Fantastic Four: The End (2006) #2

Well this should be fairly quick.

When you find out that Namor appears in an issue of a certain book, it can be difficult to guess how significant his contribution is. This book's selection is a swing and a miss but it sets us up nicely for when we purchase the next issue.

The problem from the perspective of a Sub-Mariner fan is that the team is split up at this point and their stories are told individually. It just so happens that Sue Richards' tale is not a major focus of this particular issue.

When we do meet up with her and Namor, they are swimming about a demolished temple. Richards is contemplating what causes Utopian societies to fall and Namor couldn't care any less.

When he kicks at some debris in disdain, he inadvertently reveals a secret. The Kree alien race has been here. Susan wants to study this further.

I didn't know about the death of her children but no doubt that's been reversed by now.

Whatever the case, their exploration is interrupted by an old foe.

Yay! Attuma!

Sue's portion of the story is about all of three or four pages and ends on the cliffhanger above so that's it for the moment. If the solicitation text is a reliable guide, we should see get far more of this non-couple in the following issue.

As Johnny Storm and Ben Grimm meet on Mars to compare notes, in the deepest portions of the ocean's depths Sue Richards makes a discovery that could change the future of their fractured family.

I'm still glad I got this book because starting to read right into the battle would have felt like I was missing something. As it is, this creates a little eagerness to get at #3 ASAP.

Namor The Sub-Mariner (1990) #4, "Black Water"

A recent post about an Alpha Flight issue put me in the mood for more John Byrne material so today we move ahead a bit in the 1990s series to issue #4.

The book opens with a pair in a submarine attaching a "surprise package" to a much larger underwater vessel. File that away for now.

We move from that to a discussion between Namorita and that Carrie chick that Namor's been flirting with. Carrie has decided that since Namor's romantic history is rather...frightening...she doesn't want to be a part of it. Frankly, it's hard to argue with her reasoning. Nita flies off to tell her cousin, who seems like he couldn't care any less.

He is too preoccupied with attending certain festivities, as are the creepy-ass Marss twins, who happen to discuss the subject because they are still spying on Namor with drones.

Namor doesn't seem like the type to host too many parties but on his way to it with Namorita as his +1, he explains his reasoning.

...He doesn't want to blow it on account of being anti-social and secretive. All right, fair enough.

Namorita finds the party dull as hell until the Marss twins show up. She goes to chat up Desmond. Meanwhile, a disguised Namor also has eyes a guest.

Tony "Iron Man" Stark is in the audience as well, which makes sense as a business big shot. Nice touch. Byrne has always been good at those fun cameos.

But as the "guest of honour" submarine super tanker arrives (that is what Sue Richards is reacting to above), so does the "surprise package" that was attached to it during the book's first couple of pages. And so...

Namor sheds his disguise to investigate the explosion before the submarine releases oil into the water. Things look okay at first, but...

And we end with Namor getting bogged down in the oil, unable to swim or breathe.

Kind of a fun issue. Byrne managed to keep the story moving forward and keep your interest even if it was light on suspense and action until the very end. The lack of a super-villain made for a nice break and the prospect of Namor teaming with several old friends (who have also at times been foes) makes one look forward to the story's continuation.

Amazing Spider-Man (1963) #211, "The Spider and the Sea-Scourge!"

I usually plan a review around a movie release so let's do a Namor appearance in Amazing Spider-Man in light of the Far From Home flick coming out recently.

Namor not only gets the splash page to open the book but he barks out an Imperius Rex right off the bat! Nice!

Namor here is demolishing an experimental power generator, something he's apparently done a number of times (presumably between issues and off-panel). He makes sure that its operators survive, however.

Meanwhile, Spider-Man can't sleep so he's swinging around town, bored off his ass. Apparently, a couple of issues earlier, he (as Peter Parker) promised a young lady named Debbie Whitman that he would check in on her uncle for some reason. So he does that.

Turns out his timing is impeccable. Uncle Whitman was getting pushed around by some sailors he hired that no longer want to honour their contract out of fear of what Namor's been doing. So Spidey bails him out.

Punk. That's basically what got your uncle killed.

A chat with aunt May straightens him out, so Spider-Man joins Whitman at sea. The rebellious sailors feel safer with web-head around so they agree to do the job they signed up for.

And once at sea, it doesn't take long for the guest-star to appear.

Spider-Man's attempts at stopping Namor do not go well, initially.

Ha! I love that line.

Spider-Man does take Namor down by keeping him from the ocean to gradually weaken him and webbing up his ankle wings to cause him to crash to the deck.

As they grapple on the deck, Namor explains that the power generators that are being placed in the ocean are messing with Atlantis' own power. This is why he's been wrecking them.

When Spider-Man claims innocence and ignorance of all this, Namor suggest a more productive location for the generators which won't affect Atlantis. As the land-lubbers discuss this, Namor takes off.

Oh boy. That dude with the glasses is in for disappointment over the next couple of decades...

Namor showed up again a few issues later, in #214, and that was the first part of a two-parterso for a few months in late 1980, he was a semi-regular character in Amazing Spider-Man.

Captain America (2004) #46, "Old Friends and Enemies Part 1 of 3"

I reviewed an Alpha Flight issue for Canada Day and had intended to do the same for Captain America but didn't get the time to. We're going to do that now with issue #46 of the 2004 series.

Unfortunately, the rather exciting and dramatic cover does not reflect the contents of the book. Namor contributes fairly little to the story.

But first, a recap.

The story then opens with Chin in his lab speaking to a mysterious, unnamed ("old friend" is as much as we get) man in a hat and long coat. They appear to have the unconscious body of the Human Torch (the Invaders version) in a large tube. Interesting!

We then cut to this version of Captain America (Bucky Barnes) and Namor aboard the old Atlantean ship the Invaders used to ride around in. Barnes states point blank that he felt he had to do the job with Namor. During their conversation, the Avenging Son can't help but throw in a shot at the surface world's tendency to waste and pollute (he's not wrong), as well as a sort-of approval of Barnes in the Captain suit, until remembering his old frenemy.

Writer Ed Brubaker has his personality pretty well, in my humble estimation.

We spend the next few pages in flashback/backfill. The first is an Invaders scene in which Chin's wonder at the Torch's power first took place, the second is the Winter Soldier's botched attempt at killing Chin in 1968. During said attempt, Barnes instead killed Chin's fiance. Yikes.

In the meantime, The Black Widow has supplied Barnes with a general location for Chin, in Taipei City. Captain America gets the jump on the lab's armed guards but when more appear and open fire on him, Namor makes the timely save.

And that's where they part ways, as Barnes prepares to break into the facility. So for all that Barnes said he did not want to complete this mission without Namor, he basically used him to bum a ride and clear his conscience.

The Invaders flashbacks and continuity were cool and based on the solicitation for the next issue, Namor will continue to appear at least in the second part of the story. Here's to old friends and enemies.

Alpha Flight (1983) #15, "Blind Date"

I ended by Canada Day weekend by reading an Alpha Flight issue because that just seemed appropriate. Let's have a look at that now.

The Defenders tend to be referred to as a non-team but Alpha Flight, in many ways, was even more worthy of that label. Very rarely during Byrne's initial run was the team actually together for any length of time. Rather, the book would follow the lives of the various members.

In this case, Namor is connected to one of the pair below in particular. They are the two newest members of the (non) team, Marrina and Puck. We join them as they begin to look into a creature that has killed people on Lake Ontario near Toronto.

Famous last words?

Marrina dives off and, told over the course of a few pages, ultimately follows a scent to a hidden cave. When we see her next, she's a lot less friendly.

Puck does his best to avoid Marrina's attacks and to come up with a way of stopping her without hurting her, but things become even more complicated for him.

Teratologists. What do they know?

As is often the case Namor, who was with Marrina when she was summoned by Alpha Flight in the previous issue and had been following her since, jumps in swinging. That's bad news for one "miniature thug", to use Namor's own words, in particular.

The added "u" in "Imperious Rex", thereby spelling it the Canadian way, is the sort of detail that helped make this book great back in the day.

It takes little time for Namor to realize that Marrina is...not herself. As the battle wears on, she rakes him across the eyes, blinding him.

This dude applied a similar nerve pinch on Puck while Marrina and Namor fought. Who is this mysterious stranger??

Oh, it's that guy.

This was part of a valiant effort at making TMOTW Alpha Flight's version of Doctor Doom but it never really panned out no matter how often he's appeared in that team's various titles. I never perceived him as any kind of threat and I doubt that merely hearing his name would chill Namor to the marrow but nonetheless, it was a decent cliffhanger for the conclusion next issue.

Same time next year?

Tales to Astonish (1965) #72, "A Prince There Was"

I've had about enough of Namor as a team member for a while, or stories in which he barely appears, so it's back to solo books for the next couple of reads.

When we last checked in on Namor's quest to recover Neptune's trident in order to prove he was the true ruler of Atlantis, he was being crushed by the gigantic Seaweed Man. How would he ever survive such a predicament??

Fairly easily, actually. He used a little leverage to get out from under the monster's crushing hand (describing the technique as something similar to judo) then formed a twister around it.

Precisely what I would have done.

Namor forces that trap door open and what does he find? Exactly what you'd expect: A talking fish with a diamond in its mouth.

Namor now knows that he must find...The Diamonds of Doom!!!

Meanwhile, his lady love Dorma is in a pickle as well. Krang has grown tired of not even reaching friend-zone with her so he has her banished to the cave of the Faceless Ones.

That's creepy Zantor off on the right. I'm not sure how he spends his days but he does the banishing honours here.

As a result, Namor senses a disturbance in the force...

So he DOES talk to fish? Or do they just talk to him?

Anyway, Namor has 99 problems but Dorma ain't one. He's a prince and he has to go on with his quest. It is what it is.

When he finds the diamonds though, it doesn't really strike him right away that there just might be a good reason why they're called "diamonds of doom".

And...that's it??

As you can see from the cover, Namor shared this book with the Hulk so the story is only 12 pages long. We're left with a cliffhanger but if Namor was able to defeat the dreaded Seaweed Man, surely he'll find a clever way of overcoming the devastating effect of the diamonds of doom!!

X-Men Red (2018) #1, "The Hate Machine Part 1: Heal the World"

Marvel is celebrating the release of the Dark Phoenix film, though perhaps not its early results, and while Namor's history with Jean Grey may not be as noteworthy as the one he shares with some other members, he was a part of of her version of the X-Men just last year.

Once again, his appearance is brief, but at least makes sense. Jean has consulted with some of the most brilliant minds on earth and hatched out a plan to make the world a better place for mutants. Her first stop? Why, Atlantis, of course.

Maybe you'd get more if you were wearing pants when they arrived.

Atlantis seems like an odd choice until she elaborates a bit.

Jean arranges to speak before the U.N. (just like that) and states her case that mutants need to be recognized as a group even though they are not a nation as such (and attempts at having a nation specifically for mutants have just made them easier to target). This is where Jean's friends come in.

Once the meeting is at an end, the various members of the team are complimenting Jean on her progress when one of the ambassadors who questioned her drops by for a chat. It is quickly clear though that the ambassador is under some sort of mind-control and even more so when her head quite literally explodes.

Jean is suspected of having caused the ambassador's rather spectacularly gruesome death but Namor steps in to defend her from trigger-happy UN cops.

Nightcrawler whisks the team away to regroup, Namor included. The villain is revealed to be one Cassandra Nova, a name which...means nothing to me at all.

A decent enough premise though I'd be surprised if it hadn't been attempted before. I don't expect Namor's face time to increase much and while he had a good reason to be there initially, I wonder if he'll have a good reason to stay. We'll see how he's worked in.

Sub-Mariner: The Depths (2008) #2

The previous post was about clearing out a minor appearance in an Avengers book. Namor also has a small appearance in this book too, no matter what the title might seem to indicate, but his presence is felt throughout nonetheless.

The book's first issue was discussed here.

Randolph Stein, notorious hoax debunker, is out to prove Atlantis is a myth while working with a crew convinced that it exists and quite paranoid and superstitious about it. An impulsive act on his part puts one of the crewmen in danger so the rest of the crew begins to turn on Stein.

Namor, in this book, continues to be seen in shadows and as outlines in murky water. Esad Ribic's art is excellent at creating the claustrophobic mood.

Stein constantly shrugs off mentions of Namor's existence by suggesting that they are simply delusions caused by the depths and such, until he has a more direct encounter and the tables are turned.

Stein's opinion in regards to Namor changes drastically. He believes the encounter was real so he sets off on a solo mission to find the legendary creature himself to conclude the book.

This is a great book to read in bed late at night with the lights as dim as possible. The creative team has effectively built a creepy tension. It's a mini-series I could have easily gobbled up in one night but I am deliberately dragging it out. It stands out in quality amidst the other material in which Namor has appeared around the same time, that much is certain.