Lest Auld Acquaintances Be Forgot: Namor the Avenging Son (#1 in a series)

[alschroeder3]

The oldest character from Timeley/Marvel that doesn't have a "legacy" replacement, like Jim Hammond/Johnny Storm as the Human Torch is---or was--Namor, the Sub-Mariner.

Aquaman was a direct imitation of Namor, and became much more like him as time progressed. (The early Aquaman was the son of an explorer of Atlantean ruins whose secrets made the young Aquaman--Aquaman. It was only in the late fifties that Aquaman was made the son of a lighthouse keeper and a water-breathing woman, only in the early sixties that he became king of an undersea city.)

Namor was in many ways the prototypical Timeley/Marvel character. Unlike DC's heroes, he was not loved by the public at large, but feared (with reason) and often accused of crimes he didn't commit--and others that he did. (Like X-Men or Spider-Man.) Like Wolverine, he would kill when necessary, and was the first antihero in comics. Like the X-Men, his birth, his genetics, made him different--a hybrid of two different branches of hominids, homo sapiens and homo mermanus. The first comics crossover was not a super-team of like-minded individuals a la the Justice Society, but a fight between two heroes/protagonists--Sub-Mariner and the original Human Torch...foreshadowing many similar superhero first encounters at Marvel, and duos who couldn't stand each other, like Spider-Man and Johnny Storm, Hulk and Thor, etc.

If he had to die, he deserved better than to be beheaded by a Superman rip-off like Hyperion in SQUADRON SUPREME#1.

I'm going to look at some aspects of Namor's impact on Timeley/Marvel. The Kirby stuff is pretty well known. Let's look instead at Daredevil #7, by Stan Lee and the masterful Wally Wood...and see why this character was such a great foil to other heroes.

Krang had been introduced in the first Fantastic Four Annual, when Namor's people invaded the surface world.

Dorma, on the other hand, was in the first Sub-Mariner story by Bill Everett, Subby's creator, introduced as his "cousin". Hopefully, not close cousin, considering she was in love with him, and they later married.

Like the Hulk, like the Silver Surfer, people panic when he shows up. With reason. He invaded the surface world a little over a year ago.

Subby had a "stranger in a strange land" vibe, in that he hadn't been raised on the surface world (one significant diference between Aquaman and himself), which gave him something in common with the Silver Surfer and other Marvel outsiders. Like Thor, only moreso, he personified regalness the way Lee wrote him--and Wood, even more than Kirby, caught that perfectly.

(BTW, for a fledgling lawyer duo, Nelson and Murdock got randomly selected by the oddest clients. The Fantastic Four were already their clients, and they almost defended the Purple Man at this juncture.)

After Nelson and Murdock tell a disbelieving Namor that you can't "sue" the entire human race for depriving his people of their birthright, Namor bursts out of their office.

Karen Page says to Matt, "If you could have SEEN him! So arrogant,, so merciless, and so supremely confident of his POWER!"

Matt thinks to himself, "Strange!I sensed a man of great honor--of intense pride and innate nobility! I wonder--which is the REAL Sub-Mariner?"

Namor goes on a rampage, hoping to be captured, so he can go to court and address the laws of the surface world. Daredevil for the FIRST time, dons his all-red costume. (In the course of the fight, it's the first time he used the cable in his cane/billy club to swing from bulding to building, too.)

Daredevil attacks Namor, but Namor drags him to the waters off a pier.

It doesn't go well. The military can't drop any explosives without hitting Daredevil too.

Though Namor certainly could be a killer---he killed in his first story, and in the course of his Golden Age career killed many New Yorkers (in a tidal wave) and I don't want to think about how many Japanese or Germans he killed--he respected courage.

He then surfaces, surrendering, puzzling the military, who knows he cold have easily swum to safety. But the whole idea is to present himself to the legal system, so he could have his lawyers--Nelson and Murdock--do a counter-suit on behalf to his people.

Classic Namor.

Dorma shows up in the middle of Namor's trial, and tells Namor that Krang has started a rebellion in Namor's absence. He gets up to return to his people, but the baliffs and police try to restrain him.

Fat chance.

Matt tries to get Namor to stay--to get his chance to be heard in court. Namor says he will stick around 24 hours. But the judge postponed the trial till next week, so he could study how best to try the monarch of an entire people.

So Namor busts out.

Daredevil and he tussle while Daredevil tries to keep him from destroying the military waiting to stop Namor--mostly with Daredevil getting out of his way.

Didn't work.

Then Daredevil lands atop a wrecking ball on a crane and hits Subby with it--and THAT doesn't work. Namor thinks he's taken care of Daredevil, but Daredevil gets up and grabs the electric cord of the lampost that Namor uprooted and hit him with. (!)

Again, doesn't work. But...

From this, Sub-Mariner swims to his own series in TALES TO ASTONISH, replacing the Giant-Man and the Wasp feature which was the least successful of the heroes who formed the Avengers.

Classic story of how Sub-Mariner was reimagined by Lee (Everett's Sub-Mariner was not nearly as regal) and how he reacted with other heroes in the early Silver/Marvel Age.

More to come...by Lee, by Morrison, by Claremont and others.

Comments

[skjam]

This and the subsequent solo series were reprinted in the first volume of "Essential Sub-Mariner" which I reviewed here: http://www.skjam.com/2015/02/04/comic-book-review-essential-sub-mariner-vol-1/

[aperturedreams]

Well, Squadron Supreme wasn't great, but let's not pretend Namor won't be back within a year as these things so often go.

[dcbanacek]

Yeah, Namor got a little angry and lost his head, no big.

[alschroeder3]

That's a cutting remark.

[silverhammerman]

Thanks for sharing these, I doubt I'd have seen them otherwise. I think this may actually be my first look at Wally Wood's take on Daredevil, and I can certainly understand what all the fuss is about now.

I wonder if Namor's recent death wasn't a bit of an inevitability, given his unique role in the Illuminati: as the only member without some form or ongoing, excepting maybe Reed Richards, since we don't know what his deal is right now, and as such the only one could really face retribution for some of the shady stuff from Hickman's New Avengers. In any case I expect him back fairly soon, and I wouldn't be entirely surprised if he came back within the pages of Squadron Supreme.