I have only a tiny handful of the stories from the beginning of Marvel, all reprints. SUB-MARINER stands out as by far the best for both writing and art. (With such horrid coloring in the reprint seen here, perhaps SUMP-MARINER might be an approapriate nick-name?) I kept hoping Marvel would follow DC's lead with their WONDER WOMAN ARCHIVES-- doing a collection of EVERY Subby story from wherever his adventures appeared, especially as the first 12 episodes or so apparently make up ONE big unbroken epic. But, NO! Instead, Marvel decided to do follow DC's earlier lead with SUPERMAN and BATMAN by having a SUB-MARINER MASTERWORKS series begin with SUB-MARINER #1, then going back and collecting the earlier stories in "anthology" reprints. (sigh) I think this is a shame, since from what i've seen, outside of Subby & Captain America, very little early Marvel has grabbed me AT ALL.

I've read maybe a dozen HUMAN TORCH stories over the years, and NOT ONE of them has impressed me. For all it's been put down over the years, I find the Johnny Storm HUMAN TORCH stories of the early 60's a HUGE improvement over the Golden Age series!!

I've read that THE ANGEL was somewhat inspired by THE SAINT-- except he's wearing a superhero costume. The few stories I've read have ALL be abysmal. Of bizarre note is how on that one cover posted, The Angel resembles George Sanders, who played THE SAINT in 5 movies in the late 30's-early 40's. (And while a couple of those were pretty good, that was in spite of his being totally WRONG for the part! See Louis Hayward in THE SAINT IN NEW YORK if you want an idea of what the "real" Simon Templar in the books was like.)

Last Edited By: profh0011 Dec 12 09 2:53 PM. Edited 1 times.