Fantastic Four Annual 3

Bedlam at the Baxter Building!

Featuring: Fantastic Four
Release: July 1, 1965
Cover: 1965
25 cents
Written by: Stan Lee
Drawn by: Jack Kirby
Inked by: Vince Colletta
Lettered by: Artie Simek
23 pages

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I now pronounce you man and wife! You may kiss your bride!

It’s the wedding of the century. Today’s the day. Half the Marvels have been invited! And the rest of them are turning up anyway!

This issue represents by far the largest gathering of heroes and villains yet, forever binding these disparate characters into a universe.

This issue represents the idea that there is no status quo, that these characters are at their best when they change and grow. Forward momentum is an essential ingredient to storytelling. Genuine, non-illusionary, change.

This is the most significant moment in the early Marvel Universe.

I think I’d have come up with a better title than “Bedlam at the Baxter Building”.

I wish Chic Stone or Joe Sinnott had been the inker. A few months too late to have Stone and one month too early to have Sinnott. Also, Colletta is uniquely suited to a long special issue with many characters because he’s famously expedient.

I appreciate that the headline takes for granted the public knows who Reed and Sue are without the need for surnames or superhero identities. The cover does the same for its audience.

Pretty cool this worked out to be the 400th story in our reading order. Currently on track to also have the 500th story be a particularly special issue of Fantastic Four as well. When we read Avengers #1, it was the 100th story, but then I went and retroactively mucked with the ordering.

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Tales of Suspense #67

Where Walk the Villains!

Featuring: Iron Man
Release: April 8, 1965
Cover: July 1965
12 cents
Written by our roguish writer: Stan Lee
Pencilled by our prankish penciller: Don Heck
Inked by our impish inker: Mickey Demeo
Lettered by our other letter: S. Rosen
12 pages

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The drama from last issue continues. Happy has quit; Pepper is sad; she blames Iron Man.

Count Nefaria of the Maggia returns, but with a new gimmick and identity. He now calls himself the Master of Dreams. Perhaps also Dream-Maker or Dream-Master; Stan can’t decide from one page to the next. He controls Iron Man’s dreams and sends old foes against him; if Iron Man dies in the dream, he will die.

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Tales of Suspense #56

The Uncanny Unicorn!

Featuring: Iron Man
Release: May 12, 1964
Cover: August 1964
12 cents
Written with consummate skill by: Stan Lee
Illustrated with blazing drama by: Don Heck
Lettered with bloodshot eyes by: S. Rosen
18 pages

The time of the science fiction short stories has ended, allowing this comic to devote a full 18 pages to telling Iron Man’s story. I’m sure that making it longer was the missing ingredient in making it good.

This issue, Iron Man battles the Unicorn. I’m undecided if that name conjures a powerful Soviet menace. It doesn’t sound like something a tough bad guy would call themself, but then I wouldn’t want to have to fight a unicorn.

The character arc of the issue is that Tony Stark decides to give up being Iron Man and live a normal life. He then feels guilty when Happy is injured by the Unicorn because he had neglected his responsibilities.

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Tales of Suspense #52

The Crimson Dynamo Strikes Again!

Featuring: Iron Man
Release: January 10, 1964
Cover: April 1964
12 cents
Plot by: Stan Lee
Story by: N. Korok
Art by: Don Heck
Lettering by: S. Rosen
13 pages

N. Korok is an alias for Don Rico. Stan credits Rico with the story and himself with the plot. I would love to know what Stan thinks the difference between “plot” and “story” is. Rico had been working with comics, and Marvel Comics in particular, since 1939, as artist or writer or editor. By this time, he had mostly left comics behind and become a successful novelist– likely why he’s not using his real name on this comic work. Any comics work by Rico from this point forward will be quite uncommon.

Khrushchev decides it’s time to deal with the traitorous Crimson Dynamo. He sends for Russia’s best agents, Boris and Natasha.

No, not those two.

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Tales of Suspense #46

Iron Man Faces the Crimson Dynamo!

Featuring: Iron Man
Release: July 9, 1963
Cover: October 1963
12 cents
Story plot: Stan Lee
Script: R. Berns
Art: Don Heck
13 pages

The cover bears a resemblance to the Ant-Man cover we just examined. The hero and villain are not actually in the same picture, with one confined to a separate panel.

Get it? “Shocked”.

Professor Vanko is Russia’s top scientist. He has built a suit that makes him master of electricity, the Crimson Dynamo. By the end, Tony Stark tricks him into defecting to the West.

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