Featuring: Avengers
Release: September 8, 1966
Cover: November 1966
12 cents
Spellbinding story: Smilin’ Stan Lee
Awe-inspiring artwork: Dashin’ Donnie Heck
Lots of little lettering: Adorable Artie Simek
20 pages
| Previous | #627 | Next |
|---|---|---|
| Tales of Suspense #86, Story B | Reading order | Avengers #35 |
| Avengers #33 | Avengers | Avengers #35 |
The larger the beam, the more damage I can do…
This is Stan Lee’s final credited issue of The Avengers. He may have had a hand in next issue. But starting next issue, the official scripting duties will be passed to Roy Thomas.
He leaves without much fanfare. Especially for a man so known for talking to his audience. No goodbye, no notes about it. He wrote 34 issues of one of the most beloved superhero teams of all time, and then just handed off the duties.
And he doesn’t try to go out with a bang, not really. It’s the first part of a two-part story. I wonder if he does that intentionally, thinking it’s easier for a new writer to finish off a story than come up with a new one. His final Spider-Man (comic book) story will have a similar flavor, introducing a new villain and then leaving the second part to the incoming writer.
Last issue’s blurb about this issue, went “Next: Goliath changes!”
I took that to mean he was going to finally change his clothes and wash this outfit. The blurb in the letters page hinted at more, that this would relate to Goliath’s efforts to return to normal size. It also hinted we’d see the return of Bill Foster, and of Wanda and Pietro.
We do get the return of Bill Foster, not seen since, well, last issue. But nothing else along those lines happens in this issue, and we get an editor’s note apologizing and assuring us that a big change is coming for Goliath. I think the pun is intended.
I said Stan’s final issue of Avengers lacks fanfare, but to mark the occasion, he seems to be writing it in the style of a children’s book, so that’s something.
He is a bad man! He is robbing a bank!
See the cars outside the bank! They are police cars!
And of course we meet a new villain, the Living Laser. The Avengers tend to borrow a lot of villains from their component members, so I appreciate all the Avengers-specific villains.
There haven’t been too many. There’s been Kang and Immortus, so that’s two… err, well, at least one. But then Kang might be the FF villain Rama-Tut, who might be Dr. Doom. So…. counting is hard.
There’s been Count Nefaria, Swordsman, Power Man, the Collector… so they’ve had a few, but it’s good to see their rogues gallery grow.
Though Count Nefaria’s already cheated on them several times, battling Iron Man or the X-Men. You know that Batman gets a little sad whenever Superman fights the Joker.
However, I’m not convinced this is the best villain for the Avengers. This guy has a laser on his wrist. I’m sure it’s a powerful laser. But against a whole team of Avengers? He seems outmatched to me. While he’s firing at one Avenger, another can hit him on the head.
And I’m not enamored with the costume.
His laser wrist beam does allow him to fly. Because.
His real name is Arthur Parks. A creepy dude who was recently dumped by Wasp’s friend, but now is obsessively in love with the Wasp. And we all know the only way to win a woman’s heart is to demonstrate your power by destroying the Avengers.
The friend he broke up with was named Lucy Barton. The first character we’ve met with the surname of Barton… at least that we know of.
Showing his usual aptitude for writing female characters in a non-weird way, Stan describes Jan and Lucy’s conversation as: “a few rounds of the usual female questions and answers”.
Goliath officially rejoined the team a bit ago, and Wasp has been hanging around enough that by this point she seems to be officially back. Which is good. Part of the idea of the new Avengers was that it would spotlight characters not currently having solo adventures. But since Hank and Jan got kicked out of their own title by Namor, they’d been in limbo. It’s good to see what they are up to by featuring them in the Avengers.
Pietro and Wanda have been the somewhat in-limbo characters, though we’ve occasionally checked in on them chilling in Europe. The note last issue hinted we’d see them again soon, but it’s not this issue.
Living Laser attacks Goliath and Bill Foster. Goliath hides in a tree and then knocks the villain out.
I’d claimed this was a two-part saga, but it’s only page 13. And the story seems to be over with 27 pages to spare.
If a single Avenger took out the villain so easily, I guess I was right he was hardly a threat for the whole team.
Since he’s unconscious, all you have to do is take his wrist lasers away, and the problem is solved.
Oh, but you decide to not take his lasers away. So he wakes up and uses them.
I see.
Living Laser wins the second round, trapping Hawkeye and Captain America in a laser cage that’s closing in on them. So confident is he about his deathtrap, that he sees no reason to stick around and confirm it worked.
Okay, let’s talk about continuity. Specifically one panel that gives me a headache.
Here it is.
Cap’s shield has been enhanced with an alloy designed by Tony Stark before Tony Stark left for Washington.
I’ve decided what happened is a little unclear, and there’s one interpretation of events that doesn’t give me a headache. Hopefully you’ll buy that interpretation.
Recall, Tony Stark was captured by the Mandarin on the way to DC. Battled Ultimo in China. Came back to find his factories closed. Sought the Avengers for help but couldn’t find them. Battled Namor. Finally made it to DC then had a heart attack.
But we’ve also seen him cavalierly hanging out with the Avengers without a care reflecting on if Spider-Man should be a member. To my mind, that meeting has to take place when he has a breather, after all of that, not in the middle of the insanity.
The Marvel Chronology Project disagrees, and thinks that meeting is in the middle of all that, after fighting Namor and before traveling to DC. That it was in that gap that he attended an Avengers meeting, improved Cap’s shield, and that this was when Living Laser attacked. I just don’t like him doing too much while his factories are still closed down and he’s wanted for defying Congressional subpoena.
He also was able to take a quick phone call from Hank Pym to recommend Bill Foster as an assistant. That I thought he had time for between his battle with Namor and going to DC. The MCP and I are on the same page there.
Here’s an interpretation of events. The improvement to Cap’s shield was not made specifically because of the threat of the Living Laser. It’s something Stark had done in the past during a calm moment.
If he’s making tweaks to Cap’s shield, and it happened before he went to DC, then I would have it be well before, before Ultimo, before Galactus.
Otherwise I’d prefer it be after his return from his more recent battle with the Mandarin, well after his heart attack and Congressional testimony. Around the time they tested Spider-Man for membership–which I think occurred after his DC testimony–is very sensible. But Cap is specific the changes were made before Stark went to DC.
If we think the changes to Cap’s shield were made because of the threat of the Living Laser, then we need to fit this Living Laser story into the Secret Empire/AIM stuff, which gives me a headache.
So… you’ll give me less of a headache if you accept that in the recent past, Tony worked on making Cap’s shield tougher, and it wasn’t specifically motivated by the threat of the Living Laser. It just happens to to have improved the shield in laser-resistant ways. (And we’ll see next issue, it’s not all that laser-resistant anyway.)
So my ordering of these events differs from that of the MCP. The dialogue in that panel above gives weight to the MCP interpretation, that this story takes place soon after the Spider-Man/Avengers meeting and before Tony’s trip to DC. But Tony’s general state of distress from closed factories and arrest warrants makes me prefer that Spider-Man/Avengers meeting and thus this Living Laser story to take place later, after his life has calmed down.
Final note is that the MCP thinks the Cap story we just read with Cap on a SHIELD mission in Asia takes place near the end of this Living Laser story, in the middle of next issue. That’s fine with me, but I really don’t like squeezing Tony’s Avengers meeting in the middle of all his troubles.
Avengers Assemble!
Rating: ★★★☆☆, 50/100
Significance: ★★★★☆
Living Laser just about significant enough a villain for the 4 rating. Plus it’s Stan Lee’s final Avengers story. That’s worth something.
I like this issue for introducing the Living Laser, but dislike the inanity of knocking him out but not taking his lasers. We’ll let it balance at a 50.
Characters:
- (Living) Laser/Arthur Parks
- Captain America
- Wasp
- Goliath
- Hawkeye
- Lucy Barton
- Bill Foster
Story notes:
- Narration refers to villain simply as “the Laser”. He refers to himself as the Living Laser.
- Laser beam on wrist cuts through bank vault with ease.
- Living Laser escapes by making hole in steel-beamed ceiling. He returns the money because he was just after the glory of robbing a bank.
- Cap references the Serpents being defeated.
- Goliath still working on size-reduction; Jan to go shopping; Hawkeye has a date with Black Widow.
- Goliath is acting chairman pro tem.
- Police contact Avengers on Priority “A” frequency.
- Cap and Hawkeye think investigating a bank robbery is beneath them.
- Lucy Barton is engaged to be married to the son of the bank president, but had recently broken up with Arthur Parks, a research physicist.
- Arthur is in love with Jan, at first sight.
- Arthur Parks as the Living Laser will win Wasp’s heart by convincing her of his power.
- Laser ray allows Living Laser to fly.
- Bill Foster returns to continue research with Hank. Wasp goes to hairdresser while Hank and Bill get to work.
- Living Laser attacks Goliath in lab. He had followed them from Avengers HQ.
- Goliath hides in tree to knock out Living Laser, but decides not to disarm him.
- Living Laser adds miniaturized beam spreader to control units, making beam larger.
- Living Laser demolishes a building already in the process of being demolished. Destroys obsolete planes slated to be sent overseas. Destroys ship slated to be used as target.
- Cap and Hawkeye trapped in laser cage.
- Wasp caught in air vacuum then knocked out with gas.
| Previous | #627 | Next |
|---|---|---|
| Tales of Suspense #86, Story B | Reading order | Avengers #35 |
| Avengers #33 | Avengers | Avengers #35 |
