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This is the final Atlas Era Heroes collection, a collection that highlights the brief revival of the three main heroes of the early 1940’s; Captain America, Human Torch and Sub-Mariner. The revival lasted only 23 issues over a span of two years and the first two collections chronicled the Capt. America solo issues as well as the Human Torch titles and the anthology titles featuring all three. Sub-Mariner’s revival lasted the longest, a full ten-issue run that started with Sub-Mariner #33 and concluded with Sub-Mariner #42. The issue starting with #33 resumed the numbering of the series that first ended in 1949. These stories were dated from April of 1954 to October of 1955 and after that the revival was dead and Marvel wouldn’t produce any more super hero stories until late 1961.
Roy writes another great foreword, talking about the Sub-Mariner stories presented here, the work of Bill Everett and the reason why Sub-Mariner lasted longer when Cap and Torch failed during this revival. It seems that a Sub-Mariner television show was in the work with an actor picked out (Richard Egan) but for whatever reason it fell through and when it did, it was so long to the Sub-Mariner. He also writes about the wings reappearing on Namor around issue #38, possibly due to the television show.
Spoilers Ahead
-Sub-Mariner #33- So who is the Sub-Mariner? The retelling of Subby’s origin explains that he is half-man and half-Atlantean. He’s a conflicted character who both hates the surface world but also helps them. Case in point is our second tale. Sub-Mariner stops a missile heading towards a US ship and blows up the Russians who fired it. The prose tale was an interesting one about criminals aboard a boat and how their getaway quickly fails due to the leader’s phobia about drinking seawater. Too bad they were at the Amazon with clean water. The Human Torch makes an appearance in Subby’s comic, something he will be doing for a while. He battles some aliens. Nothing to write home about. Finally, Sub-Mariner heads to Africa and finds a giant crocodile that listens to one girl’s commands. The first two stories were decent, but the rest were just bad.
-Sub-Mariner #34- Sub-Mariner helps find a missing sailboat in a story that is confusing and doesn’t make sense. Then Subby and Namora save a snooping Betty from an octopus. The written story is about a slave whaler who mistreats his subjects and a man escaping this to reveal his evil ways. The Human Torch (and Toro) stop a Russian spy and Sub-Mariner stops a Russian plot in the final story, too. The first story was just inane but the others; especially the anti-communist stories really give a look at the time these stories were written.
-Sub-Mariner #35- Byrrah, the emperor’s stepson, frames Namor for an invasion of the surface world. Namor shows the surface-dwellers that he is innocent but gets banned from Atlantis. A new feature showcasing young Namor follows and it’s a tale of him realizing he could survive out of water (because he’s half-human!). The written story is a jungle tale of espionage and Commie plots. The Torch story was pretty poor, was the norm so far in these titles, as Torch stops some Commies from framing him for diamond heists. Finally, Namor is kidnapped so that a scientist can take his brain and his underwater breathing ability. While reading this story I realized that Namor lost the ability to fly once the Atlas Era of Heroes started. The story was silly but fun. The Young Namor stuff was really fun to read and the other two Namor stories were okay, everything else is a pass.
-Sub-Mariner #36- The opener is an insane story of a new moon coming around Earth and stealing all its water. Since Namor lives in water he’s blamed. So he heads to the new moon and tells them to keep the water. Then he remembered that all his friends in Atlantis (where he was banished mind you) need water to. So he gets all the water back and Atlantis is happy, but the surface believes he is guilty and he’s a wanted man. I mean, WTF? That’s all I can say about that story. The young Namor story just shows how he became courageous while stuck outside and fighting off some wolves. The written story is a standard cursed pearls story. The place where Human Torch was supposed to be has been permanently replaced by a sea-story, this one featuring a man trying to betray his boating partner but instead ends up dead. Sub-Mariner’s crazy tales continue in a War of the Poles. At first I thought it was about Polish people but it is really even more ridiculous than that. Namor’s nemesis, Byrrah, goes to the north pole and breaks off a glacier that threatens the world. So Namor breaks one off in the South to crash into the one from the North and save the day. I don’t know what drugs the writer was on when he came up with the two Namor stories but I definitely want some. Aside from the Young Namor stuff, there’s not much of value here.
-Sub-Mariner #37- Namor stops a Commie plot to destroy the US breadbasket. Aliens are involved. This is the third completely insane Namor story. The Young Namor stuff continues to be really good as we see Namor realizing he is super-strong after Byrrah tries to kill him and only ends up injuring Namor’s mother. Namor must use his strength to save her. The prose story features a man being tortured by the Japanese but that was all part of his plan to trap the Japs and he succeeds. The generic sea-story is just a Moby Dick knock-off. The final Namor tale sees him battle a faux-Namor that is a robot built by Byrrah. Another couple of really weird Namor stories.
-Sub-Mariner #38- This is a great new beginning for Namor. Just like Clarence from It’s A Wonderful Life, Namor gets his wings here. This was due to the TV deal and the producers wanting Namor to fly like he did in the early 40’s. So the first story shows Namor getting weaker and losing his super-human strength. See, Namor hadn’t had his winged feet once the Atlas Age of Heroes began and it is explained excellently that he was just losing his powers. So the emperor of the sub-Arctic land where Namor lives creates a device to give him back his powers and his wings. He uses the newfound powers to save a US ship before destroying it to get back at the cocky admiral. Okay then. The written story is just a spy story featuring a beautiful lady being a secret agent even though another secret agent didn’t know it. The Young Namor story showcases Namor getting his wings for the first time. No, he didn’t drink Red Bull. There’s a shark story here where the “cowardly” shark eats a whale only to get eaten by a bigger whale. Um, it’s called the food chain and that’s what happens. Finally, Subby stops some aliens from using their death ray to kill the world after their attempts to sell them to any nation failed.
-Sub-Mariner #39- Our first story sees Subby taking out some commies and stopping them from sullying his good name. The written story is of a boxer who has lost confidence in his punch until his manager cons him into believing himself and winning the big fight. The young Namor stuff sees Namora appear and teach Namor a lesson in humility. We see a story about an octopus and his fight with a hammerhead and we end this with Namor fighting a hypnotist who was controlling Namor to steal for him. Not really a stellar issue or anything.
-Sub-Mariner #40- Namor stops a Russian plot to build a tunnel from Russia to Alaska via the Bering Strait. See, paranoia was high at the time and this was on people’s minds. A young Namor learns that fire can hurt him; a man loves the sea but can never get to it until he dies and has a boat named after him; a story of fog goes nowhere and finally Namor being wary of a group of ships but they only have the best of intentions in mind. The first story was interesting because of the Russian paranoia at the time, though the rest of the issue is easy enough to pass over.
-Sub-Mariner #41- Byrrah uses ice to send weapons to a country in a Russian scheme and Namor is only too happy to stop it. Again the first story is the best as the written story is about an ice island that the US uses, Namor fights a bird as a young-un (the bird is really a Nazi plane) and there’s a story about a swordfish. The last story was a fun sci-fi tale about a painting of the Nautilus disappearing and the Nautilus attacking ships. Namor stops it but the surprise ending is pretty cool.
-Sub-Mariner #42- Namor finds that the Russians are using fog to attack but Namor stops that pretty quickly. The written story was a fun one about an alien trying to warn someone of a Martian invasion but the person he warns was in fact an alien himself. Oops. Young Namor meets the Ice King in a fun tale and there’s a Viking story that’s fun to read. Finally Namor stops some prisoners from escaping.
-The Bottom Line- Man, sometimes it is tough to read these. It’s not that the stories are terrible it’s just that I don’t have a chance to get into them. It always seems to take me a lot longer to get through the Golden Age and Atlas Era Masterworks as opposed to the Silver Age stuff. Even with the DC Chronicles series. It takes me forever to get through Superman and Batman but the recent Green Lantern one I flew through. These 7-page to 4-page stories just leave the comics with no flow whatsoever. I can’t get into any of the stories since when most stories are just starting to develop they are already over. That being said, some things here stand up pretty well. There are some good stories thrown in here. The art by Bill Everett is some of the best I’ve seen out of him and he was really at the top of his game here. The extra thrown in of the original last page of the Human Torch tale that was excised from the book back then (and reprinted in the 70’s) is nice to see. In the end, the good doesn’t outweigh the bad. I just don’t think this stands up well to what readers are used to and it won’t find a lot of fans in today’s market.
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