Featuring: Captain America Release: November 11, 1965 Cover: February 1966 12 cents Blazing story: Stan Lee Burning layouts: Jack Kirby Blistering artwork: George Tuska Burnt-out lettering: Artie Simek 10 pages
Nazism, and all the evil it stood for, are dead! They must never live again!
Solid cover design.
This arc opened pretty strong. Red Skull vowed that his revenge would come 20 years after the day of his death on “Der Tag” when the Sleepers awakened. And the Sleepers turned out to be giant robots that combined together to make an even bigger robot. Solid premise. But hasn’t done much with it. We met one robot, then another. In the finale, we meet the third.
Featuring: Captain America Release: October 12, 1965 Cover: January 1966 12 cents Spellbinding script by Stan Lee! Spectacular layouts by Jack Kirby! Sensational pencilling and scintillating delineation by George Tuska! Stereophonic lettering by A. Simek! 10 pages
I’ve seen the First Sleeper– and this is the Second! What can the Third be like??
Part 2 of a 3-part saga. 20 years to the day since the death of the Red Skull amidst the fall of Berlin in World War II. Red Skull’s revenge is 3 giant robots that will awaken and destroy the world. Last issue, the first one awoke. This issue… the second.
This one flies! Even though the story’s title is ironically, “Where Walks the Sleeper”.
And the two Sleepers join up to form an even bigger robot!
Featuring: Captain America Release: September 9, 1965 Cover: December 1966 12 cents Stan Lee, sultan of script! Jack Kirby, lord of layout! George Tuska, archduke of art! Sam Rosen, tired of lettering! 10 pages
You’re too late! You can’t… threaten me… now! There are three sleepers… and… when they awake… the Third Reich will rise again!
The story’s title is, “The Sleeper Shall Awake!”
Coincidentally the exact thing my cat says to me every morning when she wants breakfast.
While I would prefer to read whole comics at once, we read the first half of the issue a little bit earlier, because the Captain America and Iron Man stories of this issue align differently with the Avengers series.
This marks a turning point in Captain America’s adventures, as we’d spent the last several issues focused on Captain America’s adventures in World War II, which don’t create any editorial headaches regarding continuity with Cap’s appearances in Avengers. But now Stan claims readers have demanded modern Cap stories.
So we jump back to the present and see Cap relating the Greymoor Castle saga of last issue to the Avengers. They even answer some plot questions about the story.
Bewilderingly, Hawkeye did not know Bucky was dead.
And then is quite insensitive about it. “It happened more than 20 years ago!” Two notes. It was less than 20 years. Captain America slept for most of those.
We must find and train at least three special agents… the best!
We’re breaking my normal format for posts beyond the fact that this is plainly not a Marvel comic.
Normally, we read one story at a time, but I want to read the entire issue in one go. It consists of several shorter stories by different creative teams that add up to one larger story, all overseen by Wally Wood.
The issue has no credits, though sometimes artist signatures are visible. I have this in a collection, which credits the writers and artists involved when known. One or two names may be lost to history.
One of the disagreements between Wood and Lee was Lee taking the writer’s credit when Wood felt he was doing most of the writing. But this comic doesn’t credit anybody. In fact, most comics of the era don’t credit their creative teams. Lee was ahead of his time in trying to credit everybody. He just claimed a lot of credit for himself as well. Perhaps to Wood it was more about credit in the form of compensation than his name appearing in a box.
A couple notable differences from what we’ve been reading. First, the publisher is Tower Comics, a brand new publisher. Second, the price is 25 cents rather than 12 cents. Marvel prices its Annual comics at 25 cents, but its normal comics at 12 cents.
For 12 cents, Marvel comics give you 20-22 pages of content. The Annuals tend to be 70-72 pages for 25 cents, but with a lot of that dedicated to reprint material. This give you 60 pages of story for 25 cents.
Across the decades, comic prices had not changed much. Marvel Comics were 10 cents in 1939 and 10 cents in 1961 and 12 cents in 1965. They were very averse to raising the price, and had instead steadily decreased the page count over the years.
Thus, the page count of this comic is more reminiscent of 1940s comics than of its contemporary competitors. The idea that the individual stories all tie loosely together isn’t novel either, as 1940s Justice Society stories from DC had a similar structure, one Marvel imitated in the later 1940s with its All-Winners Squad.
We learn from the cover that THUNDER is an acronym. (Note for this blog, we’re not often including the “.”s in acronynms. I’m just too lazy to repeatedly type out S.H.I.E.L.D., finding it easier to type SHIELD.)
THUNDER: The Higher United Nations Defense Enforcement Reserves.
I can’t believe the “T” stands for “The”.
This title is a mix of superhero and spy adventure, with the acronym name likely inspired by “The Man from UNCLE”, and of course, the aforementioned SHIELD.
The concept was created by Len Brown and Wally Wood, who had previously co-created the science fiction trading card series, Mars Attacks.
Why are we reading this anyway? Because I wanted to see what Wally Wood got up to when he left Marvel. I think it will illuminate some discussions.
We’ll read through each story at a time, noting the title, creative team, and page count as we go. So don’t just stop when you get to the character lists. More stories to come below.
Featuring: Captain America Release: August 10, 1965 Cover: November 1965 12 cents Written with the passion of Stan Lee Laid-out with the power of Jack Kirby Pencilled with the punch of George Tuska Inked with the prowess of Joe Sinnott Lettered with the penpoint of Sam Rosen 10 pages
In a war, Bucky, many people suffer! It isn’t necessary to be in the armed forces.. to be a casualty!
Because this Greymoor Castle story is a 3-part saga, we’ve gotten a little ahead in Cap reading. This comic premieres the same day as Fantastic Four #44. They share an inker, Joe Sinnott. This is an important development, and I have a lot to say about Joe Sinnott. But I’m going to save it for when we get to FF#44. Stay tuned.
The FF comic will feature Sinnott properly inking Kirby. While Kirby did the layouts for this issue, the art is really Tuska/Sinnott.
It’s time now for the conclusion of this tale. Dr. Rawlings has betrayed his country to the Nazis. His sister Celia is opposed to this.
When the Nazis try to kill Celia, Rawlings at last turns against them.
Featuring: Captain America Release: July 8, 1965 Cover: October 1965 12 cents Story by Stan Lee Layouts by Jack Kirby Lettering by S. Rosen Art by George Tuska 10 pages
My own nation has refused to recognize my talents! But the Nazis are willing to pay me handsomely for my help!
We get a new artist, George Tuska. “One of the giants from the golden age of comics”, says Lee. As with most new artists, Lee still needs Kirby to lay out the story for them.
Tuska has worked in the industry since 1939, and became well known in the 1950s for his stellar work on crime comics. His first work with Marvel was in 1949. Lately, he’s been focused on newspaper strips, having taken over Buck Rogers in 1959. Here’s a sampling of his earlier work.
Zanzibar the Magician, Mystery Men Comics #1, Fox, 1939
Tom Barry of the Royal Mounted, Wonderworld Comics #4, Fox, 1939
Featuring: The Watcher Release: July 9, 1964 Cover: October 1964 12 cents A tale of most compelling merit by: Stan Lee Illustrations of singular excellence by: George Tuska Lettering of breath-taking adequacy by: Art Simek 5 pages
If you caught an early draft of my write-up for the previous issue, you saw me accidentally claim that was the final Watcher story. Either way, it ends with so little fanfare, that it’s hard to tell.
It’s hard to make a story about a character who never does anything. You’re tempted to have him do something in every issue, which is exactly what they did for this series.
The editor enthusiastically welcomes returning artist George Tuska. Tuska’s been working in comics since 1939, and worked for Marvel in the 1950s. Let’s see a sampling of his work.
The samples of Tuska’s work are from (in order, left to right, top to bottom):
Mystery Men Comics #1 (1939)
64 Pages of New Captain Marvel Adventures #2 (1941)
Crime Does Not Pay #22 (1942)
Casey – Crime Photographer #1 (1949)
Strange Tales #1 (1951)
Adventures Into Terror #7 (1951)
If Lee was that excited to have Tuska back, you’d think he could have found a more interesting assignment than filling in on the final Watcher story.
Tuska will continue to do occasional fill-in work for Marvel over the next few years, before eventually settling into a longterm stint on Iron Man.
The rest of the series had been drawn by Stan’s brother, Larry Lieber. Sad he’s not the one to bring it to a close. He’s already started what will be a very long run on Rawhide Kid. We’re not generally reading the western titles, so this is the last we’ll see of Larry for a while. He will pop up again here and there for the occasional fill-in issue or special, so this isn’t good-bye forever.
