Throwback Thursday #11: Andrew Colman looks back at Marvel ’68

With the release of Fantastic Four today we thought it might be appropriate to republish Andrew Colman’s classic article on how everything changed at Marvel in 1968 taken from Tripwire Annual 2008…

Comic historians have generally referred to 1968 as the year when Marvel Comics really began to dominate the marketplace, and although that wouldn’t be much of an exaggeration, it doesn’t explain just how important a sea-change this year was for the company, both in terms of its past and for the future of the industry. Aside from putting the events of that year into context, the irony is that 1968 was also the halfway point between the Atlas Implosion of 1958 and the DC Implosion of 1978, both of which were connected to what occurred in this period.

Very few could’ve predicted Marvel’s meteoric and seamless rise from the doldrums of the late ‘50s, not least because Atlas, as the company had previously been known, was perhaps the most generic publisher of the Atom Age (1950s). Martin Goodman, a veteran of comics and pulps, who had overseen the seminal Timely line of super-heroes in the 1940s (featuring Captain America, the Sub-Mariner and the Human Torch) was basically a “binge-and-purge” publisher. A slave to trends, he would saturate the market with whatever sold well for either Atlas or his competitors. If Romance books were heating up, he would come up with five or six more of such titles, all cookie-cutter, distinguished solely by the masthead at the top of the book. If Two-Gun Kid was doing well, it would be followed by Kid Colt, Rawhide Kid and Western Kid.

Such cynicism, coupled with a complete absence of corporate identity (Atlas often didn’t bother with a recognizable cover logo throughout their heyday) meant that Goodman’s readership had no chance of developing into fandom. Not that his books were entirely without merit — amongst his roster of artists were Russ Heath, Joe Maneely, Bill Everett, Reed Crandall, John Romita, Gene Colan and Bernie Krigstein, all of whom were producing great work.
If anything, Goodman’s business model was underpinned by a genius for survival. The Comics Code that was introduced in 1955 didn’t so much decimate the industry as bring it to a virtual halt, with only the companies who had produced the most innocuous output (DC, Dell) remaining unscathed. The vast proportion of publishers had rapidly disappeared, unable to adapt to the enforced blandness that was the calling-card of the stringent new Code. Atlas on the other hand hardly missed a beat, switching to code-friendly fare that was the polar opposite of the viscera that had preceded it. Goodman however came unstuck three years later, when his own distribution network, ANC, went under, forcing him into a deal with IND, a company which was owned, of course, by DC Comics. And National, as it was then known, allowed Goodman a mere 8 titles a month, reducing his comics line by 80% overnight.

The period between this juncture and Fantastic Four 1 scarcely heralded what was to become the Marvel Age of comics, but it did allow what was left of the Bullpen — Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko, Larry Lieber and several other veterans to gel, and focus, perhaps for the first time, on the medium and their readers. In what has become an all-too-familiar, not to mention mythologized, period in comic history (not least by Stan Lee himself), Marvel Comics began their super-hero line after they saw the success of that revived genre at DC, especially their new super-team, the Justice League Of America, in 1960.

Much has been written about the auspicious and feted period from 1961-1964, which saw Lee and Kirby co-create an entire universe that gained such a rapid foothold in pop culture. Even more remarkable was how the “upstart” publisher managed to forge such success with only two name artists. Such a limited talent pool meant that Kirby had to churn out as much product as possible, aided by journeymen illustrators such as Paul Reinman, Larry Lieber, Dick Ayers, Werner Roth and Don Heck, whose previous work had been in horror comics before the Code arrived.

And then there was the old chestnut that at first Marvel’s output couldn’t directly compete with DC’s super-hero titles  — so Lee contrived to make out that his characters were not of that genre — the Fantastic Four not initially having costumes, the Hulk being monstrous rather than heroic, and Thor secretly being a disabled Earthman. This effort certainly didn’t last long, and by 1964 Marvel had revived its Golden Age heroes, brought in a super-team title (The Avengers) and had completely shed its late ‘50s image.

Nevertheless, those first few years saw Marvel trying to develop and find its feet — many of those early issues may still retain a naïve charm, but a large proportion of the stories were hurriedly drawn, and at times quite simplistic. Kirby and Lee had yet to work out the parameters of what they were capable of with their new universe. However,  because DC had not been paying attention and were still producing vast amounts of lazily written work that was very much the same as what they were doing a decade earlier (with the exception of their superb War books), Marvel was given the impetus to hype their “alternative” status as the “House Of Ideas”. Grandstanding it may have been (only the Fantastic Four, Spider-Man and the X-Men were truly innovative creations), but Marvel’s tighter plotting, more sophisticated storytelling and above all characterization did bring back artists who had left Atlas a decade earlier to the fold – classicists such as John Romita and the soon-to-be avatar of the Marvel House style, John Buscema, along with dilettantes such as Barry Smith, and a certain Jim Steranko.

The writing had been on the wall in 1967 when Marvel launched their self-referential satire comic, Not Brand Ecch, which less than subtly hinted that Marvel was DC’s equal. Indeed, by the time the 1968 explosion occurred, the Marvel style was in full flower. Lee and Kirby had reinvented and provided a new template not just for the super-hero genre, but the medium itself. However this year was the apex of the hero age, as it finally gave a chance for Lee to exercise his ambitions with the format, and also make dramatic gains against his Distinguished Competition. From April to June, the dual feature “split” titles —  Strange Tales, Tales To Astonish and Tales Of Suspense, ended and were replaced by solo magazines, giving Captain America and the Sub-Mariner their own books for the first time since the mid-1950s. Iron Man, Doctor Strange and Nick Fury also got promoted to solo status. The Incredible Hulk got his own series as well, five years after his first one failed. There was also a new hero, Captain Marvel, who first appeared in Marvel Super-Heroes 12, and then immediately got his own title, at least partly for copyright reasons over his name.

It has been noted by comic historians that apart from the across-the-board expansion, it was merely business as usual for the company. To a moderate extent, this is true — there was no radical shift between Tales Of Suspense 99 and Captain America 100 for example. Iron Man in particular took an inordinate amount of time to flourish as a character (one could say it wasn’t until Michelinie and Layton took over), as did the Hulk — the point was that most of these new series were going to last, and, with one or two exceptions, they did. Riding this wave of optimism and creative dynamism, there was never much likelihood of a reverse for Marvel this time.

In terms of its legacy, though, the 1968 explosion boiled down to two titles that were both innovative, influential and era-defining, both as pop-art exemplars and milestones in the development of the medium. These books also proved to Marvel that they no longer had to rely on Jack Kirby exclusively for such event comics, which may have partly influenced his decision to leave the company for DC a year later. Nick Fury, Agent Of Shield was the title that gave Jim Steranko free rein by Marvel to do what he wanted with the character. Hyped by the publisher as their first “superstar” artist, Steranko took the espionage-based Bondery of the Strange Tales series and added psychedelia, pop-art, and obvious Dali homages, creating some of the most iconic images of the time, which both knowingly sent up and pandered to fine art. Steranko’s brief tenure may have been a triumph of style over substance, but there was no doubting his understanding of comics’ potential, and how the medium had been undersold and even appropriated from (by Roy Lichtenstein, for example). The series was never likely to gain longevity of course — 40 years later however, it still retains its beguiling appeal.

Even more significant than that (needless to say) was The Silver Surfer. Created by Lee and Kirby two years earlier in Fantastic Four 48-50, he had been the herald of planet-consuming god Galactus, who ended up betraying his mentor to save earth, which consequently led him to being trapped on this benighted world. The Surfer was, despite Kirby’s input, the Marvel character that Lee considered his own special property. For Lee, the 1968 series was a chance to exhibit his skills as a storyteller and communicator with his (now college-level, apparently) readership. And it was John Buscema who was chosen as penciller, not Kirby — a sign that Lee was keen to reduce the outsize bombast of his Fantastic Four tales in favour of a more melodramatic, subtler approach to his most treasured character.
Although the series only lasted 18 issues, it was the true indicator of what was to come at Marvel in the more downbeat, introspective ‘70s. Pitching the Surfer as an intensely pure, misunderstood outsider with vast power, the stories in Lee’s first five or six issues were a tour de force, matched on every level by John Buscema’s fluid, career-best artwork. Issues 2 and 3 see him battle the Brotherhood of the Badoon and Mephisto, the latter a Satanic figure who would continually return throughout the series. Many have regarded the Surfer as a messianic figure due to his recurring battles with such a personification of evil, but it was all really Lee’s attempt to bring in more cosmic, weightier themes whilst retaining standard plot devices. The best book of the run, issue 1, gave us a detailed origin of the Surfer, exploring the notions of utopia and sacrifice, and what led the character to make the decision to leave his perfect world behind. There may have been a lot of lofty sermonizing in these earlier issues (which very much betray the uncertainty, fear and hope of this turbulent year) but they are timeless classics all the same. Perhaps unsurprisingly the series rapidly lost its way, the Surfer’s constant pontificating growing repetitive, whilst Lee simply ran out of plots. The character would not get a regular series again for twenty years, partly because Lee forbade anyone else to write it.

Fandom’s response to the Silver Surfer proved that readers were ready for more challenging work — within a year, Roy Thomas and Barry Smith brought Conan The Barbarian to comics, ushering in a very different era for Marvel, where offbeat, sometimes politicised stories by such mavericks as Gerber, Starlin, Englehart, Conway and Wolfman would become commonplace. By the mid-1970s, despite a gradual decline in industry-wide sales, Marvel became market leader, a position reinforced by the revival of the X-Men, and one that they have rarely relinquished since. The seachange begun in 1968 was complete.

DC’s reaction to Marvel’s burgeoning progress was for company boss Jack Liebowitz to appoint Silver Age pioneer Carmine Infantino as editorial director, and then in 1971 publisher. Infantino introduced radical changes at National, his remit being to bring an artistic focus to DC and completely overhaul the art department. This meant the arrival of such progressive talents as Neal Adams, Berni Wrightson, Jeff Jones, Mike Kaluta and Walt Simonson, as well as former E.C. artist Joe Orlando and Charlton’s Dick Giordano as editors. Along with Kirby, poached by Infantino in 1970, and company stalwart Joe Kubert, who was approaching his virtuoso peak, DC had brought about an artistic renaissance that culminated in such seminal works as Wein and Wrightson’s  Swamp Thing and O’Neill and Adams’s Green Lantern / Green Arrow, along with, under Orlando, a slew of beautifully drawn “mystery” titles that ironically echoed E.C.’s considerably more gruesome efforts two decades earlier.

Such wholesale changes could not convert readers to their super-hero line though, which for the most part remained as ruttish, lightweight and dated as ever — especially the Superman titles. By 1975, most of Infantino’s assemblage of talent had burnt out or left, along with Kirby who returned to Marvel for one last hurrah. By 1978, DC’s briefest and most desperate of expansions led to the Implosion, Infantino was fired, many titles were immediately cancelled, and all looked bleak at the once dominant publisher.

And by 1980, newly installed chief Jenette Kahn contracted Marvel regulars Marv Wolfman and George Perez to do a Marvel-style series for DC called the New Teen Titans. Such an ironic turnarouind would remarkably have never happened if DC themselves hadn’t stemmed Atlas’s profligate business model 22 years before, and certainly not without Marvel being allowed to break free from National’s restraining grip a decade after that. The situation under Kahn could’ve been so entirely different, with none of the creative aspiration that Marvel brought to the mainstream, with both publishers churning out the same professional but directionless fodder as they had always done. For the sake of the medium, it’s serendipitous that the ’58 Implosion and the ’68 Explosion took place.