Category: Marvel Silver Age

The Incredible Hulk V1 (1968)

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The Hulk first appeared in The Incredible Hulk #1 (cover dated May 1962), written by writer-editor Stan Lee, penciled and co-plotted by Jack Kirby, and inked by Paul Reinman. Lee cites influence from Frankenstein and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde in the Hulk’s creation. The Hulk’s original series was canceled with issue #6 (March 1963).

In the debut, Lee chose gray for the Hulk because he wanted a color that did not suggest any particular ethnic group. Colorist Stan Goldberg, however, had problems with the gray coloring, resulting in different shades of grey, and even green, in the issue. After seeing the first published issue, Lee chose to change the skin color to green. Green was used in retellings of the origin, with even reprints of the original story being recolored for the next two decades, until The Incredible Hulk vol. 2, #302 (December 1984) reintroduced the gray Hulk in flashbacks set close to the origin story. Since then, reprints of the first issue have displayed the original gray coloring, with the fictional canon specifying that the Hulk’s skin had initially been grey. An exception is the early trade paperback, Origins of Marvel Comics, from 1974, which explains the difficulties in keeping the gray color consistent in a Stan Lee written prologue, and reprints the origin story keeping the gray coloration.

Lee gave the Hulk’s alter ego the alliterative name Bruce Banner because he found he had less difficulty remembering alliterative names. Despite this, in later stories he misremembered the character’s name and referred to him as “Bob Banner”, an error which readers quickly picked up on. The discrepancy was resolved by giving the character the official full name of Robert Bruce Banner.

Tales to Astonish (Silver Age)

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Tales to Astonish was published from January 1959 to March 1968 . It began as a science-finction anthology that served as a showcase for such artists as Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko. It became The Incredible Hulk with issue #102 (April 1968). Its sister title was Tales of Suspense.

Following his one-shot anthological story in #27 (Jan. 1962), scientist Henry Pym returned donning a cybernetic helmet and red costume, and using size-changing technology to debut as the insect-sized hero Ant-Man in #35 (Sept. 1962). The series was plotted by Lee and scripted by Lieber, with penciling first by Kirby and later by Heck and others. The Wasp was introduced as Ant-Man’s costar in issue #44 (June 1963). Ant-Man and Pym’s subsequent iteration, Giant-Man, introduced in #49 (Nov. 1963), starred in 10- to 13-page and later 18-page adventures,

The Hulk, whose original series The Incredible Hulk had been canceled after a six-issue run in 1962-63, returned to star in his own feature when Tales to Astonish became a split book at issue #60 (Oct. 1964),]after having guest-starred as Giant-Man’s antagonist in a full-length story the previous issue. The Hulk had proven a popular guest-star in three issues of Fantastic Four and an issue of The Amazing Spider-Man. His new stories here were initially scripted by Lee and illustrated by the seldom-seen team of penciler Steve Ditko and inker George Roussos. This early part of the Hulk’s run introduced the Leader, who would become the Hulk’s nemesis, and this run additionally made the Hulk’s identity known, initially only to the military and then later publicly.

Captain America (1960’s)

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Tales of Suspense became Captain America with #100 (April 1968)  This series — considered Captain America volume one by comics researchers and historians, following the 1940s Captain America Comics and its 1950s numbering continuation of Tales of Suspense — ended with #454 (Aug. 1996).

Tales of Suspense (Silver Age)

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Tales of Suspense, Issue #39 (March 1963) introduced the superhero Iron Man, created by editor and plotter Lee, scripter Lieber, and artists Heck and Jack Kirby. He starred in generally 13-page but occasionally 18-page adventures, with the rest of Tales of Suspense devoted to the anthological science fiction and fantasy stories the comic normally ran.

After debuting with bulky gray armor, Iron Man was redesigned with similar but golden armor in his second story (issue #40, April 1963). The first iteration of the modern, sleek red-and-golden armor appeared in #48 (Dec. 1963), drawn by Ditko (though whether he or Kirby, singly or in collaboration, designed it, is uncertain). From #53-58 (May-Oct. 1964), the cover logo was “Tales of Suspense featuring The Power of Iron Man”. Two months before the debut of the sorcerer-hero Doctor Strange, Lee, Kirby and scripter Robert Bernstein, under the pseudonym “R. Berns”, introduced a same-name criminal scientist and Ph.D., Carl Strange. Making his sole appearance in the Iron Man story “The Stronghold of Dr. Strange” in Tales of Suspense #41 (May 1963), the character gained mental powers in a freak lightning strike. The Mandarin debuted in issue #50 (Feb. 1964) and would become one of Iron Man’s major enemies. The Black Widow first appeared in #52 (April 1964) and Hawkeye followed five issues later.

Marvel Super-Heroes V1 (1967)

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Fantasy Masterpieces, became Marvel Super-Heroes with issue #12 began showcasing a try-out feature as each issue’s lead. This encompassed solo stories of such supporting characters as Medusa of the Inhumans, as well as the debuts of Captain Marvel (#12), the Phantom Eagle (#16) and the Guardians of the Galaxy (#18). The Spider-Man story drawn by Ross Andru in issue #14 was originally planned as a fill-in issue of The Amazing Spider-Man but was used here when that title’s regular artist, John Romita Sr. recovered more quickly than anticipated from a wrist injury. Andru would become the regular artist on The Amazing Spider-Man several years later.

X-Men (Silver Age)

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Early X-Men issues introduced the original team composed of Cyclops, Marvel Girl, Beast, Angel and Iceman among a few others, their archenemy Magneto and his Brotherhood of Evil Mutants featuring Mastermind, Quicksilver, Scarlet Witch, and Toad. The comic focused on a common human theme of good versus evil and later included storylines and themes about prejudice and racism, all of which have persisted throughout the series in one form or another. The evil side in the fight was shown in human form and under some sympathetic beginnings via Magneto, a character who was later revealed to have survived Nazi concentration camps only to pursue a hatred for normal humanity. His key followers, Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch, were Romani. Only one new member of the X-Men was added, Mimic/Calvin Rankin, but soon left due to his temporary loss of power.

The title lagged in sales behind Marvel’s other comic franchises. In 1969, writer Roy Thomas and illustrator Neal Adams rejuvenated the comic book and gave regular roles to two recently introduced characters: Havok/Alex Summers (who had been introduced by Roy Thomas before Adams began work on the comic) and Lorna Dane, later called Polaris (created by Arnold Drake and Jim Steranko). However, these later X-Men issues failed to attract sales and Marvel stopped producing new stories with issue #66, later reprinting a number of the older comics as issues #67–93.

Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos (1963)

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Comics-artist contemporary John Severin recalled in an interview conducted in the early 2000s that in the late 1950s, Kirby had approached him to be partners on a syndicated, newspaper comic strip “set in Europe during World War Two; the hero would be a tough, cigar-chomping sergeant with a squad of oddball GIs — sort of an adult Boy Commandos“, referring to a 1940s wartime “kid gang” comics series Kirby had co-created for DC Comics.

Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos followed an elite special unit, the First Attack Squad, nicknamed the “Howling Commandos”, which was stationed in a military base in England to fight missions primarily, but not exclusively, in the European theatre of World War II. Under Captain “Happy Sam” Sawyer, Fury was the cigar-chomping noncom who led the racially and ethnically integrated unit, unusual for the time.

Tales of Asgard (1968)

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Giant size reprint of classic Stan Lee and Jack Kirby backup stories from Journey into Mystery (Issues 97 thru 106).

Chamber of Darkness (1970)

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Chamber of Darkness is a horror/fantasy anthology comic book published by Marvel Comics that under this and a subsequent name ran from 1969-1974. It featured work by such notable creators as writer-editor Stan Lee, writers Gerry Conway and Archie Goodwin, and artists John Buscema, Johnny Craig, Jack Kirby, Tom Sutton, Barry Windsor-Smith (as Barry Smith), and Bernie Wrightson. Stories were generally hosted by either of the characters Digger, a gravedigger, or Headstone P. Gravely, in undertaker garb, or by one of the artists or writers.

After the eighth issue, the title changed to Monsters on the Prowl, and the comic became almost exclusively a reprint book.