Silver Surfer #1: Escape -- To Terror! (1982)

Script: Stan Lee™
Plot and pencils: John Byrne
Inking and coloring: Tom Palmer
Lettering: Rick Parker
Chief: Jim Shooter


The insane scripting of the spectacular Stan Lee™ retells the titanic tragedy of the Silver Surfer's awe-inspiring origin, true believer™!

And tragedy is the word. Mild-mannered Norrin Radd gambles his homeworld Zenn-La, his freedom, Earth, and the woman he loves Shalla Bal, only to repeatedly lose, regain, and then relose each of them.

It's not as if it's even his fault, as the poor victim finds himself effectively playing piggy-in-the-middle for everything that he cherishes. And the two other players who are so much taller than he is? Well, one is Galactus (his new space-boss and devourer of worlds), while the other is…


One stunning secret of Stan's spectacular successes in creating such compelling heroes is their innate morality. Norrin is portrayed here as a paragon of virtue - fearlessly loving his soul mate and people to endless extremes, no matter how outrageous their ill-informed betrayals of him.

While there's not much about the Surfer to make you want to imagine being in his, uh, shoes I suppose, the sheer heroism that he displays is awesomely inspiring.

Just what other qualities is any 'super hero' supposed to have?

(with thanks to Herschel)