FANTASTIC FOUR #98
While Apollo 11 is on its way to the moon, Reed picks up a
secret Kree transmission and realizes there is some sort of threat to the moon
landing. He, Ben and Johnny track the transmission to a remote island, where
they fight a Kree Sentry and demolish a machine that was going to awaken a
“nameless mass” that lurked under the Sea of Tranquility
With this threat neutralized, Neil Armstrong is able to make
his “one small step” safely.
The issue is an overt tribute to the first moon landing—which
is just fine with me. A celebration of one of mankind’s greatest
accomplishments is never out of place.
I suppose that in the Marvel Universe, the Apollo missions
really shouldn’t have been as big as deal as they were in real life, since a
number of humans (most notably the Fantastic Four) had already been to the moon
and even to other solar systems. But this is ignored for the sake of this issue
and that’s how it should be. A work of fiction should never trump a real life
act of heroism.
SPIDER MAN #84
There’s now a $5,000 reward out on the Schemer, so Peter is
working hard to track him down. The Schemer, though, has a special car equipped
with a variety of weapons and gadgets, allowing him to escape from Spidey.
Reaching Kingpin’s home, he confronts his rival.
But their potential fight is interrupted when Spider Man
arrives. Kingpin ignores the Schemer while he whomps on the webslinger,
allowing the Schemer to disappear along with Kingpin’s wife. The Kingpin escapes to give chase, leaving
Spider Man with absolutely nothing for his trouble.
This is another strong issue, with Romita’s usual skill at
choreographing fight scenes on effective display. There’s also a continuation
of the Gwen/Peter travails, as Gwen is increasingly unhappy about her
boyfriend’s secretiveness and Peter struggles with the idea about coming clean
with her.
As I mentioned in the last entry, Stan Lee’s skill at
characterization had really been growing over the years. Consider how awkward
and contrived some of his earlier characterizations had been—such as the Matt
Murdock/Karen Page relationship. Then compare it to the Spider Man stories we
are currently looking at—where the relationship stuff seems perfectly within
character and is a natural outgrowth of the situations in which the various
characters find themselves. The
Gwen/Peter travails never degenerate into soap opera territory because we can
really believe it is happening—and, of course, since we also get plenty of
old-fashioned comic book action mixed in with it.
Another effective characterization to take note of is Flash
Thompson, who was shipped back to Vietnam in the previous issue.
Originally, he was the high school bully, but even in those days we’d get an
occasional glimpse of a nice person hiding inside the bully. Over the years,
Flash has stopped being a regular part of the cast, but—despite still being a
bit of jerk from time to time—he’s believably grown into someone we actually
like.
THOR #176
This high-action issue expertly packs a lot of story into
it. Loki is ruling Asgard and puts Odin in a capsule that he places in the “Sea of Eternal
Night
All this comes to a head when Surtur, the giant fire demon,
escapes from his prison because Odin’s magic is no longer there to contain him.
Surtur attacks Asgard, Loki flees in panic to save himself. Thor sends Sif and
Balder to wake up his dad, then leads an army out to fight Surtur.
Jack Kirby will draw the next issue. John Buscema will drawn
#179. Then Kirby will be back for one final issue. This story line—which will
wrap up the “Fall of Asgard” story arc, really does allow Kirby to leave Thor
while at the top of his game. This is another epic tale that makes great use of
Asgard and its inhabitants to tell a truly exciting and visually awesome story.
That’s it for May. In June 1970; the Human Torch goes
looking for his girlfriend; the Schemer/Kingpin gang war continues; and Thor’s
dad wakes up from his nap.
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