Issue(s): Marvel Feature #5, Marvel Feature #6
Cover Date: Sep-Nov 72
Title: "The incredible shrinking doom!" / "Fear's the way he dies!"
Credits:
Mike Friedrich - Writer
Herb Trimpe - Penciler
Herb Trimpe - Inker

Review/plot:
The Unofficial Handbook of Marvel Creators gives Roy Thomas a writing credit. As Editor (in Chief) he likely provided direction on the plot, but only Friedrich is listed as a writer in the printed credits.

Most superheroes' super-powers make them better than the average person, but for Henry Pym they almost always put him in situations where he'd be better off if he was powerless. For example, in Marvel Feature #5, he spends about half the book being chased by a bird (he is trapped in his Ant-Man form).

Interestingly, in narrating his situation, he says, "Bubbling anger splattered and burst through every pore of my skin --- Strangely for me, I let the anger rule -- I acted." Henry Pym has the most repressed rage of any comic character this side of the Hulk; he's just not a healthy man.

He also gets into a fight with Egghead...

...and meets Egghead's super-smart hippie niece, Trish Starr...

...who sews him a new costume, which is supposed to make him look like a swashbuckler.

Because his costume is so tiny, the stitch lines are relatively gigantic, which i thought was funny.

Trish Starr doesn't get much character development here, but she'll be turning up again in Defenders and Hulk. She's actually a character with a lot of potential that never really got used properly.

After defeating Egghead and parting ways with Trish, he returns to his home to find Janet unconscious. Oddly, it seems that she just tripped and fell while looking for Henry, but her chauffeur comes in and tries to put the moves on her.

When that doesn't work out, he attacks as Whirlwind.

Super tiny Pym manages to get the Wasp to hear him, and the two of them hide. They start to work on a cure for Henry, but he's too cautious and slow in developing the antidote, so Janet infects herself with the serum that made him stuck in his small state, thinking that he'll work faster if he's doing it for her instead of himself. What a weird relationship. Frustrated with Janet a little later, Pym thinks to himself, "I could have taken her pretty neck -- and wrung it!".

With both of them stuck at insect sizes, Whirlwind attacks again, destroying Pym's home and lab. A newspaper ("Southampton Review", one of the few times in a Marvel comic that a newspaper isn't the Daily Bugle) publishes an article claiming that the couple is dead.

The motive behind these change (trapping them at insect size, cutting them off from the real world) seems to be to repurpose the title as a barbarian adventure book, presumably to capitalize on the popularity of Conan. Similar efforts were made with Ka-Zar and the Sub-Mariner. Fighting the bird, Pym even refers to himself as a barbarian. Pym has too much baggage for that to really work, and Janet certainly isn't suited for a barbarian theme (which will result in her getting turned into a real wasp), but it could have been an interesting direction with a better writer.

An insightful letter from a Will Hamblet in Marvel Feature #6 (excerpted):

I first met Henry Pym on that fateful day Cap walked out on The Avengers...

Hank, in a delightfully understated way, was the most unique hero in Marvel's (or anyone else's) line. He was the only super-hero who, by both inclination and TALENT, was not really equipped for the job. His orientation was definitely NOT physical. Where D.D. would exult in action for its sake; Hank did not. Where Cap would react instinctively to a dangerous situation; Hank would hesitate and attempt to intellectualize his reaction. Only in times of intense anger, or fear for Jan's safety, did he lash out without thinking and then he had none of the grace or skill of Cap and his brethren. Although he was the biggest and, for a long time, the most powerful, he was the only Avenger for whom I ever felt a sense of danger when he went into battle. Hank was acutely aware of his own limitations and Roy's statement on page three concerning Hank's preference for the role of (bio)chemist over that of ANY of his super-hero identities exhibits Roy's complete understanding of the character.

I have a theory that Roy (consciously or otherwise) strongly identified with Henry Pym. Hank is the kind of super-hero that a lot of us would have turned into; self-conscious and insecure. This was probably the reason Hank didn't assert himself when The Avengers were falling apart. He had the intelligence and the seniority to take command... but didn't. Undoubtedly because he felt that his physical deficits made him unworthy of leadership. His Yellow Jacket schizophrenia was also quite in keeping with this kind of self-image. This was the kind of personality he felt a super-hero needed to succeed; brash and arrogant. Unfortunately when he recovered his true personality it simply did not go with the "jazzy" costume John had given him. Roy's handling of the character became unsure and he was finally dropped. Whether it was Roy's identification with Hank or mine, the series began to rapidly lose its old vitality.

The point of all this? Well, Hank's personality and The Ant-Man character (and costume) dovetail nicely. Hank's solo investigation of the Vision was the only post-YJ AVENGERS story which really "grabbed me" emotionally. Unfortunately, as we all know, Marvel characters must have a problem. With Hank as Goliath (Giant-Man) the problem flowed naturally from the character's powers and personality. The present problem not only seems contrived, but does NOT require the Henry Pym personality to function. The theme would work just as well with Clint Barton or Matt Murdock in the protagonist's role.

When Cap was revived from the "Golden Age" it didn't matter much that his personality had altered far beyond believable proportions. After all, characterization was NOT one of the 40's strong points. But... if Henry Pym has returned only to emerge as a completely different person be prepared for the righteous cries of wrath which surely must ensue.

I think the analysis of Pym's character is dead on, but (as the writer implies) the development comes more from subtext and interpretations that were not the original creators' intent. Interestingly, while most Marvel characters were deliberately created with a character flaw, Pym's flaws were unintentional, and yet more human and realistic than most.

Quality Rating: C-

Historical Significance Rating: 5 - new status quo for Ant-Man and the Wasp: stuck at insect size and presumed dead; first Trish Starr

Chronological Placement Considerations: Beginning this issue Henry Pym and the Wasp are presumed dead and should not appear in other Marvel books until their return in Marvel Feature #10.

References:

• Whirlwind was shown to be Janet's chauffeur in Avengers #46.

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A

On the Pym's emotional problems issue, "Tales to Astonish 44" (the first appearance of the Wasp) really does lay the groundwork for this stuff.

Pym's wife gets iced by Communist spies, and he suffers a "nervous breakdown." This is unusually explicit for an early Silver Age comic, though refreshingly plausible. Afterward, he gets fixated on becoming the size of an ant. (Ostensibly this is because ants are hard-working and unusually strong, but I gotta believe it was an expression of his insecurity in the face of a cruelty.)

Once the flashback ends, Pym meets Janet. He immediately starts lusting for her in this weird "Vertigo" type thing, and has to forcibly check his libido because she's a minor. (She looks all of about 14 in the illustrations.) Rather than commit statutory rape, he injects her with wasp DNA.

It may not have been Kirby's original intent, or Lee's, but I'm dang sure Gary Friedrich was setting up that Hank Pym was a weird, weird guy. What kind of super hero is a mentally ill widower? What kind of super hero's "girl problem" is that his love interest is literally a girl (and not a grown woman)? Well, the same kind of super hero who nearly drowns in a bathtub.

As a guy who really loves the Silver Age stuff, I'm not always down with Roy Thomas's work: it's always a little more fussy and forced than it needs to be. But the whole "Hank Pym is cuckoo-bananas" subplot from Avengers 55-60 is a totally convincing interpretation of this guy's problems.

I think the deal is that Hank Pym is a super villain in serious denial. Genius? Check. Invents homicidal, indestructible oedipal robot? Check. Crazy? Check. Crazy about the fact that he is crazy? Double check!

He's a fascinating character, though. Totally in keeping with the early Sixties "super heels," like Grey Hulk, Early Thing, and Sub-Mariner.

Weirdly DC sort of ran with this with "Sword of the Atom"; I actually thought they did it first but weirdly that was 1983, so this was ten years ahead of it's time with Pym.

I've always assumed the inspiration for this phase of Ant-Man's career was THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING MAN. But I'm reminded of "Minimidget", which appeared in comics from Centaur in the early Golden Age. Minimidget and his lady Ritty were permanently small, and Minimidget often carried a sword (an actual sword, not a nail). He dressed similarly to Ant-Man here (tight shirt and leggings of different colours, boots).

The MU had always fascinated me for its vastity, but that vastity also kept me away. Still, when I started reading, after the film Captain America 2, I did it form the beginning (FF#1). Reading all the issues from there gives a cross section of those years, I guess, and reading also "minor" issues like this one can show elements like the one you underlined in your comments. Besides, I love this site, which for one thing helps me to orient in the endless issues that have been published.
Anyway.. any idea about Orkie? He looked almost like a sidekick some issues ago, and now not even a footnote says if he surived the fire.

Interestingly, while most Marvel characters were deliberately created with a character flaw, Pym's flaws were unintentional, and yet more human and realistic than most.

Well, Hank wasn't created to be a super-hero; he was the protagonist of a fantasy story, so that accounts for the difference.

And however jejune Jan may have been when we first met her, she turns 23 in Avengers #46 (ironically the Whirlwind identity's debut), so not "literally a girl" any more.

I found Geoff Johns's Avengers v.3 #71 so gross with Whirlwind's sexual fantasies about Jan, but I guess they weren't so unfounded as I thought. (Still hate the execution, though.) I'd forgotten about Dave/"Charles"/Whirlwind being so willing to swoop in and "comfort" Jan in this one. My bad.

Whirlwind also went after Jan pretty aggressively in AVENGERS #222, knocking out her current chauffeur and assaulting her in her car with the idea that, since her husband was in jail, she was available. And he'd only just been sprung from prison by the (Egghead's) new Masters of Evil, forcing them to reveal themselves early in order to save him. So yeah, there's a basis for that characterization.

Like you, I still didn't care at all for Johns's story.

Also in Avengers 274, Jan is glad Whirlwind is caught because he has a sick fascination with her. And Steve explains that he knew that the "Jan" he spoke with wasn't the real deal because she didn't seem to care if he was caught.

And before Whirlwind, Jan had to deal with the unwanted attentions of the Living Laser.