Issue(s): Namor #10, Namor #11, Namor #12
Cover Date: Jan-Mar 91
Title: "Dark nativity" / "Reunion" / "The Invaders fight again!!"
Credits:
John Byrne - Writer
John Byrne - Penciler
John Byrne - Inker
Kelly Corvese - Assistant Editor
Terry Kavanagh - Editor

Review/plot:
There are actually no titles for these issues on the insides. The titles are taken from the covers.

I don't know if this was the plan all along or if it was just a happy coincidence, but this arc takes advantage of the fact that John Byrne brought back the Golden Age Human Torch in his Avengers West Coast run and is now writing Namor to do an Invaders reunion (and issue #10 is dedicated to Invaders artist Frank Robbins). This also coincides with the real world reunification of Germany and takes advantage of the world's nervousness about that.

So he goes with Namorita to Germany, where it so happens that Nazis have brought the kidnapped Human Torch (and Ann Raymond) for the purpose of reviving Warrior Woman.

Namor spots Master Man and follows him back to the Nazi headquarters. Despite risk of brain damage, Warrior Woman is revived quickly and she helps Master Man knock Namor out.

The revival of Warrior Woman was funded by a Herr Nacht.

And it turns out that his plan is to become a new Master Man and marry Warrior Woman, having become obsessed with her after looking at old scrapbook photos. The bad news for him is that Warrior Woman does seem to be partially brain damaged.

Meanwhile, Namor is badly dehydrated but he manages to break out of his prison. Delusional, he fights Neo-Nazi goons until the Invaders seemingly show up.

It's really an elderly Spitfire, the current Union Jack, and Namorita.

Namor is rescued and rehydrated, and the Nazi goons are defeated. The original Master Man was also dispatched to the fight, but his powers fade and Herr Nacht shows up as the new Master Man.

Captain America shows up to help out...

...and Spitfire deals with the Nazi scientist, Dr. Kraus.

Kraus, it turns out, was only being kept alive by an apparatus, and it's damaged in the fight and he dies. The original Master Man has become suicidal since he can't have Warrior Woman, and he throws a switch setting the entire place on fire.

Spitfire is injured, and the Human Torch gives her a blood transfusion that restores her to the physical age of 16, albeit with grey hair.

Henry Pym later confirms that a transfusion of the Human Torch's blood affects Spitfire in a unique way and that it wouldn't have happened to anyone.

The process drains the Human Torch's powers, though.

So, after Warrior Woman and Herr Nacht are defeated, the heroes engage in a deception, telling the world that the Torch is dead. He's even given a tribute by the (non-Golden Age) Torch.

The idea is to prevent the Golden Age Torch's enemies from going after him now that he's powerless.

I never really liked Byrne's revival of the Golden Age Torch, but if his plan all along was to de-power him after doing an Invaders reunion, i feel a little better about it. I was never really a big Invaders fan, so the whole premise here leaves me cold, and the Herr Nacht Master Man replacement is no improvement. Additionally, a lot of these issues are devoted to flashbacks and hallucinations and the story is actually pretty sparse. And if you are going to do an Invaders story, i feel like it should have bright and clear art and colors, not the Duo-Shade stuff that Byrne is doing at this time.

Also in these issues, Misty Knight (wearing something weird) and Colleen Wing go to confront the guy claiming to be Iron Fist.

The guy makes a pretty good show of being the real deal, at least in terms of look and powers, if not politeness or culinary preference.

Misty and Colleen later meet with Detective Rafael Scarfe and decide to exhume Iron Fist's grave.

Quality Rating: C+

Historical Significance Rating: 1

Chronological Placement Considerations: The Golden Age Human Torch was captured in the previous arc and shouldn't appear any where between there and here. Union Jack appears here after getting powered up in Knights of Pendragon #7-12. Sersi is seen in the background when Spitfire calls Jarvis to see if Captain America can help.

Herr Nacht is also known as Axl Nacht or Gotteskrieger.

References:

• Namor lost his ankle wings in the last arc, and once previously prior to Young Men #24.
  
• Master Man and Warrior Woman were married in Invaders #20, although it's pointed out here that the ceremony was interrupted.
  
• There are a few other flashbacks to the Invaders series while Namor is hallucinating while in captivity, and there's also a flashback to Fantastic Four #4.
  
• Ann Raymond's husband Toro is thought to have died in Sub-Mariner #14 (although he showed up subsequently in Power Pack).
  
• Union Jack last fought alongside Captain America in Captain America #254. And since then, the Green Knight invested him with the power of the Pendgragon in Knights of the Pendragon #7.
  
• Spitfire was shown to still have her powers in Marvel Super Heroes #4 (the only actual footnote in these issues).
  
• Johnny Storm mentions having met the Golden Age Torch in a desert. That was Fantastic Four annual #4.

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A

There's a specific political cartoonist Byrne is aping in that panel, but I'm blanking on his name. He always had those tiny characters in the lower right of the panels, commenting separate from the main characters.

Pat Oliphant.

Spitfire is also injured, and the Human Torch gives her a blood transfusion that restores her to the physical age of 16, albeit with grey hair.

Wow, Byrne was really way ahead of fashion trends. Nowadays the rejuvenated Spitfire would fit right in with all the teenage girls who are dying their hair grey! (Presumably in a couple of decades once they actually start going grey they'll dye their hair back to their "real" color!)

In retrospect, its almost amusing at how paranoid people were over the reunification of Germany, with the forecasts that Nazis were going to start popping up all over the place. Certainly the united Germany has done much more to make up for its past mistakes than most other nations with similar problems. Just compare that to the United States where it seems a day doesn't go by without some politician arguing that slavery wasn't actually all that bad!

My thoughts exactly, Ben Herman.

Does anyone else think that "teen Spitfire" (Spit-Ember?) looks a lot like Namorita. If Fnord didn't identify the caption, I would have sworn that was Nita.

Also the (Golden Age) Torch has BLOOD now? WHAT THE HECK IS UP WITH THE TORCH? Sorry, about that, but it seems like creators keep going back and forth about how "robotic" Jim Hammond is and I'm starting to get a might confused about his status. I always assumed that what was explained back in AWC is that the big difference between Jim Hammond and someone like Vision is that, much like the imfamous R.O.T.O.R., The Torch doesn't have motors, gears or tubes, and his "parts" are all artificial constructions of the human body (which I took to mean basically "plastic.") Meanwhile Vision has some mechanical parts (which I assumed is why he's called a "synthezoid.") Nevertheless, that would still mean that the Torch's body wasn't "real" and therefore should not have "blood", much less any that should be compatible with a human. Unless you're referring to the OTHER torch. In which case, feel free to disregard me for being a dumb.

And since he isn't listed as "character appearing" I take it that that ISN'T Iron Fist?

Doesn't Strucker make a flashback appearance in issue 10 where he seems to know FOR SURE that Germany will lose the war? Of course, we'll see in Marvel Universe 1-3 how Strucker came by his knowledge of the future. I wonder if Byrne had the "time machine" plot in mind and gave his notes to Stern when it came time to do Marvel Universe or Stern had the "time machine" plot in mind for years and shared his idea with Byrne when did these issues or Marvel Universe 1-3 is just an example of Stern's tendency to fix continuity problems.
I'm not sure how to react to Namorita not knowing what the Sudentland was.( Don't tell kveto.)

Jon-no, the Golden Age Torch has had blood since the early issues of Avengers- this story was a reference to a previous incident in Invader 11 where the GA Torch gave blood to Spitfire.
And in fact, the Vision seemed to be bleeding from the mouth in Giant-Size Avengers 3.

The idea of a blood transfusion taking away the Torch's powers, given their origin, also doesn't make much sense. How is it the same John Byrne that decided Scarlet Witch's kids couldn't exist because the Vision is an android basically treats the Golden Age Torch as an ordinary human with fire powers? You'd think Byrne didn't even know what the origin of the Golden Age Torch was, but there seems to be a long tradition of making the Torch and Vision's robotic nature an unimportant detail good only for making Vision angst about not being a real boy, and not something that might actually affect their physiology (unless someone wants to bleep up Scarlet Witch of course).

Jon Dubya, kudos for mentioning R.O.T.O.R.! Amazing character and movie... :))

@Michael, yes, this has a scene where Strucker shocks a young Dr. Kraus by saying that he "knew this day would come" as Germany's defeat looms and Hitler "cowers in his bunker". I remembered the Marvel Universe scene but since this is Strucker claiming he knew only after it happened it could have been idle boasting as opposed to proof of anything. I was more curious how that flashback fit with the fact that Strucker was kicked out of Germany prior to the end of the war (Sgt. Fury #29).

@Jon, correct that it is not Iron Fist. A close look at the Characters Appearing will spoil who it really is.

Sudetenland? Where's that?
:-)

Kveto, not sure if you were kidding or not -

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sudetenland

Clyde, you know Kveto's from Prague, right?

Wow, Clyde. You sure know how to kill a joke.

Did you miss the :-)?

:( Sorry, I do the same kind of thing in "real-life". I'm always ruining jokes because I usually "don't get it".

No worries, clyde. take care:-)

A possibly strange question, but in what way does Warrior Woman's brain damage manifest itself? She seems fine in these scans...

She basically comes across as confused and not as assertive as you'd expect. The real Warrior Woman wouldn't let some upstart fake Master Man make time with her and convince her to marry him!

Interesting. Would it be possible to see some more scans of this?

There's nothing particularly scanworthy but here's some key dialogue:

Herr Nacht, after kissing and partially undressing WW: "Since I came to manhood, I have been preparing for this day. The day I would claim Kriegerfrau as my bride!

Warrior Woman: But... Butt...

Nacht, to Dr. Kraus: She does not respond as I dreamed. Kraus, what's wrong with her?

Kraus: As I warned her husband, the long years she was in suspended animation may have caused brain damage. It would seem her legendary fires have been at least partially doused!

I see. Thanks, fnord :)

To mirror Ben Herman's comments about the paranoia of German reunification, I was disturbed by Captain America's comments about how every generation there was war with Germany, as if it was almost an inherent quality.

In the scene, it appears that Cap is trying to counter Namor's concern, yet agree with the possibility at the same time, but it also comes across as if Cap is politically naive about the causes of both the First and Second World Wars, which seems really out of character for him, having not only lived during that time, but also given his past adventures against political opportunists.

And while there was some pessimism about the reunification at the time, there was also some real hope, especially knowing that many who lived under Soviet dictatorship would be able to experience the freedom of a democratic society.

Also, I'm in agreement about how it made no sense to have the original Human Torch lose his powers here. A wasted opportunity to do something more with the character.

To be fair, Aaron, there were plenty of people living during that time that DID believe that there was something inherently warlike about the Germans and plenty of them would also argue that there was no contradiction between believing the First World War was an imperialist war and that the Germans were an inherently aggressive nation. I agree that it's out of character for STEVE to say that, though.

Michael, yeah, I tried to briefly note that with my comment about "some pessimism" since I felt Ben had already spoken to that point. But I can see how it looks like I glossed over it.

I should have been more clear too- I meant that there were plenty of people in the '40s as well as the '90s that thought there was something inherently warlike about the Germans.

I don't think it's out of order for Cap to express some concern. There was a lot of fear in Cap's generation about Germany, and from his perspective it's only 5 to 9 years Marvel time since WWII ended for him. He did not have several decades to adjust and feel comfortable that Germany's democracy was secure.

The US did not have much objection to German reunification, but it was different in Europe. Both Britain and France expressed concern about letting Germany reunite since it would allow the Germans to dominate the continent.

Contemporary Nazi stories bored me at this point. I liked the Red Skull, but honestly how many thawed Nazis do you need in the modern day? Still, I thought it was entertaining, and I liked the idea of an Invaders reunion even though the team has no reason to exist nowadays.

I like this, as I always liked the whole concept of the Invaders. But then again, the first comic I ever bought with my own money was an issue of All-Star Squadron, where Roy Thomas basically did the same thing at DC that he done at Marvel with the Invaders.

I love how Spitfire not only gets younger, but slimmer. Shouldn't that skirt be falling off her now?

Eric, regarding, Spitfire's weight loss, she's usually depicted as having been thin as a teenager. That's the problem with deaging stories- if someone has the finger cut off when they're 30, and they're deaged to 25, should their finger grow back?

Contemporary Nazi stories bored me at this point. I liked the Red Skull, but honestly how many thawed Nazis do you need in the modern day? Still, I thought it was entertaining, and I liked the idea of an Invaders reunion even though the team has no reason to exist nowadays.

Given how many powerful Nazis seemingly escaped justice in comic-book universes, up to and including Hitler himself (via cloning and so forth), you have to wonder how much of a victory it really felt like. And then there's the sheer number of comic-book Neo-Nazi groups, all of them absurdly well-funded and well-connected.

But then, as Tom Lehrer pointed out brilliantly, the very existence of World War II nostalgia is a rather odd thing in some respects. "Hey, remember that time there were a bunch of dictatorships and invasions and genocides and then a lot of people had to die to stop most of them? Good times!"

It's a good thing these issues were published in the New Warriors era (and that Namorita often mentions them) because after reading #12 I finally noticed just how much Firestar looks like Spitfire. It wouldn't have occured to me if Firestar didn't have so much exposure in that era. Her mask is very similar to Spitfire's and she basically has the same costume, minus the cape. I got no proof of it but I'm pretty sure Spitfire was the inspiration for Angelica's design because otherwise it'd be one hell of a coincidence. Maybe she was originally intended as a modern counterpart? (kind of like how D-Man basically runs around in DD's old costume)