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Silver Surfer was always one of Stan Lee’s favorite characters, due to his deep thinking, and Stan loved to write him. So much so that in 1968 Silver Surfer got his own series. The first 7 issues were 40 pages long and the first six were included in Volume 1. This picks up with #7 and ends with the final issue in the series, #18. Ironically, Silver Surfer #18 ended with the character going in another direction but as Stan wrote in the foreword, he didn’t want to do that to the character and the title was just dropped. Interesting. Let’s check out the Sky-Rider of the Spaceways!
Spoilers Ahead
-Silver Surfer #7- This is the last 40-page Silver Surfer tale. They wanted to strike while the iron was hot and make it monthly, so they cut it down to 20-pages after this one. In this tale, Silver Surfer comes upon a man being attacked by an angry mob. Surfer stops the mob and the man appears thankful. Of course, SS didn’t see that the man is a descendent of the Frankenstein family and was trying to make another monster and the villagers had enough of that. Anyway, Surfer is tricked by Frankenstein (a theme you will see a lot in this volume) and he creates an evil doppelganger of the Surfer who attacks the villagers. Surfer eventually defeats his doppelganger because the real one had compassion and the fake did not and Frankenstein plummets to his death after his deformed assistant redeems his evil acts from previously in the issue. They actually kept the story going for the 40 pages with no lulls and it was a really good story.
-Silver Surfer #8- This was originally supposed to be a 40-page story but was cut to 20-pages and funnily enough, Stan apologizes on the last page for it being incomplete! That wouldn’t happen today, you rarely see a self-contained story anymore. So since the action is usually in the last half of a book, this is more setup than anything else. Mephisto still wants the Surfer’s soul and he gets a minion to do his bidding for him, the mythical ghost named The Flying Dutchman! He transforms him into an all-powerful ghost with his only mission (and only chance of redemption) being to destroy the Surfer!
-Silver Surfer #9- This is the big fight between the Flying Dutchman and the Surfer. They actually have a very heated battle but it is very evenly matched. Eventually Mephisto shows his head and the FD takes a hostage. Surfer uses his cosmic power to release the woman from harm and FD is shown he is not beyond redemption by the act of the Surfer. FD renounces Mephisto and Surfer shedding a tear for him frees him from limbo. Surfer still has his soul and Mephisto is defeated. This was just all-out action and the soul of the Surfer is more powerful than anything.
-Silver Surfer #10- Yarro Gort and Shalla Bal head to Earth. Yarro wants Shalla’s love but he can’t have it while Surfer is there. He wants to show Shalla that Surfer has moved on. While they head to Earth Surfer ends up in a South American country in the midst of a Civil War. The despot ruler is striking down all resistance and Surfer finds himself with the resistance. He saves a woman at the end and the woman kisses him in gratitude, which of course is witnessed by Shalla Bal!
-Silver Surfer #11-Shalla and Yarro land on Earth but are attacked by the South Americans, logically concluding that if they were attacked by a spaceman, then all of them must be out to get them. So they attack Yarro and Shalla but Yarro tells them he can create a device to kill the Surfer! Shalla doesn’t like this but she can’t do anything about it. So Yarro goes about creating this device, they attack Surfer and the resistance but Surfer prevails. Of course, victory has a price. Shalla is wounded during the fight and Earth medicine cannot save her. So Surfer sends her back to Zenn-La, again losing his love. I assume Yarro dies at the end with the despot ruler. Another great two-parter for Surfer.
-Silver Surfer #12- The next few issues feature Surfer fighting different characters from the MU. In this issue, a cult raises a long-lost villain, Abomination. Abomination goes on a rampage and Surfer (who was tricked by the same cult) has to stop him. Surfer shows how compassionate he is by using his powers to heal the one who double-crossed him and then had a great fight with Abomination before defeating him.
-Silver Surfer #13- Surfer learns of a threat to the world and heads to the UN for more information. It seems that there is a robot created by the US that cannot be stopped. He has been called the Doomsday Man. Surfer takes a scientist to this island and they encounter the behemoth! He breaks free and heads to the mainland US with a cobalt bomb that will destroy the world. Surfer eventually learns that the scientist was behind this to gain amazing wealth (yep, he was tricked again) but Surfer doesn’t want that. He throws the bomb into space, shoots a hole in the ground that the monster falls down into and with its last efforts strikes and kills the scientist. Surfer is victorious but as usual for him, he is blamed for the scientists death. A perfectly acceptable story.
-Silver Surfer #14- This would be the standard: “two heroes have a misunderstanding and fight,” issue and this time the two heroes are the titular character and Spider-Man. Spider-Man swings throughout the city and accidentally swings onto Surfer. The two have a bit of a scrap and the military is called in to take down the Surfer. The military shows up and as Surfer calls his board, he realizes a boy found it and is on the board. Surfer uses all his power to save the boy and he is vindicated for now, flying off as the military leaves.
-Silver Surfer #15- Another misunderstanding, as the military goes to the FF to ask for their help in getting the Surfer. The Surfer hears this and is a little pissed. Mr. Fantastic tries to grab him when they see him but he shocks him and flies off. Torch goes off to look for him and the two of them scrap, too. Torch ends up unconscious on the train tracks and Surfer saves him. Surfer then learns that the FF just wanted him to help the government in space travel. This time it was the Surfer who misunderstood and attacked first than the other way around. That was a nice twist at the end.
-Silver Surfer #16- Mephisto has a fail-safe plan against Surfer to finally get his soul. He will kidnap Shalla Bal and command Surfer to do his bidding. Mephisto meets with Surfer and allows him to leave the barrier Galactus had in place. Surfer does and goes to Zenn-La but finds his love his missing! He learns Mephisto took her and he flies back to Earth and the two have a physical confrontation. Eventually Surfer relents to the will of Mephisto and becomes his slave. Mephisto has one goal, to destroy SHIELD!
-Silver Surfer #17- Surfer goes off to destroy SHIELD to save his love but Mephisto, cunning as usual, places Shalla Bal in the SHIELD facilities so Surfer will destroy her! Surfer confronts SHIELD but is knocked out by their Z-gas and put in a 10-foot thick cell. While there Mephisto shows Surfer that Shalla was there. For the second time in as many issues, they fight. Mephisto sends Shalla back and eventually decides he has had enough of Surfer and leaves. Surfer flies off but not before getting another dose of the Z-ray gas. He flies off, passes out, and lands on the moon near the Inhumans. I loved the way Fury was written here, as a no-holds barred commander.
-Silver Surfer #18- Surfer awakes on the moon and is attacked by Inhumans! Surfer fights them off and the Inhumans return. It turnes out it was all a plan by Maximus to cause Surfer to distrust the Inhumans and attack and destroy Black Bolt. So Surfer flies on and the good Inhumans think Surfer is teamed with Maximus! They attack him but Surfer again fights them off. Surfer has had enough and flies off. He vows at the end of the issue he will become as savage as the humans and fight them like they fight him. He is truly a man who has reached his breaking point. This issue was drawn by the inimitable Jack Kirby. It promises a new direction for the Surfer on the last page but it is a trigger they never pulled.
-The Bottom Line- I mentioned before that Stan wrote the introduction and he basically says he doesn’t remember the stories! He re-read them and tells us he loves the deep thinking of the Surfer and the character was a favorite of his. He talks about the ending to issue #18 (which I touch upon in the intro) and mentions that he doesn’t know why Kirby drew the last issue. It is odd that there is a 2-month gap between #17 and #18. Anyway the trigger was never pulled on the savage Surfer which is good and bad in some ways. I would’ve loved to see how Stan wrote the savage Surfer but Stan had such love for his character he couldn’t do it. I am going to check to see what the next Marvel appearance was of Surfer to see what happened after this. The volume is an amazingly quick read. The 12 issues were written superbly and Stan’s characterization of Surfer as a peaceful man thrust into violent battles was probably a statement on the turbulent late 60’s he lived. Still, that is not a crutch. Such human emotions were not normal at the time and Surfer was definitely the lonliest character in the MU. The Fantastic Four were a family, The X-Men and Avengers were very close teams, and even solo characters like Hulk, Spider-Man and Doctor Strange had people they could communicate with. That isn’t so with the Surfer. He was more out of touch than even Captain America and since Surfer was different, he was persecuted. It is a tragic character. The stories here were just a wonderful look at how mature and telling Stan’s scripts could be while telling a story of an alien with a surfboard. The art is another huge plus. John Buscema was meant for the Surfer and his work especially shines the first few issues with his brother Sal inking them. Kirby filled in for the last issue and did a nice job but this was Buscema’s showcase. This is probably the best you will see Silver Surfer written. I almost forgot about the extras. You get two pages of Buscema’s original artwork and two of his original covers. You also get covers for the Fantasy Masterpieces reprints which featured these titles. High recommendation.
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