Issue(s): Fantastic Four #15
Cover Date: Jun 63
Title: "The Mad Thinker and his awesome android!"
Credits:
Stan Lee - Writer
Jack Kirby - Penciler
Dick Ayers - Inker

Review/plot:
Sometimes you run into some weird surprises when you read the first appearances of old characters for the first time. It never would have occurred to me that the Mad Thinker got his start working with the mob. He tells the various mob gangs that he is going to take them over, but you get the impression that he is stringing them along. They've been using him to develop strategies to rob banks, but now he's decided he's going to take over New York City and declare it an independent country, with himself as the King. I've always liked the Mad Thinker because he's not really out for self-gain; he just does what he does for the mental challenge, so it's interesting to see him here in his first appearance doing something for what appears to be personal gain.

In any event, you've got to love corny Silver Age computers:

The first step in taking over NYC is getting rid of the Fantastic Four. He arranges for each of them to get a tempting opportunity outside of the FF - Reed is offered a prestigious position at GE, Sue is given an acting career, the Thing becomes a pro-wrestler...

...and poor unambitious Johnny joins the circus. We will see other characters, like Thor, Hawkeye, the Scarlet Witch, and Quicksilver, join the circus when they have nowhere else to turn, but for Johnny, circus life is even better than being a glamorous super-hero celebrity. After all, he gets to meet "all those cool circus chicks!". Who knew Johnny was into bearded ladies?

Johnny (and presumably Sue) have cousins in the circus: Bones and Shorty.

Eventually the FF all get sick of their new professions and return to the Baxter Building but it has been taken over by the Mad Thinker. He hits them with a number of traps...

...including an attack by the Thinker's Awesome Android (Reed keeps claiming it was created based on his notes, but you know what? I don't believe it. I've never seen Reed create an Awesome Android.).

Then he loses due to Reed having arranged for the mailman to press a safety switch down in the lobby that shuts off all the electronic equipment in the building. Yep, the Mad Thinker was defeated by Willie Lumpkin.

Problems with this:

• I hate out-of-nowhere solutions based on arrangements the characters make that we aren't shown until after the fact.
• The entire Baxter Building was covered in some weird booby-trapped crystal that only allowed the FF to enter. How did the mailman get inside?
• Reed put a button in the lobby that turns off all the equipment in his lab? And it looks just like an elevator call button? I bet that's caused some interesting situations. "Oh let me just open up the Negative Zone portal." Ding! "Damn." "BLAAAASTAAAAAR!!!!"
• Reed tells the Thinker that the reason he was defeated was because of the X-Factor, which the Thinker defines as the human element. I don't see how this has anything to do with the human element. I could see a situation where the Thinker doesn't win because he wasn't able to account for human emotion. That would be a good way to have him defeated. This is just... even accepting all the insanity you would have to accept in order for this plot to work, it just means that Reed out-strategized the Thinker. It has nothing to do with the 'human element'.

Oh well. First appearance of a cool character. I can't complain. Except, you know, when i do.

More Silver Age madness: the Thing was on Yancy Street, about to throw a tank at a building over some taunting by the Yancy Street Gang when he was summoned away by the FF signal.

And Reed was on the verge of creating life when he got interrupted by all this crime-fighting nonsense.

Quality Rating: D

Historical Significance Rating: 6 - first Mad Thinker, first Awesome Android

Chronological Placement Considerations: N/A

References: N/A

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: Marvel Collector's Item Classics #10

It's also interesting to see the Mad Thinker without unkempt hair.

Roy Thomas has a letter here.

So Reed's one-celled organism is....a frilled lizard? Yeesh it must have evolved while he wasn't looking.

"The entire Baxter Building was covered in some weird booby-trapped crystal that only allowed the FF to enter. How did the mailman get inside?"

Well clearly Lumpkin's audition in Fantastic Four #11 had an impact and they were forced to bring him into the group.

Willie Lumpkin is actually one of the Elders of the Universe ("The Messenger"). Watch for 6 part mini-series "The Cosmic Adventures of Willie Lumpkin" coming soon!

"After all, he gets to meet "all those cool circus chicks!". Who knew Johnny was into bearded ladies?"

Nah, let's be honest. They couldn't spell it out for you because of the Comic Code, but Johnny was really talking about the girl who swallows fire.

Aside from all the problems you pointed out, there's another one. I think what kept happening in the early years was that Stan would create almost unbeatable villains (case in point, the Awesome Android - who is probably far more awesome than anything Reed ever created - in fact, since Doom created the time machine, what exactly has Reed invented that was cool?) and then figure out ridiculous ways they could be beaten. That's probably why the Android hasn't been used that much over the years (your checklist proves that) - not that he's not Awesome, but because it's difficult to think of ways to beat him.

I think I like the Mad Thinker looking more normalish here before growing his hair out to look a little 'madder.' That's actually what I really liked about him looking so normal and boring: all his powers really of his mind.

I could see someone using him like DC's Suicide Squad, like the animated version where the Clock King was the planner/mission control.

Kind of looks like an evil and smarter Ben Grimm now that I think about it.

I think the opening splash page of the Thinker here really defines him, more or less emulating the statue without any real idea regarding who he will eventually become later. Though I do think Stan goes a little crazy calling Andy "neither animal, vegetable or mineral"...but that's just flourishments.

Was the Awesome Android created using Reed's notes?

Yes. In 1962 Watson and Crick received the Nobel Prize for their work on the DNA double helix molecular model. This was covered extensively in Life and Time magazines, along with diagrams and photographs of DNA double helix models, similar to the one shown in this issue, page 4, panel 2. At this time, molecular genetics was still in its infancy, and the informal term "building blocks of life" was widely used in reference to DNA, again, see page 4 panel 2. Here we also have Reed incorrectly calling DNA molecules "cells," so let me just blame that on Stan Lee misquoting Reed, hah.

Next, on page 12, panel 2, the Mad Thinker says "Here are Mr. Fantastic's notes concerning his work with DNA, the building blocks of life itself! Using this information, I should be able to create a new form of life-- one which will serve only-- the Thinker!"

Does the Mad Thinker define "X-factor" as "the human element?"

No. On page 20, panel 2, Reed defines the X-factor as "the unexpected." This is consistent with the commonplace definition of X-factor as an unknown, unexpected, or variable value, or element, as per the use of the variable X in algebraic equations.

Then, on page 20, panel 5, the Thinker uses the phrase "human element" as an example of an X-factor, but not as a definition. Reed had already defined the term. Willie Lumpkin was the human element being discussed, insofar as he had done something unexpected, something which the Thinker had not factored into his plans.

I agree that it's confusing, and these are certainly not the most shining examples of Stan Lee's dialog writing skills, but that's the way I interpret these dialog snippets.

The x-factor in question is obviously a time traveling X-Factor whose off-screen presence explains away any plot hole, true believer.

I like how the Awesome Android has awesome purple skivvies to protect true believers from the awesome synthetic genitals he must surely possess. His creator truly was a Mad Thinker.

I think the real reason Ben's mad at the Yancy Boys is because they discovered his secret love of the ballet; part of why he's so surly after he becomes The Thing is that he can't sneak into the Met to see Swan Lake anymore.