Tales of Suspense is an Anthology Comic from Marvel Comics, debuting in 1959. The series introduced Iron Man and gave Captain America his first modern solo stories.
The comic began as a science-fiction series with multiple unrelated stories in each issue. In 1963, issue #39 introduced an ongoing Iron Man series, firmly set in the shared Marvel Universe, with one-off stories remaining as back-up strips. The alien known as The Watcher, who had been introduced in Marvel's Fantastic Four series, became the narrator for the one-off stories.
A year later, in issue #59, a solo Captain America story was added alongside Iron Man, at which point the comic completely dropped the standalone back-up stories and adopted a split-book format.
The series effectively ended with issue #99, when Iron Man was relaunched in his own comic. At that point Tales of Suspense was retitled to become a solo Captain America comic, but kept its original numbering.
Tales of Suspense contains examples of the following tropes:
- Anthology Comic: Initially there were multiple short science-fiction stories in each issue. Once the Iron Man series took the lead they remained as back-ups.
- The Watcher: Uatu the Watcher, the Trope Namer, acts as the narrator for some of the later one-off stories.
- Wins by Doing Absolutely Nothing: In Tales of Suspense #54 a radioactive cloud that the Watcher could have stopped was hit by a runaway uninhabited planet, destroying both and saving populated worlds. The Watcher was quick to extol the virtues of doing nothing.
- Artistic License – Nuclear Physics: In Tales of Suspense #49, guest starring Angel of the Uncanny X-Men, Angel is accidentally caught in Tony Stark's nuclear weapons test. His immediate first thought afterwards? He can feel his personality getting eviler. And no, it's not just implied by his actions, he literally states the radiation made him evil. At no point does he mention feeling anything, like crippling radiation sickness.
- Breakout Character: Issue #39 introduced a hero in a grey armored metal suit. Tony Stark, alias Iron Man. He went on to become one of Marvel's Long-Runners, a founding member of The Avengers and a key character in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
- Mad Scientist's Beautiful Daughter: Carla Strange, the daughter of Doctor Strange (No relation to Dr. Stephen Strange, the Mad Scientist who threatened both America and the USSR with nuclear armageddon. Eventually, she turned against her father's ambitions and helped Iron Man defeat him.
