Issue(s): Marvel Two-In-One #96
Cover Date: Feb 83
Title: "Visiting hours!"
Credits:
Tom DeFalco - Writer
Ron Wilson - Penciler
Mike Esposito - Inker
Linda Grant & Lance Tooks - Editor

Review/plot:
The Thing is in the hospital after his fight with the Champion.

And in the tradition of stories like Fantastic Four annual #3, just about every hero comes to visit him...

...and every villain comes to try to kill him.

Joke villain Fabian Stankowicz is among those who come to attack the Thing, but Spidey stops him.

Pretty much the only villain who doesn't get involved is Dr. Doom, who considers an attack on a hospitalized foe to be beneath him. Fantastic Four #258 will include a flashback of Doom's robots taking Terrax out of the same hospital at this time and note that Doom is aware of the Thing's condition and wants him unmolested.

    

In the end, the only villain who makes it through to the Thing is the Sandman, and he just wants to share some beers.

This was fun!

Quality Rating: C+

Historical Significance Rating: 1

Chronological Placement Considerations: The heavy lifting was done for Marvel Two-In-One Annual #7, where just about everyone appears. I've placed this directly after it. And since this is an intentionally silly story, i'm not going to sweat any minor problems.

References:

• The Thing had not fully recovered from his fight with Gladiator in Fantastic Four #249 before he fought the Champion in Marvel Two-In-One annual #7.
  
• Bill Foster is among the visitors. He has recovered nicely after his cancer was cured in Marvel Two-In-One #85.
  
• Very minor villain Shellshock previously appeared in Marvel Two-In-One #70 (but he's completely redesigned his costume since then).
  

• The Thing helped put the Grapplers in prison in Marvel Two-In-One #56.
  
• Another very minor villain is the Hijacker (and his Deadly Murder Machine!). There's no footnotes for him, surprisingly, but he last appeared in Marvel Two-In-One #24, and before that in Tales To Astonish #40.
  

• Sandman and the Thing became friends in Marvel Two-In-One #86.

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A

The weird thing is that Beetle is in his old armor in this story, and not the new armor he started wearing in Spectacular Spider-Man 58.

I'm in two minds about this one. Using these massive super-villain/hero team up things for just a random issue feels off...

Wait is that Doc Ock but with a stave instead of his arms?

David, I believe that's the Mole Man.

Looks kind of taller and hairier for Mole Man but maybe it is.

I do wonder why exactly did they have Sandman start turning over a new leaf? I mean out of all the villains he never really had much depth, lots of fun to look at on the pages. I mean he tried to kill Thing a few times and only other link I can think of is they got working class growing up enviroments.

Oh wait, just noticed the Mole minions behind him, yep that's Mole Man alright.

"I do wonder why exactly did they have Sandman start turning over a new leaf?"

I suspect almost all of it can be traced to Marvel Team-Up #1, where Sandy gets a sympathetic Christmas story where Spidey and the Torch help him keep his aging mother in the dark about his secret.

There are some nice bits in here, like Mirage trying to use holograms to distract Daredevil, which fails for the obvious reason.