Tales to Astonish #69

Featuring: Giant-Man and Wasp
Release: April 1, 1965
Cover: July 1965
12 cents
Edited with perfect control by: Stan Lee
Written with all bases covered by: Al Hartley
Drawn with the impact of a line drive by: Bob Powell
Inked with the beauty of a three-bagger by: John Giunta
Lettered with only a few errors by: S. Rosen
12 pages

Previous	#356	Next
Tales to Astonish #68, Story B	Reading order	Tales to Astonish #69, Story B
Tales to Astonish #68, Story B	Tales to Astonish	Tales to Astonish #69, Story B

All good things must come to an end, and so must this series.

Giant-Man is reduced to a small corner of the cover, with Hulk hogging the space. No mention that this is the epic finale to the adventures of Giant-Man and the Wasp.

Hulk’s solo series ended after only 6 issues, but then he returned as the backup feature in this title and has been a monthly fixture for going on 60 years. He returned by ending the Wasp’s solo series. Captain America’s return to a solo series caused the Watcher to lose his.

Marvel has had distribution problems for as long as we’ve been reading them, keeping a tight limit on the number of titles they can publish. So for every new title, something has to go. They’ve been trimming the western and humor lines, but ultimately it’s time to let go of some superhero titles.

We read the final Human Torch story a while back, but it was actually released just a week after this. Both Human Torch and Giant-Man lose their series at the same time. Both to make way for better things.

They found the weakest two series in terms of story to ax, and presumably the sales reflected that. Thor stories are good now, so it’s good they’ll stick around. Iron Man stories aren’t any good yet, but maybe they will be one day. Either way, he gets to stick around, now with the dubious honor of being Marvel’s worst remaining title.

We’ll have to wait until next month to see who these cancelled titles are making room for. Neither character will be new to us. One just hasn’t had a title for a while, and the other will get a second title with a very different focus.

Before we get to the final issue of their series, I think it’s worth pausing to reflect on the entire 36 issue run of Henry Pym/Ant-Man/Giant-Man/Wasp stories.

The History of Giant-Man and the Wasp

The story of Giant-Man and the Wasp begins in Tales to Astonish #27, a one-shot science fiction story like many others Marvel was publishing at the time, concerning a scientist Henry Pym and an experiment gone wrong. “The Man in the Ant Hill!”

Nothing distinguished this particular story amongst all the other tales to astonish and strange tales of suspense until Tales to Astonish #35. Henry Pym returned, now as a super-hero called Ant-Man. He proceeded to have a number of forgettable adventures.

Finally in issue 44, he met a girl who wanted to be a superhero to avenge her father. So he shared the power to shrink with her and gave her wing implants, and she became the Wasp. This was the issue where we also learned some of Dr. Pym’s back story, that he once had a wife Maria who had been killed by Soviets, which had led to his mental breakdown.

The two characters were founding members of the Avengers. Wasp gave the group their name.

Then it finally occurred to Dr. Pym that if he could shrink and grow, he could also grow and shrink. And so Ant-Man became Giant-Man in issue 49. He decided not to share this growing power with his partner for reasons of his own. Was his desire to become Giant-Man motivated by insecurity around his more powerful teammates, like Thor, Hulk, and Iron Man? Almost certainly.

Starting with issue 51, Wasp gets something like a solo feature. The short science fiction tales which had been the core of the series since its inception now get narrated by the Wasp. By the following issue, the only features in the book are the Giant-Man/Wasp feature and the Wasp sci/fi feature.

With issue 57, Wasp gets a proper solo feature in the back of the book. It unfortunately only lasts two issues before they shake up the title again.

Issue 59 features a story where Giant-Man and Wasp battle Hulk. This paves the way for a shared title structure starting the next issue, where Giant-Man and Wasp get the first story, and Hulk gets the backup feature.

Hulk’s back-up feature will continue, but a new hero (or is he a hero?) will take over the title’s lead story next issue.

Costumes

Since becoming Giant-Man, Hank has gone through a few costume tweaks. And sometimes different artists would draw his costumes differently, not quite agreeing how thick his suspenders should be. At first, his costume was just Ant-Man’s without the helmet. Then he realized the ant-motif was vestigial and switched it up. In the final issues, Wasp insisted he get a whole new look.

• 

• 

• 

• 

Wasp has had a few costume tweaks herself.

Powers and abilities

The artists have spent the last 20 issues tweaking Giant-Man’s powers, never quite sure what they wanted to do with it. A lot happened in his final few issues, a sign of the series flailing to find a direction. Let’s review the different powers, abilities and weapons of Hank Pym and Janet Van Dyne.

• TtA #27 — Hank Pym pours a potion on his skin that shrinks him to ant-size and another to enlarge. He then destroys the formula, vowing to never use it again.
  
  
  
• TtA #35 — Hank Pym dons a cybernetic helmet which lets him communicate with ants and designs an Ant-Man costume.
  
• TtA #36 — Potion changed to gas form, which can be released from belt, so Ant-Man needs only inhale it to shrink to ant size.
  
• TtA #44 — Wasp gets similar gas capsules on her belt; when she shrinks, wings grow.
• TtA #45– Wasp gets a little needle she calls her stinger. We also learn she can command wasps as Ant-Man does ants.
  
• TtA #49 — Hank invents a growth serum that allows him to become Giant-Man. He still calls himself Ant-Man at times, depending on what power he is using. He changes the shrinking and enlarging potions from gas to capsules, and color-codes the capsules to different sizes. Jan is only given shrinking capsules. 12 feet is his optimal height; he can’t support his own weight if he grows any larger.
  
• TtA #50– We see Wasp can grow wings even when full-size, but she will rarely do this. It’s not clear they are functional at that size.
  
• TtA #57– Wasp gets a new stinger in the form of a compressed air gun strapped to her wrist.
  
• TtA #58 — Giant-Man learns to change size through thought with his cybernetic headpiece and can also changes Wasp’s size. Another gimmick he neglects to share with her. He does often change her size without warning or consent.
  
• TtA #63–Giant-Man had always been pretty clumsy, but he now trains himself to be an agile acrobat, combining acrobatics with fast size-changing.
• TtA #65–Hank adds an attachment to his helmet that allows him to cause other living things to shrink or grow.
• TtA #67– Hank loses the ability to shrink to ant-size.
  
• TtA #68–Hank decides 35 feet is his optimal height for strength, not 12 feet as before. He also realizes that growing and shrinking so often is causing damage to himself, so he needs to pick one size for a fight and stick with it.
  

Villains

The duo have fought a lot of super-villains. The four notable and recurring villains are: Egghead, Porcupine, Human Top, and Black Knight.

• 

• 

• 

• 

But there were plenty of forgettable one-hit wonders where those came from: Comrade X, Protector, Scarlet Beetle, Hijacker, Kulla, Voice, Time-Master, Creature from Kosmos, Cyclops, Trago, Eraser, El Toro, Magician, Colossus, Second-Story Sammy, Wrecker, Madam Macabre, and Supramor. If I forgot anybody, they’re even more forgettable than the characters I just named.

Creative teams

The best series have been the ones with a consistent creative voice. Lee and Ditko have done every issue of Amazing Spider-Man, as Lee and Kirby have done every issue of Fantastic Four. Thor improved by leaps and bounds when Lee and Kirby became the regular team starting with Journey Into Mystery #101.

This title had an unstable creative team since almost the beginning and suffered for it. The original Man in the Ant Hill tale was written by Stan Lee and Larry Lieber with art by Jack Kirby and Dick Ayers. The same team was responsible for remaking Dr. Pym into Ant-Man 8 issues later.

Don Heck took over as regular artist with issue 41, and I think the series improved slightly under Heck. He’s not the storyteller Kirby is, but he gave better definition to Hank Pym’s facial features and really defined a distinctive look for the character.

Ernie Hart took over the writing duties from Lieber with issue 44, credited as H.E. Huntley.

Kirby briefly returned to the series to oversee the transition to Giant-Man. Kirby is often called in for key issues or to make a visual overhaul to characters.

Dick Ayers became the mostly regular penciller with issue 52, sometimes inked by Paul Reinman.

There was a run of fill-in art issues with work by Steve Ditko, Carl Burgos, George Roussos, and Chic Stone.

Staring with issue 65, Bob Powell became the regular artist, but the series was soon cancelled.

Stan Lee even occasionally surrendered the writing duties toward the end, with one issue scripted by Leon Lazarus and this issue by Al Hartley.

Transportation

I’d like to take a minute to reflect on what stood out most to me about this series: the weird methods of transport. The writers seemed very concerned with how the heroes got from their headquarters to the scene of the crime, and came up with several wacky transport methods.

• TtA #36– Ant-Man has catapult launch him from his house to a crime scene, where a group of ants form a cushion to break his fall. Ant-Man can then ride an ant the rest of the way to his destination.
  
• TtA #44– Ant-Man is still using the catapult, but Wasp can actually fly. They are always illustrated flying through the air together despite the very different means of air travel.
  
• Tta #46 and Fantastic Four #16–Ant-Man starts riding flying ants. This is perhaps his most sensible method of transport.
• TtA #55– Giant-Man has a ring attached to a flag pole that will lower him to the ground. This is almost sensible as a way of getting to the ground outside his building, but he seems to use it to travel all over the place in the coming issues.
  
• TtA #63–Giant-Man combines his methods of transport with his newfound agility, leaping from ring to flying ant while quickly changing from giant to ant-sized.
  
• TtA #67–Hank trains a bee to be Wasp’s companion that she can ride as he does ants.
  
• TtA #68–Wasp didn’t like the bee, so she got a pet wasp to ride, that she could control with her cybernetic helmet. The wasp is named Boopsie.
  

Brian Cronin also has a good run-down of Ant-Man’s methods of transport here.

Other notes

Some final notes about the series. Giant-Man had the most active fan club, appearing in several issues, introduced in issue 51.

Giant-Man almost proposed to Wasp, going so far as to buy a ring. A misunderstanding caused him to change his mind. Presumably he still has that ring, but they are still not engaged.

People always think Giant-Man has the ability to appear out of nowhere and to disappear. Even when they already know he can shrink and grow, they still think he’s vanishing. Even the other Avengers act surprised. It’s weird.

Hank and Jan act like they have secret identities but have always been pretty careless about them. Wasp’s masks often don’t cover her face. Her civilian friends call her Jan when in costume. It was apparently even a secret that Giant-Man and Ant-Man were the same person. Giant-Man’s cop friend Lee Kearns didn’t even realize it… even though they initially wore basically the same costume and had the same partner, and very similar powers, just in reverse.

Every time Wasp and Spider-Man meet, they don’t get along, and somebody points out it’s because wasps and spiders are natural enemies.

Giant-Man often disguised himself by putting a hat and trenchcoat over the costume. You’d think it would be easier to just take off the costume.

By the numbers

You may notice I add a score out of 100 to every story we cover. You can get a sense of how I feel about a series by peeking at that distribution of scores. The best-scoring comics we read are recorded on the Best We’ve Read page. You may notice the complete absence of Ant-Man/Giant-Man/Wasp stories from that list.

Looking to the stories and backups featuring Ant-Man/Giant-Man/Wasp, the worst score I gave was a 25 for their battle against Trago in issue 47. The best was a 62 for issue 59, but mainly because that was a significant chapter in Hulk’s saga. I thought the introduction of Ant-Man in issue 35 was actually a good tale, and I gave it a 60. Wasp’s solo outing against the Magician in issue 58 received a 55 from me. Generally, a score of 50+ means the comic is good. 8 out of 36 feature stories met that standard, mostly because I’m generous in my ratings (only 4 of those got my “confidently good” score of 53+). The mean rating for the features is 44, and the median is 47. I give scores in the 40s to stories that are fine, unobjectionable.

With that background out of the way, we turn to the actual subject of this post…

The Final Giant-Man and Wasp Adventure

The title is a play on 1 Corinthians 15:55, “Oh Death where is thy sting?”

A popular verse for superhero comics to quote. This paraphrase has a humorous edge, because it’s the Wasp, and she literally stings.

Al Hartley is the credited writer. We last saw him as an artist in Journey Into Mystery #90. Stan usually takes the writing credit, so Hartley’s credit here is unusual. Stan takes editing credit (an actually accurate description of his role), but still takes top billing. Hartley is a regular artist on Patsy Walker.

There are a lot of reasons Stan may have needed a fill-in writer, but it’s possible there had been direction from above to let others do some writing. Publisher Martin Goodman may have noticed how dependent he is on Stan.

John Giunta is a new name to us, and not one I know well. He died too young, aged 50, only a few years after this comic saw print. This is his only Marvel superhero work. He worked in the industry for almost 30 years, since the industry’s beginnings in the 1930s, particularly for DC and Archie.

Here’s a sampling of his pencil work.

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• Amazing Man Comics #7, Centaur, 1939
• Joker Comics #5, Marvel, 1942
• Tally Ho (with Frank Frazetta), Baily Publishing, 1944
• Romance Trail #1, DC, 1949
• Mystery in Space #2, DC, 1951
• Man Comics #8, Marvel, 1951
• Adventures of the Fly #6, Archie, 1960
• THUNDER Agents #3, Tower, 1965

And a couple examples of his inking work.

• 

• 

• Star Spangled Comics #79, inks over Jim Mooney, DC, 1948
• All-American Western #103, inks over Joe Kubert, DC, 1948

In one of those serendipitous things, I just the other day saw some people much more knowledgeable about comics than I discussing John Giunta’s work online, specifically his 1940s black market comics. To find out more than I can tell you, look for the next book in the American Comic Book Chronicles series (when it’s finished).

As a complete aside, I was unfamiliar with the Magician from Mars until researching this column, but it seems like there’s a case to make that she’s the first female superhero. She predates Wonder Woman. She predates Black Widow. She even predates the Woman in Red. Though I can’t really find anybody trying to make that claim. There’s a dearth of information on the internet, really. Here’s Jess Nevins’ Encyclopedia of Golden Age Suprheroes entry.

Now, finally, Giant-Man and Wasp. One last time.

This issue picks up right where last issue left off, with Wasp a prisoner of Human Top. Except… Wasp seems to have somehow changed her mask.

Wasp describes her pet wasp Boopsie as being devoted to her. They met today. Wasp has spent more time with the bee she decided to callously get rid of.

Stan tries to explain a plot oddity. Wasp tries to use the wasp to warn Hank it’s a trap; instead Hank follows the wasp to Wasp.

Andrew and Mildred are Hank’s neighbors and the real stars of this story. I hope they get to take over the title.

Hartley gets in a Patsy Walker reference to plug his normal title.

Wasp’s capture is shown as the thing that causes a shift in perspective. “I vow I’ll never place her in such jeopardy again.” As noted last issue, I like to think this Human Top adventure is taking place between pages 5 and 6 of Avengers #16. They just fought the Masters of Evil. Then this Human Top battle happens. Then they have the fateful Avengers meeting.

In the end, Hank decides it may be time to retire. This was published one month after Avengers #16, where Hank and Jan actually do retire from superheroing.

And with that, we bid farewell to one of Marvel’s most consistently mediocre series of the era. Speaking for myself, I’m glad to be done with it.

Rating: ★★☆☆☆, 35/100
Significance: ★★★★☆

I read this story in Marvel Masterworks: Ant-Man/Giant-Man vol. 2. You can find the story in Ant-Man/Giant-Man Epic Collection vol. 1: The Man in the Ant Hill. Or on Kindle.

Characters:

• Giant-Man
• Wasp
• Human Top
• Boopsie

Minor characters:

• Andrew and Mildred (Hank’s neighbors)

Story notes:

• Human Top spins at 6500 rpms to fly; causes Wasp vortex vertigo.
• Hank can’t shrink, so he makes Boopsie large.
• Human Top traps Giant-Man and freezes him.

Previous	#356	Next
Tales to Astonish #68, Story B	Reading order	Tales to Astonish #69, Story B
Tales to Astonish #68, Story B	Tales to Astonish	Tales to Astonish #69, Story B