King-Sized Annual! All New! The Thing and The Man Called Nova!
"When Strike The Monitors!"
Marvel Two-in-One was the Marvel series in the 1970s and 1980s that featured The Thing teaming up with a random hero to fight what were usually simple and lighthearted stories. This annual, published in 1978, featured The Thing teaming up with Nova, a Marvel character that has been around for decades without ever finding his niche, either in universe or out. The story features an alien race called "The Monitors" that come to earth. The Monitors seek perfection, meaning they are programmed to destroy, because all planets fall short of their standards of perfection. The Monitors are gigantic aliens in blue and orange suits, and even in the story, the Thing refers to them as "Galactus rejects". This is familiar territory, both in-universe and out. But wait! The Monitors ships are powered by giant women in comas. Those women, along with wearing bright purple and powder blue disco leotards with cone bras, are also robots. Who were originally the engines of the ships, before absorbing so many souls from doomed planets that they evolved into psychic disco leotard ladies who realize that the Monitors must be stopped. This finally happens, with small contributions from The Thing and Nova, but mostly due to a revelation.
Interesting and important note: this was written, and edited, by Marv Wolfman, who was a versatile and well-known creator in comics at the time. Apparently, this was the same year that Jim Shooter became editor-in-chief at Marvel, but he isn't included on the byline. At this time, Marvel was tightening up its writing styles and standards. But this story seems to be a relic of the freewheeling 70s, and seems to have more in common with goofy silver age titles, and anthology science-fiction, of the 1970s, rather than of the more structured Marvel Universe that would be appearing in the 1980s. At one point in the story, Nova is blasted "100 million light years" from Earth, and must return to earth through a "reality warp". The Monitors are also big and strong enough that Nova and The Thing are almost useless against them---but later on, they are destroyed by being thrown into a volcano, and being hit by a subway car. It has that lack of scale or proportion that characterized comics of the silver age.
It is not without its own sort of charm, being full of the sort of pulpy, campy charm that Marvel had before it got so serious. There is a Hostess Fruit Pie Ad in here, and Doctor J and Rick Barry selling you a basketball on the rear cover. The only thing missing, as the Thing himself observes, is that he never gets to say "It's Clobbering Time". This cost me $4 in fair condition, after a 50% discount, and it was $4 well spent.