Ferret Press/PANEL Weblog

Stan suggested to Jack for the plot, “the F.F. fight God,” and Jack sent back pages of omens and signs presaging the arrival of a prophet, all the trappings of a classic myth set in modern day New York City. Here’s what our heroes witness upon their return home from their adventure in the Hidden Land: the skies turned to fire as the people panic in the streets. Soon the fire turns to a sea of stone hiding the sky, and we later learn this is the work of the Watcher, who is trying to conceal the planet from the figure approaching from deepest space on the back of a silver surfboard.

The Watcher’s efforts fail, however, and the stranger from the stars (who looks strangely like a hood ornament and whose ridiculous form of transportation Jack actually manages to sell to us, he’s that good) sends a signal back to the stars he traveled from. Too late, the Thing clobbers him from his perch atop the Baxter Building, sending him flying over the rooftops of the city. The damage has been done, however, as a wonderful Kirby spaceship collage presages the arrival of the big G.

The cool thing about Galactus is, he’s not a villain. He needs to eat to survive, he’s just a being of such a higher order than we mere humans that he doesn’t view us as being worth consideration. Most humans don’t get worked up over the morality of a chicken sandwich (besides vegetarians, obviously), and we’re closer to chickens than Galactus is to human. Rather than a villain, I view Galactus as an analogy to our own strip-mining, oil-guzzling, toxic waste-dumping selves, stripping away all the resources of a planet without any consideration for the cost. Stan and Jack’s depiction in issue 49, as related by the Watcher, seems to back that up:

So, the FF are facing their most desperate battle with the fate of the entire world on the line… and losing. Galactus is just way out of their league, and all their powers add up to a goose egg for the chances of Earth’s survival. Salvation instead is going to come in the form of a blind sculptress named Alicia Masters who takes in the Silver Surfer, still dazed from the Thing’s attack. His encounter with her and the conversation they share awakens all the sentimental old humanoid feelings the Surfer harbors somewhere inside that shell, and he decides he can’t let a planet full of people like her get reduced to dust.

The Watcher, meanwhile, has sent the Human Torch on an errand. Flying through a Clarke/Kubrick-style space warp, Johnny Storm arrives at the home of Galactus, a Mobius-strip space station chock full of scientific wonders beyond human ken. Somewhere on this vessel is an artifact which might help the humans in their fight against Galactus. But the Torch isn’t going to find it and return in time…

…unless Galactus’ former loyal servant turns on his master and buys some time. He ultimately fares just as poorly as everyone else-- he’s fighting with power given to him by Galactus to begin with-- but manages to hold the line long enough for the Human Torch to materialize and hand over to Reed Richards a doomsday device called the Ultimate Nullifier.

The nullifier is a weapon capable of wiping out everything in existence, Big G included. Mister Fantastic threatens to eradicate the cosmos if Earth isn’t spared, and Galactus falls for the bluff, packing up his world crushing machines and leaving-- but not before dealing out some heavy handed punishment to his former herald, stripping him of much of his power and imprisoning him on Earth.

I really envy those readers who encountered these stories and their contemporaries when they were newly minted. Imagine picking these issues from the spinner rack in a mom and pop store and encountering these characters and concepts for the first time; those silver age books were buzzing with wonder and discovery. How long has it been since we were given a new Galactus, or Inhumans, or Savage Land, or Negative Zone? I find a lot of faults with modern comics, but really, I'd shut up if they weren't simply boring.