Tag: wand of watoomb

Strange Tales #150, Story B

The Conquest of Kaluu!

Featuring: Dr. Strange
Release: August 9, 1966
Cover: November 1966
12 cents
Gloriously edited by Stan Lee
Graniloquently scripted by Roy Thomas
Gorgeously drawn by Wild Bill Everett
Grudgingly lettered by Artie Simek
10 pages

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Strange Tales #149, Story BReading orderTales of Suspense #81
Strange Tales #150Strange TalesStrange Tales #151

It is the Sacred Griffin– the beast appointed by the priests of the Babylonian god Marduk to stand eternal vigil over the mystic text! It has ever been written in the Words of Flame that he who defeats the fearsome sentinel… is the destined possessor of the book!

Dr. Strange gets the cover again. Seems like he and Nick Fury will be trading off who gets featured.

We’re skipping the Nick Fury half of this comic to finish off the Kaluu arc.

O’Neill had been the writer for the last few issues, but Thomas fills in for this one. His scripting is described as “graniloquent”. Looks like Stan will return to the title next issue.

As you can see from the list down the page, Thomas is all in on the invocations.

So far, the Kaluu story has been terrible. Will Thomas turn it around?

Four issues into the battle, and Dr. Strange and Kaluu still haven’t met. So if we get that far, it will be a step up.

We’d heard Ancient One whine for several issues now about how powerful Kaluu is. But now Kaluu seems to fear that he will lose if his foes get any time to plan.

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Amazing Spider-Man Annual 2

The Wondrous World of Dr. Strange!

Featuring: Spider-Man
Release: June 1, 1965
Cover: 1965
25 cents
Written and edited by the toast of Marvel: Stan Lee
Plotted and drawn by the boast of Marvel: Steve Ditko
Lettered and bordered by the ghost of Marvel: Sam Rosen
20 pages

Previous#378Next
Amazing Spider-Man #28Reading orderSgt. Fury #21
Amazing Spider-Man Annual 1, Story CAmazing Spider-Man AnnualAmazing Spider-Man Annual 3

“May the Vishanti watch over thee!”
“And may your amulet never tickle!”

This is a great comic, but it seems like they forgot to make a cover for it. It’s actually a decent picture by Ditko with the many Spider-Men of various poses and sizes. But a picture of Spider-Man and Dr. Strange would be in order. A missed opportunity as Dr. Strange gets so few cover appearances, sharing his title with Human Torch or Nick Fury.

Next week, we will read Strange Tales #136, except not the entire issue. We’ll skip the Dr. Strange story, just as we have skipped the Dr. Strange Stories from #130-135. And I appreciate your patience, I really do.

I decide what order to read these in based on when they came out and when the stories take place, sometimes heavily weighting either one over the other on a whim.

Because Dr. Strange appears in this story and an upcoming Fantastic Four story, and I judged there’s no room for him to do so after #130, we are holding off on the Dr. Strange stories until after these two guest appearances.

I’ve made no secret of the fact that I think Dr. Strange and Spider-Man are Marvel’s two best titles at the moment, courtesy of the fact that I think Steve Ditko is the greatest graphic storyteller of all time.

They finally meet. For sort of the first time. They had a brief meeting in the last Amazing Spider-Man Annual.

Now that’s what the cover should have looked like.

As far as Dr. Strange knows, this is the first meeting between him and Spider-Man. He and Peter Parker have briefly crossed paths, and it seems likely that Peter would remember the encounter while Strange would not.

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