeded by John Romita, who is slightly too clean cut for my liking here. Sal Buscema is the last artist to grace this volume, he’s doing alright but not great. It’s always been that way with Captain America, never a title to be considered for its art, save for some brief shining moments.

Somewhat of a mixed volume here then, not unmissable but for the hardcore fan. Like me.

Fifty Essentials in Fifty Days 34: Essential Fantastic Four Vol. 04

cover of Essential Fantastic Four Vol. 04


Essential Fantastic Four Vol. 04
Stan Lee, Jack Kirby and friends
Reprints: Fantastic Four #64-83 and Annual 5-6 (July 1967 – February 1969)
Get this for: Lee and Kirby at the peak of their game still — Five stars

I’m sorry, but I have to repeat the praise from last time: gods, Stan Lee and Jack Kirby were good together on The Fantastic Four. With the start of this volume they’ve already had more than sixty issues behind their belts and you’d expect that, especially after the creative burst of the last ten-fifteen issues that the pace would slacken a bit, but nothing is further from the truth. They keep on expanding the Marvel Universe, first with the coming of the Kree, including the Kree Sentry and Ronan the Accuser, then with the origin of what would later become Adam Warlock, finally with the discovery of Subatomica. Not to mention the birth of Sue and Reed’s son…

But there are also adventures with old friends, like the Inhumans and the Black Panther and old villains like the Mad Thinker and the Wizard return too. Apart from the Kree Sentry and Ronan, the only real new villain is Psychoman, introduced in Annual #5. There’s plenty of action and conflict here, but the focus does not lie on fighting supervillains, something which the Fantastic Four at any rate has never been about. The FF is at its best confronting some cosmic menace or going on a voyage of discovery, not handling the same villains that could also be menacing Iron Man next week.

There’s not much to say about the stories here, to be honest, that I haven’t said before. Lee and Kirby know these characters inside out, they know how they will respond in any situation they put them in. There’s always a bit of argument of who did what on these series and it’s no great secret that it was largely Kirby’s imagination that made The Fantastic Four so special. He gets to go wild again with Subatomica and the story introducing Him, who would later become Adam Warlock. His design work and sense of grandeur remain unsurpassed.

As does the rest of his art. It’s the cosmic decors and bizarre creatures and villains everybody remembers from Kirby, but his quiet moments are great too. He can get so much emotion from a few subtle lines in a character’s face, especially with the Thing, who wears his heart on his sleeve. You will never mistake one Kirby character for another. His story layout is excellent too, great sense of pacing and with everything he does in service to the story.

One thing that did annoy me about this volume was the neglect of the Invisible Girl, who had married Mr Fantastic the previous volume and who was now kept out of the action by her over anxious husband. It reflects the mores of the time that Sue, as a married woman, would need to be protected and kept away from danger but it comes over as incredibly sexist in retrospect. Things get worse when she’s pregnant. Obviously then she cannot join them on missions anymore, but the other three members keep her completely out of the loop for a time. There’s also Crystal, Johnny’s Inhuman girlfriend whose powers are arguably greater than any of the Fantastic Four, yet is completely wasted in most of the stories here…

That quibble aside, this is another perfect volume.

Fifty Essentials in Fifty Days 29: Essential Spider-Man Vol. 04

cover of Essential Spider-Man vol 4
Essential Spider-Man Vol. 4
Stan Lee, John Romita, Jim Mooney and friends
Reprints: Amazing Spider-Man #66-89, Annual #5 (November 1968 – October 1970)
Get this for: the continuing Spider-Man soap opera — four stars

The bastards! Not only does Essential Spider-Man Vol. 04 overlap with the first printing of Essential Spider-Man Vol. 03, but they also ended the collection of a cliffhanger with issue 89! Worse, I never did find volume 5 so I don’t know how things turned out. (Actually, I’ve read that story in Dutch reprints ages ago, but it would’ve been nice to have had in Essential format as well…

To be fair, it is almost impossible to present any decent chunk of Spidey’s career from this time without ending on a cliffhanger, as by now Stan Lee and John Romita have shifted into full gear on the Marvel superhero soap opera. Any given story may end, but the various plots and subplots continue. So for example in #68 Spidey attempts to foil a plot by the Kingpin to steal an ancient tablet from E.S.U. campus at the same time as Randy Robertson, the son of Joe Robertson, Peter Parker’s editor at the Bugle is protesting in the same building: they are framed for the robbery while Spidey is blamed for the loss of the tablet. In the next issue Spidey manages to track down the Kingpin and defeat him, winning back the tablet but then the Kingpin manages to trick the police into believing Spider-Man is workin for him. So the next issues finds our webhead wanted by the cops, got to mention fighting Quicksilver and finally managing to hand over the tablet to Gwen Stacy’s father, Captain Stacy. The very next issue it is stolen again by the Shokcer and Spidey has to chase after it again. This is not the end of it, as then another bunch of gangsters are after it, who then capture Curt “the Lizard” Conners to work on a translation of the tablet. Once Spidey finally gets the gangsters sorted, he then has to chase after the Lizard again…

It’s no wonder then, that after a story that kept evolving and finally ran for almost a full year, ten issues (#68 to #77), the very next story, “The Night of the Prowler”, meant to be a threeparter was cut to two parts because Spider-fans were sick and tired of continuing stories… Lee even managed to keep his promise for another three issues each featuring a complete story, yet by #83 he was back again with a multi issue storyline: the coming of the Schemer. At the same time, one issue stories or not, all the subplots were still continuing as well, with poor old Peter alternating between worrying about money, his Aunt May’s health and his relationship with Gwen and always worrying about how his career as Spider-Man complicated things. Like it or not soap opera storytelling was here to stay in Amazing Spider-Man and you better be reading every issue if you want to know what’s going on. (Though as always, Lee makes sure you get a hefty dose of recap each issue when needed).

What Lee also delivers a hefty dose of each month is troubles for Peter. The guy can’t catch a break in this volume: about the only thing that goes well for him is defeating the villains. Thanks to J. Johan Jameson and the Daily Bugle half of New York thinks he’s a crook, while the other half doesn’t believe in him at all. Struggling with money as always, Peter barely has time to keep up with his friends, while his romance with Gwen goes through rough patches, as he’s never there for her. Every time he does go out with her something comes up that means he has to ditch her to become Spider-Man. And meanwhile both Joe Robertson and especially Captain Stacy seem to get suspicious of him and Peter is never sure how much they know about his true identity…

Artwise, John Romita, inked by Jim Mooney is a treat as always. In fact, having seen some of these stories in colour as well I’m started to believe his work looks better in black and white. It’s easier to see his line work without the distraction of colour and realise how good he is. Or they are I should say, as Mooney’s inking has to have something to do with this as well. He gives Romita’s pencils just that little bit extra. As always Romita is best with women, as shown in #86, when the Black Widow comes to visit and gets a makeover…

One last thing that needs mentioning: the dialogue, which is rather on the “hep” side. This can either annoy or charm you: I liked it. Apart from The Fantastic Four the best work Stan Lee ever did was on Amazing Spider-Man. This volume shows this once again…