Featuring: Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD Release: July 8, 1965 Cover: October 1965 12 cents Story: Stan Lee Layouts: J. Kirby Art: J. Severin Lettering: Art Simek 12 pages
Well, we can’t just stand here cryin’ in our soup, like kids! That won’t bring those joes back! We gotta make sure they didn’t cash in their chips for nothin’!
It’s a pretty big deal that Severin is given the cover. Even when Stan’s used different interior artists, he’s wanted Kirby on the cover. Heck’s been the regular artist on Iron Man since day 1, but Kirby’s almost always done the covers. All but one, so far. Kirby got all the Giant-Man covers, whether it was Heck or Ayers on art. But the artist base is starting to expand. Colan’s been doing the Sub-Mariner covers, and now Severin gets a SHIELD cover.
We get something new with the credits. The art attempts to integrate them into the story. Rather than a separate box, they show up on a computer screen at SHIELD HQ.
We see the “Q” scene as Nick Fury gets his fancy gadgeted clothing. The dialogue is pretty rote at this point. “Why are you giving me an ordinary hat?” “Ho ho, it just looks like an ordinary hat…”
I think the hat is cool because it seems like it might actually work. There’s nothing too fancy going on in their diagram. A hat whose brim works like a periscope to allow you to see what’s going on behind you.
I’m not sure I would want to wear a suit made of explosive fabric.
Featuring: Dr. Strange Release: June 8, 1965 Cover: September 1965 12 cents Edited and written by mystical, magical Stan Lee Plotted and illustrated by weird, wondrous Steve Ditko Lettered and bordered by loveable, laughable Artie Simek 10 pages
Demons of Darkness, at my command transport me to the hidden land!
Dr. Strange is still searching for Eternity. Last issue was something of a misstep along the way. He sought answers from a once-loyal servant of the Ancient One only to find betrayal and a trap. This will have a similar flavor. He’ll seek out another wise mystic and again get led astray.
While these are in a sense interludes, I appreciate that it’s not easy to find Eternity. Dr. Strange is somewhat fumbling in his quest. He doesn’t know where to go and keeps taking wrong turns.
Mordo remains in pursuit this whole time, grown more desperate since Dr. Strange seeks Eternity. Mordo doesn’t understand the word. But Dormammu knows exactly what it means and fears Dr. Strange learning the secret. This increases the excitement for the search.
As he searches, our insight into this world grows. We meet a woman whose life he once saved. We meet another unnamed mystic. We see Rama Kaliph has been rendered comatose by Mordo, and only Mordo’s defeat will save him.
Featuring: Dr. Strange Release: May 4, 1965 Cover: August 1965 12 cents Written and edited by Marvel’s mystical madman: Stan Lee Plotted and illustrated by fandom’s favorite fiend: Steve Ditko Lettered and bordered by comicdom’s cuddlesome conjurer: Sam Rosen 10 pages
By the Seven Rings of Raggadorr… By Cyttorak’s Crimson Bands! I send thee through the unseen door… go thou where my spell commands!
This is a big issue for Strange Tales, as Nick Fury takes over the lead feature. This was the issue that introduced SHIELD and Hydra. But in the backup feature, Dr. Strange’s saga is still barreling along. Anybody picking up the title for the first time to check out the new Nick Fury stories will find themselves smack in the middle of a long Dr. Strange story.
Notice Ditko gets credited with the plotting. He’s plotted every Dr. Strange story, but now he’s getting credit. Proper credit is at the heart of his conflicts with Stan Lee.
We enter into a new status quo for the story. Mordo continues his pursuit of Strange, but Strange is no longer just on the run. He has a goal now, to find Eternity.
He seeks out a former disciple of the Ancient One, Sir Baskerville.
Featuring: Dr. Strange Release: April 8, 1965 Cover: July 1965 12 cents Written by Marvel’s own living legend, Stan Lee Illustrated by Marvel’s own unsung genius, Steve Ditko Lettered by Marvel’s own beaming pixie, Artie Simek 10 pages
This is the final issue of Strange Tales to feature Ben and Johnny. We read their finale over a year ago, but are long delayed in finishing the comic.
With the end of the Human Torch/Thing and Giant-Man/Wasp series, Marvel basically stopped putting out bad superhero books. They aren’t all great. Hulk is flailing a bit without Ditko. Colan’s Namor is off to a rocky start. Iron Man hasn’t quite found his footing, but is much improved. And Ayers isn’t delivering on Sgt. Fury the way Kirby did, and I anyway think the best of Ayers’ work is mostly behind us on the series. But they’re all at least decent now. And the best of them–Spider-Man, Dr. Strange, and Fantastic Four–are getting even better.
We get some progress in our big arc, and we’ll have some pedantic questions.
Let’s start with the progress. Dr. Strange at last learns that Ancient One has been occasionally awakening to say “Eternity”, and agrees to uncover the secret. That quest should occupy him for a few issues.
Mordo and his wraiths find Dr. Strange again, and again Dr. Strange is basically helpless against Dormammu’s power.
Featuring: Dr. Strange Release: March 11, 1965 Cover: June 1965 12 cents Strange is this script by: Stan Lee! Awesome is this art by: Steve Ditko! Lilting is this lettering by: S. Rosen! 10 pages
For I have truly gained the greatest power of all… that which is the fountainhead of all other power… I have gained the gift of knowledge!
Dormammu and Mordo have teamed up. The Ancient One is comatose. He keeps ominously referring to Eternity. Last issue ended with Dormammu possessing Mordo to destroy Dr. Strange, and Dr. Strange died.
I expect this to be a short issue.
Wait. Maybe I should read the first panel better. Dormammu claims Dr. Strange still lives. Strange summoned all his remaining power to transport himself to another dimension.
I’ve claimed repeatedly this is a great story arc. I think there’s some excellent melodrama throughout and some cool ideas coming, but it’s also a perfect showcase for what Ditko’s Dr. Strange is best known for: these bizarre almost formless dimensions that defy description or visualization, yet somehow rendered on our page.
More than that, what Ditko seems to be depicting in these first three panels is the transition from one strange dimension to another.
Featuring: Dr. Strange Release: February 11, 1965 Cover: May 1965 12 cents Though there be many writers, none but Stan Lee could have penned this tale! Though there be many artists, none but Steve Ditko could have drawn this tale! Though there be many letterers, none but Artie Simek was available when we needed him! 10 pages
Eternity! If only Strange could know of– Eternity!
Again, the splash page serves as the cover.
Again, I love the noirish atmosphere of rain-soaked desperation that Ditko creates. This is a man on the run, who feels the whole world closing in.
Oh, Stan. Stan, Stan, Stan. Four issues ago Dr. Strange encountered a minor sorcerer he knew as the Demon. Ditko has plainly brought back the same character. Certainly, Dr. Strange would remember this person. Yet he gives no hint or reference to the fact that he and this guy just fought. Who was supposed to have renounced the mystic arts at Strange’s command. But who apparently got a better offer from Mordo. Strange mentions none of this, perhaps because Stan doesn’t recognize the guy. And we’re pretty near the point where Steve stopped speaking to Stan, which doesn’t help.
Featuring: Dr. Strange Release: January 12, 1965 Cover: April 1965 12 cents Written in a stygian swampland by: Stan Lee Drawn in a dismal dungeon by: Steve Ditko Lettered in a conjuror’s castle by: Artie Simek 10 pages
…it is almost like the calm before a terrible storm!
We read the first half of this issue in June 2021 and wrote the following.
I must emphasize that the Dr. Strange story is one of the single greatest Marvel stories of all time, yet the Bouncing Ball of Doom is what gets spotlighted on the cover.
The first page almost serves as a cover, as is common for Ditko stories. The story really begins on the next page, which picks up exactly where the previous issue went off. I’ve seen arguments online that how well this reads if you just chop off the splash page chapter breaks means this should just be read as a 153 page graphic novel, perhaps the first graphic novel ever.
We saw this same servant of Mordo’s last issue. Ditko is good about using distinctive faces and taking care to repeat characters. Lee is often unconcerned about naming these repeat characters. This random dude will eventually get a name, and then weirdly get chosen as the lead villain in the first Dr. Strange film.
I appreciate how Ditko illustrates the espionage thriller, where Dr. Strange is furtively trying to escape detection.
Featuring: Dr. Strange Release: December 10, 1964 Cover: March 1965 12 cents Written by the nabob of the netherworld: Stan Lee Illustrated by the sultan of the supernatural: Steve Ditko Lettered by the overlord of the occult: Artie Simek 10 pages
Man. Remember when Ben and Johnny met the Beatles? Seems like a lifetime ago.
I have a grammatically annoying habit in these posts to confuse time with my tenses. Sometimes I speak as though the present is 2022, and sometimes I speak as though the present is 1964. I’m going to double down on that confusing habit.
Strange Tales #130 was released December 1964, and we read the first story, in which Ben and Johnny meet the Beatles, back in May 2021. It’s now November 2022, a good 18 months later we are finally finishing the comic. Wow.
In our last post, we read Avengers #20, from July 1965, a good 7 months after the release of Strange Tales #130. We’re going back in time 7 months and 18 months.
18 months ago, I wrote the following:
Dr. Strange finally gets the cover almost to himself… but we won’t be reading his story. As we’ve discussed, the plan is to take a break from Dr. Strange, but keep reading the Human Torch/Thing stories. The Dr. Strange stories have mostly been happy to be single short episodes that fit in 10 pages. The only exception has been the 2-part battle against Dormammu. But even that epic was only 20 pages, the length of a normal Fantastic Four or Spider-Man story. Not one to make incremental change, Ditko decided he needs 170 pages and 17 months to tell the next story.
We’ve been waiting a long time for this story. Over the months, I’ve occasionally reminded you of it, asked for patience, and hinted at just how much I love it. Let’s see if it was worth the wait.
We’ve already read the first stories from Strange Tales #130-136, finishing up the Human Torch/Thing stories and beginning the Nick Fury Agent of SHIELD stories, including the first two parts of the “Hydra Saga”.
We’ll now catch up on the Dr. Strange stories of 130-136, and then read the entirety of Strange Tales #137-141, which will finish off the Hydra Saga and bring us to a climactic moment and decent enough pausing point for the Eternity Saga. (By “decent enough pausing point”, I mean the issue will end with a bomb about to explode in Dr. Strange’s Sanctum Sanctorum. But decent enough.) We’ll then need to spend a bit of time catching up with the rest of the Marvel Universe before coming back to finish off the Eternity Saga, which runs through issue 146.
I think of this 17-part saga as the “Eternity Saga” or the “Dormammu/Mordo War”, or some mixing and matching of those words. There’s no real official name. A quick browsing of the internet suggests “Eternity Saga” is the most common name, and that’s anyway my preferred name, so we’ll call it that.
This spins out of Dr. Strange’s 2-part battle with Dormammu in issues 126-127. If you look to the Best We’ve Read, you’ll see both parts of that saga are presently in our top ten, though that list is about to get shaken up. Much of this 17-part saga will find its way to that page presently, so check out the bottom couple rows of entries while you can. They’ll be getting pushed off.
Prior to that Dormammu arc, we’d heard a lot of invocations with strange words in them. Vishanti. Agamotto. Hoggoth. Dormammu. It wasn’t that clear what these words referred to. They almost seemed like magic words like Abracadabra. With issue 126, we understood that Dormammu is a demonic sorcerer who rules the Dark Dimension. And that when Dr. Strange or Baron Mordo would invoke his name, they were literally calling upon him to lend them power. That Dr. Strange’s power might come from an evil demon seems a bit of hypocrisy.
In an adventure in the Dark Dimension, Dr. Strange met a pretty girl and faced off with Dormammu, whose power dwarfed his own. He won the day only because of Dormammu’s strange sense of honor. While evil, Dormammu does defend his own realm from the Mindless Ones, and Dr. Strange aided Dormammu against the Mindless Ones. Dormammu then felt obligated to not kill Dr. Strange. Honor and all that. Because his sense of honor is really strange, he has now sworn revenge on Dr. Strange for being in debt. Dr. Strange did Dormammu a favor, and now Dormammu must destroy him. Honor and all that. And while Dormammu swore not to attack Dr. Strange, he didn’t promise not to lend his power to Dr. Strange’s greatest enemy Baron Mordo so that Mordo could kill the good Doctor.
OK, maybe some mild spoilers above. I see the opening of the story does obscure just who it is Mordo is talking to. But it will be revealed by page 5 and this is a 170 page saga.
Given how long this saga is, you’d expect a bit of prelude. But we get basically one panel of Strange and the Ancient One doing their thing, the calm before the storm. By panel 3, the attack begins.
By page 3, the Ancient One has fallen, Mordo controls his temple, and Dr. Strange is on the run.
Featuring: Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD Release: June 8, 1965 Cover: September 1965 12 cents Script by the unpredictable Stan Lee Layouts by the unmatchable Jack Kirby Art by the unbeatable Johnny Severin Lettering by the unsinkable Art Simek 12 pages
Hail Hydra! Immortal Hydra! We shall never be destroyed! Cut off a limb and two more shall take its place! We serve none but the Master– as the world shall soon serve us! Hail Hydra!
We get a new artist, described as another returnee from the Golden Age. John (Johnny) Severin. I’m a big fan and excited he’s joining us.
Kirby is on the layouts, but John will provide most of the details. This of course means Kirby is responsible for the storytelling.
He’s been with the industry almost 20 years by this point, working off and on for Marvel, but doing his most famous work for EC. Here’s a sampling.
Prize Comics Western #72 (Prize, 1948)
Actual Romances #1 (Marvel, 1949)
Two-Fisted Tales #19 (EC, 1951)
Frontline Combat #1 (EC, 1951)
Mad #1 (EC, 1952)
Sergeant Barney Barker #1 (Marvel, 1956)
Notice that the colorist for the EC books, including Mad, was John’s sister Marie Severin. We’ll be hearing more from her soon.
Of those titles, Mad is the most famous, and would endure in some form for 65 years until finally shutting down in 2018. Perhaps the world had grown too farcical by then to satire.
Featuring: Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD Release: May 4, 1965 Cover: August 1965 12 cents Writer: Stan Lee Artist: Jack Kirby Inked by: Dick Ayers Lettered by: Artie Simek 12 pages
It’s 1965. Thunderball will be hitting the cinemas in Decembr, the 4th consecutive year Sean Connery will go into action as 007.
In the second film, From Russia with Love, we were introduced to a global criminal organization that it takes a dedicated government to fight– SPECTRE (Special Executive for Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge, and Extortion).
The head of SPECTRE wasn’t named and we didn’t see his face, only his kitten. The kitten plainly identifies him as evil.
These movies are popular, and the rest of the entertainment industry is taking notice.
Michael Caine just went into “action” in a more subdued and bureaucratic spy tale as Harry Palmer, definitely not the world’s best spy.
Television will soon be satirizing this secret agent genre with Get Smart, in which Maxwell Smart of CONTROL fights against KAOS, an international organization of evil.
The following year, secret agents on TV will be offered an impossible mission, if they choose to accept it.
Probably most relevantly, the previous year introduced The Man from UNCLE (United Network Command for Law and Enforcement), letting us know that these organizations should have acronyms for names.
(Picture chosen especially for my mother)
In the 1950s, Marvel had dabbled in every genre, including the occasional spy series like Spy Fighters or Kent Blake of the Secret Service.
Now they are bursting at the seams with the expanding superhero genre. They have one current war title, Sgt. Fury, which we’ve been reading with the superhero comics for some reason.
They haven’t abandoned their long successful romance/humor girl genre, and Millie and Patsy each carry two titles still. And three western heroes still carry titles: Two-Gun Kid, Rawhide Kid, and Kid Colt.
They’re ready to ride on the booming spy genre with their own 007 or Man from Uncle. They’ll need a secret spy organization with a cool title that’s really an acronym. And they’ll need an evil organization to pit them against. Preferably headed by a mysterious man with a kitten.
And a star to headline these adventures. New character? Or look to their already expansive cast of characters.
We know from the pages of Fantastic Four that Sgt. Fury of World War II is now Colonel Fury of the CIA. Why invent a new top spy when you already have one?
Where to put them? Make a new title? No, you’re having crazy distribution problems at the moment and are artificially limited in the number of titles you can put out. Why Captain America and Iron Man need to share a book.
I’ve got it! Strange Tales. The Human Torch/Thing stories all sucked, so we cancelled them. Our new spy series can share this former horror title with Dr. Strange. Makes sense to me.
On that note, I then have to recall that we haven’t actually read any Dr. Strange stories since issue 129, 6 issues ago. We read the wonderful Human Torch stories from issues 130-134, but skipped the Dr. Strange stories.
But now that Nick Fury is taking over the first half of the book, I would like to… still not read the Dr. Strange stories. Not just yet. We’ll read this first half of this comic, then return to it later. Even though, with the new Dr. Strange movie out, a Dr. Strange post would be topical.
