Reading The Multiverse: A Marvel Comics Journey

S1E5: Fantastic Four #17-19 & Annual 1 - Namor Declares War, Skrulls Return, & Doom's Got Tricks

• Earth's Mightiest Nerds • Season 1 • Episode 5

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In this episode of Reading The Multiverse, I dig into Fantastic Four #17–19 and Annual #1, where Doctor Doom pulls off another disguise scheme, the Skrulls unleash the first ever Super-Skrull, and Namor launches an all-out war on the surface world. This episode covers one of the most chaotic and world-expanding stretches of early Marvel, from cosmic power-ups to underwater politics to Jack Kirby drawing sea monsters like he’s trying to win a competition with himself.

Stories Covered In This Episode

Fantastic Four 17, "Defeated By Doctor Doom!" written by Stan Lee, Penciled by Jack Kirby, Inked by Dick Ayers, Colored by Stan Goldberg, and Lettered by Artie Simek

Fantastic Four 18, "A Skrull Walks Among Us" written by Stan Lee, Penciled by Jack Kirby, Inked by Dick Ayers, Colored by Stan Goldberg, and Lettered by Artie Simek

Fantastic Four 19, "Prisoners Of The Pharoah!" written by Stan Lee, Penciled by Jack Kirby, Inked by Dick Ayers, Colored by Stan Goldberg, and Lettered by Sam Rosen

Fantastic Four Annual 1, "Sub-Mariner Versus The Human Race!" written by Stan Lee, Penciled by Jack Kirby, Inked by Dick Ayers, Colored by Stan Goldberg, and Lettered by Artie Simek

Fantastic Four Annual 1, "The Fabulous Fantastic Four Meet Spider-Man!" written by Stan Lee, Penciled by Jack Kirby, Inked by Steve Ditko, Colored by Stan Goldberg, and Lettered by Ray Holloway

Resources, Episodes, & Links Mentioned In This Episode:

Joe: what's going on Marvelites? welcome to Reading The Multiverse, a Marvel Comics journey presented by Earth's Mightiest Nerds. I am your host, Joe, and if you're new here, we are exploring all of Marvel's greatest stories. One great run at a time, and making those connections, two, the MCU while we're doing it.

I am reading most of these issues for the first time, so if this is your first time as well, that's amazing. And if this is just like a nostalgic reread, that is also amazing as well. I'm glad you're here. We have, uh, more than usual issues on the docket today. Four Fantastic four by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby.

So without further ado, let's get into them right now from May of 1963. Fantastic. Four issue 17. Defeated by Dr. Doom, written by Stan Lee, penciled by Jack Kirby, inked by Dick Ayers, colored by Stan Goldberg and lettered by Artie Simek. Fresh off of a last issue, the Fantastic four return home with Antman from the micro verse after being captured by Dr.

Doom. Now, we went over this last issue in episode four, so make sure you check that out if you haven't already. And before I continue, I have to point out that once again at the beginning of this issue, Ant-Man is leaving the Baxter building and Sue is in the panel saying, isn't he the cutest? And I'm just like, Sue again.

My girl, like, let's, let's just pick a man. She's been struggling to fall in love with Reed. She's been going back and forth with Namor, and now she's, she's fighting a little attraction to Hank Pim. Let's just pick a man, Sue. So our heroes then decide to have a night out on the town, and they all go their own separate ways, but the lobby of the building is moed.

That's when an unsuspecting janitor helps them escape through a freight elevator. However, unbeknownst to them and us, the janitor is Dr. Doom in disguise, and he sneakily wanted to shake each of their hands, and when he did, he placed this little tracker on them. So Doom has these ghosts, like Android trackers, follow each of our members of the Fantastic Four, which caused them, of course, to return to the Baxter building.

And once Reed figures out that they have a tracker on them, the Androids disappear. Doom then takes Alicia hostage and they continue to play up. The sheer fact that Alicia is blind, they always continue to refer to Alicia as either Ben's friend, even though they're clearly in a relationship. But they also refer to her as always being blind or vision impaired, and I'm just like.

Again, if this is your first issue reading this, I get it that you would have really no idea that Alicia is blind, but at the same time, I don't think we need to point it out every single time we introduce her. It just seems like it's a little bit too much. Anyway, Reed, uh, not Reed, sorry. Doom has taken Alicia hostage, which I already mentioned, and.

Reed starts working on a plan to stop doom and get Alicia back. Of course, he's learned that Doom's Laboratory is floating above and it has this force field that will destroy any of the Fantastic four members once they come in contact with it. Because when Doom put those trackers on their body, keyed in on their DNA, and he created this force field that again, when one of them comes in contact with it.

It will pretty much destroy them. So Ben had this tracker on him when he was the thing though. So that changes his DNA. So Reed figures out that he will create one of those serums to turn, uh, the thing back into Ben. This would allow him to go through that force field. So Reed creates the serum. Ben A is, goes up to that floating laboratory of Dr.

Doom. He's able to hold off his transformation into the thing at the last minute. He's like turning back into the thing at the last minute as he goes through the ship's force field and is able to get into Doom's lab. While he's there, there's a little back and forth between, uh, the thing, uh, sorry, doom and the Fantastic Four, where Sue eventually finds Alicia and hides her, and then takes her place.

So when Doom tries to grab Alicia, we now know that it's Sue. Sue goes invisible. And once again, doom feels like he has no way out, but of course he does because he leaves this floating laboratory via an escape hatch at this point. I'm pretty sure Doom has escaped every single time via an escape hatch. I feel like whatever he's building, he's gotta have an escape hatch pretty much like every three feet because he's always escaping that way, and that is pretty much where our issue ends Now.

This was a good issue. There was a lot of dialogue, though it probably took me like 25 minutes to get through this issue. A lot of these issues do because I feel like anytime someone's on or in a panel. I felt like, uh, they, they wanted them to, to say something even though they didn't necessarily need to, and I felt like for whatever reason, this issue took me a long, long time for whatever reason.

But I do feel like this one had, like the story was always moving forward. I mean, there was a part where Doom demanded he be part of the president's cabinet and they said no. So he created havoc across America, which ultimately didn't really lead to anything besides the government asking the fantastic Ford to do something.

But they were already going to do that, um, because, uh, he took Alicia hostage. Um, the other things though that I did like, we got a little bit more character development regarding Doom. As, um, we learned that he was kind of like put back to the fact that Alicia, with her being blind is somehow in love with quote unquote the grotesque Ben or the thing.

And we know that Doom's face was damaged, um, back in issue five in his first appearance, which we covered in episode two. So go ahead and check that out if you have it. Um. But he's amazed that someone loves someone as grotesque as Ben, but he is afraid to show his face. So he must always, you know, have that mask on.

And, you know, that is kind of played up over time, that that's just like this one thing that Doom can't get past is like showing his face. Um, so yeah. So for this next issue though, we get a return of one of the Fantastic Fours, first villains from June of 1963. Fantastic four issue 18. A Skrull walks among us, written by Stan Lee, penciled by Jack Kirby, inked by Dick Ayers, colored by Stan Goldberg and lettered by Artie Simek.

We learned that the Skrulls have been watching over earth and have been plotting on how to take it over since their first defeat at the hands of the Fantastic four that was in their first appearance back in issue two, which was a while ago at this point, which we covered in episode one. So again, if you haven't listened to that one, go check that out.

Well, the Skrulls have created the super Skrull one of which can mimic all of the fantastic fours powers, but even greater. And we learned initially that he, uh, has this other power that they didn't tell us about, and we see that later in the issue. The super Skrull lands in Times Square, plants a flag, and claims the planet in the name of the Skrull empire.

Luckily, our heroes were out on the town shopping and they get right to Times Square, but they are no match for the super Skrull especially when he combines his powers. Then forces the fantastic Ford to flee. So back at the Baxter building, Reed Deduces that the super Skrull is too powerful by himself and that he must be getting his power fed from an external source.

So Reed recreates this jamer that stops the powers being beamed from the Skrull home world, which we didn't know that this was the case until after Reed Deuced this, that those powers were getting sent, um, to the super Skrull. So, uh, just, just pointing that out. Then the Fantastic Four sends this message to the super Skrull that they won another battle, but they're going to take it to this deserted island so no one else gets hurt.

Very thoughtful of the Fantastic four. The super Skrull agrees and basically Reed, Ben and Johnny distract the super Skrull while Sue turns invisible to put the jamer on him. So as soon as the Jamer gets put on him, the super Skrull starts to lose his powers. Which by the way, we did learn that last power on this deserted island is that the super Skrull can hypnotize, uh, hypnotize people.

Um, so that happens, although it doesn't really matter too much because they hop right out of it once the jam's put on 'em. I guess that means his hyp hypnotism powers also stopped working at that moment. Um. At that point, they push the Skrull while he trips over Sue's foot into a crater on this island.

They push some sand over it and Johnny seals it up using his powers, leaving the super Skrull inside forever, or at least that's what I'm assuming until we probably see him pop out of it at some point, would be my guess. Um, this was a pretty good issue in my opinion. Um, from the standpoint of like, we finally now got an enemy that really, really tested the Fantastic Four, it seemed like for a long while while reading this, there was a lot of fighting back and forth, like literally at least a quarter or a third of the pages are the Fantastic four fighting the super Skrull initially in Times Square.

And you can see that there's no way that they can beat him. He's just way too powerful. So I felt like that was really good to finally see literally their toughest opponent yet. Um, and there was a lot of extra stuff though in this issue that really didn't matter to the plot, hence why the summary was so short.

Um, and also they didn't really develop any characters either. Um. So there was just a lot of extra stuff in this that didn't really matter all that much in my opinion. Um, besides the fact that we now expanded on the Skrulls lore, and again, the Fantastic four faced their toughest enemy in my opinion.

Before we technically get into the next publication, which is annual number one, we have a word from this episode sponsor yesterday's time travel agency. The only travel service bold enough to say, why book a cruise when you could book a different century. Yesterday's specializes in handcrafted, ethically questionable time excursions for the modern traveler.

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Maybe the Savage Land. No, no, no. Maybe not there. Definitely, definitely not. Days of future past, I'm, I'm like stuck on X-Men. Timelines. For whatever reason, I don't know. I'm gonna have to look at a brochure because nothing's coming to my mind. If you have a place in mind you'd like to go, please share it with me.

I would love to hear, you can text me by the way, via that link is in the show notes. You can actually text me. It will be me answering. And uh, if you're watching on YouTube, leave it in the comments. Where would you like to go? I guess it could be in, in the Marvel Universe, timeline era maybe, or somewhere else.

I don't know. Tell me where you want to go. Um, alright. Into. Annual, uh, the first annual from July, 1963. This is Story, a Submariner versus the Human Race, written by Stan Lee, penciled by Jack Kirby, inked by Dick Ayers, colored by Stan Goldberg and lettered by Artie Simke Namor has found his lost people of Atlantis and is once again ruler.

In fact, he has the name. Namor, the first Prince of Atlantis, emperor of the Deep, Lord of the Seven Seas and Supreme commander of the undersea allegiance. That is not a joke. That is literally, literally word for word his name in the first like, uh, panel describing Namor. Anyway, we first met Nemore in issue four, which again, we covered in episode one.

When he returned to the sea, his people from Atlantis were lost or scattered because of the humans, like testing bombs or whatever, and had destroyed Atlantis. And then. Namor had declared war on on the surface world. So now he's found his people, he's reunited with his love Lady Dorma, who was apparently in a situationship with the warlord crying, but now that Namors back, she said, forget you crying.

Which also didn't make crank to happy. So that's gonna play a role later. Our story then turns to the Fantastic four who are ready for a vacation. So they decide to go on a cruise. Was it through yesterday's time travel agency? That is the question. Uh, because of course though Reed needs to mix business with pleasure.

They can't just go relax. Reed has ha has heard that there have been large sea creature sightings. Of course he wants to go study them, leave it to read, to not be able to relax. So while on the cruise, of course, these sea creatures present themselves and the fantastic four go to investigate. And when they do, Namor captures them all just to tell them that they need to relay a message to the un that he's basically going to declare war on the surface world.

So anyway, they go back, he, he sends them back home, they go back and Reed is telling the un. We get this long history of the sea creature people. Homo Meis by the eminent authority on Undersea life, Dr. GW Fain, and after this very long explanation, which I did think was was good to learn, honestly, again, expanding on lore related to Namor, GW Fain is namor in a disguise and the way it was depicted like in the panel, like literally, I wasn't sure if like Namor was in disguise or if like Namor took.

Fault in's head right off of his body. 'cause it was, wasn't initially apparent, uh, it was just like, whoa, what is happening right now? And so, like I don't understand why Namor brought the Fantastic four underwater to tell them to relay this message that he's gonna declare war. 'cause that's what he does immediately after he gets out of his disguise and tells the UN that so na Namor then send his troops to invade New York City and across the entire planet, which they do successfully.

Now you'll see Namor troops can't breathe in the air like he can. So he has, they all have these like helmets filled with water, and Reed is able to create this device that evaporates the water in them, and Namor sees that they're in trouble. Tells them all to retreat back into the sea, and then once again, takes our favorite person, Sue Storm Hostage.

So now Reed, Johnny, and Ben go after her underwater. Um, they technically don't go underwater right away because Namor leaves Sue underwater with Lady Dorma and Kran. So Namor is fighting the guise of the Fantastic four on the sea level basically. Lady Dorma and Kran learned that there is a romantic connection between Namor and Sue, which of course Lady Dorma is not very happy about because she feels like Namor could never love a human.

So Lady Dorma punctures a hole in the, you know, ship that they're in and water starts to ru rush in, in an attempt to drown. Sue, Sue Escapes, but of course starts to drown while underwater. And at the same time, Namor brings the thing underwater and they both see Sue and they go to save her. Sue is apparently clutching on for dear life and Namor Namor brings her to a hospital back at New York City where she's then saved, um, and Namor calls off his war with mankind for the time being.

As Namor returns to Atlantis. All of his people are gone once again, because I'm assuming Lady Dorma and Kran have told the Atlantian people that Namor has turned his back on them and that he loves a human, and that he saved a human again. They've pretty much all been riled up to hate humans because again, they destroyed Atlantis.

So this again, is leaving Namor with basically nobody. Uh, this obviously is. Being in this annual is a much longer story, way longer. I thought it was a really good story. Again, we got to expand on the lore of Namor and the Atlantian people, which I didn't go fully in depth about, but just know that we developed more of that.

We also get a little bit more character development. With, with Ben and Johnny, uh, just their brother brotherly rivalry, which was nice to see because again, in earlier issues, they kind of just like really hated each other, and it was just more of them fighting and it wasn't such like, uh, you know, like, again, cutesy, brotherly rivalry.

The other bright spot in this entire issue, uh, at least, at least in this story, is Jack Kirby's Art. We get some really great inventive stuff. In terms of like the atlantian people, the underwater life, their inventions, the sea creatures, all of these things, it's just absolutely incredible. Jack Kirby is the King for a Reason.

Onto the B story from July of 1963, story B in Fantastic four annual number one, the fabulous, fantastic four Meet Spider-Man. Written by Stan Lee, penciled by Jack Kirby, inked by Steve Ditko, colored by Stan Goldberg. And lettered by Ray Holloway. Now, before we get into this story, I did wanna share that this was first seen in amazing Spider-Man issue number one, but was a very short portion of that.

And this is an expanded version of that story. So we see Spider-Man break into the Baxter building because he figures that if he can join the Fantastic Four, he'll be able to make some money. So once he breaks in, he's initially trapped, uh, but doesn't, you know, he's not trapped for very long. He's able to escape.

But one thing I wanna point out is like when he's trapped, Reed points out that like, if you break this, it'll cost us thousands. I'm like, Reed, you're a superhero with lots of things breaking. Didn't you think at some points if you trap someone in this contraption that you made to trap someone that they would try to maybe break out of it, meaning they would break it like, come on man, come on.

Spider-Man holds his own against each of the Fantastic Four, and honestly, this is more of a display of Spidey and his powers than really anything with a Fantastic four. And this is definitely early on Spidey, because I haven't really seen him use his webs or his powers like this. Like he turned his webs into a baseball bat to hit some flare rockets that Johnny sent after him.

He also uses web to like block some rays from a stun gun. Again, kind of uh, ways that I personally haven't seen Spider-Man use his. His powers, and again, this is obviously early on in Spider-Man's history, so things have evolved, but stuff that we're not necessarily used to seeing. Um, so eventually Reed asked Spider-Man what he wants and he tells him that he's looking to join the Fantastic Four to make some MO money, which we learned.

The Fantastic Four is a non-profit organization. Apparently all of their proceeds just pay their bills and then go to research and none of them get paid. I guess this was a decision that was made after Reed lost all of the Fantastic Fours money in the stock market in issue nine. That is, uh, literally one of my most favorite comic issues ever, not just Fantastic four.

Uh, we covered that in episode three, and if you don't know what I'm talking about, I highly encourage you. You go back to episode three and either listen or watch to that, uh, watch that technically that finishes that story. Uh, I thought it was fun, quick. It, it wasn't anything special. Again, it was more about Spidey.

Not that I hated it, it was just kind of just a fun story. Um, and technically the last story in this annual of is the Fantastic four issue number one, which we of course covered in episode one. So we're not gonna cover that again. It's just a reprint of that story. So that leads us into a story with a villain.

We have yet to meet from July of 1963. Fantastic. Four issue, 19 prisoners of the Pharaoh. Written by Stan Lee, penciled by Jack Kirby, inked by Dick Ayers, colored by Stan Goldberg and lettered by Sam Rosen. Reed and Sue were at an Egyptian exhibit in a museum where Reed saw that they had cured blindness in one of the Pharaohs.

Supposedly, the Egyptians used some radioactive material and Reed wanted to like use this or figure it out to help Alicia. So back at the Baxter building. They tell Ben and Alicia this, but Ben says, how is that possible from that specific time period, which is when Reed suggests that they use Dr. Doom's time machine to travel into the past and retrieve this radioactive element to try and help restore Alicia's vision.

So the Fantastic four make their way to Dooms Castle, which apparently has been vacant since his first appearance after he left via an escape hatch flying away, um, in issue five. Again, that was in episode two. So for that story, make sure you go check that out. And they use the time machine and go back to Egypt.

Now the Fantastic Four are immediately attacked and for some reason their powers are starting to fail, which we don't know why. And that's when they get captured and are brought before the Pharaoh Rama. So we learned that Ramu is from the future, the year 3000 to be exact. And apparently his world was at peace and ha, he had absolutely no adventure.

Uh, talk about lonely white guy epidemic or whatever. It's so ridiculous. Come on people. You're not lonely. Um, you're just not trying and seeing the fantastic four of, he would watch the Fantastic four of the past on his television, and he wanted to have adventures like them. So he traveled back in time using, uh, time Machine Blueprint from one of his relatives shaped in the form of the Sphinx, and decided to use Egypt as his headquarters.

Well as he landed in Egypt, his time machine broke and he became blinded. But the Egyptians used a radioactive herb, which healed his vision. And because he had this gun like weapon from the future called the ultra diode ray, he was able to rule the Egyptian and has been ruler ever since. And we also learn that the weapon is what sap, the fantastic four of their powers.

So Rama Tut SAPs their power even more. Makes, uh, Reed Ben and Johnny slaves while he makes sue his queen. And while it seems like there is no hope whatsoever, the thing is chained up working in the hot sun and undergoes a transformation thanks to the ultraviolet rays. Back. He turns back into Ben Grimm, which allows him to escape his shackles.

He's then able to sneak up on Rama Tut steal his ultra diode ray and free his teammates, causing Ramu to flee to his time ship, and ultimately time travel to another destination. Luckily, he left behind a container that is easily identified with a label, and I quote, optic nerve restorative. Which is the exact how, how convenient, which is the exact reason they time travel or they time travel to ancient Egypt.

But when they time travel back, it doesn't go with them, which Reed says he was afraid of. So like Reed knew this entire time that there was a risk that that may not come back. Now you could argue that it is worth the risk because if it does come back, you know, we could restore Alicia's vision. But also he didn't tell everyone that, which I think they might have argued with him.

It may not be worth it. Um, I just think Reed says it was worth the trip because now he knows that there's something that can help and he could try to figure it out in his lab, which, uh, I Why didn't you just do that first Reed and then you could go back and go get that if you really needed to, if you didn't figure it out on your own?

Just questionable. I think Reed really likes to put. Put his family and friends into questionable situations. And if you've been listening for some time slash you've watched some other videos of mine, you know that I'm not the biggest fan of Reed Richards. Anyway, I really like this issue. Um, we get more expansion on the Fantastic four lore.

We get more time travel, um, and we get a new villain, Ramu, which. We learn at some point in the future. I'm not exactly sure to be honest. Maybe we will cover it, uh, during this Stanley and Jack Kirby run of who he actually is, and I do know, but I don't necessarily wanna ruin it. I will say though, that we have seen his character in the MCU for a very short amount of time, and that is all I will say on that.

I also know that next episode we're going to cover another new villain, one who is very, very powerful. I don't know if he's portrayed that way in in the next issue, but he's very, very powerful. We get a return of Moleman and yet another appearance of Dr. Doom. You won't want to miss what is happening in next episode, so wherever you are listening or watching, make sure you hit that follow subscribe button.

If you're listening to this on a podcast player, hit that rating, maybe leave a review. That would be awesome. If you're watching on YouTube, hit the like and leave a comment down below. Leave me feedback, tell me what, uh, I could improve upon what you're liking, what you're not liking. Again, you can text me if you're listening to a podcast player.

That link is in the show notes. Um, but yeah, other than that, you can leave me your thoughts. Just say Hi. I'm super glad you're here listening, watching wherever you're, uh, getting this. Entertainment, I guess. I don't know wherever you're getting this from. I truly appreciate you until the next episode.

Excelsior.

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