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Marvel: May 1965 Omnibus
496 pages, Hardcover
Published April 29, 2025
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About the author
Stan Lee
7,563 books2,342 followersStan Lee (born Stanley Martin Lieber) was an American writer, editor, creator of comic book superheroes, and the former president and chairman of Marvel Comics.
With several artist co-creators, most notably Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko, he co-created Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four, Thor as a superhero, the X-Men, Iron Man, the Hulk, Daredevil, the Silver Surfer, Dr. Strange, Ant-Man and the Wasp, Scarlet Witch, The Inhumans, and many other characters, introducing complex, naturalistic characters and a thoroughly shared universe into superhero comic books. He subsequently led the expansion of Marvel Comics from a small division of a publishing house to a large multimedia corporation.
With several artist co-creators, most notably Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko, he co-created Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four, Thor as a superhero, the X-Men, Iron Man, the Hulk, Daredevil, the Silver Surfer, Dr. Strange, Ant-Man and the Wasp, Scarlet Witch, The Inhumans, and many other characters, introducing complex, naturalistic characters and a thoroughly shared universe into superhero comic books. He subsequently led the expansion of Marvel Comics from a small division of a publishing house to a large multimedia corporation.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
December 20, 2025
With the dominance of superheroes already having happened in preceding years, Marvel: Omnibus May 1965 feels like it brings them forth into what later generations think of as the 1960s.
Whereas the previous releases chronicling each year of the 1960s had been based around the introduction of one of the iconic Marvel superheroes, instead May 1965 highlights the first appearance of Nick Fury, an existing character, as an agent of SHIELD. There are also enough characters that we can get odd pairings, such as the Incredible Hulk playing second fiddle under Namor the Sub-Mariner in Tales to Astonish, which boasts of the latter getting his own series ‘at last’. Westerns and romance comics still jostle for space with the superheroes, who have already absorbed the longstanding science fiction and fantasy titles as vehicles for their own adventures. It makes for a nice reminder that even with the arrival of the ‘Marvel Age’ the company still catered to those who cared for other genres. It was also two issues of romance comics, Patsy and Hedy and Patsy Walker, that provided the biggest historical surprise for this reader as Patsy’s boyfriend is injured in the Vietnam War, returned home, and pretends he no longer cares for her to spare her feelings should he die after returning to duty. It’s not anti-war, but it’s not exactly Howling Commandos either.
The interstitial prose stories remain terrible, but these seem to be getting phases out in favour of more letters’ pages, advertisements for other titles, and mail-in forms for t-shirts (still haven’t heard back after sending one). It seems that this year Marvel had become aware of themselves as a brand unto themselves and sought new avenues to make money from their True Believers. This can also be seen in how often characters in the comics will refer to a prior adventure, accompanied by an asterisk leading to a footnote advising readers the exact issue where they can find said adventure. One wonders how much this habit led to the rise of the secondary market of comics as prior issues became harder to obtain. From a writing perspective, the dialogue feels like it has come on leaps and bounds from where it was at the start of the decade. A big part of that is probably more and more comics having a recurring cast of characters who will have their own personalities and quirks, as opposed to the anthologies that previously dominated where we had to be introduced to characters every issue and would never hear from them again.
It also feels like the complexity of the stories has gone up compared with the earlier titles, with little in the way of glaring plot holes. The opening issue of X-Men, which introduced Juggernaut to the world, stood out especially to this reader as the title characters fortify the X-Mansion against the new villain, whose destruction of those fortifications plays out in the background as Professor X tells the story of his life and his relationship with his stepbrother in flashback. This omnibus is however notably slimmer when compared to prior instalments of the 1960s collections. There are fewer titles compared with the earliest and there are no larger sized annual editions that made up the page count of the preceding 1964 collection. What’s inside might be better, but this still feels like less a lesser omnibus. The visual style has also improved with the dominance of the superhero titles, so much so that whenever a reprint appears in the western or romance comics it really sticks out compared with those newly drawn stories. These feel like the last remnants of prior decades struggling for life as the 1960s, even its staid version portrayed in the pages of Marvel comics, asserts itself.
Marvel: Omnibus May 1965 makes for an interesting snapshot of Marvel’s recently overhauled company output reacting to ongoing wider changes in contemporary US society, with lingering remnants of both the prior output and cultural norms still showing.
Whereas the previous releases chronicling each year of the 1960s had been based around the introduction of one of the iconic Marvel superheroes, instead May 1965 highlights the first appearance of Nick Fury, an existing character, as an agent of SHIELD. There are also enough characters that we can get odd pairings, such as the Incredible Hulk playing second fiddle under Namor the Sub-Mariner in Tales to Astonish, which boasts of the latter getting his own series ‘at last’. Westerns and romance comics still jostle for space with the superheroes, who have already absorbed the longstanding science fiction and fantasy titles as vehicles for their own adventures. It makes for a nice reminder that even with the arrival of the ‘Marvel Age’ the company still catered to those who cared for other genres. It was also two issues of romance comics, Patsy and Hedy and Patsy Walker, that provided the biggest historical surprise for this reader as Patsy’s boyfriend is injured in the Vietnam War, returned home, and pretends he no longer cares for her to spare her feelings should he die after returning to duty. It’s not anti-war, but it’s not exactly Howling Commandos either.
The interstitial prose stories remain terrible, but these seem to be getting phases out in favour of more letters’ pages, advertisements for other titles, and mail-in forms for t-shirts (still haven’t heard back after sending one). It seems that this year Marvel had become aware of themselves as a brand unto themselves and sought new avenues to make money from their True Believers. This can also be seen in how often characters in the comics will refer to a prior adventure, accompanied by an asterisk leading to a footnote advising readers the exact issue where they can find said adventure. One wonders how much this habit led to the rise of the secondary market of comics as prior issues became harder to obtain. From a writing perspective, the dialogue feels like it has come on leaps and bounds from where it was at the start of the decade. A big part of that is probably more and more comics having a recurring cast of characters who will have their own personalities and quirks, as opposed to the anthologies that previously dominated where we had to be introduced to characters every issue and would never hear from them again.
It also feels like the complexity of the stories has gone up compared with the earlier titles, with little in the way of glaring plot holes. The opening issue of X-Men, which introduced Juggernaut to the world, stood out especially to this reader as the title characters fortify the X-Mansion against the new villain, whose destruction of those fortifications plays out in the background as Professor X tells the story of his life and his relationship with his stepbrother in flashback. This omnibus is however notably slimmer when compared to prior instalments of the 1960s collections. There are fewer titles compared with the earliest and there are no larger sized annual editions that made up the page count of the preceding 1964 collection. What’s inside might be better, but this still feels like less a lesser omnibus. The visual style has also improved with the dominance of the superhero titles, so much so that whenever a reprint appears in the western or romance comics it really sticks out compared with those newly drawn stories. These feel like the last remnants of prior decades struggling for life as the 1960s, even its staid version portrayed in the pages of Marvel comics, asserts itself.
Marvel: Omnibus May 1965 makes for an interesting snapshot of Marvel’s recently overhauled company output reacting to ongoing wider changes in contemporary US society, with lingering remnants of both the prior output and cultural norms still showing.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
September 18, 2025
Are these the 17 greatest comic books I've ever read? No, of course not! What this collection contains is all 17 comics Marvel published in May, 1965 along with the house ads and letters columns from each issues. Strange Tales #135 is the first appearance of SHIELD and Nick Fury in a non WWII comic and is the main justification for this collection. It's a great comic and the bones of the MCU are very present in those 12 pages. Another highlight is X-Men #12 which is the first appearance of Juggernaut. Jack Kirby depicts him almost like the shark in Jaws and you don't get a look at him until the issues final page. The comics contained here are often good to great with a stunning amount of production from Lee and especially Jack Kirby. It's also fun that the western and model comics are included as a forgotten artifact of the comics company Marvel used to be. The Millie the Model and Patsy Walker comics are equal parts great and jarring especially the kayfabe that these comics are written by fictional characters and the letters columns where kids all over the world write in to tell Millie and Patsy how much they love their comics. This collection isn't perfect but as an artifact it absolutely is and I hope Marvel does more collections like this.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews