Another take on the Jewish myth of the Golem. It annoys me that there are so many different versions of this character, and no attempt to reconcile them with each other. At least in this case it makes sense to feature Golem, as the issue is about The Invaders’ adventure in the Warsaw Ghetto during WWII. At least this version even has the
“ometh” on the forehead (interior–not on the cover). So it’s very “Jew-y.”
And as far as issues of this (really bad) comic go, this is one of the better ones. A Nazi captures the team and I like the way he restrains Torch/Toro (submerged–and this counts as a clear container for my tag, below) and Sub-Mariner (under heat lamps and encased in concrete).
The Golem kills the Nazi. That’s really the whole story. But I liked it.
The Invaders spend a lot of time being tied up or chained or otherwise captured. The Nazis are creative.
This issue of “The Invaders” really doesn’t work for me, and I’ll tell you why- the reviewer above refers to the events of this issue as an “adventure”, which is a misnomer- “misadventure” much more accurately describes it after Captain America commits a serious cardinal no-no in surrendering himself and the Invaders to the Nazis in a misguided effort to prevent the Warsaw Ghetto Massacre of 1942. War is ugly, ugly things happen in war. Surrendering to the enemy is NEVER an option, as the Captain and his team learn the hard way on this mission. Things went pretty bad for the team following their surrender, and things would have undoubtedly gotten much worse had they not caught a break with the quite fortuitous arrival and intervention of Jacob Goldstein and his pet Golem. There is something in war known as collateral damage- the quite-often high price which must be paid for victory. Captain America sacrificing himself and his team in exchange for the lives of a few dozen innocent bystanders who were in the wrong place at the wrong time was a terribly bad deal which probably would have resulted in the Axis powers winning the war without the Invaders around to eventually defeat them. Captain America was still a pretty young officer at the time, but he still should have realized the stupidity of surrendering to the Nazis. I am certain he recieved great instruction in the concept of collateral damage, and how it works, at war college. No Allied tribunal would have prosecuted him for refusing to surrender to those Nazis, even if it did result in the slaughter of those Poles. The Invaders were priceless and invaluable to the war-effort, and to the overall survival of freedom, and those bystanders simply were not. The Human Torch supposedly possessed a computer mind, so it is staggeringly inconceivable that he ( it? ) would go along with this surrender. What the world needs, all right, is for the Nazis to get ahold of the Human Torch, dissect him, and figure out how to mass produce an enormous army of Human Torch androids in the service of the Third Reich! ( an eventuality which unfortunately came to pass in the first four issues of “Captain America: Sentinel of Liberty” ) Likewise, Spitfire, as a beautiful young woman, just had to figure what-all would have happened to HER, if she surrendered herself to the Nazis! The Sub-Mariner is also too smart, and arrogant, to surrender himself to the Nazis! But, as noted, all these champions learned the hard way of the folly of their poor decision in the Nazis’ science dungeons! Thank God for the Golem! Collateral damage, Captain, collateral damage. You can’t win the war and save the world from the Axis Powers if you and your fellows are being dissected and tortured to death in their dungeons! Thank God for the Golem! Speaking of whom, the forgoing reviewer conveyed his ire at how this creature was being characterized in his small handful of appearances throughout various Marvel Comics. He indicates that he feels the Golem should possess a streamlined, uniform personality throughout all his appearances, as if he ( it? ) were some kind of a sentient being. I disagree. Each Golem creature is created wholly unique by different people ( usually Jews ) and each one is an entirely new creation, separate and independent of all previous Golems. There is no such thing as a “single” Golem. For lack of a less disgusting analogy, creating a Golem is like using a condom: One shot, and throw it away. Next time you need a condom, or a Golem, you use, or create, a new one! I don’t believe there is a single spirit that travels from Golem to Golem. Golems are operated by their creators on a need-to-need basis. So, Marvel’s initial take on the Golem legend is correct, regardless of how the above reviewer feels to the contrary. Thank you for your time.
I get it. I also said I “liked” this issue but when I wrote it I had just binge-read the first 10 issues in a row and…Wow. Those were some boring comics. So this one stood out as “less bad/boring” than the others…