The Man For The Job
From time to time I reprint material here from my old comic book blog -- Longbox Graveyard -- particularly when a comics article bumps up against the mystery/suspense/horror genre. Today I reprint my enthusiastic retro-review of Strange Tales #135, offering the origin of Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.
Marvel Comics was never one to miss a trend, and with Bondmania stirring up superspy excitement around the world in the summer of 1965, it was only natural The House of Ideas would come up with their own secret agent man. To lead their answer to U.N.C.L.E., Marvel recruited Sgt. Nick Fury (late of the Howling Commandos), promoted him to Colonel, and dropped him in the deep end of running the Supreme Headquarters, International Espionage, Law-enforcement Division.
Checking in at a taut twelve pages, this S.H.I.E.L.D. origin story from Strange Tales #135 has little room for exposition — like the best James Bond movies, the action is fast-paced and a little weird, racing from one exciting set piece to the next. Right on the opening page, a bewildered Nick Fury doesn’t have time to extinguish his stogie before he’s stripped down to his skivvies and installed in a Life Model Decoy Master Mold, on a timetable so tight that Fury’s artificial body doubles start to get knocked off by the bad guys before Fury is even informed that he’s been mechanically cloned!
One page later, and Fury is getting napalmed in his Porsche; a page after that and the Porsche has folded up her wheels and taken off into the sky.
And the page after that, we’re introduced to the masters behind all this mayhem, as HYDRA makes it’s first Marvel Universe appearance. I love HYDRA — they’re the perfect supervillain goon squad, clad in their cultish baggy uniforms, and seeming to welcome casualties just so they can break out their signature phrase — “Cut off a limb, and two shall take it’s place! HAIL HYDRA!”
No sooner has HYDRA completed their pajama party than we are back with Fury in the secret base of S.H.I.E.L.D., where Nick tries to resist getting dragooned into running the operation, claiming he’s still a sergeant at heart, and way out of his league… until his battle-honed instincts detect a hidden HYDRA bomb, which Fury throws out the window of the headquarters, sparking one of the greatest reveals in Marvel Comics history.
So there you go… in twelve pages, Stan Lee and (especially) Jack Kirby blow our minds at least five times, create the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier, give birth to not one but TWO super-secret spy organizations, and introduce a character that half a century later is still prowling the Marvel Universe, now a big-screen movie hero played by Samuel L. Jackson.
And King Kirby pre-imagines the Transport Safety Administration, too!
Not a bad day at the office. And a great single-issue story!
This article original appeared at StashMyComics.com, and later appeared at Longbox Graveyard.