Only one Kirby piece in this issue, a great image of Izaya, the Highfather, inked by Greg Theakston, with a symbolic representation of the exchange in “The Pact” in the background. Izaya is a fascinating character from the glimpses we get of him, never really explored outside of “The Pact”. Having his logo being written in flames on the Source Wall is a nice touch.
Published 1985
Two Kirby reprints in this issue. First up is “Titan, The Amphibian From Atlantis”, from TALES OF SUSPENSE #28, a 7-page story inked by Russ Heath (I think the only time Heath inked Kirby). Looks very pretty, with a lot of the qualities that someone like Wallace Wood brought to the pencils of that period, without being quite as overpowering. Anyway, in this story a giant monster comes out of the waters and attacks New York, informing everyone telepathically that he’s an advance scout from Atlantis, which will invade, and promises riches to any human who will betray the secrets of humanity. One man, industrial giant John Cartwright, agrees, managing to escape with Titan just ahead of an angry mob. He’s branded a traitor by humanity, who put aside their national difference to prepare for the Atlantean invasion, not realizing that Cartwright has in fact sacrificed his own life by exaggerating. humanity’s technology to the creatures.
The other Kirby story goes back much further, to 1941, “Death Loads the Bases” from CAPTAIN AMERICA #7. 15 pages with Syd Shores inking, according to the Kirby Checklist. Not the sharpest reprint quality, really, and made worse by adjusting the layouts, adding space between panels to make the art fill the page. Anyway, in this story Steve Rogers and Bucky attend a Brooklyn Badgers game, only to see two of the players drop dead on the field. Cap spots a poison dart, and he and Bucky go after the masked Black Toad and henchmen and get soundly defeated. The next game Cap and Bucky take over as pitcher and catcher for the team, doing quite well. Which has to be embarrassing for the regular players. I mean sure, Cap has the super-soldier serum, but Bucky?
The Toad finally attacks, in the form of a bomb hidden in a baseball, and Cap and Bucky take him out and unmask him. This is far from the best written of the S&K Cap stories, and the reprint doesn’t really show off the line-art, but it does have some really nice action bits, as the quality of their layouts was improving by leaps and bounds in those early years. The baseball bits are especially well done in this story.
Published 1967
A pair of Kirby reprints from JOURNEY INTO MYSTERY v1 in this issue. First up is “The Scorpion Strikes”, inked by Paul Reinman, from #82. At a lab where they’re doing delicate experiments with radiation, the owners find that some of the lab boys are getting a bit clumsy (and unknowingly irradiate a scorpion in one mishap), so they hire a hypnotist to keep everyone calm. Soon after, that scorpion mutates to giant size, with telepathic abilities, and plans to take over the world. The hypnotist tries and fails to get the Scorpion under his spell, but soon after it finds itself in physical agony.
![Journey Into Mystery #7 [1973]](http://kirbymuseum.org/blogs/kirby/wp-content/uploads/sites/8/2005/01/Journey-Into-Mystery-7-1973.jpg)
And I have to say, Kirby drawing a scorpion screaming in agony is a pretty funny sight. Anyway, it consents to another radiation dose to end its pain, which un-mutates it. Turns out the hypnotist did a fake-out, intentionally failing his first attempt to catch the Scorpion off-guard later. Junk science wins the day!
The cover of this issue is also from JiM #82, for this story. It’s inked by Dick Ayers, and slightly modified (adding some shadows) and coloured very differently for this version. It seems the Scorpion was green first time around.
Ayers also inks the second Kirby reprint in this issue, “Won’t You Come Into My Parlor”, from JiM #80. In this story a European industrialist, Krumhausen, wants to take over a competitor, Zamora. He finds out that Zamora has a gypsy past and a bad heart. He comes up with an insane plot to shock Zamora to a heart attack, by building giant replicas of various rooms, inviting Zamora for dinner, drugging him and making him think that he shrunk. This works, surprisingly enough, but Zamora uses his mysterious gypsy powers to lay down a dying curse, so that Krumhausen finds himself shrunk for real, and attacked by his cat (which seems to be possessed by Zamora). Fun story, and I especially like Kirby’s drawing of elaborate European rooms and furnishings done on a large scale.
Also a very nice Ditko story in this issue, “Take A Chair”.
Published 1973