[3] The Sub-Mariner was created for the unpublished movie-theater giveaway comic Motion Picture Funnies Weekly earlier that year, with the eight-page original story now expanded by four pages.

Also included were Al Anders' Western hero the Masked Raider (Jim Gardley), canceled after appearing in the first twelve issues; the jungle lord feature "The Adventures of Ka-Zar the Great", with Ben Thompson beginning a five-issue adaptation of the story "King of Fang and Claw" by Bob Byrd (pseudonym of Martin Goodman) in Goodman's pulp magazine Ka-Zar #1 (Oct. 1936);[4] the non-continuing-character story "Jungle Terror", featuring an adventurer named Ken Masters and Professor John Roberts, written by the quirkily named Tohm Dixon;[5] "Now I'll Tell One", five single-panel, black-and-white gag cartoons by Fred Schwab, on the inside front cover; and "Burning Rubber", a two-page prose story by Ray Gill about auto racing.

[3] A painted cover by veteran science fiction pulp artist Frank R. Paul featured the Human Torch,[3] looking much different than in the interior story.

[7] Other characters introduced in the title include the aviator the American Ace (#2, Dec. 1939), with part one of his origin reprinted, like the first part of the Sub-Mariner's, from Motion Picture Funnies Weekly #1; the private detective the Ferret (Leslie Lenrow) by writer Stockbridge Winslow and artist Irwin Hasen (issues 4-9, February 1940-July 1940); and writer-artist Steve Dahlman's robot hero Electro, the Marvel of the Age (appearing in every issue from #4–19, Feb. 1940 – May 1941).

Marvel Tales included among its contributors writer and editor-in-chief Stan Lee and such comics artists as Golden Age veterans Harry Anderson, Carl Burgos, Bill Everett, Fred Kida, Mike Sekowsky, Syd Shores, and Ogden Whitney, and, early in their careers, Dick Ayers, Gene Colan, Tony DiPreta, Mort Drucker, Russ Heath, Bernard Krigstein, Joe Maneely, Joe Sinnott, and Basil Wolverton, among others.

[14][15] An issue of Marvel Tales was included in a display of covers representative of the "Crime, Horror & Weird Variety" at the April 1954 hearings of the United States Senate Subcommittee on Juvenile Delinquency.