WITH THE ARRIVAL of The Incredible Hulk as Giant-Man's Tales to Astonish co-star in issue 60 (Oct 1964), the character now faced more of a struggle to stand out. The battle issue of Astonish 59 had been great fun but had been let down by the unsuitable artwork from Dick Ayers. I had always liked Ayers inking on the classic Kirby-drawn monster tales from the earlier issues of Astonish and its stable-mates Tales of Suspense , Strange Tales and Journey into Mystery . In fact many of the classic stories from those books had been inked by Ayers, like Fin Fang Foom ( Strange Tales 89 , Oct 1961), Spragg ( Journey into Mystery 68 , May 1961) and of course Groot ( Tales to Astonish 13 , Nov 1960). Dick Ayers was the inker of choice for all those near-legendary Jack Kirby monster tales in the old pre-hero Marvel comics, but the Kirby magic failed to rub off on Ayers when he pencilled superhero series like Giant-Man. DICK AYERS (1924 - 2014) Richard Bache Ayers was born in Ossining, New...
AS THE DAYS of Marty Goodman's Atlas Comics drew to a close in the late 1950s, the publisher was casting around for the Next Big Thing. Locked in to a draconian distribution contract with arch rivals DC Comics, Goodman was limited to a tight eight titles per month and if he needed to launch a new title, he was forced to cancel an existing one. So, feeling that mystery and science fiction was the coming trend Goodman decided to launch three new comics to complement the existing Journey into Mystery, World of Fantasy and Strange Tales titles. The new books were Strange Worlds , beginning in December 1958 and replacing the cancelled Navy Combat , and Tales of Suspense and Tales to Astonish , both debuting in January 1959, replacing the cancelled Homer the Happy Ghost and Miss America . Journey into Mystery and Strange Tales had been around since the twilight of the Golden Age and changed in content according to Martin Goodman's take on his customers' tastes. So they bega...