Doc was the original template of our "modern" heroes Batman and Superman. Indiana Jones is very much in keeping with Doc Savage.
I purchased lots of the magazines for a few years then drifted off. I blew the dust off the books recently and picked up issue #1 which contains two "complete book-length novels," Fortress of Solitude and The Devil Genghis.
It was an interesting place to start a new publication of reprints. I would have expected Will Murray, the consulting editor of the series, to start at the beginning. Instead he chose these two stories, #68 and #70, when the series was well established.
John Sunlight, the antagonist of the books, marked a departure in the series. It was the first time Doc suffered the bad guy to get away.
In Fortress of Solitude, John Sunlight stumbles upon Doc's secret hideaway. Once he makes his way inside, he takes advantage of all the technology within for his own purposes.
Up to this point the Fortress has not been revealed to the readers, only that Doc occasionally went there to think, learn, and train.
The beauty of the Doc Savage books is that you need not read them in order. Each story is self contained and the Doc Savage universe is explained in each installment with the first time reader in mind.
That is, except for these two.
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