Essential Man-Thing 1

by Roger Ash

Today I’d like to talk to you about Marvel’s Man-Thing. Go ahead. Make a joke. I’ll wait. Ready to move on? No? OK, one more joke….

When I heard that Jeff Parker was making Man-Thing a member of Thunderbolts, I was intrigued. He’s not the kind the of character who would seem to work well as part of a team. But so far, I’ve liked how Parker has utilized him. Want to know more about the newest Thunderbolt? I highly recommend checking out his early adventures which are collected in Essential Man-Thing Volumes 1 & 2.

Man-Thing first appeared in Savage Tales #1 in a story written by Roy Thomas and Gerry Conway (Marvel legend Stan Lee is also one of the co-creators of Man-Thing) with art by Gray Morrow. Scientist Ted Sallis is working in the Florida Everglades as part of a team attempting to re-create the Super Soldier Serum which created Captain America. Betrayed by his employers, Sallis destroys his research, taking the only vial of serum with him. An accident causes the serum, combined with the mystical energies of the swamp, to turn Sallis into the Man-Thing, a mindless, shambling beast.

What makes Man-Thing unique (at least as far as I’m aware) among comic characters is that instead of acting, he reacts. He doesn’t seek out evil doers and costumed villains. Honestly, he doesn’t have the brain capacity to do so. However, he reacts to emotions and most violently to bad emotions. So when his path crosses with those who are bad, whose emotions betray them as evil, he reacts. And no emotion affects him quite as much as fear, for as all Man-Thing fans know, “whatever knows fear, burns at the Man-Thing’s touch.”

The fact that Man-Thing’s a reactive character would make him an odd choice for a character to receive his own title, yet he did, first in Adventure Into Fear and then in his own title. And I think that had a lot to do with the writing of Steve Gerber. While he didn’t create the character, Gerber’s stories really defined the character. He solved the problem of Man-Thing not being an active character by surrounding him with lots of things to react to, both mundane and fantastic. He could face corrupt developer F. A. Schist, or zip off on cosmic adventures with Dakimh the Enchanter; his apprentice, Jennifer Kale; and Korrek the Barbarian. And things got really wonky when the mundane and fantastic overlapped.

I do not want to give short shrift to the artists who worked on the stories with Gerber. They all brought something to the character. Val Mayerik drew some fantastic stories, including the classic Fear #19 which introduced the world to Howard the Duck. Mike Ploog didn’t draw many issues of Man-Thing, but the ones did are classics, including a domestic drama played out with the swamp as a stage. Jim Mooney and John Buscema also provided art for the series, and Frank Brunner drew some killer covers.

Essential Man-Thing 2

Other highlights of Gerber’s run on the book include the Wundarr story in Fear, which angered DC due to Wundarr’s similarity to Superman. A Man-Thing story that is the favorite of many, myself included, comes from Giant-Size Man-Thing #4 which features an overweight high school student who is hounded my his classmates and gym teacher. Ed Hannigan’s art for the issue is simply gorgeous. Gerber himself appeared as a character in the final issue of the series.

But that was not the end of Man-Thing as he continued to appear throughout the Marvel Universe. He notably returned in a short-lived series in the 1980s, most of which was written by Chris Claremont with art by Don Perlin and Bob Wiacek.

The nature of Man-Thing makes him an unlikely lead character, so it’s not surprising that he’s usually confined to mini-series or supporting roles. But that doesn’t mean he isn’t a fascinating character. After you read the stories contained in these volumes, you’ll see how fascinating, exciting, and relevant a mindless, shambling swamp beast can be.

Now, go read a comic!