The Invaders #16

History

Written and edited by Roy Thomas — Marvel's foremost champion of Golden Age continuity — the issue appeared in May 1977 under editor-in-chief Archie Goodwin. Interior art was handled by penciler Jim Mooney (in place of the series' regular Frank Robbins, who returned for #17) with inks by Frank Springer, colors by Janice Cohen, and letters by John Costanza; the cover was supplied by Jack Kirby. The story's title, 'The Short, Happy Life of Major Victory,' is itself a meta-textual wink: the fictional in-universe cartoonist Biljo White — based on a real Marvel reader of the era whose name appears in the issue's letters column — has been creating a comic whose super-soldier hero suspiciously mirrors Captain America's own origin, a device Thomas used to explore the wartime mythology of the character.

Trivia · 8 facts

• First appearance of Frieda Ratsel (disguised in this issue as 'Julia'), the Nazi spy who transforms into the supervillain Warrior Woman in the immediately following issue, Invaders #17 (June 1977).
• First appearance of William Joseph White ('Biljo White'), a fictional WWII-era American soldier and cartoonist whose in-universe comic 'Major Victory' features an origin story that mirrors Captain America's; the character was modeled on a real-life Marvel reader of the period.
• Master Man (Wilhelm Lohmer) returns in a revitalized form with greater abilities than his original Giant-Size Invaders #1 (June 1975) debut — this issue opens his six-issue consecutive run as the arc's primary antagonist (Invaders #16–21).
• The story is set partly in London and partly at Hitler's mountain fortress Berchtesgaden, with the full Invaders lineup — Captain America, Bucky, Human Torch, Sub-Mariner, and Toro — captured by Master Man by the issue's end.
• Cover art by Jack Kirby; interior pencils by Jim Mooney with inks by Frank Springer — one of the few issues in the series where Mooney substituted for the title's regular penciler Frank Robbins.
• Written and self-edited by Roy Thomas, with Archie Goodwin serving as editor-in-chief; Thomas also served as the series' ongoing architect of Marvel's WWII retcon continuity.
• Warrior Woman was later confirmed by Wikipedia and multiple sources to have been conceived by Roy Thomas and Frank Robbins as a deliberate homage to DC's Wonder Woman.
• The issue — along with the full first-series run — was collected in Invaders Classic: The Complete Collection Vol. 1 (Marvel, 2014), which reprints Giant-Size Invaders #1, Invaders #1–22 and Annual #1, Marvel Premiere #29–30, and Avengers #71.

Cast · 9 characters

Full credits

Key issues in The Invaders

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#7 1st appearance — Spitfire

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#11 1st appearance — Blue Bullet

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#14 1st appearance — Thunderfist

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#2 1st appearance — Brain Drain

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#27 1st appearance — Human Top

Variants (1)