Featuring: Thor
Release: February 5, 1963
Cover: April 1963
12 cents
Plot: Stan Lee
Script: Larry Lieber
Art: Joe Sinnott
13 pages
I read this story in Marvel Masterworks: The Mighty Thor vol. 1.
Joe Sinnott is best known as an inker. We’ve seen him twice so far in that capacity, inking Kirby for the introductions of Thor and Dr. Doom, respectively. This is the first time we see him as the primary artist.
This event was teased already because I chose to read the last Fantastic Four slightly out of chronological order and because I accidentally read the last Strange Tales out of chronological order.
But this is one of three comics released February 5 to sport the spiffy new Marvel logo. The others are Tales to Astonish and Patsy Walker. We are not currently including the Patsy Walker stories in our Marvel reading, not until she becomes more intertwined with the superheroes than she currently is.
There’s a lot going on that will become a feature of Marvel covers for years. The first is that there’s a little box with the picture of the lead character. Now, Journey Into Mystery is still an anthology title. There are two other scifi/fantasy tales within this very issue. But Thor is the star, now. And that little box makes that clear.
Then we get the price, 12 cents. That’s been the price of all the comics since Fantastic Four #3 raised the price from 10 cents. Usually, the price has been in a circle somewhere on the cover. Now it’s in this new logo box.
And then the phrase “Marvel Comics Group”. Previously, there had been the letters “MC” in a little box on the covers.
Here’s how it all looked on the cover of Fantastic Four #1.
