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Fantastic Four (1961 series) #26

May 1964 on-sale: Feb 11, 1964

Stan Lee
writer
 |  Jack Kirby
penciler

Fantastic Four (1961 series) #26 cover

Story Name:

The Avengers Take Over!


Synopsis

Fantastic Four (1961 series) #26 synopsis by reviewer Peter Silvestro
Rating: 4 stars

Image from Fantastic Four (1961 series) #26
The Thing continues his battle against the Hulk, laying waste a condemned neighborhood. The Human Torch leaves the hospital against doctor's orders to go to the aid of his blue-eyed buddy. But the two of them are no match for the Hulk's might and he knocks them unconscious with a thunderclap.

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The Army fires on Jade Jaws, but he catches the cannon shell and hurls it away. The Hulk arrives at the Avengers Mansion where he finds his former teammates waiting for him. Hulk seizes Rick Jones, whom he thinks has betrayed him and flees, with the Avengers in hot pursuit. The Fantastic Four arrives on the scene as well, but the two superhero teams get in each others way, allowing the Hulk to escape.

All the heroes besiege the Hulk atop a large construction site. But the Green Giant manages to hold them off. Wasp leads an army of ants to irritate the Hulk, enabling Rick to toss a Gamma-ray treated capsule in the Hulk's mouth. The Hulk throws himself into the Hudson River, where the capsule triggers his transformation into Bruce Banner. Captain America takes Rick under his wing, and the FF and the Avengers become friends.
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Characters
Good (or All)
CAP  
Captain America
(Steve Rogers)
GIANTMANHP  
Giant-Man
(Henry Pym)
TORCH2  
Human Torch
(Johnny Storm)
INVISIBLEWOMAN  
Invisible Girl
(Sue Storm)
IRONMAN  
Iron Man
(Tony Stark)
MRFANTASTIC  
Mister Fantastic
(Reed Richards)
RICKJONES  
Rick Jones
(Richard Milhouse Jones)
THING  
Thing
(Ben Grimm)
THOR  
Thor
(Odinson)
WASP  
Wasp
(Janet Van Dyne)

Antagonists
HULK  
Hulk
(Bruce Banner)

> Fantastic Four (1961 series) comic book info and issue index



This comic is in the following collection:
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COLLECTING: INCREDIBLE HULK (1962) #1-6, FANTASTIC FOUR (1961) #12 and #25-26, AVENGERS (1963) #1-3 and #5, AMAZING SPIDER-MAN (1963) #14 and material from TALES TO ASTONISH (1959) #59 and JOURNEY INTO MYSTERY (1952) #112.

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Main/1st Story Full Credits

Jack Kirby
George Roussos
?
Jack Kirby (Cover Penciler)
Sol Brodsky (Cover Inker)
Stan Goldberg (Cover Colorist)
Additional Credits
Letterer: Art Simek.
Editor: Stan Lee. Editor-in-chief: Stan Lee.



Review / Commentaries


reviewer
Fantastic Four (1961 series) #26 Review by (August 10, 2011)
This completes the 2-part sidebar to the Avengers mission to control the Hulk in issues 1-5 of their own comic. Hulk's anger this issue is aimed mainly at Captain America and Rick Jones, because he thinks Cap has stolen his sidekick. And he's not wrong. The Avengers will temporarily conclude their involvement with Hulk in Avengers #5.

Later additional comments by RobFJ:-

The previous week saw Daredevil #1 with the origin of blind lawyer Matt Murdock (a superhero with enhanced other senses) and his basic support cast Foggy Nelson & Karen Page. At this stage he's clad in a mixture of red and yellow. He won't switch to his classic all-red costume until #7. This title and X-Men aren't as well received as others, and there'll be no other new superhero title for some years. But this issue is also a sign of change for another reason. The pencilling for the other main superhero strips had been split between Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko (with some of the lesser strips handled by Marvel stalwarts like Dick Ayers and Don Heck). But this issue was pencilled by Bill Everett, the 40's/50's artist mainly famous for creating and sticking with Sub-Mariner. And subsequent issues will bring in other artists.
Besides that Journey Into Mystery #103 intro'd Enchantress & Executioner. Tales To Astonish #55's return of Human Top left room for only a 1-page text reprint which is how it will continue with 18p for Giant-Man & Wasp and 5p for Wasp alone until the text story is dropped in #58.
This week also sees teenage Iceman of the X-Men guesting with Human Torch in Strange Tales #120, and its remaining 2p text item dropped to 1p while somehow managing to increase *both* HT and Dr Strange strips by 1p each. This will be the status quo until a letters page replaces the text page in #126. Tales Of Suspense #53 includes the Origin Of The Watchers in the Tales Of The Watcher slot (from now on all the TOW tales will be *about* the Watcher(s) nor just told by him). But TOS and JIM still include extra 'monster' stories. However TOS now follows JIM's lead by having Iron Man's name more prominent on the cover than the mag's title. Ant-Man and Human Torch will never achieve that status, which is reflected in the result that they'll never have long-running titles as IM and Thor do.





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