Black Panther continues his wild ride, courtesy of Jack Kirby — but filling a role that could have been played by virtually any character. With Abner Little and Princess Zanda, we see him fight various treasure protectors, drive an incredibly stylish ancient vehicle, take on a samurai who’s been transplanted to Africa, and more. Tim and Emmet try to keep up with the craziness.
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Somehow it’s taken us 20 years of podcasting to get to Jim Steranko’s fabled run on Nick Fury: Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. But is the early stuff really so fabled? There’s lots of action and it’s exciting, but don’t dare think about it too much, because the seat-of-the-pants plotting is all over the map, and the anatomy drawing sometimes leaves something to be desired. Still, as you go issue by issue, you start to see new ideas coming to him as he starts to innovate with Marvel’s Jack Kirby house style. Tim and Kumar discuss the “Fury” stories in Strange Tales 154-163.
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We begin our look at Jack Kirby‘s Black Panther series from the 1970s, introducing a new Kirby character who’s a bit too similar to one who first appeared in Captain America! Panther has somehow gotten mixed up in the search for the mate to King Solomon’s Frog, an oddball time travel device. The mate is used to return people to their proper point in time. Tim and Emmet discuss the first two issues of the run and how Kirby’s Panther dialog just doesn’t seem quite right to the modern Marvel reader.
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After “hunting” the Fantastic Four, the Black Panther reveals that he did it for practice, as he anticipated a battle against his father’s killer: Ulysses Klaw. Sure enough, Klaw shows up right on schedule, and the FF help Panther take him down. Tim and Emmet discuss Fantastic Four #53 by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby!
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Sixty years ago, Stan Lee and Jack Kirby presided over the debut of the Black Panther in Fantastic Four #52. The story presents the expectations of the average American for stories about Africa (Jungles! Natives! Africa is a country, right?) and defies those expectations by showing a rich, technologically advanced African nation. This time, Tim and Emmet discuss the Panther’s debut.
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While it seems a bit odd to see Captain America fighting Magneto, they do have something in common: Jack Kirby had a hand in creating both! The battle takes place in Captain America Annual #4, from 1977; the story is titled “The Great Mutant Massacre” — but no, not that one. It’s an X-men – adjacent story with some very Kirbyesque bizarre concepts. Tim and Emmet discuss, and also look back at the experience of reading all this 1970s Jack Kirby-penned Cap.
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Jack Kirby wraps up his run on Captain America and the Falcon with issue 214, the rather underwhelming conclusion of the Night Flyer story. But wait! Kirby also did a couple of annuals, so we dig into annual #3 from 1976. Yeaahhhh, that’s the stuff! If you haven’t been getting enough PULSE-POUNDING ACTION in your comics, this is the issue for you!
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FLASHBACK! If you’re into American comics at all, you undoubtedly know how Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko and others changed the industry with their work in the 1960s, and set the template for kinds of stories Marvel still publishes today.
That’s just part of the story that Sean Howe researched for his 2012 book Marvel Comics: The Untold Story. Through interviews, research of media reports, and of course tons of comics reading, Howe uncovered the backgrounds of many comics stories and rumors that longtime readers may have wondered about. There’s plenty of intra-creator acrimony to be found in its pages, yet Howe found that the book helped some of those involved to move on from decades-old wounds.
This week Tim talks to Sean Howe about the research, the reaction, and what this book has to say to aspiring creators. (Originally published July 7, 2014.)
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Captain America and the Falcon #212 concludes the Arnim Zola/Red Skull storyline in somewhat perfunctory fashion, and gives a living castle with big teeth much less P.R. than it deserved! In #213 we meet the strange and underutilized assassin the Night Flyer! (Underwhelming name? Must’ve been named by Jack Kirby!) Tim and Emmet discuss both issues in this episode.
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We’ve been building up to it for months with our reviews of previous Fantastic Four movies. Now it’s here, the FF’s debut in the MCU, Fantastic Four: First Steps. How well did it scratch that FF itch? Kumar and Jordan once again join Tim to review the film, and discuss how it stacks up against the others (including the unreleased 1994 version).
One idea about what “Subzero Intel” might mean
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