A magnificent battle between the X-Men vs. the Imperial Guards but an amazing rescue by the Starjammers.
TITLE: Fantastic Four – Special King Sized Annual #3
YEAR: October 1965
COMPANY: Marvel Comics
WRITER: Chris Claremont
PENCILER: Jack Kirby
INKER: Vince Colletta
LETTERER: Artie Simek
COLORIST: Stan Goldberg
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF: Stan Lee
The third annual for the “Fantastic Four” was no doubt a special issue and for collectors one of the more pricier issues to own.
The primary reason is that it featured the wedding of Reed Richards and Susan Storm’s wedding and of course, and it became one of the major events in the mid-60s for comic book fans as it was a major wedding event.
The main storyline is that Dr. Doom wants to ruin the wedding, so what best that to use a special device to make every super-villain attack the ceremony.
Fortunately, Reed and Sue and the Fantastic Four have friends in high places and has Nick Fury and S.H.I.E.L.D. as security for the wedding, Professor X and the X-Men are guests, as with Dr. Strange, Daredevil, The Avengers and Spider-Man.
But it’s interesting to see how Dr. Doom has control of the Mandarin, Black Knight, Kang the Conqueror, the Awesome Android and Grey Gargoyle, the Cobra, the Executioner, the Enchantress, Mr. Hyde, the Mad Thinker, Electro, the Unicorn, the Melter, Beetle, Moleman and his Moloids, Red Ghost and his Super-Apes and so many more!
What an issue to feature so many characters but at the same time, making you wonder that if Dr. Doom has ways of controlling people, why hasn’t he used this technology on other villains or heroes since then? Hmm….
But what makes this issue a King-Sized Annual is the addition of reprinted stories from “Fantastic Four” issue #6 and issue #11.
Back then, Marvel used annuals as ways to do reprints and bring in new comic book readers to a title. And while I’m happy that they went away from that, for collectors of old issues, it’s kind of a blessing because despite having nearly every issue of “Fantastic Four” from the ’60s through the ’90s, I am missing a lot of the issues before issue #23 and the more higher priced issues with the first appearance of the Watcher, Black Panther and Silver Surfer.
So, I kind of liked the fact that I can read these two reprints in this 1965 annual!
But more than anything, to own a copy of Reed Richards and Sue Storm’s wedding!