Sunfire

Sunfire. He was a bit a bit of an arse, wasn't he? Ok, actually he was a gigantic arse, always calling The X-Men 'Yankee Imperialist Scum' which was, at the very least, a bit churlish considering they let him guest-star in their book.
I always liked him though. Arrogant dicks are always more fun than goody goodies, plus it's a great look for a costume.
Here's his debut, towards the end of Rascally Roy and Nefarious Neal's classic, short run on the series.
Neal Adams was behind on deadlines, so Dashing Don Heck stepped in on this issue. It may take you a couple of seconds to spot it's Don, as he's inked here by Tom Palmer ( what was Tom's Bullpen nickname? I forget ).
It's a great art job, actually, there's a few patented Heck poses, but he really does try to mimic then newcomer Adam's wild layouts, and Palmer's inks make it absolutely shine.
Maybe if Don had been given inkers of the calibre of Tom throughout the Bronze Age, he might've had been given an easier time of it from fans, then and now. Who knows?
What I do know is that Sunfire's got the major 'ump. Start as you mean to go on, son.

Dr. Strange: Planet Earth Is No More

Hey, remember when the Earth was destroyed back in 1976, and we all died, then Dr. Strange saved us and we were all reborn as exact duplicates of ourselves?
No? Oh, that's right, only Doc and Steve Englehart were allowed to keep their memories of The End & Resurrection Of The World.
Even for Stainless Steve & Genial Gene, even for '70's Marvel, Planet Earth Is No More is out there. Like OUT THERE. To this day, I don't really understand what's happening in this issue ( and the issues leading up to it ) but that doesn't matter. This is less a story than an experience.
Eternity's behaviour for instance, his absolute refusal to save the human race, then his absolute turn-around, only makes sense if you remember that Gods are always spiteful, and change their minds on a whim, while The Ancient One? God alone knows what music he's dancing to.
Englehart meanwhile, absolutely never copped out as a writer. Rather than just pretend everything was now fine, the ramifications of this issue were felt for a good long while after, not least Clea's struggle to accept that she was actually no longer herself, but an exact replacement.
Wong, presumably, took it all in his stride as per.
And how appropriate that, after all he's experienced, the last panel is simply Doc sitting back at home, trying to take it all in. Or, as Steve says, 'coming down.' Well, we've all read Marvel Comics: The Untold Story, right?

Dr. Strange In Blue Face

I was always puzzled by that brief period ( Issues #177 to #183 ) when Dr. Strange took to wearing a blue mask, and couldn't figure out what it was all about. Sure, there was some nonsense in the story to explain it:

But I still couldn't make head nor tail of why it'd happened. And the subsequent stories didn't seem to make a vast amount of sense either. For instance, once back in our reality, there was no reason for him to continue wearing a mask.
The general consensus is that it was a last desperate attempt to grab sales, as #183 was Doc's last issue for a while, before he came back with The Defenders. Others have theorized an attempt to 'cosmic up' the good Doctor's look, more in line with The Surfer or Deadman. Some people even think it was Roy Thomas' sneaky way to do a comic about the Golden Age Vision:

Regardless, it was undoubtedly a great visual, and I remember those tales as a short, trippy interlude of randomness, but it did feel like you were suddenly reading about a totally different character. The thing about Doc is that, despite his world being one of the more out-there ones that a superhero could live in, he's actually quite a down to earth, pleasant, well-mannered guy ( I mean, he was always letting the other Defenders crash at the Sanctum Sanctorum ), and a big part of that was that you could always see the face of this middle aged, cultured man.
Blue Face Doc, by comparison, was weird and distant and puzzling, and you couldn't figure him out. In fact, I don't think I realized at the time he was wearing a mask, but assumed he'd just cast a spell on his face, which was even more confusing.
But unlike, it seems, a lot of fans, I do have a lot of affection for this period of the Sorcerer Supreme, just because I remember as a kid going: 'That looks really cool...but why?'
Here's one of my favourite Blue Face Doc issues. There are many reasons to love this episode, like: Clea's reaction to seeing snow for the first time, and the rather creepy suggestion that Doc has set her up in a love pad like some sugar daddy. Then there's an incredibly shoehorned in cameo from Tom Wolfe ( who referenced Strange in his book The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test ), Doc doing something as mundane as having a snooze ( in sorcerous pyjamas ), Dinosaurs on New Years Eve, and the joint appearance of Nightmare and Eternity, two of his best villains. None of it makes a lick of sense though...