THIS POWER UNLEASHED by Dave Goode

It's funny. I started writing this week's blog about "Cap's Kooky Quartet". The second team of Avengers who just about no one would consider "Earth's Mightiest Superheroes". I even had my buddy Vance Capley draw a Judo League of America cover to go along with it. Then I got to thinking how much more I liked the team when Giant-Man and the Wasp returned. Especially when the editorial staff changed Giant-Man's name to Goliath. You see I've always liked the Silver Age Hank Pym.

Hank Pym first appeared in a seven page story in Tales To Astonish No.27 (January 1962) titled The Man In The Ant Hill. This was the cover featured story plotted by Stan Lee, scripted by Larry Lieber, penciled by Jack Kirby, and inked by Dick Ayers. Geez Louise! All those guys working on one seven page story! The story appeared to be one of those many one-shot Atlas/Marvel sci-fi horror tales that were featured in anthology titles like Tales of Suspense and Strange Tales. This one had generic research scientist and judo expert Henry Pym using himself as a guinea pig in an experiment and shrinking to the size of an ant. He escapes several dangers before restoring himself to normal size.

Hank Pym would return eight issues later in Tales To Astonish No.35 (September 1962) in a story titled Return of The Ant-Man where he becomes a union suited superhero. One of the first in the new Marvel Age of Comics. He had a feature that ran in Tales To Astonish from issues No.35 to No.69 where he would sometimes use judo to battle the bad guys. And he was also a charter member of the Avengers along with Thor, the Hulk, Iron Man, and his own female partner, the Wasp. Later Pym would gain the power to grow as well as shrink and became ... Giant-Man.

Interestingly enough in Avengers No. 10 (November 1964) he would face off against the biblical giant Goliath brought to the present by the villain Immortus. I had hoped Pym would take out Goliath with judo. But the creative team on this issue decided to get cutesy. Dr.Pym, the Wasp,Thor, and Iron Man leave the Avengers with the sixteenth issue and turn the team over to Captain America who teamed up with three reformed villains Hawkeye, Quicksilver, and the Scarlet Witch.

Pym and the Wasp would return to the Avengers in Avengers No. 28 (May 1966) where he ditched the corny Giant-Man code name. I really enjoyed the Avengers after Pym rejoined the team. I thought the one thing the team was missing after the departure of Thor and Iron Man was a member with pure raw strength. Goliath provided that. Just not on an Asgardian level. I only wished that he would have  used his judo skills more often.

I mentioned that Vance Capley had originally drawn a new JLA cover for this blog. And since I hate to see anything go to waste you can find it below.

Now YOU can support the JLA!

Now lets take public domain superheroes and make an Avengers type team....

SECRET - AGENT MAN by Dave Goode

During the Silver Age of Comic Books there was only one Marvel Comic Book hero that starred in two separate series. Nick Fury was the star of Marvel's " war comic for people who don't read war comics " , SGT.FURY AND HIS HOWLING COMMANDOS. He also starred in NICK FURY , AGENT OF S.H.I.E.L.D A series that first ran as a feature in STRANGE TALES before graduating to it's own title. I never gave much thought to a Sgt. Fury flick. We already had more than enough John Wayne war movies. But a Nick Fury ,Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D movie made during the height of the spy-craze would have been bosso-keeno.







It was in Strange Tales No.135 (Aug.1965) that ex-World War Two hero Sgt. Fury , now a colonel , was recruited to be the director of a new counter-espionage agency in a life or death struggle against the forces of Hydra. But much like Captain Kirk on the original STAR TREK , Colonel Fury never learned to delegate. He wasn't just S.H.I.EL.D's director. He was the organization's No.1 field agent. But who to cast as the combat veteran turned secret agent? For the longest time I had thought Dean Martin. Dino had portrayed secret agent Matt Helm in a series of campy spy spoofs and may have been good as artist/writer Jim Steranko's version of the character. And it was Martin who played opposite Daliah Lavi in the best of the Matt Helm movies THE SILENCERS (1966).

Lavi was the only real choice to play the part of Valentinia Alegra de la Fontaine (Val to her friends). The stunning Israeli actress/singer had appeared in a number of Euro-Spy movies. And reportedly Val was inspired by the actress. I thought she would have made a great Modesty Blaise as well. But that's another discussion.

 

Someone suggested to me a better choice to play Colonel Fury may have been Robert Lansing. And I had to agree. Lansing would have been perfect as the S.H.I.E.D agent created by Jack Kirby and later drawn by John Severin. And if your a fan-boy of a certain age you remember him as Gary Seven on the STAR TREK episode Assignment:Earth. Watch it again. That was Nick Fury. In either case I wouldn't have put Fury in that skintight bodysuit that Steranko eventually did. Too much like Steranko's Spyman from Harvey Comics. Too campy.