I do believe this is the first tale in John Buscema's stint on the Fantastic Four.
Not only that but it's a truly ground-breaking story line, as it sees the Thing start to turn against his teammates for only the nineteenth time ever.
I wonder what the Man-Thing story was? The only Man-Thing tales I can recall from his Planet of the Apes days are the one with the dead clown, the one with the lost conquistador village in the swamp and the one with the space pirates. I have no clue if the tale in this issue is any of those.
Did the Devastator ever make another appearance in the pages of Marvel? I can't remember him ever doing so.
Gerry Conway did like to revive old villains by having them be replaced by imposters, Hot on the heels of the fake Vulture, he's at it again, as Fake Mysterio seeks to succeed where the real one has failed on so many occasions.
Needless to say, he uses the same methodology as the real Mysterio.
Needless to say, he fails just like the real Mysterio.
The Devastator's super suit malfunctioned and it fried him like an egg.
ReplyDeleteYou wonder why that doesn't happen a lot more often in comics.
M.P.
Although the Devastator died in this tale I seem to recall another version of the character appeared in an issue of ROM there was also Devastator in the FF
ReplyDeleteThe Hunter's Planet Of The Apes website shows all the apes stories from the Marvel UK weekly but sadly the back-up features like Ka-Zar and the Man-Thing are not included which is a real pity. I remember the Man-Thing stories about the clown (didn't he shoot himself ?) and the Conquistadors but I don't remember the space pirates at all !!
ReplyDeleteThanks for the info, Paul and MP.
ReplyDeleteColin, I may be imagining the space pirates. I seem to remember him ending one tale on a sailing ship, in space, with pirates but I could be going mad.
You're memory hasn't failed you Steve, Man Thing issue 13 had this story ("Red Sails at 40,000 Feet!") which featured "space type pirates an Man-Thing in Space in a few panels
ReplyDeleteThanks for the confirmation, Paul. I now feel it's safe for me to cancel my appointment with the psychiatrist.
ReplyDeleteGood stuff, but bear in mind all of those comics actually came out the week before, on September 22nd. The cover date was the day the newsagents would take them off the shelves and replace them with the next issue.
ReplyDeleteThis is true, Lew. Just to confuse matters more, I always used to get them on a Saturday or Sunday, so the date I really got them on would have been four or five days before the cover date. I therefore cheat and just rely on the cover date, in order to prevent me hurting my brain trying to work out when they really entered my life.
ReplyDeleteYes, that's what I'm saying. They came out the Saturday before the cover date, so you had them on the weekend they were published. Just deduct 7 calendar days from the cover date and Bob's your uncle. :)
ReplyDeleteBut, Lew, by this point, they were being given a Wednesday cover date, instead of their earlier Saturday cover date. This is why they're hurting my head.
ReplyDeleteAh, right, it'd be the previous Wednesday then when they came out.
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ReplyDeleteArgh! Sorry, Lew. I accidentally removed your last comment while trying to reply to it. I'll work out how this blog works some day.
ReplyDeleteThe comment was, "The point I'm making is that you're specifically connecting the cover dates with world events that happened on that day, but in fact it'd be the next week's issues that came out that day so you're always one week out. In this case, September 29th was the day the issues dated 5th October would be on sale," and you're absolutely right. I just like to pretend there's a direct correlation between the dates because it simplifies things and makes the posts tidier.