Tales To Astonish 39

The Vengeance of the Scarlet Beetle!

by

Stan Lee, Larry Lieber & Jack Kirby

Henry "Ant-Man" Pym has been recieving strange signals from his friends, the ants. Based on the erratic patterns, he suspects something dangerous going on in the local insect kingdom. Releasing a vial of his shrinking gas, Pym becomes minute and launches himself out of his lab to investigate. Landing on a pile of waiting ants, Ant-Man mounts one of the insects and heads towards a storm drain.

Deep underground, Ant-Man spies an insect revolt. A large, red, glowing beetle is inciting a mob of insects of every type to attack mankind. As it goes on to explain, the Scarlet Beetle has grown intellegent due to atomic experiments. Overhearing all of this through his helmet, Ant-Man can't help but feel panicked. He starts fighting through the insects to reach the unruley beetle, but is held back by more of the creatures. The bugs trip him, knocking his communication helmet off. Before they carry Ant-Man away, the red beetle steals his growth serum. The enemy beetle uses Ant-Man's growth serum to become as big as a small person.

As Ant-Man struggles to get free of the hole the insects have imprisoned him in, the Scarlet Beetle's minions prepare to take over the world. Termites destroy telephone lines, assorted bugs steal dynamite from the army, spiders poison public officials and the big, red beetle itself leads an army of bees to take over television & radio stations.

Meanwhile, Ant-Man's pleas for help have been heard. His discarded helmet is close enough to his hole prison, that the ants have picked up on his distress. Ant-Man mounts one of the rescuer ants and they all head to the surface. Quickly spotting the Scarlet Beetle in a nearby park, Ant-Man commands the ants to take him up a drinking fountain. With a popsicle stick in hand, he gets the beetle's minions attention. They all rush to attack, but Ant-Man has a strategy in place. He has sent the honey producing ants to the front lines in order to slow the enemy bugs down. As the grasshoppers spring up to attack him, Ant-Man uses the popsicle stick to blast the fountain water in their way.

In a nearby store, more ants carry out Ant-Man's plan. They carry out a cannister of DDT pesticide and bring it out to the battlefield. Ant-Man blasts the chemicals at the enemies, forcing them to leave. Suddenly the Scarlet Beetle springs into action. Ant-Man leads the giant bug on a chase through the streets. Inside a toy store, Ant-Man avoids the insect's attacks until he reaches a toy jeep. He drives the jeep over to a mounted toy knight and grabs its jousting sword. He hurls the sword into the cannister of reducing gas that is strapped to the red beetle's chest. The puncture releases the gas, shrinking the insect back to a normal bug size.

As the red beetle shrinks, Ant-Man spots a balloon. He uses it to drift to the floor and then imprisons the red menace inside. With the beetle defeated, Ant-Man commands the ants to take it back to his lab for further analysis. Back at the lab, Ant-Man puts on his Henry Pym pants and cures the bug of all radioactive effects. While Henry Pym returns the now harmless insect back to the ground, the police question Ant-Man's bravery as he was not around when the insects attacked.

Notes:

The cops are starting to get suspicious of the super heroes already.

Henry Pym shrinking and growing potions are in a gas form now. I don't know how this prevents everything else from not shrinking/enlarging. This nitpick is not explained.

Nothing happens with Henry Pym that we don't already know about and there are no character developments beyond his being superheroic.

Thoughts:

This is a pretty so-so issue. It's not terrible, it's just a bit silly. Nothing huge happens, the art isn't incredibly interesting, but I'm still more entertained by this than random commies/aliens every other story. It's just a bit of cat & mouse, but with a big red bug as an allegory for Soviet Russia.

Rankings:

I'm putting this down as the new #25 on the list. I like it a little bit more than the issue with Egghead and it's about even with the General Fang story in Incredible Hulk #5 in my eyes. The Hulk story wins out just a nudge for the artwork being a little more tighter and interesting to look at.

Next Time: The Wizard Returns!