The week before last I had one of my increasingly rare opportunities to visit a comics shop. I found a copy of "Origins of Marvel Comics Marvel Tales" #1. It collects the earliest appearances of the Fantastic Four, Spider-Man, the X-Men, and the Avengers. I know all these issues by reputation. I've either never read them, or read them so long ago I don't recall them well.

So I got the book, and have started reading it one story at a time. Most of the 1960s Marvel stories I've read come from later in the decade. I'm curious to see just what these very early Marvel Age stories were really like as comics storytelling.

Fantastic Four #1
The opening sequence shows a mysterious summons going out in the form of a blazing "4" across the sky. It is answered by mysterious superhuman people that the reader of 1961 would never have seen before. They're in such a hurry that they don't mind disconcerting others. Ben and Johnny are in such a rush that they cause millions in collateral damage (Even in 1961 jet fighters didn't come cheap! Fortunately we see that the pilots all made it out safely...). When they assemble, we learn that it's NOT to assist with a battle in progress or anything of that sort. They've merely been called to a meeting/briefing. Couldn't Reed simply have phoned them? Or used his genius to equip them with pagers or something?

Next, we see a sequence depicting the FF's origin. They were obviously in an excessive hurry there, too, and paid the price. Fortunately they survived, immediately recognized that they had the responsibility to use their powers for good, and pledged to come when called.

Next (we're now fully halfway through the issue) the actual story begins. Reed has learned that nuclear power plants have been getting swallowed by the Earth. The devastation is on a scale that recalls a 1970s Gatchaman/Battle of the Planets episode. Yet somehow only Reed already knows about it. He also knows that giant monster sightings at the disasters suggest that the answer may be found on the mysterious "Monster Island." Ben has evidently heard of it without believing in it. Reed insists that it's real. Sue figures they might as well look. Turns out they're able to find it quite easily.

They land and encounter the Mole Man, a seemingly ordinary--if homely--fellow who fled human society when everybody treated him shabbily based on his looks. He eventually found a vast underground region full of monsters, and made himself their master (Like to know how he managed that!). And now he is using his powerful monsters to burrow all over the world, wrecking nuclear plants and plotting the overthrow of the human race that shunned him.

Our heroes defeat him, flee the subterranean world, and seal if off behind them. The Mole Man blows up Monster Island for good measure. Reed believes that he and his monsters have been isolated safely from the rest of the world. It's hard to see how he might think that, given that they've already demonstrated an ability to strike all over the world. Anyway, our heroes are okay and ready for future adventures. When Reed issues the flaming "4" summons, he expresses a wish that he will never have to do this again (Understandable, given the chaos the summons ends up causing). His prayers would go unanswered in a most spectacular fashion....

I recall having once read FF #1 in a crummy little digest-sized reprint many years ago. I was amazed at just how little I remembered of it. The thing that most strikes me about the story as I read it yesterday evening is just how slapdash it is. It looks like it was written very much by the seat of the pants in a blinding hurry that left no time to think about whether a great deal of what the reader would be seeing actually made any sense. And it's absurdly overstuffed with incident. We have the initial summons sequence, the FF's origin, the Mole Man's original, and a couple of battles, all crammed into 24 pages. I'm no fan of decompressed storytelling in superhero comics. Leave that for slice-of-life stories and manga! One of the things that I like about comics is that the combination of words and pictures makes it possible to put a lot into a little space, a bit like poetry. But there's just too much going on here!

And yet...that opening sequence, as little sense as it makes in story terms, definitely gets things started with a bang. Which is surely what one needed to do to draw the attention of prospective comics readers in 1961. As silly as it is, it has a reason for being there, and it accomplishes what it was meant to accomplish. And, in the middle of all the Silver Age goofiness--the story has most of the weaknesses that characterized so much Golden Age and Silver Age comics storytelling--there are glimmerings of what would make later Marvel stories interesting. The character flaws and drama that we would later see are present in embryo. I had never realized, for example, that Reed goaded Ben into making the rocket flight prematurely against his better judgement. The whole thing was very much impatient Reed's fault. And Ben, though proven right, paid the hardest price for it. No wonder there was bad blood between Ben and Reed at first! And just imagine the load of guilt that Reed must carry, given that he is a fundamentally noble and ethical person. If only his genius could have been accompanied by a little...sense.

The fact that most panels have minimal backgrounds or none at all suggests that the art must have been rushed as well. It looks different from what I think of as the mature Jack Kirby style of a few years later. It is, however, very definitely his work. And, like that opening sequence, the art WORKS. It's easy to "read" in terms of visual storytelling, and it's nothing if not dynamic. It's the work of a highly-seasoned pro.

I can see why, in the context of the superhero comics familiar in 1961, the Fantastic Four's first adventure drew readers' attention. They let Stan Lee and his bosses at Marvel know, through their sales and letters, that they wanted more. And they'd soon be getting it, and it would soon be growing into something well beyond this kind of cuckoo beginning.

As an adult, I'm always struck by how the FF don't even have permission to be flying the space rocket:

That part never stuck with me as kid. Yes, they seem closely linked to the rocket; Reed constructed and probably designed it,
perhaps even funded it, or whatever, but the four of them have to sneak aboard, avoid security, and essentially steal the rocket.

But maybe obtaining "clearance" just means getting air-space clearance.

When you re-read these things as an adult the flaws are obvious. Lee & Kirby presented things in such a powerfully simple way that these stories have the feel of myth, which is what makes them so compelling (in my opinion). The details become extraneous because the essence of it is so easy to commit to memory.

I've also never read those books Daphne, but I've always wanted to. I recall seeing ads for them in comics when I was a kid.

I've always found that opening sequence from FF #1 hilarious, even as a kid. It was all so dramatic, and they caused SO much unnecessary damage... all to have a sit-down chat.

Amazing Fantasy #16
Meet Peter Parker, high school student. He lives with an aunt and uncle who love and care for him to the point of doting on him. He does so well at his science classes in school that his teachers believe he's a good candidate for a college scholarship in that field. In today's world, where STEM rules our education, he'd probably be one of the most acclaimed students at his school. But it's the early 1960s, and the geeks have yet to inherit the Earth. Geeky Peter is one of the least popular guys at his school. He no doubt spent his early years always being chosen last at recess.

One day Peter attends a nuclear radiation demonstration (At a nuclear science lab whose safety protocols leave something to be desired), and is bitten by a radioactive spider. Next thing he knows he is manifesting the proportionate strength and agility of a human-sized spider. All he lacks is the ability to spin a spider's webs--and his scientific genius enables him to make up for that with a set of artificial web shooters. He whips up a costume, and the Amazing Spider-Man is born!

And has absolutely no interest in superheroing. Peter plans to use his abilities to make good money as a masked popular stunt entertainer (In fairness, he wants money for his aunt and uncle's sake, not merely his own). He's got no intention of looking out after anybody else. When he has a chance to stop a runaway thief, he figures it's somebody else's problem. Only days later that uncaught criminal murders Peter's Uncle Ben. The story ends with Peter learning the hard way that "with great power comes great responsibility." So begins the career of a driven crime fighter, people-rescuer, and occasional world-saver.

Spider-Man's origin story, which I read many years ago in another of those crummy digest-sized reprints, is only half a standard comics issue long. "Amazing Fantasy #16" must have included some long-forgotten backup story, probably about a monster or alien or something. The origin story's brevity makes for a very compressed read. However, its smaller size and scope, and focus on a single protagonist, keeps it from being as hopelessly overstuffed as the Fantastic Four's origin story.

It's overall a much better-written story. It does have a Silver Age comic's lack of subtlety. The writing seems aimed at a middle-school level. But where the first FF story carries only glimmerings of future potential, Spider-Man's origin is a true prototype of what would become Marvel's standard flawed-superheroes-with-actual-problems story format. Marvel storytelling has already come a long way in the year or two since the FF's first story.

The art is clear and straightforward, but more detailed and less aggressively dynamic than in the FF's origin. It's also as unmistakably Steve Ditko's work as the other story was Jack Kirby's. While Ditko doesn't have Kirby's sheer dynamism (What artist's work does?), his art moves the story along at a brisk pace. Ditko too was a seasoned comics pro by the early 1960s. He knew how to tell a story visually. His visuals aren't as flashy as so much of what we see in later years, but they accomplish the primary function of telling a story quite well.

It's no wonder the introduction of Spider-Man got people's attention. It really would have stood out on the superhero racks back in the day. I've sometimes seen commentary to the effect that Peter Parker appeals to superhero comics geeks because he's a character not unlike themselves. Note, though, that in the early 1960s comic books in the U.S. were still a mass medium, not the province of a small, geeky fandom. Spider-Man had a wide appeal, as multiple successful movies have since demonstrated.

Amazing Fantasy 15. There were a couple of backup stories, one featuring a mummy and another Martians.

And all by Ditko.

Spider-Man also benefited from having the best costume in comics, bar none. And that was important to me as a kid, back then.
And the best - most relatable - powers.
And the best rogues gallery.
And the best stories.
Spider-Man is fecking awesome.

Amazing Spider-Man is certainly the crown jewel of early Marvel.

But Spider-Man's rogues gallery can't compare to Purple Man, Stilt-Man and the Owl.

Come on, people.

Beat this Spidey! Cower at the power of the Purple Man! Cower at the sight of DD's color scheme!

That's a brilliant cover though, innit? Kirby didn't do much DD, but when he did it was mint!

Yes, that's a great cover!

Yeah, I love it!

It's okay.

X-Men #1
At his posh private school Professor Charles Xavier trains a group of very special students. "Professor X" is a telepathic mutant. Having experienced misunderstanding, fear, and shunning due to his powers, he hopes to spare young mutants the same problems by teaching them to cope with their powers in a supportive and safe environment. Or anyway, supportive. The grueling combat drills that Xavier subjects his youths to don't look very safe at all. He is teaching them to fight in the belief that there are surely evil mutants out there as well. It will be up to Professor X and his students to defend mutant- and ordinary humankind from these evil mutants.

The school has just gone co-ed with the arrival of the lovely Jean "Marvel Girl" Grey. The arrival of a pretty girl naturally prompts the boys to start making fools of themselves. Hank "Beast" McCoy, apparently taking his code name a little too seriously, pulls an especially uncalled-for move. Fortunately Jean has both the confidence and the power to put the guys in their place.

She is still settling in when the team learns that a frighteningly powerful evil mutant called Magneto has just struck a military missile base. The personnel at the base are helpless to stop the rampaging mutant. Then the X-Men arrive in their private jet (You have to wonder where they get their money from) and go into action. They have no time to lose, as they have only a few pages of the issue left in which to bring the battle to a resolution. Within less that 15 minutes they've defeated Magneto and sent him packing. No doubt he'll be back! In the meantime, the commander of the rescued garrison is most favorably impressed by Professor X's students. The X-Men have gotten off to a good start.

Marvel's writing made a lot of progress in that first couple of years! "X-Men" #1 is the best-written story of the three so far. We're beginning to see examples of the sort of clever dialog that Marvel would become known for. And the plot more or less makes sense. The story is admittedly still very compressed. It also still seems written at a middle-school level. Still, it treats with relationships between the sexes in a way that suggests that Marvel has a chance of developing appeal to adolescent readers.

The art is by Jack Kirby and Paul Reinman, an artist I had to look up. He apparently drew comics for many years. He inked Kirby a good bit during that time, although not all that many of Kirby's superhero stories. Which is too bad, since Kirby and Reinman seem to have been a good team. The art is attractive and "reads" very well. Visually the story holds up just fine.

This is the first time I've ever read "X-Men" #1 anywhere. Where FF #1 and "Amazing Fantasy" #15 have long been held up as Marvel's most seminal early works, "X-Men" #1 doesn't get as much praise. It seems to have been considered something of a B title in the early years. It would be quite some time later, under a different creative team, that the X-Men would begin to get readers excited. This first appearance nonetheless has a secure place in Marvel history as the issue where what would one day become a highly successful franchise got started.

I remember a "What-If" story where Spidey met the early Daredevil, learned that he was blind, and cracked that this would explain the awful color scheme. He immediately realized that he'd put his foot in his mouth. The comment nonetheless prompted DD to redesign his color scheme.

I agree with your assessment of the first X-Men story - it's extremely well done in comparison to the FF and even Spider-Man's origin stories.