The cover to this next issue of SHAZAM, which I borrowed along with the rest of the compete run of the title from my grade school friend Donald Sims, presaged changes that were coming to the series. For the first time, the cover image isn’t the work of the character’s co-creator C. C. Beck but rather the appealing work of Bob Oksner. As we’ve spoken about before, Beck was having increasingly contentious disagreements with DC editor Julie Schwartz about the quality of the stories he was being asked to illustrate, and with the book not being a runaway best-seller, the point was approaching where the two would part company. After all, why put up with such a situation when there were other creators who would be equally adept at drawing the adventures of the World’s Mightiest Mortal? Oksner had done a boatload of humor comics over the years, and he hits this cover illustration with skills well sharpened by that experience.
The opening story in this issue is one that Beck refused to illustrate, sending it back to Schwartz with a note saying that he thought it was stupid. And it’s difficult to argue with him on this point. As we’ve talked about earlier, it was apparently difficult for Schwartz and his writers, Elliot S! Maggin in this instance, to give gravitas to the assignment and take it seriously as a work of craft, even though it was targeting a younger audience. There’s a subdued feeling of disdain that runs through all of these early SHAZAM issue, like the creators involved feel like they should be working on something more substantiative and think less of the readers for being interested in this pablum. A self-fulfilling prophesy, ultimately, but one that appears to have been in effect. They didn’t entirely get the appeal of the golden age Captain Marvel stories.
The story concerns Captain Marvel coming to the aid of a group of alien vegetables from the planet Salada whose spaceship has broken down, stranding them on Earth. They need to earn money to pay for replacement parts, but everybody they approach in this strange world runs in terror, thinking them the vanguard of an alien invasion. Captain Marvel himself doesn’t happen to have the $200,000 the equipment will cost, but he helps the plant people to earn it by co-starring with them in a monster movie. Beck wasn’t wrong, this entire story is exceedingly dumb and juvenile, and Vince Colletta’s haphazard inks don’t do Oksner any favors here.
Things look up, though, in the second story in this issue. By this point, SHAZAM had dispensed with the reprint material (which had reliably been the best stuff in each issue) in favor of going all-new with stories of other players within the Marvel Family pantheon. This issue stars the Captain’s sister Mary Marvel in her first solo outing in this new era. It was written by E. Nelson Bridwell, who had been a huge fan of the Fawcett Captain Marvel and so understood the boundaries of the assignment better. Also, artist Bob Oksner got to ink his own work here, which presented him at his best, and he gave Mary a cute 1970s makeover that made her very appealing. Oksner was known for drawing pretty girls.
The tale is only six pages long, though, and relatively straightforward: while serving as the Grand Marshall of the Thanksgiving Day parade, Mary captures a trio of bank robbers who at one point attempt to escape by untethering the colossal Mary Marvel parade balloon and using it to fly to safety. It isn’t much, but it’s attractively drawn and it takes the situations seriously, at least at the harmeless level that they’re being pitched at.
Nelson also wrote the final story in this issue, which was illustrated by C.C. Beck. I can’t help but feel that this was a combination that might have solved everybody’s problems, Beck’s in particular, has the pair been allowed to steadily collaborate on the series. But while Nelson would increasingly be prevailed upon more and more for Captain Marvel stories, Beck was just about at the end of his tether and ready to walk, so it never came to pass. This was, in fact, Beck’s final story illustrating the character that’s he’d helped to come up with and illustrated throughout his storied history. Not a bad way to go out, but not a moment of high triumph either.
The story brings back Aunt Minerva, one of the Big Red Cheese’s foes from the past. She’s an old lady criminal whose had five husbands, each of whom suffered an unfortunate fatality, and she’s interested in making Captain Marvel her sixth. Here, she hired Osky the Ox and Pretty-Puss Pete to eliminate the World’s Mightiest Mortal–the one who does so will get a valuable reward. (I can’t help but wonder if Osky and Pete were a reference to Bob Oksner and Pete Costanza, both of whom would work on the series.) But there’s very little they can do to the impervious Captain Marvel, and when they discover that the prize for their efforts was going to be Minerva’s hand in marriage, the criminal duo is only too happy that Marvel captured them and spoiled their plans.
The Tom Brevoort Experience 
Invasion of the Salad Men, shades of the Hulk’s Hostess Ad: The Incredible Hulk and the Green Thumb. Villain cousin Betsy, the Plant Lady and her strange plants.
LikeLike
Aunt Minerva was a fun character.
LikeLike
Scott Edelman and Al Milgrom, in their run on Marvel’s CAPTAIN MARVEL, introduced an antagonist named Doctor Minerva, who, much later, showed up in the movies.
I’ve often wondered if that was a deliberate reference.
LikeLike
I asked Scott, and he said there was no connection between the two.
LikeLike
I guess that settles that. It’s a hell of a coincidence, though…especially considering that both Minervas were trying to “mate” with their respective Captains.
Next thing you know, you’ll tell me that Gerry Conway’s “Dr. Savannah” (CM #22) or Marv Wolfman’s “Dr. Mynde” (CM #24) weren’t deliberate references either…
LikeLiked by 1 person
Tom I totally believe Scott told you that, but I also do not believe what he told you.
LikeLike
The Kree Extrakreelarial Intelligence Agency has gotten to him.
LikeLike
Well, I like these stories better than Tom does, but one thing we can agree on is that Oksner is dynamite — his Mary Marvel, wholesome and sexy at the same time, is absolutely charming.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I don’t disagree with your general assessment of the off-key tone of the stories,but as someone who worked with him, I know editor Julie liked to be quite involved in the plotting process and quick with a blue pencil, so I can’t lay all the blame at the feet of Elliot and Denny.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Ahh, Bob Oksner.
I really liked the Judy-Garland-looking Mary Marvel, but I have to admit, Oksner’s update is adorable, and his storytelling is, as usual, impeccable.
As to Beck, it’d have been nice to see what the book would have been like if it had stories he’d have enjoyed drawing, but if he was going to be this unhappy, it was best for him to go. A shame, but DC wasn’t going to reassign the book to a different editor, even if they should have.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I think I remember Schwartz saying in the letter column, in this issue or the next, that Beck was working on writing and drawing a story. Not sure, if the plan changed, the relationship deteriorated beyond that or anything submitted was seen as unusable.
Too bad this ended that way, as Beck had been enthusiastic at first by a few accounts,
LikeLike
Make up your mind, dummy. First you wrote: “it was apparently difficult for Schwartz and his writers, Elliot S! Maggin in this instance, to give gravitas to the assignment and take it seriously as a work of craft, even though it was targeting a younger audience” and further state that the story was “exceedingly dumb and juvenile” then trash Vince Colletta for doing cartoonish inks? Your Colletta-hate has surpassed any of the Kirby people (those who continue to trash him at every turn, anyway) so how about some balanced reporting? Either that or give it up altogether.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I see Colletta hate in various Comic communities and on forums. Its wrong and often misdirected. Sadly if has become ingrained.
Joe Giella once told me when I asked about Vince. “He was able the provide passable results to meet tight deadlines that many other inker’s could not, and Vince needed to put food on the table” Joe included himself as one of the inkers who could not do what was often required from Vince.
I forget exactly how Joe put it several decades ago to me but to paraphrase; It was a business creating a product first and foremost, “Artistic Beauty” was simply a bonus when they got it.
LikeLike
Readers aren’t required to like something just because it met the deadline. They don’t get charged less for rushed work. So if they don’t like the results, they get to say so — even if it was hacked out for schedule reasons.
This is also aside from the issue that Colletta hacked out work fast that didn’t need it — Kirby was not late on his deadlines, for example. Colletta just wanted to make more money, so he took on large amounts of work and then rushed through it to get it all done — not necessarily because the work came in late but because he’d taken on so many assignments.
And while there’s nothing wrong with wanting more money, if it’s done at the cost of making the work look crappy, readers get to say they think it’s crappy. They don’t get a cut of the extra earnings, after all.
And Colletta wasn’t having any trouble putting food on the table.
This story may well have been assigned to Colletta because the deadline was tight, after Beck had refused the script. But that doesn’t mean readers can’t judge the results; if the editors chose to go with bad inking because it was fast, it’s still bad. And even if they didn’t need it in a hurry Colletta would still have inked it in a hurry; that was just how he worked by then, putting as much food on his table as possible, however disappointing the work might be.
LikeLiked by 1 person
And that even Giella called Colletta’s inks “passable” indicated the he knew it was mediocre work.
It’s not somehow wrong to say the work is mediocre if the people commissioning it were happy with mediocre work and thought “artistic beauty” was a bonus. That just explains why it’s mediocre; it doesn’t make it good.
LikeLike
Agreed it was NOT a glowing endorsement but merely food for thought. Joe was great like that. I had the pleasure of knowing him personally, in the 1990s. Wish I had stayed in contact this century. I miss the guy very much.
You are correct people should like what art they like and not like what they don’t.
LikeLike
“Balance” is not required in an opinion piece. If Tom doesn’t like Colletta’s inking (a view shared by a lot of folks), he’s allowed to say so.
LikeLiked by 1 person
He didn’t say Colletta’s inks were cartoony. He said they were haphazard.
There’s nothing wrong with cartoony. Beck, Oksner, Costanza, Schaffenberger, all of them were accomplished cartoonists, and “cartoony” would be a fine way to handle these stories. But just because something is aimed at younger readers doesn’t mean it’s okay to make it sloppy or hack it out in an ill-considered manner, art or story. And it feels like it’s more of an insult to the material when it’s done to an excellent penciler like Oksner.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Funny coincidence — I was wondering just today whether anybody had ever referenced the “Achilles Heel” in reference to Captain Marvel, and then I run across this as I’m catching up with my Bluesky.
Fun fact: in the Iliad, Achilles says in so many words that he can’t fight without armor. He doesn’t have any kind of magic invulnerability in the epic, nor a weakness in his heel.
(And what the heck is “courage of Achilles” if not the invulnerability? Who’s gifting Cap with the invulnerability if not him?)
LikeLike
I would have thought “Stamina of Atlas” as a better attribute fit for the invulnerability. But DC itself says that’s just not getting tired. Also they have a retcon that these are gods who go by these names because of the legends, not the legendary beings themselves. I suppose that makes some sense.
https://www.dc.com/blog/2021/10/07/shazam-whats-in-a-name
LikeLike
Hmm, “courage of Achilles” might work as fighting skills or warrior prowess, if one doesn’t overload that on “wisdom of Solomon”. It’s not perfect, but you could say it’s not just the mental feeling, but the ability itself to have the confidence of taking on anyone in a fight.
Superman (at least pre-Crisis) was show to seriously train to be a top-level fighter even without his powers, since he had to deal with opponents who could be as powerful as him. That’s not a level a scrappy kid could meet just wearing magic-powered armor, unless the magic has the fighting skill included too.
LikeLike