The Galactus Trilogy

"The Galactus Trilogy" is a 1966 three-issue comic book story arc that appeared in Fantastic Four #48–50. Written, co-plotted and drawn by Jack Kirby with editor Stan Lee for Marvel Comics, it introduced the characters Galactus and the Silver Surfer. In 2018, The Atlantic called it "the indisputable pinnacle of the so-called Silver Age of comic books".

In 1966, nearly five years after launching Marvel Comics' flagship superhero title, Fantastic Four, Kirby and Lee collaborated on an antagonist designed to break from the era's archetypal mold of supervillains, and instead be a being of god-like stature and power. As Lee recalled in 1993,

Galactus was simply another in a long line of super-villains whom we loved creating. Having dreamed up such powerful baddies as the Mole Man, the Frightful Four, the Grey Gargoyle, the Executioner, the Mandarin and Doctor Doom, we felt the only way to top ourselves was to come up with an evil-doer who had almost godlike powers. Therefore, the natural choice was sort of a demi-god, but now what would we do with him? We didn't want to use the tired old cliche about him wanting to conquer the world. There were enough would-be world conquerors in the Marvel Universe and in all the other comic book galaxies. That was when inspiration struck. Why not have him not be a really evil person? After all, a demi-god should be beyond mere good and evil. He'd just be (don't laugh!) hungry. And the nourishment he'd require is the life force and energy from living planets!"

Kirby described his Biblical inspirations for Galactus and an accompanying character, an angelic Herald Lee dubbed the Silver Surfer:

My inspirations were the fact that I had to make sales and come up with characters that were no longer stereotypes. In other words, I couldn't depend on gangsters. I had to get something new. For some reason, I went to the Bible, and I came up with Galactus. And there I was in front of this tremendous figure, who I knew very well because I've always felt him. I certainly couldn't treat him in the same way I could any ordinary mortal. And I remember in my first story, I had to back away from him to resolve that story. The Silver Surfer is, of course, the fallen angel. When Galactus relegated him to Earth, he stayed on Earth, and that was the beginning of his adventures. They were figures that had never been used before in comics. They were above mythic figures. And of course they were the first gods.

Kirby further explained, "Galactus in actuality is a sort of god. He is beyond reproach, beyond anyone's opinion. In a way he is kind of a Zeus, who fathered Hercules. He is his own legend, and of course, he and the Silver Surfer are sort of modern legends, and they are designed that way."

Writer Mike Conroy expanded on Lee and Kirby's explanation: "In five short years from the launch of the Fantastic Four, the Lee/Kirby duo...had introduced a whole host of alien races or their representatives...there were the Skrulls, the Watcher and the Stranger, all of whom Lee and Kirby used in the foundations of the universe they were constructing, one where all things were possible but only if they did not flout the 'natural laws' of this cosmology. In the nascent Marvel Universe, characters acted consistently, whatever comic they were appearing in. Their actions reverberated through every title. It was pure soap opera but on a cosmic scale, and Galactus epitomized its epic sweep."

All this led to the introduction of Galactus in Fantastic Four #48-50 (March–May 1966), which fans began calling "The Galactus Trilogy". It culminated in Fantastic Four #50 (May 1966), which featured the Silver Surfer interceding on behalf of humankind against Galactus.