Marvel Two-In-One #100 (Marvel/1983)

Marvel Two-In-One #100 (Marvel Comics)

John Byrne (w) Ron Wilson (a)

The Thing was one of the iconic members of Marvel's "first family" the Fantastic Four and it was hardly a surprise that he was given his own "solo" book in 1974. However Marvel Two-In-One was not really a solo title. It was a "team up" book that ran for 100 issues and saw Benjamin Grimm team up with other characters in the Marvel Universe.

"Team-up" books are always great fun. DC had Brave & the Bold which mainly featured Batman and later produced DC Comics Presents with Superman. Marvel also has err...Marvel Team-Up which was for the most part a Spider-Man book, though there was the odd issue without Spidey

  

One of the opportunities this gave Marvel was to feature characters who did not have their own comics as well as the one's that did. So Ben Grimm met not Just Captain America and Doctor Strange but The Golem, Black Goliath and Modred the Mystic just to name a few. There was even a book that featured Doc Savage whilst Marvel had the licence.

  

Issue #100 was to be the "last" although the comic did continue as simply The Thing.

This last issue was a team-up where The Thing meets himself or rather his doppelganger in an alternate timeline in a world devastated by Galactus and the survivors fighting the Red Skull. Ben has been to this world before and tried to cure "himself" in the past but now realises that this wasn't him. Reed richards explains all the scientific mumbo jumbo.

Grimm blames himself for turning this worlds "Thing" human again and wonders if it was his fault that Galactus beat Earths heroes. Turns out there was no Silver Surfer in this reality. I note the Watcher wasn't mentioned either. Both were instrumental in stopping Galactus on "our" Earth.

At the end Ben contemplates whether his human counterpart is better off than him and decides otherwise...