|
A Brief introduction
to Marvel Comics
in the Silver Age
Reviews and Analysis by
Pierre Comtois and
Gregorio Montejo
There can be little argument regarding Silver Age Marvel's impact on the comic book world since the inception of Fantastic Four # 1 in 1961.
The definition of the super-hero as human being, encumbered with all of the same problems and challenges as ordinary people, stemmed from editor Stan Lee's personal vision and was translated into pictures by artist Jack Kirby. From there, it was the mutually supportive contributions of both men together that combined to reinvent the super-hero genre. But important as the work of these two men was in that creation, artist Steve Ditko, perhaps lacking Lee's facility with language and Kirby's dynamic artistry, nevertheless displayed a certain synthesis of both when he helped to create the single most fallible (and popular) of the Marvel stable of characters.
None of this, however, sprang whole from the brow of any single man, Lee, Kirby or Ditko. On the contrary, we believe it began almost by accident, and developed more or less unconsciously through 1963 until, after a gradual realization of the potentialities inherent in this new twist in super-hero writing, a more deliberate approach began to be taken.
As a result, the whole process, the rise and fall of Silver Age Marvel, can be broken down into four distinct parts:
| | The early, formative years (1961-1962) when characters began to be infused with the humanism that would become the hallmark of Marvel and the first steps were taken that would later reshape Marvel's entire line of books into a single coherent universe, |
|
|
| | ...the years of Conscious Consolidation (1963-1964) when editor Lee set the policy of infusing the new humanism into every character (and creating whole new books such as Daredevil and the X-Men based entirely around the concept) and solidifying the Marvel universe with increasing cross-over events, |
|
|
| | ...the Grandiose years when the consciousness of a deliberate humanism in the Marvel line resulted in comics written and conceptualized for adults as well as children (1965-1969), |
|
|
| | ...and the Twilight years (1970-) after Lee, Kirby and Ditko's creative energies seemed to have spent themselves and a new generation of creators succeeded them, prolonging Marvel's Silver Age in a new guise into the mid-seventies. |
|
|
|
Here's
the
22 nd
of our regular
reviews:
on-line
22 Dec
2001 |
 |
Strange Tales
# 167
Apr 1968 |
|
Cover by
Jim Steranko |
“Armageddon!”
Scripted and penciled by
Jim Steranko
Inks by
Joe Sinnott
“This Dream…This Doom!”
Scripted by
Denny O'Neil
Penciled and inked by Dan Adkins
|
|
Past reviews
are archived
in the
REVIEW INDEX |
By Strange Tales # 167, Steranko was at the top of his game. After coming onto the troubled SHIELD strip at # 151 as an inker/finisher for Jack Kirby, he was soon penciling, then writing the super-spy feature. In rapid succession, he introduced new graphic elements to the strip, experimented with layout and storytelling style, redefined his characters' anatomy and otherwise made Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD so strongly identified with himself that it was almost unimaginable that it could ever be continued by anyone else.
And this issue may be the perfect example of why Steranko by this time had not only become an insider's fan favorite, but an irreplaceable ideas man whose sense of style may have outgrown the comics he worked on. Two issues after this one, Fury would have his own title, and Steranko would reach an unparalleled peak. His later work on the X-Men and Captain America, though beautifully designed and arranged in high energy, with over-the-top layouts, would yet be mere echoes of Kirby type action-oriented Marvel comics, while his pair of isolated short stories for the anthology titles Tower of Shadows and Our Love Story (see review # 12 for an in-depth review of the latter), although as graphically revolutionary and eye-opening as anything he ever did on the Nick Fury book, were isolated last hurrahs for a creative dynamo who had gone as far as he could within the limited palette of comic books.
But at the time of Strange Tales # 167, Steranko found himself only at mid-career at Marvel. Everything he'd done up to this issue was but a prologue. Over the previous sixteen months, the artist had brought a dizzying array of tools and techniques to his work, employed them, moved them around, found the best ways they could work in a four-color medium printed on cheap pulp paper and now, perhaps with word already having come down from editor Stan Lee's office that the Fury strip would soon graduate to its own full length feature, Steranko exploited all that he'd learned in a tour-de-force conclusion to the sprawling Yellow Claw serial that he'd been spooling out since # 160.
Here, the story begins with the climactic scene from the previous issue, the death of SHIELD agent Jimmy Woo's girlfriend Suwan at the hands of the Yellow Claw. But Steranko allows the reader little time for grief as he immediately launches into an unprecedented action scene spread over four single-panel pages. The only thing was, to get the full impact of the bludgeoning action, a reader was required to either tear the pertinent pages from his book or buy a second copy in order to view all the pages contiguously! Or, as Steranko himself said in a footnote: "It was absolutely impossible to present this mind-bending super-spectacular in anything less than a powerful, panoramic four-page spread! To get the full effect, of course, requires a second ish placed side-by-side, but we think you'll find it to be well worth the price to have the wildest action scene ever in the history of comics!" Despite his native genius, Steranko it seemed, was still able to learn a few things from the hyperbolic Lee! But the truly impressive thing about this four page extravaganza was that it was by no means the most interesting visual trick in the issue. Where other creators might've been satisfied to have such a device serve to underline the climax of a story, Steranko manages to get it out of the way to make room for more visual pyrotechnics in the pages to follow.
Dropping color, Steranko uses the lack of it to emphasize moments of tension as Fury comes face-to-face with the Yellow Claw ("Witness the effect as my infinity sphere enters nucleo-phoretic drive!" shouts the Claw as he stands amid a black and white inversion of collapsing universes. "Observe, as I begin to slip into the space-time continuum beyond human reach!") And here, amid the eye-grabbing graphic special effects that established his reputation, Steranko adds another layer to his creative smorgasbord. As flamboyant a writer as he was an artist, Steranko had learned how to string words together not from the effete reserve of Dickens, Poe and Tolstoy, but in the rough-and-tumble schoolyard of hard-boiled paperbacks and purple-prosed pulp novels. Tailoring his scripts to the needs of the kind of stories he was telling (he could adapt to the style of Dashiell Hammett for projects like his 1976 graphic novel "Chandler" for instance), Steranko used words as counterpoint to the action being described. As a result, his scripting for the Fury strip was rarely subtle and almost always painted word-pictures filled with forceful adjectives that left little room for sentiment or reflection.
And so, as Fury dons the Claw's "proto-type warp vest," his full figure divides a half page panel in two: on one side is the black and white image of our hero's angry face and on the other, the vast depths of the universe itself. "…an instant later, the Shield ramrod activates the fantastic device, risking his life in a million-to-one chance he can lock in on the Yellow Claw's cosmic trajectory! Suddenly, the spell-binding undercurrent of infinity pulls him beyond the black tide of space, between life and death, between time and eternity, between heaven and hell, in an astounding mission of galactic revenge where only one can survive!"
Suddenly, the minds of Fury and the Claw meet in a pair of kaleidoscopic panels reminiscent of sixties' pop art San Francisco rock posters, as Steranko's prose continues: "…as the infinity sphere passes thru realm beyond realm of hyper-night, the two combatants continue their seething cosmic duel…mind against mind, will against will…while the fate of millions hangs in the balance…"
Looked at in the right way, Fury and the Claw's hurtling passage through myriad dimensions might be interpreted as a metaphor for Steranko's own wide-ranging interests. Steranko had, by his early twenties, become a serious student of such diverse subjects as film, boxing, magic, art, fencing and music. Invariably, during his meteoric career at Marvel, Steranko brought what he had learned of these other disciplines to his work in comics. His use of cinematic techniques has been regularly commented upon, and Steranko has stated his debt to such directors as Edgar Ulmer. His masterful 1970 story "My Heart Broke in Hollywood" (with script by Stan Lee: cf. review # 12; Our Love Story # 5) displayed a consummate knowledge of the language of film, effortlessly combining such techniques as montage, panning, and tracking, to create a witty commentary on the interplay between the two media of cinema and comics, as well as a tour de force of narrative ingenuity.
Steranko's love of music is also often noted. In fact he has remarked that it's a medium that has a special significance for him.
"Music has always been closer to my heart than any other of my proceedings, and is infinitely more fulfilling," he's quoted as saying. "I often regret my decision to move out of that field."
Learning to play several instruments, Steranko also sang, and arranged musical compositions. As an accomplished musician he honed his skills by mastering the basic foundations of music: rhythm, melody, and harmony. This familiarity with rhythmic construction, melodic movement, and harmonic structures is evident in his comic book work as well.
Rhythm is the most basic building block of music, and the most intuitive. The propulsive, toe-tapping surge of a regular beat is evident to anyone who listens. The beat is the temporal measure of a composition: like a metronome it keeps time through a succession of regular pulses. Tempo can be speeded up or slowed down by varying these rhythmical stresses. An even flow can be transformed into a staccato flurry by shortening the beats, or an ordered sequence lengthened by expanding the rhythmic progress into a series of extended vibratory movements. In the cinema, music and images are uniquely combined to produce a richly varied succession of rhythms. Short, sharp percussive beats, and fast cutting, provide the rapid motion necessary for a suspenseful scene. Or slow, plangent movements may be juxtaposed with long, drawn-out editing in order to create scenes full of pathos. In a medium without a soundtrack, such as comics, tempo can still be established by the rhythmic conjunction of images. Moreover, changing the shape of the panels can create a temporal dimension. Steranko routinely used this method in his work to accelerate or extend the "time" within his narratives. For example, in "Armageddon," page 8, panels 3-6 are presented as a succession of four small, identically framed panels, which, by their steady, pounding rhythm, heighten the anticipated final confrontation between Fury and the Yellow Claw. By contrast, the three elongated panels that open the next page expand the action within their frames, thereby accentuating and expanding the import of the graphically brief, yet symbolically momentous battle itself.
Melody concerns the succession of notes, or panels in the case of comics, so ordered as to form a distinctive, unified, satisfying statement. If rhythm can be studied at the level of individual graphic or sonic elements juxtaposed against other such elements, melody then must be analyzed by examining larger compositional units. In cinema and in comics this means entire scenes, where overall designs might be observed. Melody utilizes two formal principles, interval and duration, to weave together these extended compositions. Interval yields motion, duration obtains rhythm, and their interplay results in patterned energy. Many of Steranko's scenes are justly famous, but the analysis of one will suffice to exhibit his absolute mastery of this procedure. The one page sequence from Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD # 5 ("So Shall Ye Reap-Death", July 1968), depicting a romantic tryst between Fury and Val, is considered the first mature scene of love making in mainstream American comics. Editor Stan Lee persuaded Steranko to change some of the steamy artwork, but even in its altered form it remains a masterpiece of implied eroticism. The sequence is wordless; it relies solely upon its subtle progression of images to create its amorous atmosphere. The initial panel sets the tone, a large composition occupying the top tier of the page, showing the couple lounging amidst sumptuous surrounding, which immediately establishes an ambience of languorous sensuality. The next ten panels tell the story of arousal and consummation. Significantly, Steranko places an image of a record being played on a stereo turntable in panel 3, indicating that the lovers coupling will be accompanied by the strains of romantic music, a groove that the artist will supply with a suitable melodic refrain. The regular shape and progression of the panels, the juxtaposition of a rose in bloom and a smoking cigar, emblems of palpable sexual openness and smoldering desire, climaxing with a shot of Fury's weapon deeply ensconced in its holster, are in themselves a sensual sarabande, at once accompanying and embodying the union of flesh in rhythmic motion.
Harmony, the third constitutive element of music, is the most complex to understand, and the most difficult to explain. While the basics of rhythm and melody can be taught to almost any child, harmonics, even though codified over the centuries in a series of intricate laws, seems to be an innate talent in only certain people. This inborn ability can best be described as an intuitive comprehension of the architectonic structures of musical composites, a feeling for the way the myriad chord progressions and sonic intervals, all the melodic patterns in a given work, are intertwined into a unified whole. The rules of classical harmonics postulate a tonic, or tonal center, from which the composition emerges, varies in several distinct yet interconnected modes, and ultimately returns. In a visual narrative such as film or comics, this tone can be a thematic plot element, graphic leitmotif, or recurrent character that holds the varied strands of the story together. At Marvel, Steranko quickly began to experiment with the modalities of extended composition. Indeed, "Armageddon" is the culmination of a sprawling work that encompasses eight separate movements. The individual thematic elements weave in and out of the main harmonic structure in convoluted permutations, only to be resolved in a sudden, unanticipated denouement - in much the same way as Ravel's Bolero, where the distinctive melodies wend their way with increasing urgency, until they reach fruition with an emphatic climax of immense power. Steranko's most extensive harmonic work would only come in such later works as Chandler, whose scope allowed an elaboration of motifs that can only be characterized as symphonic.
Increasing sophistication of techniques, cross-pollination of artistic media, and greater experimentation with form: these are all manifestations of the turmoil and growth in the popular culture of the time. In film, the decade saw the advent of the New Wave, and in music, the British Invasion. Marvel Comics emerged from the same innovatory atmosphere. Steranko's stylistic and technical daring gains further clarity when seen in this context. The parallels between Steranko's appropriation and expansion of classic Hollywood film-making methods, and the experimental cinema of the time, has already been explored in relation to the analogous expansion of the form by such New Wave directors as Godard (q.v., review # 12). Alternatively, by relating Steranko's achievements to contemporary rock groups such as the Beatles, we gain new perspective on his groundbreaking adaptation of musical forms. For example, "Armageddon" and the Beatles' "White Album" were both released in the tumultuous year of 1968. A comparison of Steranko's and the Beatles' work from this period of social and artistic ferment highlights a number of similar artistic strategies:
- Modal Retrieval: Popular culture begins to achieve self-conscious artistry when it begins to draw on former styles. On their White Album, the Beatles incorporated folk and country influences in "Blackbird" and "Rocky Raccoon" and paid homage to Chuck Berry and the Beach Boys in the satiric "Back in the USSR." In Strange Tales, Steranko brought back the Yellow Claw, an Atlas Comics villain from the 1950s, and inserted him into a James Bond scenario. Later, he'd borrow from other genres and styles such as romance for "My Heart Broke in Hollywood," Arthur Conan Doyle type mystery in "Dark Moon Rise, Hell Hound Kill" (Shield # 3, Aug. 1968) and the horror tale in "At the Stroke of Midnight," from Tower of Shadows # 1, (Sept. 1969).
- Chromatic Distortion: As the word suggests, chromatics designates the color spectrum of visible light. In music, a chromatic note differs from the dominant key of a composition in which it occurs. Such a note adds a vivid contrast to the predominant sonic pattern, and is therefore sometimes said to "add color." Classical composers began to mix in deliberate touches of harmonic distortion, for colorful effect, into their compositions as early as the 19th century. In popular music, the Beatles were the first widely successful band to include deliberate distortion, such as feedback, into their recordings. "Helter Skelter," an explosive sonic mélange of electrified instrumentation, may be the Beatles' most radical exploration of chromatics. Taking charge of the coloring (as well as every other graphic design aspect of his narratives), Steranko introduced his own brand of bold chromatic experimentation into his work. In his hands, these departures from the usual naturalistic hues became narrative as well as aesthetic devices. The magenta swirl in the final panel of page 8 of "Armageddon" is a perfect visual analog of the psychic battle between Fury and the Yellow Claw. The saffron, indigo and crimson on page 3 of "Today Earth Died" (Strange Tales # 168, May 1968) herald the epiphanic descent of Vaenger to our mundane realm. And the transmuting spectra of Shield # 5, page 8, panels 1-5 ("Whatever Happened To Scorpio?" Oct. 1968) exemplify the metamorphic return of Scorpio.
- Audile Space: The exploration of inner space, the realm of the mind, both psychological and psychedelic, through auditory experience. The characteristic emblems of psychedelia, such as the intricate vertices of a moiré pattern, figure in the work of Steranko and the Beatles, as it does in that of many other popular artists of the time. This is more than just a graphic design fad; the whirling, mesmeric shapes were closely aligned to the sub-culture of "mind expanding" drug use. Sonic effects, such as backward tape loops, fade-outs/fade-ins and Moog synthesizers were called upon to evoke the conditions of an "acid trip." These aural effects sought to approximate a psychedelic state of mind by creating a non-objective, audile space that eschewed the rational, three-dimensional environment of quotidian existence. Similarly, abstract patterns helped induce trance-like states by jettisoning the mathematical regularity of linear perspective, and positing an alternate state devoid of horizon as well as vanishing point-a non-Euclidian space without center or periphery. The audio assemblage of the Beatles' "Revolution # 9" is mirrored by the visual collage of "Today Earth Died!" pg. 10, both create a composite image of modern existence out of the heaped shards of Western culture. The warped temporal continuum and negative spatiality of the Yellow Claws' Infinity Sphere ("Armageddon," page 6, panel 4), melds the optical phantasmagoria of Op Art, with the boundless and de-centered orb that is audile space.
"Perhaps some time in the future, I'll return to music," Steranko has said. "The possibility exists that I'll combine music with a new entertainment project and satisfy several artistic sensibilities at once."
Despite his stated feelings, it's possible that Steranko never really abandoned music at all, but in fact, has been unconsciously utilizing his musical abilities all along. His subtle and complex merging of visual and aural techniques in his work at Marvel seems to hint at the multi-media project he currently envisions. If so, then it's possible to glimpse what shape that work might take with this issue's synesthetic concert of Steranko's twin muses, art and music.
And so, beneath one of the most iconic comic covers of the 1960s (one that resonates even more today than it did when it first appeared), Steranko managed to deliver in Strange Tales # 167, an 11-page mini-masterpiece whose quality, unbelievably, would be far surpassed in following issues of the new Nick Fury, Agent of Shield solo title. Unfortunately however, such work came at a cost. Unable to maintain his personal standards of quality at the merciless pace demanded by a monthly deadline, Steranko was soon forced to abandon the strip that had given him legendary status in the comics world. The exciting sense of graphic design that he'd brought to the comics industry only a few years before would be put on hold temporarily as he dabbled in more traditional layouts to meet short term assignments. They'd re-emerge only when the artist had given up monthly work completely to do short features for a couple of Marvel's anthology titles before moving on to his own self-publishing projects.
Undeservedly overshadowed by Steranko's lead story, was Strange Tales # 167's second feature, Dr. Strange. Like the Fury strip in the first half of the book, the Strange strip had also suffered from a lack of direction and inadequate art since the departure of first artist Steve Ditko and then writer Stan Lee. But as would frequently happen, if a reader had patience, sooner or later, the stars would line up just right and a moribund strip would be revived to energetic life with the serendipitous joining of a new artist and writer which is exactly what happened with the Dr. Strange strip.
After understudying with his artistic hero Wally Wood for years, Dan Adkins finally left the artist's studio for solo work at Marvel. After bumping around the company for a few months doing some penciling here and some inking there, Adkins finally settled down as the penciler in the Dr. Strange half of Strange Tales with issue # 161. At first told to "draw like Ditko," Adkins soon left an imperfect emulation of the strip's co-creator for his own style, which was nevertheless heavily influenced by Wood. But even that influence seemed to be waning by this issue as Adkins left behind his mentor's preference for pages composed of many small panels for Kirby style full page spreads. Suddenly, for the first time since Ditko left the strip, the mysterious world of Dr. Strange became one of weirdness again, filled with shadows and unearthly menaces. Even the layout was unorthodox; or at least it wasn't anything like the Kirby standard of six panels per page. Now a page was more likely to be laid out in overlapping panels where no frame was the same size as any other! Who'd have thought it, after seeing the stiff, stodgy work Adkins had done under the supervision of Wood over at the recently deceased Tower Comics? Here though, Adkins is teamed with the serviceable but unimaginative Denny O'Neil (who would have to wait until going over to DC - a company whose product was almost as stodgy as Tower's - to make his mark in comics). The sad part is that, just as he was really starting to get into the feel of the strip, Adkins would end up leaving Dr. Strange following the second issue of the character's full length title even as scripter Roy Thomas came on as permanent writer. Even more unfortunate for his fans, was that with rare exceptions, Adkins would never pencil again, serving the company by concentrating instead on his considerable inking skills. |
|
