American Update: The Good Doctor Collection/Mighty Marvel Firsts: Silver Age Debut of Sub-Mariner in Fantastic Four #4
*Marvel: We lead off this week’s selections from the Good Doctor Collection with a real gem. In the earliest days of the Fantastic Four, when Marvel Comics were still a well-kept cult secret, Stan Lee, having previously resisted his publisher’s request to combine the company’s Golden Age heroes into a Justice League clone, decided to plunder the company’s history anyway, but in a distinctive manner. Johnny Storm, the Human Torch, finds in a Bowery flophouse a homeless derelict who turns out to be the long-lost and amnesiac Prince Namor, the Sub-Mariner, ruler of Atlantis (and star of his own comic book back in the 1940s). Impulsive but well-intentioned, Johnny ‘shocks’ Namor back into awareness, but when the Sub-Mariner returns to his undersea kingdom, he finds it devastated by the weapons testing of the surface world. Enraged, Sub-Mariner swears revenge on the land-dwellers – though he’s willing to make an exception for Johnny’s shapely sister Sue, the Invisible Girl – and thus began one of the most dramatic ongoing conflicts of the series, as Namor flipped from enemy to ally as the plots demanded. Eventually Sub-Mariner’s status as anti-hero earned him a series in Tales to Astonish, then the first of many ongoing solo series, and he remains a major figure in the MU to this day, with a debut in the MCU allegedly imminent.
As you’re doubtless aware, prices have soared on big Marvel keys over the last 1-2 years, and this issue is no exception, although it does have a flaw which keeps the price in the realms of reality for some. There is some minor graffiti on Namor’s head on the cover (faint facial hair and horns) and someone has drawn in him holding a trident as well as Sue. These defects should be visible on our scan. Otherwise this copy isn’t too bad: moderate spine and edge wear, a small scuff on Mr. Fantastic’s thigh, some colour-breaking creasing on right edge and bottom right corner and one long diagonal crease across top right (quite faint). There is also a small cover tear towards the bottom of the right cover edge repaired by tape on the inside front cover. The colours are bright, the page quality good and the staples firm. A little tired, perhaps, but we’ve graded (and priced) it down due to the graffiti, so if you can live with that, a great opportunity to pick up a cents copy of huge Marvel key at the right time. High resolution images are available on request.
PICTURED: FANTASTIC FOUR #4 GD- £1,550 SOLD