Tales to Astonish #39
The Vengeance of the Scarlet Beetle!
Henry Pym is scanning the monitoring device that connects him to a network of ants that watch the city for crime. There are no crimes in progress, but something happening in the insect world has his ants agitated. He decides to check it out and changes into Ant-Man. After shrinking down in size, Ant-Man uses his catapult to launch him to the location of the disturbance.
He lands near a storm drain and goes into the sewers below. There he finds a gathering of different breeds of insects. It appears that they are all listening to a massive red beetle that is glowing with energy. Realizing that this Scarlet Beetle is talking to the other insects through telepathy, Ant-Man adjusts his cybernetic helmet so he can hear what it is saying. The Scarlet Beetle is attempting to amass an army of insects in order to overthrow the human race. Amazingly, this beetle has been mutated when it was irradiated during a scientific experiment. Spotting the intruder, the Scarlet Beetle orders the others to attack Ant-Man. They knock the hero out and remove his helmet. The Scarlet Beetle then takes Ant-Man’s belt which contains his size-changing chemicals, intending to use them to become human-sized. When Ant-Man wakes up he finds himself in a pit he is unable to climb out of.
Meanwhile, insects loyal to the Scarlet Beetle begin attacking humanity. Termites begin chewing their way through communication networks, hordes of insects begin stealing explosives from a National Guard armory, while venomous spiders have been biting people and making them sick. The Scarlet Beetle himself begins taking an active role by taking down television and radio stations, while swarms of bees keep law enforcement at bay.
At that moment, Ant-Man continues to struggle to get out of his hole. Luckily, when his cybernetic helmet was discarded it began sending out a transmission that his ants — the only insects that have not joined the Scarlet Beetle — are summoned. They spot their master trapped in the hole and help him escape. When Ant-Man returns to the surface he finds the Scarlet Beetle terrorizing people in a park. Grabbing a popsicle stick he has an ant race him up the side of a nearby water fountain. When other insects attempt to impede Ant-Man, they find their path to the water fountain mired by a field of honey left by the ants. Ant-Man then presses the popsicle stick up against the water fountain’s drinking sprout so it can spray a wide swath of flying insects. By this time, the ants have brought Ant-Man a chemical sprayer full of insect repellant and he uses it to drive the other insects away.
That’s when the Scarlet Beetle notices that Ant-Man is free and chases after the hero. Pym lures his foe into a nearby toy store. There Ant-Man takes a javelin from a toy knight and uses it to puncture the canister of shrinking gas that the Scarlet Beetle is wearing, causing the creature to return to its normal size. Ant-Man easily overpowers the beetle and traps him inside a balloon. Pym then returns to his lab and, after resuming his normal size, uses his scientific skills to stripe the Scarlet Beetle of the radiation that gave it is enhanced intelligence. With the battle returned to normal, Pym lets it free in his back yard.[1] Henry is later amused when he overhears the police wondering why Ant-Man wasn’t around when the city was being terrorized by the insect swarm.
Recurring Characters
Ant-Man, Scarlet Beetle
Continuity Notes
This isn’t the end of the Scarlet Beetle as the creature will return to terrorize humanity many times after starting with his return in Untold Tales of Spider-Man #12.
Topical References
The termites in this story are depicted as eating through wooden telephone poles. This should be considered a topical reference as wired telephone networks have since been relocated into underground infrastructure to prevent outages when poles go down. Also, traditional landlines are quickly becoming obsolete as wireless communication is becoming more commonplace. Modern readers could assume that the termites are eating through underground landlines, internet connections, or damaging cellular towers that provide wireless connectivity instead of old fashioned telephone poles.
The pesticide that Ant-Man uses against the insect horde is DDT, aka Dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane. This chemical was banned from use in the United States in 1972 due to its toxicity to humans. Modern readers can assume that Ant-Man used a different type of pesticide.
