Featuring: Iron Man Release: May 9, 1963 Cover: August 1963 12 cents Plot: Stan Lee Script: R. Berns Art: Don Heck 13 pages
I read this story in The Invincible Iron Man Omnibus vol. 1.
In June 1963, a Cleopatra film starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton debuted.
One month earlier, perhaps in an attempt to ride a marketing tail, Iron Man meets Cleopatra!
While there are certainly lots of things Iron Man can do that may seem like sorcery to Cleopatra, having wheels is not one of them.
The comic does end with Iron Man attending the Cleopatra film premiere, to make this a very specific nod.
Now, Anthony Stark is already famously a ladies’ man. And a reporter earlier in the issue asks him about how he’d fare if he met her. It turns out very well. She is smitten with him despite never seeing his face. He wears bulky Iron Man armor the entire time.
Featuring: Iron Man Release: April 9, 1963 Cover: July 1963 12 cents Plot: Stan Lee Script: R. Berns Art: Jack Kirby Inking: Don Heck 13 pages
I read this story in The Invincible Iron Man Omnibus vol. 1.
If there’s one thing I associate with Kirby (and there’s a lot more than one), it’s stylish headpieces on women.
That outfit seems pure Kirby.
Beyond that and maybe some of the machinery, the issue mostly reminds me of Heck’s art. I’m guessing Kirby’s art is really pretty loose design and layout, leaving a lot of the details, particular facial details, to Heck’s finishing. Just a guess.
Anthony Stark leaves costume behind, figuring it will be safe. This is called foreshadowing.
The world beneath the surface seems pretty crowded. I guess there’s lots of room down there, enough for a few underworld kingdoms. Kala is the third ruler of a subsurface kingdom we have met, after Moleman and Tyrannus. She won’t be the last. Let’s see who Thor fights next month…
Featuring: Iron Man Release: March 12, 1963 Cover: June 1963 12 cents Plot: Stan Lee Script: R. Berns Art: Don Heck 13 pages
I read this story in the Invincible Iron Man Omnibus vol. 1.
I also have it reprinted in Marvel Collector’s Item Classics #5 from 1966, and include scans from that reprint below.
Robert Bernstein has been scripting more and more Marvel books. We just saw him in our last Human Torch entry and his name is showing up on Ant-Man and Wasp stories.
As we’ve discussed before, the comic treats Stark’s military work as entirely noble, as opposed to the more nuanced take the movie would have decades later. It’s about changing attitudes. But this comic really seems to push it. Stark invents a disintegrator ray, and notes among its applications that it could destroy a metropolis. Surely we recognize that as a purely evil application? That’s not much better than building a nuclear bomb.
We all get this is evil, right?
Hulk’s origin had a subtle swipe at weapon-building, given that Dr. Banner was a victim of his own bomb. But it’s not clear to me how intentional that was on the part of Lee or Kirby. Or whether it’s interpretation that comes from reading the comic through a modern lens.
Featuring: Iron Man Release: February 12, 1963 Cover: May 1963 12 cents Plot: Stan Lee Script: R. Berns Art: Jack Kirby Inking: Dick Ayers 13 pages
Confession time. I just made a dumb mistake here. Got confused by numbers and dates. This post should have come before my previous Journey Into Mysterypost, as this issue is from February and the Thor story is from March. It’s a little confusing because both are cover-dated May. The Thor stories always seem a month out of sync in terms of their cover dates for some reason.
Robert Bernstein returns on scripting duties. He will be the regular scripter for a while. This is the first Iron Man story without Don Heck involved with the art (either as primary or finisher). This is perhaps why Tony looks so radically different from the previous 2 stories.
Maybe I’d recognize him better with black hair…
Though part of the problem is that his hair is brown in my omnibus (scanned above). Other modern recolorings make it black. It’s hard to speak intelligently to the coloring of these comics because of how wildly it varies between reproductions.
Iron Man is falling into a somewhat familiar pattern 3 issues in. After a very good origin issue, we get a sequence of pretty forgettable stories. Last issue, he fought Gargantus, and this issue introduces Dr. Strange. Neither of whom am I expecting to show up any time soon in a major motion picture.
Another familiar trope is that we’ve skipped the establishing of the hero. In this issue, the third Iron Man story, the first of which was set in a Vietnam jungle, we learn that children idolize Iron Man. So he, like the rest of the heroes, has fast become a sensation.
The armor makes him a superhero and keeps his heart beating.
Iron Man Versus Gargantus! Featuring: Iron Man Release: January 10, 1963 Cover: April 1963 12 cents Plot: Stan Lee Script: R. Berns Art: J. Kirby Inking: D. Heck 13 pages
I read this story in Iron Man Omnibus vol. 1.
Most of the credits only get first initials, perhaps to fit on a line. The letterer John Duffy doesn’t even get an initial, referred to as “Duffi”. Heck was the primary artist on the first issue of Iron Man, though building off some initial character work by Kirby. Here, Heck is credited with inking over Kirby. But to my eye, this issue mostly reminds me more of Heck than Kirby.
The script is credited to “R. Berns”. The first time we’ve seen that name. In fact, I think it’s the first writing credits given to anybody except for Stan or his brother Larry. The scripter is Robert Bernstein, who used the pseudonym “R. Berns” for all of his Marvel work, as he was mostly known for his DC superhero work at the time. He’d been working in comics for at least 17 years at this point, and had worked with Lee before on western and war stories. But he’d spent the last 4 years working in superhero comics at DC, famously reviving Aquaman for the Silver Age, and adding Aqualad and Aquagirl to the cast (working with Ramona Fradon). His Superboy stories (with George Papp) introduced the menace of General Zod and other Kryptonian criminals imprisoned in the Phantom Zone, concepts that would make it into the 1978 Superman film and the 2013 reboot. And he transformed Congo Bill into Congorilla (alongside Howard Sherman). An impressive pedigree to join our crew.
We saw 18 months of superhero comics made almost entirely by 3 people. It wasn’t sustainable as the number of heroes continued to grow, so we’ve seen an infusion of new writers and artists in the last month, some filling in, some here to stay.
Gundar! Featuring: Odin Release: December 10, 1963 Cover: March 1963 12 cents Script: Stan Lee Art: Steve Ditko 5 pages
A short story we’ll cover for a couple reasons. One is that it’s the other new comic story in the issue that introduces Iron Man. So noteworthy in and of itself. Another is that it includes Odin. And this is after Odin has become a regular in the Thor stories. That doesn’t mean Stan sees any particular connection between this Odin and the one in the Thor stories. But Odin is here.
A shipwrecked man finds immortal vikings trapped there by a curse. Their captain Gundar had been evil, and they once questioned his orders, so he attacked and ultimately cursed them. Odin apparently took Gundar’s side in the conflict; so he’s not entirely benevolent here. Or perhaps he’s just literal-minded about the laws– the crew had taken up arms against their captain; that he attacked them may be immaterial to the laws Odin enforces.
Iron Man is Born! Featuring: Iron Man Release: December 10, 1962 Cover: March 1963 12 cents Plot: Stan Lee Script: Larry Lieber Art: Don Heck 13 pages
I read this story in Invincible Iron Man Omnibus vol. 1.
Don Heck is the artist on this issue, but the cover is by Jack Kirby. The cover was drawn first, and Jack Kirby is thus responsible for designing this version of the Iron Man armor. Heck claims credit for the look of Anthony Stark and generally the interiors. I’ve read conflicting reports on how much input Kirby had to the interior art and storytelling.
Recall that Kirby had been drawing every ongoing Marvel superhero series prior to this month. One week earlier, Don Heck took over as artist on the Ant-Man feature, and now Heck will also be the artist on the Iron Man stories. And a new Marvel superhero title premieres this same day which will be drawn by Steve Ditko, so the load is getting shared now.
That’s right! It’s Iron Man! The character nobody had heard of in 2007 who was everybody’s favorite superhero by 2009.
As we discussed, December 10, 1962 is a day with four big milestones in Marvel superhero history. This is the second.
Milestone #1 of December 10, 1962: Fantastic Four meet the Hulk!
Milestone #2: Iron Man
Anthony Stark is a rich, handsome, glamorous playboy, a bachelor and socialite. Also a brilliant scientist helping out the US military. He’s invented a tiny transistor that increases the force of any device, which he’s helping the military deploy in South Vietnam.
As I understand the problem in Vietnam, it will take more than a tiny transistor to solve…
Wong-Chu is described as a “Red Guerilla” conquering villages is South Vietnam. I assume the implication is he is with the Việt Cộng, but that is not explicit.
The depictions of Asian people remain awful, with Wong-Chu as racist a caricature as General Fang.
His name was… Merlin! Featuring: Merlin Release: December 12, 1961 Cover: March 1962 12 cents Credits: Stan Lee and Steve Ditko 5 pages
This is a late entry. But now that Merlin’s been mentioned as the ancient enemy of Tyrannus, I realize he did have a single earlier appearance in the Marvel Age. Again, these famous mythological figures were common fodder for Marvel’s old weird tales. There’s not necessarily a connection between these isolated stories and the characters who appear in the Marvel superhero stories. But it’s not clear there isn’t. And in hindsight, I wish we had covered this way back in the beginning. It came out the same day as Fantastic Four #3.
This was a pretty standard fantasy tale in one of these anthologies. We’ve seen the exact summary before: a dishonorable man gets what’s coming to him through a mystical twist when he picks the wrong victim to mess with. We’ve seen this in an Odin story and a Medusa story.
I Brought the Mighty Cyclops Back to Life! Featuring: Cyclops Release: February 29, 1960 Cover: July 1960 10 cents Credits: Jack Kirby and Dick Ayers 7 pages
Online sources suggest the writing is by Lee or Lieber or both. Fair guesses. Kirby’s and Ayers’ signatures appear.
Hey, it’s Ulysses!
This is our first look at the Tales of Suspense series, a fantasy anthology just like Journey Into Mystery or Strange Tales or Tales to Astonish… We’ll be getting to know Tales of Suspense shortly when it too starts spotlighting a superheroic character. But for now, let’s flash back to the year before the debut of Fantastic Four to a story featuring the Cyclops of legend.
