Tales to Astonish #63, Story B

A Titan Rides the Train!

Featuring: Hulk
Release: October 1, 1964
Cover: January 1965
12 cents
Only Stan Lee could have written this monumental masterpiece!
Only Steve Ditko could have drawn these powerful panels!
Only Geo. Bell could have inked this sensational saga!
Only S. Rosen would have lettered his name S. Rosen!
10 pages

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We’re nominally on the March books, but we just got up to June with Thor comics and July with X-Men, and now we need to go back to October of 1964 for Hulk stories.

We read the first story of this issue a while back. We’ve been skipping the Hulk stories because they are so intertwined with each other. Hulk is in the middle of a saga that really began in issue 60. We’re going to try to do the whole saga in something like three chunks.

Let’s review the story so far.

Dr. Bruce Banner is a weapons builder on a military base who is frequently absent. General Thunderbolt Ross has little patience for Banner and is uspet his daughter Betty seems so fond of the “weakling”. Of course, Bruce is also the Hulk. He recently decided that strain was the trigger of his uncontrollable changes into a monster with its own personality.

Dr. Banner has built a robotic suit, but a spy has stolen it. Hulk fights the spy in the robot suit. After a couple encounters, the robot is tossed into a bottomless pit.

Major Glen Talbot has been hired as the chief of security, with a particular remit to look into Dr. Banner’s strange behavior and any connection between Banner and the Hulk. He also seems fond of Betty, and the General would much prefer his daughter choose someone like the Major.

Hulk finds himself captured by the military. Rick has been spending time with Captain America and the Avengers, but still feels a debt to the Hulk. He returns to the New Mexico military base and helps Dr. Banner escape the military. This was likely before the Avengers’ battle with Immortus.

We learn the spy was working for someone named the Leader, whose face we do not see. Since the spy failed, the Leader dispatches the Chameleon to investigate what happened. When the Hulk foils Chameleon’s plans, Leader decides to get personally involved. He has just perfected a creation called the Humanoid.

And that’s where we left off.

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