Hey, Mom! The Explanation.

Here's the permanent dedicated link to my first Hey, Mom! post and the explanation of the feature it contains.

Also,

Sunday, July 6, 2025

A Sense of Doubt blog post #3792 - Thor #168 - 1969 - and a Collection of My Oldest comic books - part four


A Sense of Doubt blog post #3792 - Thor #168 - 1969 -  and a Collection of My Oldest comic books - part four

Hi, Welcome. Thanks for clicking inside this post.

Before I start, I want to acknowledge that today is the day TEN YEARS AGO when I started the daily HEY MOM feature, two days after my Mom passed away.

I plan to write about that event tomorrow and share a song as is fitting for Music Monday.

Today is COMIC BOOK SUNDAY, which would not exist without my parents, especially my Mother, giving me comics as gifts for most of my life even taking me to stores when I was little to buy me a comic or let me spend my allowance on comics.

My first allowance was the cost of two comics and tax. Comics were twelve cents then, so my allowance was twenty-five cents.

The tradition of giving me comics persisted until the last year of my Dad's life. For many years near the end, his birthday and Christmas gifts to me were buying my monthly comics at Fanfare and having them shipped to me, which is what always happens.

And so, Comic Book Sunday...

I have this series on the blog that I have neglected. It's a series in which I share about my oldest comics. Farther below, I have collected the three posts I have made about these comics and collected all the covers for a fast scroll through the titles.

As I explain below, my first comic was Detective Comics #351 with Batman and Robin going against the Cluemaster. It was published in May of 1966. I was four-years-old.

I was not proceeding in chronological order, but the first post shares comics I had given to me (I don't think I had an allowance yet) in late 1967 and early 1968 -- Christmas and my birthday, which were prime times to give me comic books as gifts.

I am keen to track other early comics of mine, which I have to do by memory as the comics themselves are in boxes in a storage facility in Michigan. I am hoping to bring them out here next year or the year after.

MY OLDEST parts one and two (linked below) collect multiple titles because most if not all of the content was copied in from various posts on the 365 T-Shirts blog. I am more interested now in featuring one issue at a time in this series both for focus and because I have a tendency to try cram everything in one, gargantuan post, and that's really not necessary.

So, today's post is dedicated to Thor.

Since I have to figure out the oldest issue by memory, I had some doubt about which Thor issue I had first.

I am pretty sure it was The Mighty Thor #168 - September 1969

The Mighty Thor- wiki.


THE MIGHTY THOR SERIES at COMIC VINE 

The Journey into Mystery series at COMIC VINE

The Mighty Thor #168 - September 1969

However, in reviewing the entire series at COMIC VINE (my preferred database), I had some doubt.

Partly, my doubt stemmed from having bought a t-shirt featuring The Mighty Thor #151, published in April of 1968.

T-SHIRT

https://comicvine.gamespot.com/thor-151-to-rise-again/4000-124579/

I think that cover only looks familiar because of the shirt I now own that I have owned for a few years after a moment in which I realized I did not have a Thor t-shirt and went and found one.

I love Thor.

I am working on a catch-all post about Al Ewing's twenty-five issue story arc of The Immortal Thor.

Previously, I wrote about one issue in particular: The Immortal Thor #020 [Legacy #781] in my first installment on why I still read comics books:

Sunday, May 4, 2025

Shortly before that May post, I shared a post by the wonderful Marvel editor Tom Brevoort on Thor:

Saturday, March 29, 2025

BTW, I had dropped the Thor title from my subscriptions in 2024 and resumed it in 2025, at which point I caught up and read the entire run and was blown away! That journey is described in that May 4th post.

Some comics are better read as a saga with two dozen issues or more in the can and reading them quickly and consecutively.

Sometimes the monthly installments are not as satisfying.

MAYBE
https://comicvine.gamespot.com/thor-143--and-soon-shall-come-the-enchanters/4000-9564/

Okay, so I am positive that #151 was NOT my oldest Thor comic, but I am less sure about issue #143 from August of 1967.

Maybe?

I had a vague memory of an issue with Balder and Sif early in my reading, but also my memories are clouded by borrowing a bunch of early Thor comics while in college from Chris Nagy, with whom I played Ultimate, and so some covers look familiar because of that lending situation.

It's possible that issue #143 is my earliest Thor comic, and I can't check it until I get into those boxes in storage.



There's some measure of control to remembering and logging these facts of my life. Comic books have been very important to me throughout my life.

If this is my first issue of The Mighty Thor, it's a great one with which to start reading Thor.

I have shared the entire issue below.

I suspect that there's a debate over which Jack Kirby run on a comic is his best: The Mighty Thor or Fantastic Four. I doubt there's argument over his other comics (Avengers, The Incredible Hulk, Captain America, and The Uncanny X-Men). Some might pick his Fourth World DC comics or even his return to comics and the gorgeous Eternals, which had a huge influence on me. I think it's down to either The Mighty Thor or Fantastic Four.

Kirby drew Thor starting in Journey to Mystery (#s 101 - 125) that was renamed The Might Thor once they realized it would be all about Thor and no one else (#s 126-179 plus annuals) -- so that's about 82 issues. His run on Fantastic Four  started with the first issue and ended with issue #102 (not counting the partial #108).

I probably would vote for his run on Fantastic Four being his very best work, but I know many would fight me on that claim. The Thor comics are a very close second given the interstellar and apocalypse centered storylines.

This issue features all sorts of particular Kirby-isms in their best form. From the splash page on, there's the classic Kirby features of the Asgardian armor decorations and the crackling energy backgrounds as well as the "Enchanti-Screen" all artfully "embellished" by George Klein.

Odin sends Thor off in the "Odinship" to find Galactus as penance for his recent "Warrior Madness."

Apparently, Galactus had to be sought out only because his power rivaled Odin's. And in 1969 when this issue was published, the original Galactus story in Fantastic Four has been published (#s 48-50 - 1966) and the second story, the return in 1968. And so it was time for another hero to confront Galactus, and Thor was a logical choice.

The Odin ship moving through space is all classic Kirby. Other classic features are the foreshadowing via newspapers headlines in the hands of bystanders in which the Warriors Three have collected Balder the Brave from a hospital. There's more classics with the guards in the Atomic Experimental Center as Thermal Man breaks free as well as a Kirby signature (page 11) of Chinese official scoping out a rocket through binoculars with what is seen in on the outside of the lenses viewing them up to his face from the front. Classic. Only Kirby.

The Galactus-Thor confrontation is also a classic twist for readers expecting a mega-battle. Galactus is weary and did not wish to be found. But he creates a "Visi-Cloud" (also Classic Kirby) to tell Thor his origin (or at least the beginning of it).

It's a great issue!!

Classic.

Following all the pages of The Mighty Thor #168, find the links to my previous Oldest Comics posts and all the covers for quick viewing.

Thanks for tuning in!

Now on to the issue.

SYNOPSIS

Thor enters the vastness of space as an act of penance for his Warrior Madness. There, Thor is tasked with finding the true origin of Galactus, Devourer of Worlds. Has Odin set an impossible task for his son? And what mysteries will Thor uncover in the universal folds?

Galactus origin, part 1 in "Galactus Found!" Script by Stan Lee, pencils by Jack Kirby, inks by George Klein. Appearances by Balder, Hogun, Fandral, Volstagg, the Watcher, and Odin. First appearance of the Thermal Man. Kirby/Klein cover.

Creators










Issue details

Name
Volume
Thor
Issue Number
168
Cover Date
September 1969
In Store Date
July 08, 1969

THE ENTIRE ISSUE - THOR #169





























MY OLDEST COMICS - PREVIOUS POSTS

Wednesday, March 22, 2017

Tuesday, April 18, 2017

Friday, July 7, 2017

MISSED ONE (ADDED 2508.31)


IN PART ONE







In Part Two:






IN PART THREE:



In part three and a half



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- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 2507.06 - 10:10

- Days ago: MOM = 3657 days ago & DAD = 311 days ago

- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I post Hey Mom blog entries on special occasions. I post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day, and now I have a second count for Days since my Dad died on August 28, 2024. I am now in the same time zone as Google! So, when I post at 10:10 a.m. PDT to coincide with the time of Mom's death, I am now actually posting late, so it's really 1:10 p.m. EDT. But I will continue to use the time stamp of 10:10 a.m. to remember the time of her death and sometimes 13:40 EDT for the time of Dad's death. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.
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