5BC: The Five Best Comic Books of 1971

By 1971, Stan Lee’s career scripting comic books was winding down. While he’d remain in place as Marvel’s Publisher for the remainder of the decade, he ceased scripting pretty much everything he had been working on, except for an occasional and far-between assignment. AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #96 is the first part of the last truly great multi-part story that Stan dialogued for the magazine, and one that made headlines due to its content. Requested by the Department of Health, Education and Welfare to do a story that exposed the dangers of drug use to the book’s young readers, Lee complied–only to run afoul of the Comics Code, which prohibited any mention of drug use. Undaunted, Lee and publisher Martin Goodman decided to print the book anyway, without the Comics Code approval stamp. This led to the restrictive Code being revised and updated for the era, making such stories permissible under its strictures. It’s also a crackling Spider-Man adventure in which, under the pencil of artist Gil Kane, who brought a fluidity of motion back to the wall-crawler not seen since his co-creator Steve Ditko left the strip, the web-slinger was once again confronted by his most dangerous enemy, the Green Goblin.

It was just another issue of one of DC’s regular mystery/suspense anthology titles, but HOUSE OF SECRETS #92 would have an oversized impact on the future of comic books. Behind an absolutely stunning cover by artist Bernie Wrightson (for which future Marvel editor Louise Simonson posed as reference) the world was introduced to a muck-encrusted mockery of a man in a stand-alone story also evocatively illustrated by Wrightson and written by Len Wein. Intended only as a one-off, Wein and Wrightson were convinced to return to the idea a short year later by editor Joe Orlando–the issue had sold surprisingly well, and Orlando hoped to find a way to make a series out of it. And so, SWAMP THING became a new title in the DC line and Wein and Wrightson began a collaboration that would remain a high water mark in both creators’ careers.

The rejuvenation of BATMAN as a character was in full swing when issue #232 carried those strides forward. Working to cast off the image of the camp-driven television series of only a few years before, writer Denny O’Neil and artist Neal Adams brought the Darknight Detective back to his roots as a creature of the night. Here, Robin returns to the series for the first time in several months — he had been sent off to college, allowing Batman to operate on his own. But he’s a pawn in a deadly game between the Caped Crusader and his newest adversary, Ra’s Al Ghul, the Demon’s Head, master of the League of Assassins and a criminal on a scale that Batman had rarely encountered. It’s a globe-trotting adventure in the mold of a James Bond film, and Ra’s is definitely cast in a Bond villain mold. Batman is at once thoroughly capable in this story while also being totally overmatched by his opponent.

Having set the table across the first few issues of his Fourth World lynchpin series NEW GODS, creator Jack Kirby hit the gas in a big way, producing a string of masterpieces that stand with the best that the era had to offer. In issue #6, he presented “The Glory Boat”, a contemporary tale that centered around a family caught up in the epic conflict between grim Orion of the New Gods and his Apokoliptian enemies, the Deep Six. The son is a conscientious objector to the war going on in Vietnam, a position that earns him scorn from his veteran father. But when the chips are down, teh sone proves his worth, while his sire is petrified and unable to take action. But the story isn’t quite as simple as that, as Kirby allows each character to contain their own reality, and showcases the long-term effect that warfare can have on those who fight it.

An issue later, Kirby did it again in NEW GODS #7, with a story that is widely considered the pinnacle of his career; “The Pact”. In it, Kirby revealed the backstory of the ongoing conflict between New Genesis and Apokolips and the origins of both Darkseid, his main villain, and Highfather. It’s an epic tale told in only 24 pages, one that evokes myth and legend and history and folklore and combines them all into something elemental. It’s a departure in that it’s entirely set in the distant past, and the central character of the series, Orion, only appears in the final few panels of the story. But it’s essential reading for understanding what Kirby was building here, and its imagery is memorable and haunting.