Strange Tales #108

The Painter of a Thousand Perils!

Featuring: Human Torch
Release: February 12, 1963
Cover: May 1963
12 cents
Plot: Stan Lee
Script: R. Berns
Art: Jack Kirby
Inking: Dick Ayers
13 pages

Kirby is back with Ayers inking after 2 issues of Ayers on main art. They will go back and forth some, but Ayers is going to be the more regular artist at this point. This is the second script we’ve seen by “R. Berns”, Robert Bernstein, who just provided the script for the last Iron Man story. We’ll see him in a few more places.

The basic idea of this comic is fun. The Painter has magic paint that makes whatever he paints come to life. The ending is somewhat absurd, and the story has some severe structural problems.

The splash page is pretty heavily expository and overly explains the plot of the issue, when really it should just be teasing it.

I mean… that’s pretty much the entire story.

We get a couple pages showing how Human Torch regularly helps police capture common crooks. This isn’t the type of thing we see any other FF members doing. It’s a regular activity for Ant-Man and semi-regular activity for Thor.

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