sam rosen – Page 2 – Coke ⊕ Comics

Daredevil #23

DD Goes Wild!

Featuring: Daredevil
Release: October 11, 1966
Cover: December 1966
12 cents
Story: Stan (The Man) Lee
Art: Gentleman Gene Colan
Inks: Fearless Frank Giacoia
Lettering: Swingin’ Sam Rosen
20 pages

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	INTERLUDE	Captain Atom #83, Story B
Daredevil #22	Reading order	Sgt. Fury #36
Daredevil #22	Daredevil	Daredevil #24

Surrender, Daredevil… or suffer the fatal consequences!

We seem to have two very similar opening splash pages.

Stan explains that Gene had drawn both, and they liked both, so they used both. I think Gene just likes his splash pages because it’s less pictures to draw.

As part of a brilliant plan to protect his secret identity, Matt told Karen he was going to pretend to be Daredevil. And he put on a Daredevil costume in front of her. They then went to the arena, where the real Daredevil showed up. And then she couldn’t find Matt in his Daredevil costume.

Daredevil #22

The Tri-Man Lives!

Featuring: Daredevil
Release: September 1, 1966
Cover: November 1966
12 cents
Written with rapture by: Stan Lee
Drawn with drama by: Gene Colan
Delineated with delight by: Giacoia & Ayers
Lettered with the ball game on by: Sam Rosen
20 pages

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Avengers #35	Reading order	Daredevil #23
Daredevil #21	Daredevil	Daredevil #23

I know it’s utterly insane, but I can’t help thinking of Daredevil every time I look at Matt! I know a blind attorney can’t possibly be a costumed super-hero… and yet…!

We checked in with Daredevil at the start of the Secret Empire mess because his story was entangled with Spider-Man’s battle against the Rhino. We paused, but now need to look back and remind ourselves where we were some.

Matt Murdock was wanted for Rhino’s defense council, but he couldn’t be found, because he was a prisoner of the Owl. When the Rhino broke out of prison, we saw that Matt had returned safely from the Owl’s island, and considered going after the Rhino, but decided to let Spider-Man handle it.

We now go back in time a bit as this issue opens with Daredevil just escaping from Owl’s island.

But by page 3, we are back in the present, in a scene set after his appearance in Amazing Spider-Man #43. So, the first two pages took place a few days back. But it’s been quite the few days in the lives of the Marvel heroes. And starting on page 3, a longer saga begins.

I hope this is the last time I refer to the continuity of the Secret Empire saga.

Avengers #35

The Light that Failed!

Featuring: Avengers
Release: October 11, 1966
Cover: December 1966
12 cents
Edited (ecstatically) by Stan Lee
Scripted (surprisingly) by Roy Thomas
Drawn (dynamically) by Don Heck
Lettered (legibly) by Sam Rosen
20 pages

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Avengers #34	Reading order	Daredevil #22
Avengers #34	Avengers	Avengers #36

To be an Avenger is to surrender a part of one’s life… to be ever at the beck and call of humanity! Still, in these quiet moments, each of the others has another human being to whom he can reach out… only I have no one… no life, except behind the mask of the Red-White-and-Blue Avenger!

This begins a 70-issue run on Avengers by Roy Thomas. Thomas will have his highs and lows over those 70 issues, and it will take him a minute to warm up and get into the groove, but on the whole I think his Avengers will be much better than Stan Lee’s.

We’ll try to note along the way milestones marking an increase in quality. I’ll offer a hint that a new artist is going to help a lot.

The slow move of Stan off scripting duties, and the expanding bullpen of artists… this is a transition into the next era of Marvel Comics. Where it’s not Stan and Jack and Steve making most of the comics.

Strange Tales #155

Death Trap!

Featuring: Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD
Release: January 10, 1967
Cover: April 1967
12 cents
Edited by: Stan Lee (Marvel’s James Bond)
Written and drawn by: Jim Steranko (Marvel’s Man Flint)
Letted by: Sam Rosen (Marvel’s Secret Squirrel)
12 pages

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Strange Tales #154, Story B	Reading order	Strange Tales #155, Story B
Strange Tales #154, Story B	Strange Tales	Strange Tales #155, Story B

And so saying, the SHIELD agent’s finger begins to tighten on the trigger… his trance-like face telling of the incredible turmoil seething within… Then, the overwhelming force of the spell sweeps over his ego, as once again, the Supreme Hydra’s command echoes through his mind…

Jim Steranko is now writing and drawing Nick Fury, Agent Of SHIELD, and credited for doing so. Wally Wood had wanted that for Daredevil but was turned down.

Does this show Lee’s faith in the newcomer Steranko? Or is it just that he’s busy and become somewhat indifferent?

Steranko delivers quite the opening splash page, so maybe he’ll do okay with this assignment.

What are we looking at? It’s called the Vortex Beam. It seems to be like a tractor beam they use as a fancy elevator. Best as I can tell, people get onto a disc on the ground and then get lifted onto the Heli-Carrier. We see some VIPs and a strange device coming on the ship that way.

Strange Tales #154, Story B

Clea Must Die!

Featuring: Dr. Strange
Release: December 8, 1966
Cover: March 1967
12 cents
A mystic Marvel masterwork by: Stan Lee and Marie Severin
Lettered by: Sam Rosen
10 pages

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Strange Tales #154	Reading order	Strange Tales #155
Strange Tales #154	Strange Tales	Strange Tales #155

Do as you will, Spectral One! Dr. Strange cannot be harmed by the truth!

Where were we? Oh yes, Dr. Strange thought he had rescued Clea. But it turned out to be a Mindless One in disguise.

I’m sympathetic, having grown up thinking I’d been successful in finding a woman only to be constantly told, “Our princess is in another castle.”

Strange Tales #154

Beware… the Deadly Dreadnought!

Featuring: Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD
Release: December 8, 1966
Cover: March 1967
12 cents
Edited by: Stan Lee
Scripted by: Roy Thomas
Plotted and drawn by: Jim Steranko
Lettered by: Sam Rosen
12 pages

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Strange Tales #153, Story B	Reading order	Strange Tales #154, Story B
Strange Tales #153, Story B	Strange Tales	Strange Tales #154, Story B

Leave the thinkin’ to AUTOFAC…

The training wheels are off for Jim Steranko. In his first couple issues, he’d been drawing off layouts from Kirby, but Kirby has stepped away. The newcomer Steranko has drawn this all by himself.

And he even gets a plotting credit for his work. Something it took Ditko and Kirby years to get. That folks like Orlando and Wood left the company over.

Roy Thomas was also on scripting duties last issue, but this won’t be a regular gig for him. This is his second and final turn on the series.

AUTOFAC is the AI system that does SHIELD’s thinking. If they feed it what they know about Supreme Hydra, it will deduce their identity.

Can you, reader, deduce the identity of Supreme Hydra before AUTOFAC can? If not, maybe we should just surrender to AI.

We get a detailed diagram of the Heli-Carrier. Below the story notes, we recorded all the rooms and notes.

Strange Tales #153, Story B

Alone, Against the Mindless Ones!

Featuring: Dr. Strange
Release: November 10, 1966
Cover: February 1966
12 cents
Stupefying story by: Spellbinding Stan Lee!
Inconceivable illustration by: Mystical Marie Severin!
Legendary lettering by: Sardonic Sammy Rosen!
10 pages

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Strange Tales #153	Reading order	Strange Tales #154
Strange Tales #153	Strange Tales	Strange Tales #154

I must endure their blows… regardless of the pain… By the Omnipotent Oshtur, I shall not fail… I shall not fall!

After Ditko left, Bill Everett became the regular artist on Dr. Strange for the next half dozen issues. And I was unimpressed. But I do really like Bill Everett. Last post, I rattled off Sub-Mariner, Venus, and Daredevil. All great works by him.

We get a new artist. Marie Severin. We haven’t seen her work yet. We saw her coloring when we read an old tangentially related EC comic. We saw an issue of Nick Fury illustrated by John Severin. Some possible connection, there. Siblings, perhaps.

But she’s actually been with Marvel for the entirety of our reading, just one of those unsung heroes behind the scenes, working on the production of the comics, sometimes as a colorist, perhaps lending a hand to some bits of art here or there.

Tales of Suspense #85, Story B

The Blitzkrieg of Batroc!

Featuring: Captain America
Release: September 8, 1966
Cover: January 1967
12 cents
A Stan Lee Jack Kirby premium presentation
Inimitable inking by: Frank Giacoia
Laborious lettering by: Sam Rosen
10 pages

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Strange Tales #150	Reading order	Strange Tales #151
Tales of Suspense #85	Tales of Suspense	Tales of Suspense #86

Indeed, eet shall be for zee last time, mon ami…! For none may strike Batroc in such a manner… wizout paying zee price!

“This must be the place,” thinks Cap, anticipating David Byrne.

In Tales of Suspense #76, Captain America defeated Batroc, but a SHIELD agent on assignment succumbed to poison and was hospitalized. We didn’t learn her name. She reminded Cap of a woman he’d known in World War II, a woman whose name we also didn’t learn.

Strange Tales #150

Hydra Lives!

Featuring: Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD
Release: August 9, 1966
Cover: November 1966
12 cents
Script… Stan Lee
Layouts… Jack Kirby
Pencils… John Buscema
Inks… Frank Giacoia
Letterings… Sam Rosen
Ear plugs… Irving Forbush
12 pages

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X-Men #26	Reading order	Tales of Suspense #85, Story B
Strange Tales #149, Story B	Strange Tales	Strange Tales #150, Story B

‘Cut off a limb, and two more shall takes its place!’ We were right… Hydra still lives!

We read the second half of this issue already. Last issue really ended the AIM stuff, and this issue begins the return of Hydra arc, so I wanted that cutoff. But the Dr. Strange stories cut a bit differently, as this issue ends the Kaluu arc and next issue properly begins the Umar arc.

Kirby is on hand for the layouts, but the main art credit goes to John Buscema. We spoke of him at length with his return to Marvel in Tales to Astonish #85, published one week prior to this. And we’ll be seeing a lot more of him.

We begin with Nick in a strange contraption performing a dangerous test. So dangerous, he won’t let anyone else do it. It’s a prototype Overkill Horn. They are concerned an enemy has a real one.

Perhaps a Super-Overkill Horn. Adding the word Super in front of something already called the Overkill Horn seems like, well, overkill.

X-Men #26

Holocaust!

Featuring: X-Men
Release: September 1, 1966
Cover: November 1966
12 cents
Editing.. Stan Lee
Script.. Roy Thomas
Art… Werner Roth
Inks.. Dick Ayers
Lettering… Sam Rosen
Mayan headdresses… Irving Forbush
20 pages

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X-Men #25	Reading order	Strange Tales #150
X-Men #25	X-Men	X-Men #27

I hate to sound like a poor man’s Hawkeye, but I can’t seem to stop myself! Why should Jean prefer Scott over me?

Last issue, the gem-hunter El Tigre found a pendant which transformed him into the Mayan feathered-serpent god Kukulcán. He now has the power of the sun. Which sounds pretty powerful.

This seems to be basically what happened to Don Blake. He found a mystic artifact and now finds himself the avatar for a god.