Marvel Two-in-One #61: The Coming of Her!


Writer: Mark Gruenwald
Penciller: Jerry Bingham
Inker: Gene Day
Letterer: Joe Rosen
Colorist: Ben Sean
Editor: Jim Salicrup

The Guest Star:
      Starhawk

The Villain:
      Her

Guest Shots:
      Moondragon; Jarvis

The Set Up:
      Out on Pier 17 on Manhattan, a couple of guys drag a cocoon out of the water. Almost immediately, it hatches, a hand bursting forth, soon followed by a dark humanoid body. It soars to a position over the loft where Ben Grimm and Alicia Masters are having a romantic dinner, and the bursts through the ceiling. We can finally see it clearly, and it seems to be a golden human woman. A very annoyed Ben attacks, and she blasts him across the room. She then tells Alicia that she has come for her, and when Ben gets back up she blasts him through the wall and then deposits him gently on the terrace across the street. After repairing Alicia's apartment with a wave of her hand, she flies off with Alicia in tow.
     Ben races back to the Baxter Building (headquarters of the Fantastic Four), and frantically tries to find and activate a gadget of reed's that will allow him to track her. He's interrupted by Starhawk, of the Guardians of the Galaxy, who had sensed the rising of the golden woman, but who's sense are being interfered with by Ben's gadget.
     Meanwhile, we learn that the golden women has abducted Alicia because she's looking for information about the one once known as him, and according to a computer she'd once been linked to, Alicia had been among the last to see Him. Moondragon, meanwhile, has been attracted by all this, and tells the golden woman of Him's later life, and death, as Adam Warlock.
     At about this time, Starhawk and Ben arrive, as the other three are about to depart again (Alicia is going along voluntarily, but Ben doesn't know this)...

Clobberin' Time?:
      Page 7, panel 2. After Her bursts in on Ben and Alicia. "All right, goldengirl- you think just 'cause yer a gal you can barge in here an' I won't take a poke at ya, huh? Well, I'm sick 'a you super-creeps invadin' my private life! An' in case you don't know what that means- It's Clobberin' Time!"

Petunia's Patch:
      No Petunia.

Things of Interest:
      This is one of those great Gruenwald stories, where you can read it without knowing the backstory, but its a much richer story if you do...
     The golden woman, who we come to know as Her, was created (and known then as Paragon) in Incredible Hulk Annual 6. She emerges in this issue from a cocoon that is identical to the one Adam Warlock had frequently emerged from. Her will eventually adopt the much more functional name of Kismet, and in the Guardians of the Galaxy series in the 1990s, it will be learned that she is, in fact, the mother of Starhawk, who appears in this issue.
     Starhawk is a time traveller from the 25th century, and a member of the same Guardians of the Galaxy that Ben met in issues 4 and 5 of Marvel Two-in-One (though Starhawk was not yet a member of that team when Ben met it). He was in this century as part of the very classic Korvac saga that ran through the Avengers from approximately issues 160 through 175. Prior to returning to their own century, the Guardians will appear once more in MTIO, in issue 69.