In this bi-weekly series reviewing classic science fiction and fantasy books, Alan Brown looks at the front lines and frontiers of the field; books about soldiers and spacers, scientists and engineers, explorers and adventurers. Stories full of what Shakespeare used to refer to as “alarums and excursions”: battles, chases, clashes, and the stuff of excitement.
Novels that tie into other forms of entertainment don’t always have the best reputation. They are generally written by authors who are working for hire, and their quality can certainly vary. But back around the turn of the century, when I saw a book featuring one of my favorite comic book characters, Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D., I couldn’t pass it up. Plus, it was written by an author I was familiar with from his work on the venerable Doc Savage adventure series—and the fact that it had an eye-catching cover by Joe Jusko didn’t hurt either. You might wonder why I chose to review this book during the holiday season, but it turns out the fictional terrorists schedule their attack for Christmas Eve. So, like the movie Die Hard, this book is a Christmas tale.
Books are often used as source material by other media, and their stories frequently get adapted as movies, TV shows, cartoons, and comic books. But when the reverse happens, it is often looked down upon by those who take a relatively limited view toward what works have literary value. Authors of those adaptations rarely own the product they produce, and work for a fixed fee. But those adaptations sell well, and thus even the heroes of lowly comic books find themselves in prose form. And, of course, some of the books can be quite good…
Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.: Empyre is one such adaptation (while the acronym is presented as S.H.I.E.L.D. without periods on the cover, it is presented with periods on the copyright page, and throughout the book). The book is a paperback original, published by Berkley Boulevard Books in 2000. The author, Will Murray, is a noted author of adventure fiction with a long career. As mentioned above, the book has an evocative cover by the prolific comic book and cover artist Joe Jusko that echoes posters from the James Bond films. And it is illustrated with clever chapter headings by Jim Steranko, who illustrated one of the most popular runs of the S.H.I.E.L.D. comic book during the 1960s. These chapter headings start out as abstract shapes with a 1970s computer graphics feel, and slowly transform into a recognizable picture that appears at the end of the final chapter. But while the cover proudly proclaims this is, “THE FIRST NOVEL STARRING MARVEL’S SUPER-SPY!,” it is also the last I know of to feature the classic version of Nick Fury in a starring role.
About the Author
Will Murray (born 1953) is an American journalist and author of both books and comic books, specializing in new adventures of old pulp heroes. He has also edited magazines and reprints of classic pulp tales. In his youth, he was a fan of the Doc Savage pulp adventure series, and began his writing career with articles in fan magazines. He then got approval from Bantam Books to write additional Doc Savage novels under the house name of Kenneth Robeson, and began ghostwriting for the Destroyer adventure novel series. He has since gone on to publish over twenty new Doc Savage books, as well as adventures featuring Tarzan, John Carter of Mars, the Spider, the Executioner, and other characters. Murray has written adventures for a range of classic comic book characters for both Marvel and DC comics. His most notable contribution to the comics field, working with famed artist Steve Ditko, was creating the popular humorous character Squirrel Girl. He has won several awards recognizing excellence in the comic and pulp fiction fields.
The Many Adventures of Nick Fury and S.H.I.E.L.D.
Nick Fury is one of my favorite fictional characters. He is not a super-hero (at least, not at the start of his adventures), but is simply a man without special powers thrust into a super-powered world. He is a veteran of World War II’s European theater, just like my dad (my own personal hero). And when the writers thrust that pragmatic man, like a fish out of water, into the high-tech world of international espionage, the result was something special.
Fury was a creation of writer Stan Lee and artist Jack Kirby, and first appeared in the book Sergeant Fury and his Howling Commandos in May of 1963. The book was inspired by the WWII adventures of both men, especially those of Kirby, who served as a scout on the front lines (and beyond them) in Europe. I reviewed one issue of that comic (issue 13, where they met Captain America) after Stan Lee died, and you can find that review here. The review contained short biographies of Lee and Kirby, and also a roster for the commandos.
The comic companies tend to copy characters and elements that have proved successful for their competitors, and Sergeant Fury was probably intended to appeal to the same readers as DC’s Sergeant Rock, who had been around since 1959. But Fury’s WWII adventures were just part of his role in Marvel Comics. He began to appear as a CIA agent, in comics set in the present day of the 1960s, in stories featuring superheroes like the Fantastic Four. And then in August 1965, in issue #135 of the anthology comic Strange Tales, Fury was recruited by defense industrialist Tony Stark to head the shadowy international entity called S.H.I.E.L.D., the Supreme Headquarters, International Espionage and Law-Enforcement Division. The organization was obviously modeled on the popular James Bond movies with their fancy gadgets and vehicles. The world-weary and cynical Fury served as an audience surrogate, an ordinary guy thrown into an extraordinary environment, and that contrast gave the adventures a unique feel. Fury and S.H.I.E.L.D. had their own book for a while, and even after it was cancelled, frequently appeared in other comics.
Over the years, however, it was increasingly implausible to have the character rooted in WWII, given that he hadn’t been frozen in suspended animation after the war like Captain America. In the comics, the writers explained Fury’s longevity to an “Infinity Formula” that he and some of his allies used to extend their lives.
Starting in 2001, Marvel created a new “Ultimate” universe to give their characters a fresh start, and introduced a new alternate world version of Nick Fury, whose appearance was modeled by the artists on actor Samuel L. Jackson, and who was not tied to a WWII origin. Jackson was persuaded to allow the comics to use his likeness on the condition that he would be offered the role if the character was ever featured in a movie. Thus, when the new Marvel Cinematic Universe (or MCU) was launched in 2008, Jackson donned the eyepatch. This new version of Fury soon eclipsed the classic character. The comics eventually introduced a son of the original Nick Fury who resembled the MCU version. The older Fury, who had long since stopped being a fish out of water, and thus lost much of his pragmatic appeal, was drawn into increasingly improbable adventures in space, appearing occasionally as a guest in comics focused on other characters.
The organization S.H.I.E.L.D. went on to make many appearances on TV and the big screen. There was a made-for-TV movie in 1998 starring David Hasselhoff as Fury, which while not being very good, was not as bad as some other comic book adaptations in that era. There were a number of S.H.I.E.L.D. appearances in Marvel Comics-based animated features. Nick Fury (the new version) was a central figure in the MCU, and the downfall of S.H.I.E.L.D. was a major plot point in the movie Captain America: Winter Soldier. The TV show Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., starring actor Clark Gregg as Phil Coulson, ran for seven seasons from 2013 to 2020 (and you can find Tor.com coverage of the show here).
Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.: Empyre
Before reading a book, I often flip to the front and back to read copyrights, forwards, and author biographies. In this one, I noticed some additional information in Will Murray’s biography. It stated that he is a professional psychic, with skills including clairvoyance and precognition. This put me on my guard, because while I enjoy science fiction stories of paranormal powers, I am skeptical when people claim such abilities are real. And when it transpired that a psychic character, Starla Spacek, plays as big a role as Fury in the book, I was not pleased. I wanted to read about Fury and the characters from the comic book, not some character I’d never heard of.
While psychic abilities take up a lot of the narrative, however, there is still a lot of exciting old-fashioned spy stuff, and Murray has a good feel for the comic book characters and a knack for thrilling action scenes. Fury has a way of charging into action like a bull in a china shop that might not be very realistic, but sure is fun to read. After a short training scene where Fury meets Spacek, he is lured onto a commercial airliner that is piloted by men who seem to be hypnotized, and are determined to crash the plane. The plane goes down in spectacular fashion. Murray did his homework on the aviation field, and the flying scenes are full of realistic details. Then a badly injured airliner requests permission to land on the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier (a giant flying aircraft carrier), only to blow up on the deck and damage one of the massive turbines that keep the craft aloft.
Spacek is assigned as the new S.H.I.E.L.D. Special Powers Director, taking over an organization that had been on the verge of being eliminated due to erratic results. She immediately clashes with Director Skindarian, who oversees traditional intelligence for the organization. Spacek’s first job is to find out what happened to Fury, who appears to be dead.
Fury, in a typical S.H.I.E.L.D. act of misdirection, is only pretending to be dead, and uses one of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s high-tech devices to temporarily reshape his features. We meet Contessa Val de Fontaine and Gabe Jones from the comics, but other than a few tangential mentions, they do not play a role in the narrative. The staff’s first guess is that these airline disasters are the work of Hydra, the evil organization that opposes S.H.I.E.L.D. at every turn, because some of the planes were carrying Life Model Decoys, or LMDs, human-like robots that are used by both S.H.I.E.L.D. and Hydra. But Spacek is picking up hints that there may be a nefarious element based in the Middle East mixed up in this as well.
There are more aircraft-related disasters, and Spacek helps uncover a psychic Hydra agent who has infiltrated the helicarrier. It appears Empyre Airlines is involved with the crashes, so Fury decides to infiltrate their headquarters alone (which makes little sense, but feels true to the comic book adventures). He uses Spacek and her powers to stay in touch with S.H.I.E.L.D.. The facility is abandoned, and he suspects that’s been the case for some time—because unlike S.H.I.E.L.D. facilities at this time of year, there are no Christmas decorations in the common areas. As the facility begins to mysteriously sink into the ground, Fury makes a narrow escape.
Spacek links the aircraft accidents to people sporting mysterious scorpion tattoos, who turn out to be linked to Nadir al-Bazinda, head of the fictional nation of Quorak, recently defeated in the first Gulf War (a very thinly veiled version of Iraq). Al-Bazinda is eager to exact revenge for his defeat, and he and Hydra have been working on a plan to attack cities around the world. Spacek casts his horoscope (exhibiting yet another paranormal power) and discovers that al-Bazinda’s violent death is imminent. If he is going to see his evil plan succeed, it will take place on Christmas Eve. At the risk of spoiling the ending—and because potential readers might require some advance warning, given the disturbing parallels with real-world events that would unfold only a year after the book was written—it turns out the plan is to use captured jets full of passengers as cruise missiles. In a comic book-style bit of excess, the jets will also carry a substance called Inferno 42, which packs an explosive power that rivals nuclear weapons. Fury and Spacek take a S.H.I.E.L.D. flying car to confront al-Bazinda face to face (because of course they do). To further spoil the ending, Fury and his team are successful in saving Christmas, but that will come as no surprise to readers. In this type of book, while the journey to victory is assured, it’s how they get there that keeps things interesting.
Final Thoughts
I don’t imagine that many readers of this column have encountered Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.: Empyre, but if you have, I’d love to hear your thoughts on the book. I’d also like to hear suggestions on any good comic book adaptations you have encountered over the years. And we can grapple with the eternal question: should adventures set at Christmas time, like this book and the movie Die Hard, be considered Christmas stories?
And finally, I’d like to wish all of you a safe and happy holiday season, no matter how or what you celebrate at this time of year.
Alan Brown has been a science fiction fan for over five decades, especially fiction that deals with science, military matters, exploration and adventure.
