Reprints of the Inhumans backup get to the tale of Black Bolt in this story from THOR #148 (1968). First it’s established that he’s a beloved ruler who keeps his people safe. Then we look back in time on the Historikon and find out that when he was an infant his ability to manipulate energy and matter was even greater than it is now, but he had a scream outside the sonic range that brings the house down.

Of course his own powers protect him, but obviously something is going to have to be done to protect everyone else from him.

I always thought the ideas behind the origin of Black Bolt were intriguing, but we really didn’t get more than a hint of them in these little 5-page snippits. A shame, as he’s a great character.

Joe Sinnott inks the 5-page story.

Published 1981

Anyway, as their second issue opens, the Forever People find themselves attracting attention as the Super-Cycle is blocking traffic. They phase-out to another area where they meet a young boy and his uncle, who Beautiful Dreamer pacifies by making them seem like clean-cut kids, and set up with them for a while. However, an attack from Apokolips in the form of the power vampire Mantis, who Darkseid hopes will generate enough fear to bring out the Anti-Life Equation (and thus introducing the very creepy DeSaad), forces the kids to bring in the Infinity Man to defeat Mantis.

It’s a good story, although once the Infinity Man stuff starts it’s like a whole different thing, and you want to see more of the Forever People and their story, so I guess it’s not surprising that Kirby wrote him out after a few issues.

Colletta inks the 22-page story and the cover, which has a photo collage background.

Published 1971

This issue concludes the brief 3-issue run CHALLENGERS had as a reprint book in 1973 with the story from SHOWCASE #11 (1957), though re-coloured to feature the groups later red and yellow jumpsuits instead of the classic purple. The aliens were also changed from orange to green.

In this story the Challs are sent down to find some missing scientists in Antarctica. While there they find the scientists in the clutches of an alien invasion force, the Tyrans, who plan some major explosions to reduce the gravity of the planet more to their liking, as well as destroy human civilization making us ripe for conquest. Some great artwork in the underground alien lair, and later on there’s a great huge alien machine which comes out of the ocean.

Bruno Premiani, best known as the co-creator of the Doom Patrol and his long stint on Tomahawk, inks the 24-page story. This might be his only time inking Kirby, unless he did some while working for S&K at Crestwood (the Kirby Checklist lists him on SHOWCASE #12 as well, but it looks quite different and I think DC’s recent George Klein credit seems more likely). I really like his work on this, reminding me a lot of the texture that Wallace Wood brought to later stories but not nearly as overwhelming. This might be my favourite inking in a Challengers story, which had a lot of good inking. It’s also interesting that this seems to be Premiani’s only DC credit in a several year period when he apparently wasn’t even living in the United States. Was this done well before it was published? Or was it just a job Premiani picked up while visiting from Argentina?

Published 1973

This story is available in CHALLENGERS OF THE UNKNOWN ARCHIVES v1.

Hm, the Inhumans and the Black Widow “In one mag together – Because You Demanded It”? I wonder how many letters they got actually demanding a split-book with those characters?

Anyway, after years of saying it was coming, the Inhumans finally got their own feature, written and drawn by Kirby, just before he left the company. In this issue, after a brief intro with the FF reviewing some film of the Inhumans, we see the royal family repel an attempt by some soldiers trying to find the Great Refuge, and then seeing their home attacked by a pair of missiles, sent by the exiled Maximus but designed to look like it came from the FF, sending those oh-so-paranoid Inhumans on the attack.

Not a bad start, although this brief run did get a bit weaker through the run, as I’m sure Kirby was ready to work on the next thing by this time.

Chic Stone inks the 10-page story, which is a bit better than his work on the later two issues of this four issue run, but still not close to his early 1960s run inking Kirby. The cover is split for the two features, with Kirby just doing the Inhumans half, inked by Frank Giacoia.

Published 1970