Featuring: Dr. Strange
Release: November 10, 1964
Cover: February 1965
12 cents
Edited by: Stan Lee, and his magic typewriter.
Script by: Don Rico, and his mystic fountain pen.
Illustrated by: Steve Ditko, and his miraculous lead pencil.
Lettered by: Sam Rosen, and his melancholy penpoint.
10 pages
| Previous | #300! | Next |
|---|---|---|
| Strange Tales #129 | Reading order | Fantastic Four #35 |
| Strange Tales #129 | Strange Tales | Strange Tales #130 |
Welcome to the 300th Marvel Age story! We’re almost 1% finished!
I think the periods that end each credit above are the first periods we have ever seen. Stan Lee holds to a pretty strict exclamation point-only policy. But then, Stan Lee didn’t write this.
For the second time this month, and the second time in our entire Marvel Age reading, Stan Lee claims no story credit for the issue. His name still comes first, but he takes credit for editing. The only other time we’ve seen this is with Tales to Astonish #64, published just a week earlier, and scripted by Leon Lazarus.
Rumor is that publisher Martin Goodman was concerned of the power Lee held by being the sole writer on these increasingly successful titles, and instructed Lee to diversify the writing staff. However, neither Rico nor Lazarus became regular writers. So if that was Goodman’s intent, he was not successful.
We’ve met Don Rico twice before, though he used the alias of N. Korok, when he worked on Tales of Suspense #52–53 and helped introduce Black Widow. The first time we saw him work with Stan, Stan credited himself with “story” and Rico with “plot”. I don’t know the difference either.
This is Rico’s final scripting assignment for Marvel, a company he’s worked for off and on for 25 years at this point. It’s pretty close to his last comics work. He’d basically already left comics behind for prose writing at this point. A couple miscellaneous pieces in the 70s, including the art for a short Captain America story.
Don Rico passed away in 1985 at the age of 72.
Human Torch once visited the 5th Dimension. Now we’re up to the 6th. Wonder how many there are.
Tiboro has a cool helmet.
Dr. Strange turns down an invitation to appear on a television program, the Twelfth Hour. In his absence, a panel of expert scientists seek to prove there is no such thing as the supernatural. The House of Shadows had a similar plot, in which a television skeptic sought to prove a house was not haunted. It didn’t turn out well for him. Let’s see what these skeptics get up to with this pagan idol they’ve found.
We get a cool-looking villain, Tiboro, in a strange dimension, where he has taken our panel of skeptics. A mystic duel with the tyrant. Good stuff, but pretty similar to a lot of what we’ve seen in this title.
There are some vague statements about mankind’s faltering ideals which attempt to lend more weight to the story. Tiboro has been summoned because our civilization has reached a point of decay and crisis. Dr. Strange acknowledges the truth in this, but thinks humanity will overcome its present dilemma.
It’s hard to know precisely what they’re getting at. Nuclear proliferation? Vietnam? Knowing Ditko, he and I may not agree on just where our ideals have faltered. He may have been more upset about protests against the Vietnam War than the war itself.
We do get to see the cloak used as an offensive weapon to attack Strange’s opponents and tangle them up.
It was used to similar effect in the Dr. Strange (2016) film.
Invocations:
- By the Mystic Moons of Munnopor
- By the Seven Rings of Raggadorr (invoked by both Dr. Strange and Ancient One)
- Hosts of the Vishanti
- In the name of the All-Seeing Agamotto
- Tiboro: the Vapors of Valtor
- Shades of the Seraphim and the Circle of the Cosmos
- Omnipotent Oshtur
Mostly familiar. We’ve see the Shades of Seraphim before. What’s new is the “Circle of the Cosmos” Strange asks the Seraphim to engulf him in. It is a protective shield which resists Tiboro’s wand, though not for long.
Valtor is usually spelled “Valtorr”.
The letters page notes next issue will be a “different type of series”. If anything, that is understated, a word not usually ascribed to Stan Lee.
Unfortunately… it’s so different that we’re not going to read it. I hope you enjoyed this Dr. Strange adventure because it’s the last we’ll read for a while. We’ll read Strange Tales #130 in just 7 posts… but only the Human Torch part.
When will we read the Dr. Strange part?
Well, this was story #300. If you peek at the reading order, which I’ve got listed out to #400 as of this writing, you will see Strange Tales #130-136… but never the B stories, where Dr. Strange will be found.
Why are we taking such a long pause in the reading of Dr. Strange?
Because Dr. Strange is starting a very long story. Next issue begins a 17-chapter adventure in which Dr. Strange faces the combined might of Dormammu and Baron Mordo and must uncover the secret of Eternity. It’s one of the single greatest stories in the history of Marvel Comics, and the first true epic in Marvel history.
Because it’s just one flowing story, we want to mostly read it together. We also want to think about continuity. At some point, Dr. Strange will attend a famous superhero wedding (hint hint), and it can’t be in the middle of that adventure. It must be before or after. General wisdom suggests his appearance in that wedding is before he gets embroiled in that arc. So we will wait until the other characters’ stories catch up to that wedding… almost a 100 stories away in our reading.
Thus, we bid a temporary farewell to Dr. Strange. But don’t worry, I have a feeling he’ll pop up in at least one other comic before we return here, maybe to help a certain webslinger out of a jam.
Rating: ★★★☆☆, 55/100
Significance: ★★★☆☆
You can find this story in Marvel Masterworks: Dr. Strange vol. 1 or Dr. Strange Epic Collection vol. 1: Master of the Mystic Arts. Or on Kindle.
Characters:
- Dr. Strange
- Tiboro
- Professor Schuyler
- Dr. Green
- Mr. James
- Ancient One
Minor characters:
- Joe (assistant to Mr. James)
Story notes:
- Full title: Beware… Tiboro! The Tyrant of the Sixth Dimension!
- “Screaming idol” of Tiboro excavated in Peru.
- Dr. Strange says 4 men vanished; there were only 3 panelists. No idea who the fourth man is. A host or producer?
- “Tiboro, Lord of the Seething Volcano, ancient rule from the dim dead past!”
- Tiboro used lightning to create his electroplasmic ray.
- Dr. Strange mentally urges Tiboro to fight without his wand.
- Dr. Strange invokes Agamotto to cast the spell of forgetfulness over those he saved.
| Previous | #300! | Next |
|---|---|---|
| Strange Tales #129 | Reading order | Fantastic Four #35 |
| Strange Tales #129 | Strange Tales | Strange Tales #130 |
