Featuring: Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD
Release: November 11, 1965
Cover: February 1966
12 cents
Rapturously written by: Stan Lee
Resplendently drawn by: Jack Kirby
Rollickingly inked by: Frank Ray
Reluctantly lettered by: Sam Rosen
12 pages
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| Strange Tales #140, Story B | Reading order | Strange Tales #141, Story B |
| Strange Tales #140, Story B | Strange Tales | Strange Tales #141, Story B |
If he’s what ya say, he’s the most dangerous guy in the world!
Jack Kirby returns to full pencils after several issues of laying out the series for various artists, with Frank Giacoia on inks. The difference is noticeable, though I did quite appreciate John Severin’s take on these characters.
They do what is to my mind a very weird thing. The 7-part Hydra Saga is really 6.5 parts. As it’s over by page 7 of this story. They then just begin their next saga mid-issue. It’s a bit obnoxious. I’d like to keep the arcs together to best appreciate them, but Stan seems to want to end everything on cliffhangers now, so the arcs aren’t well-defined.
They’ll head-scratchingly do the same thing next month with Fantastic Four.
We will take a break after this issue. We’ll have started the first few pages of the Mentallo/Fixer Saga, and we’ll return to it one day.
First up, the half-issue Hydra finale. The organization was defeated, but Imperial Hydra, in his true identity as Arnold Brown, is about to destroy the place, killing everybody.
In a cool twist ending, he is defeated not by Nick Fury, but by his own anonymity. Hydra agents who had never seen him without his cloak don’t recognize him and kill him.
That just leaves his daughter to deal with. She’s a top lieutenant in a global terrorist organization. She did betray them to help SHIELD in the end, and these circumstances can weigh in at her trial.
But wait. Nick is letting her get away. Why is he doing that? His agents want to shoot her dead. I’m sure it’s not because she’s an attractive woman, Nick.
We end the Hydra Saga with a schematic of their secret tunnel system.
No time to catch our breath. The next four pages introduce SHIELD’s ESP Division, known as “The Thinkers”.
Thinking. A dangerous pastime.
We learn the origin of Mentallo. He was born with the power to project thoughts. Perhaps this makes him a mutant. He became the basis for SHIELD’s ESP Division, before they realized he was bad, and he went on the run. What he can do naturally, SHIELD has been learning to do with machinery.
Mentallo decides to team up with a famous criminal known as the Fixer. This is an inventor, and not to be confused with the Daredevil villain of the same name, who fixes boxing fights, and is responsible for the murder of Daredevil’s father.
The story really doesn’t get very far. They introduce the two villains. One decides to team up with the other and considers making contact. But hasn’t yet done so. Just remember where we are. We’ll come back to this eventually.
The defeat of Hydra makes a good spot to pause, and the Dr. Strange/Dormammu conflict also reaches an okay spot to pause this issue. We’ve read a lot of Strange Tales in a row, and we’re now about 4 months ahead of the other Marvel titles. Let’s catch up.
Rating: ★★★★½, 63/100
Significance: ★★★★☆
Fantastic Four #36 introduced the Frightful Four and was a key turning point in the title’s rise to greatness. But it’s no longer one of the Best We’ve Read. This drops Fantastic Four to #3 in entries on the list, after Spider-Man and Dr. Strange.
Characters:
- Colonel Nick Fury
- Mentallo
- Fixer
- Dum Dum Dugan
- Agent H
- Gabe Jones
- Arnold Brown/Imperial Hydra
- ESPer male agent
- ESPer female agent
- ESPer older male agent
Story notes:
- Full title may be: Operation “Brain Blast!”
- Hydra mostly captured; only Imperial Hydra escaped.
- Bazooka Drill used to break through steel door.
- Imperial Hydra’s personal guard kills him because they don’t recognize him.
- Agent H uses vacuum shoes to escape. Nick lets her go.
- Diagram of Hydra tunnels under city.
- SHIELD ESP (Extra-Sensory Perception) Division known as “Thinkers”.
- Thinkers save Fury from gun with Alarm Waves in test. Scramble Helmet shields him.
- Mentallo was born with power to project thoughts and a former agent of SHIELD. Forced out for trying to gain control. Used his power to stay in hiding.
- Fixer builds things out of prison materials to escape cell. Inventor to rival Tony Stark.
| Previous | #427 | Next |
|---|---|---|
| Strange Tales #140, Story B | Reading order | Strange Tales #141, Story B |
| Strange Tales #140, Story B | Strange Tales | Strange Tales #141, Story B |
