STRANGE TALES #113

Pre-1977 Silver Age issue so no direct/newsstand distinction applies. Visible defects include moderate spine wear with several small ticks along the spine edge, a diagonal crease running through the upper right corner near the price box, notable discoloration/tanning at the top edge and right border, and a small chip/tear at the right edge near the middle. Corners show some rounding and softness, and there is general surface wear consistent with handling; the book is in a protective sleeve which adds some glare. Interior and back cover were not assessed.

Strange Tales #113 (Marvel, October 1963) pairs a Human Torch lead story by Stan Lee and Dick Ayers with a Doctor Strange backup illustrated by Steve Ditko, the pairing that defined the title's early Silver Age run. The Human Torch story introduces Samuel Smithers, the botanist-turned-villain Plantman, who would go on to recurring appearances across the Marvel Universe for decades. The Kirby-penciled, Ayers-inked cover captures the Torch in mid-battle, typical of the dynamic action covers that made the Strange Tales anthology format a proving ground for both the emerging Marvel style and Ditko's early Doctor Strange mythology.

Demand for the issue is anchored primarily in the Plantman first appearance rather than the cover or the Ditko backup, placing it in the secondary tier of early Strange Tales keys behind #110, #111, and #114. The FMV curve reflects that positioning: mid- and low-grade copies trade in a tight, shallow band typical of a supporting-cast key, while values accelerate sharply above 9.0 as the pool of high-grade certified copies thins dramatically, with only a handful of copies graded above 9.4 across the entire census.

The book suits Silver Age Marvel villain-origin collectors, Human Torch and Doctor Strange run-builders, and completists chasing the full 1963 Strange Tales sequence rather than crossover speculators. Lower and mid-grade raw copies remain accessible and trade steadily as reading and set-fill copies, while the very small population of high-grade certified examples commands outsized premiums driven almost entirely by scarcity rather than broad character demand.