"Miss Storm, a pretty young lady can always be of help- just by keeping the men's morale up."
Anyway... ladies and gentlemen, with this crossover, between what are, as of the beginning of 1963, Marvel's biggest properties, we can sort of say that this is a shared universe. A caveat, though: the existence of crossovers, nothing new in comics in 1963, do not a fully formed shared continuity make. Yet. But it'll be fun to see that emerge, develop and evolve.
Anyway, we start with some fun little moments. Ben and Alicia have been to see a performance of Beethoven's Fifth, although Ben prefers New Orleans jazz. And, when Thunderbolt Ross hires the FF to get the Hulk, blamed for a naughty bit of sabotage, Reed comments, after seeing some footage, that the Hulk seems to exist, implying that this had been in doubt. Er... pot, kettle, Reed?
Johnny, teenage auto whiz that he is, has redesigned the Fantasti-car, by fan demand(!) with a very impressed General Rossas its first passenger. And the FF meeting Bruce Banner and Rick Jones is a big moment.
Of course, the Hulk is innocent, the true culprit is- you guessed it- a communist spy, caught by the Torch after, er, leaving a membership card in his wallet. If only today’s Russian spies were this rubbish.
The fight between Hulk and the FF (and especially the Thing!) is both enormous fun and no longer than it needs to be. All is satisfactorily resolved- and it’s left nicely ambiguous whether Reed suspects Bruce of being the Hulk.
Excellent stuff, and a real watershed.
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