Journey Into Mystery #86

On the Trail of the Tomorrow Man!
Featuring: Thor
Release: September 4, 1962
Cover: November 1962
12 cents
Plot: Stan Lee
Script: Larry Lieber
Art: Jack Kirby
Inks: Dick Ayers
13 pages

I read this story in Marvel Masterworks: The Mighty Thor vol. 1.

There’s a pretty significant milestone here. Relatively full credits are given at the bottom of the first page. Many comics we’ve read had no credits at all. Others bore a signature here or there. The Fantastic Four have featured the signatures of Stan and Jack fairly prominently. For the first time, we see explicit credit given to Lieber and Ayers, along with a breakdown of who did what. Online sources were generally clear Lee and been doing the plotting on Thor (though it’s likely Kirby also deserves credit) and leaving the scripting to Lieber. The table of contents of the Marvel Masterworks edition simply refers to Lee and Lieber as writers. Fantastic Four #9 debuts the same day and also features similarly robust credits. We’ll cover that shortly.

I’ve been noting the main credits above–writers and artists–as best I can, drawing from the credits given in the collection I’ve been reading or from online sources. I’m not trying to be a definitive source for credits, so have not been giving full credits myself. I don’t mention above the lettering of Artie Simek or the coloring of Stan Goldberg. I mean no disservice to their talents; it’s just not the focus of this blog. (Notably, I am often looking at these reprint editions, not the originals, and they have often been recolored… so I am anyway in no position to speak intelligently to Goldberg’s coloring).

Zarrko the Tomorrow Man comes from the utopian future of 2262. It is a world without weapons or war. He is seemingly the only evil person on the planet, so he invents a time travel machine to steal a Cobalt bomb from 1962, causing Thor to follow him into the future.

The military officer is not named, but he sure looks like General Thunderbolt Ross to me. If so, this would be the first crossover of the Marvel Age! However, CMRO and MCP don’t seem to think that is General Ross. Just another mustached general? As another piece of evidence in favor of Ross, the narration notes this is taking place in New Mexico.

Thor is pretty famous for talking in an old style of English. We here see him use the words ‘thy’ and ‘whence’. In full disclosure, I also use the word ‘whence’ to mean ‘from when’, but have always strongly disliked the seemingly redundant phrasing Thor uses here: “from whence”. We haven’t seen him use any archaic language in the first few issues, and he doesn’t use it at the beginning of the issue here. When he’s talking to military commanders, he’s speaking in plain, modern English. When he speaks to Odin, he adopts some archaic terms. Odin as well uses the phrase “thou hast”. I’ve seen this many times. People who have learned to speak without an accent, but will switch to their native accent when they call their parents at home.

It’s a little unclear if the language affectations are appropriate to Thor. These words today are most associated with Shakespeare, as that’s the time period when they were popular. England in the 14th through 17th century. The word ‘thou’ was an informal version of ‘you’, which faded from use as old class systems broke down. The word ‘you’ is old, but it was less common and more formal 500 years ago. Even if this language were familiar to Thor, surely addressing the monarch of Asgard calls for more formal language. But really, it seems like any english familiar to the Norse gods should be even older English, and as earth languages go, Old Norse or Old German seem like they should be more familiar to these Norse gods.

Of course, all this hinges on this unanswered question of just who Thor is, and why Don Blake turns into him. For the most part, he talks like Don Blake. Even early in the issue, he seems more like an American than an old god, when he describes his willingness to help the military keep the “free world secure”. But, when he calls Odin, he refers to him as his father, and starts talking in shakespearean English.

I return again to the reproduction aspect of all this. I don’t have Journey Into Mystery #86 or easy access to it. I have a modern reprinting of it as part of the Marvel Masterworks series, and access to some online copies, but those are also reproductions– but not the same reproductions, so I don’t know exactly what the original issue looks like. My collection has Thor say: “to the unknown from whence this metal comes”; the online version I posted above removes the word “from”. Modern English accepts both phrasings as legitimate, but I feel strongly the word ‘from’ is out of place there and would never use it. One reprint editor agreed with me. Based on the spacing in the word balloon, I would guess Lieber originally used the phrase “from whence”.

Thor’s hammer has demonstrated all sorts of weird powers. Summoning a storm is its main thing, but we learned last issue that it can emit anti-matter particles. Now, he spins his hammer faster than light to travel through time. It at first seems like this can only happen because Odin is granting a special blessing, but then Odin says, “Hast thou forgotten, my son?”

In addition to learning new powers of the hammer, we see a new power for Thor: he can exhale with hurricane force. As a natural extension, this would allow Thor to keep from being trapped in an alternate dimension.

We twice in this issue see countdown effects. Once leading up to the bomb test, and once when Thor loses his hammer, giving him 60 seconds before losing his powers. It gives us an opportunity to reflect on time in panels. How much time does a single panel cover? How much time takes place between panels. Kirby’s style for panels is to base them around a single major action, with the next panel showing the next major action.

Here we get one panel for water flooding into the room, and another to note the robots have come to a complete stop due to the water short-circuiting them. We see from the countdown to Thor losing his powers that each panel covers about 4 seconds and the “gutter” between the panels also covers about 4 seconds.

This issue has several minor milestones: the introduction of more robust credits; Thor adopting his shakespearean dialect; and, if that is indeed Thunderbolt Ross, the first Marvel Age crossover. This is also the first interaction we see between Thor and Odin.

Rating: ★★★☆☆, 50/100
Significance: ★★★★☆

Characters:

• Zarrko/Tomorrow Man
• Thor
• General “Thunderbolt” Ross
• Odin
• Jane Nelson

Minor characters:

• Bob ( military officer)

Story notes:

• We glimpse the future of 2262 (the year is referred to explicitly, also as “3 centuries from now” and as the “23rd” century)
• 2262 is a utopian world free of weapons or war.
• Zarrko is an evil genius of the future who invents a time machine; Dr. Doom already had one 3 centuries earlier.
• “I’m happy to play a part in keeping the free world strong and secure against the forces of tyranny” — Thor
• Thor helps the military test experimental weapons
• Thor believes he can survive cobalt bomb (C-bomb) explosion. Based on what evidence?
• As with Puppet Master (Puppet-Master?) and Submariner (Sub-Mariner?), they can’t decide how to spell the villain’s name. They are inconsistent within the issue. Is it Tomorrow-Man or Tomorrow Man?
• Second time we see the phrase “uru hammer”
• “Behold the plight of thy eldest son, Thor!” — Thor to Odin
• Thor’s first use of “thy”
• Thor has future resident disguise himself as decoy Thor
• Zarrko has delta-electron gun to send Thor into another dimension
• Narrator notes weapons testing is taking place in New Mexico desert
• Jane Nelson referred to as Jane. Last name only given in first appearance.
• “If only I could work for Thor– instead of the colorless Dr. Blake!” — Jane

#27 story in reading order
Next: Incredible Hulk #4
Previous: Fantastic Four #8