Similar to Marvel Team-Up, but starring the Thing instead of Spider-Man. I know some folks prefer this book, feeling the Thing fits more readily into a wider variety of situations than Spider-Man. While I might agree with the assertion about the character (at least when it comes to crazy science/outer space stuff; neither of them is at home with magic), I don't think it works to the book's advantage.
Ultimately, whether it's an alien, a mad scientist, an Asgardian, a demon or whatever, The Thing's response is going to be, "It's clobberin' time!" Of the scattered issues I've read, not many rely on the fact Ben Grimm is a smart enough guy to qualify as an astronaut, versus his ability to punch things real hard and take more punches than Rocky Balboa.
There are broad stretches where one writer dominates. Steve Gerber writes the first 10 issues, then Bill Mantlo writes most of the next 15 issues (and pops up with writer credit on several other issues later), before Marv Wolfman takes over for most of issues 25-45. Mark Gruenwald writes about 20 issues between #53 and #74, including a 6-part story at Project PEGASUS involving Quasar and Giant-Man (Bill Foster), before Tom DeFalco takes over for most (but not all) of the final 25 issues.
The artists shuffle even more frequently. Ron Wilson is probably the closest the book had to a regular, and even he's not involved for 10+ issues at a time. Sometimes it's Sal Buscema or Ernie Chan, sometimes John Byrne and Joe Sinnott, or George Perez and Gene Day. Like Marvel Team-Up, which issues you want probably depends on either who's working on the book, or who they've got the Idol o' Millions teaming up with this month.
The book concluded at 100 issues, with a callback to the issue 50 face-off between '80s Thing and '60s Thing. Ben Grimm would subsequently get another solo book, that ran for 3 years.
2 comments:
I believe it did cross over with MTU too, which is probably obvious, but I'd be disappointed if they never did it.
There was at least one, where Spidey and the Thing team up to stop the Basilisk from creating an active volcano near New York, or something like that. And there was a 2-parter with the Annuals that was part of some big deal with Thanos, Mar-Vell and the Avengers. Probably at least one other crossover I'm forgetting.
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