Obsessively putting our comics in chronological order since 1985.
| 1951-10-01 00:01:10 |
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Astonishing #6
Issue(s): Astonishing #6
Cover Date: Oct 51
Title: "The phantom pen / Unseen terror!"
Credits:
Bill Everett - Writer
Bill Everett - Penciler
Bill Everett - Inker
Review/plot:
Bill Everett on writing is again a best guess.
Two more crazy Marvel Boy stories reprinted in the back of the Marvel Boy: The Uranian mini-series.
Story #1 is the first i've seen where Marvel Boy is fighting communists instead of sci-fi/fantasy menaces. The "fabulously wealthy" Mr. Corpora receives a pen as a gift from a communist benefactor.
However, the pen forces him to write checks to the "Upper Stalinian" government.
Robert Grayson is apparently now working as an insurance investigator...
...so after hearing Corpora's story he heads to the Stalinian embassy and gets into a fight. Marvel Boy's wrist-light causes the pen ink to disappear.
After it's all wrapped up, Mr. Corpora decides to donate all his money to the US government. Grayson's smirk as he talks about Corpora proving his loyalty is downright creepy.
Grayson is in civilian clothes throughout this story.
The final story has Marvel Boy investigating a case of strange strangulation.
They turn out to be the work of a Professor Diminutio, chief scientist from the satellite planet Agros.
He builds clothes that shrink, strangling their wearers. It's not said why, exactly. Is he just a psychopath? And it seems incredible to think that this alien would stand trial in a US court.
And with that, the Marvel Boy series is ended until his sort-of revival in Fantastic Four #164. The Astonishing series continues as a generic Strange Tales-ish book, which is not too different than the stories with Marvel Boy, except without the recurring main character. Marvel Boy seemed to play a variety of civilian roles in his stories, from newspaper reporter to insurance investigator to traditional super-hero. In the final story, Grayson shows up at the police headquarters and the police immediately start requesting his help on the case, without any explanation about why they'd be going to him.
It's almost as if Grayson was just fitted into whatever story was already written, but more likely Everett just didn't put a lot of thought into the character's backstory.
Quality Rating: D
Historical Significance Rating: 1
Chronological Placement Considerations: N/A
References: N/A
Crossover: N/A
Continuity Insert? N
My Reprint: Marvel Boy: The Uranian #3
| Previous: Astonishing #5 | Up: Main Box 1 / Golden Age / Post-WWII | Next: Tales To Astonish #25 Marvel Tales #113 Adventures Into Terror #28 Men's Adventures #26 |
Comments
The Stalinian guy looks exactly like Amahl Farouk.
@Mark: Well Colonel Alexi Vazhin did reveal in Uncanny X-Men #265 that the Shadow King had been previously allied with the Russian government so does this provide a brief glimpse of that untold tale?
That would be interesting, but I doubt Claremont ever read this story. He never seemed too big on Golden Age stuff.
@Mark: I was being facetious (but you never know;)
That wrong with issues?
http://www.supermegamonkey.net/chronocomic/entries/astonishing_4astonishing_6.shtml (Astonishing #4, 6)
and
http://www.supermegamonkey.net/chronocomic/entries/astonishing_6.shtml (Astonishing #6) 6 and 6 and both different??
Hi Edward. There's nothing really wrong here, it's just that i have stories from Astonishing #6 reprinted in two separate books. Most Golden Age and early Silver Age/Monster Age books had multiple stories. There were a total of 4 stories in Astonishing #6. One of them was not a Marvel Boy story and i don't have it. The other three were reprinted in the backs of the 2010 Marvel Boy: The Uranian series, and they are included in my site the way they were reprinted.
From a chronology perspective they are all standalone stories so the exact order doesn't matter.
A little confusing but i hope that clears it up! ;-)
(FYI, i'm deleting your duplicate comment in the General Comments section).
