This week, all the mainstream news outlets were breaking a huge story about an Earth-shattering development in Marvel Comics.
Headline after headline after headline, all in giant fonts and bold letters screamed the same “news” item over and over again…
“Is it true?! Is Marvel really killing of a major character?! How do you feel about that?”
And even some of my pals who’ve read comics for as long as I have got caught up.
“I can’t believe Marvel’s doing this! This is bullsh*t!”
I tell ya, whenever Marvel makes headlines about shuffling a major character off this mortal coil, I always get… nostalgic. I think back on the first time I saw the company kill a major character. I think back on a little story billed on the cover as…
“FOUR… NO MORE!”
Confession time; I love the Fantastic Four. For me, like so many others, the work Stan Lee and Jack Kirby did on the book stands as a testament not just to what comic book storytelling is capable of, but science fiction storytelling as well.
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| The creations of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, depicted by John Byrne |
And then you throw in runs from guys like John Byrne, Mark Waid and Mike Wieringo, Walt Simonson and the recent genius that was the Jonathon Hickman run and you get a book that is a regular showcase for what an entire genre and medium is capable of.
I wish I could say the Stan and Jack run was my first exposure to the book, or that it was John Byrne’s The Trial of Galactus that hooked me. But it wasn’t.
No, Mr. Tom DeFalco gets the honor of hooking a young Chris and he did it with issue #381.
Know that it’s only been a recent development that I could or would openly profess my love of the work of one Tom DeFalco on the Fantastic Four. It was with good reason, though. After all, it was DeFalco and company who introduced more than a few… questionable elements into the Fantastic Four canon.
Elements like…
- Reed Richards’ vest’o’pouches
- Johnny Storm marrying a Skrull
- Ben Grimm being maimed by Wolverine.
- Franklin Richards becoming… ugh… Psi-Lord.
- Susan Richards’ 4-shaped… ugh … boob window
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| I think someone left the Boob Window open… |
And that list is just what I came up with based on quickly reviewing two pages from issue #381.
But…
Say what you will about the 90s and the various tropes that it spawned, DeFalco and artist Paul Ryan did create a Fantastic Four run that managed to not just capture an adolescent Chris looking to have his mind blown, but they also managed to make a Fantastic Four fan for life and it all started with issue #381.
First, check out that cover….
… that’s an amazing cover no matter you dice it. You look at that cover and you know shit’s going down in the pages within. You just know it. Granted, you don’t know that that an alien is tearing up Latveria and the FF have arrived on the scene to give Doom an assist in dealing with it. But who cares! Look at that cover! And then you turn to the first page…
… and you see him. See that guy?
That, ladies and gentlemen, is the Reed Richards I was first introduced to.
Reed Richards: Man of Action. Despite the very 90s-esque vest’o’pouches, this portrayal of Dr. Richards is actually pretty much in line with the way Stan and Jack wrote him.
In the early 2000s it kind of became a thing to write Richards as nothing more than a nerdy, stretchy… nerd, but that’s not at all who the character is. Sure, he’s smart and often times more than a little nerdy. But he’s also confident. He’s a doer. He’s active. He knows the things that need doing and how to do them. As 90s as that page from issue #381 is, it’s pretty much, well, Reed Richards.
And Doom? Man is he so totally Doom in this issue. Remember, this was my first exposure to the character beyond trading cards and I have to say a new reader could do so much worse than this.
He’s conniving. He’s petty. He’s vindictive. He’s got plans within plans, wheels within wheels. In fact, Doom, as he does in any good Doom story, damn near steals the show.
Let’s talk about Paul Ryan. Paul Ryan, to me, is one of the great unsung heroes of the 90s. Guys like Jim Lee, Rob Liefeld and Todd McFarlane were the hotness way back when, but, surprise surprise, their art doesn’t always hold up. It looks dated and, worst of all, the more you learn about the medium, the clearer it becomes where those guys cut corners.
Paul Ryan will likely never be a keynote speaker at a Wizard World, but holy crap could that guy tell a story. There’s an old adage that a good artist should be able to convey pertinent plot points in a story without the help of dialogue.
Ya know what? Flipping through issue #381 after all these years, you can absolutely follow the story and the action without reading word one. Can’t really say the same for other, more prolific artists from the same era.
I have to admit, I really did enjoy going back through issue #381 of Fantastic Four. I thought I was going to find a whole heckuva lot to mock, but besides the pouches and boob window, I have to admit, what I was pleasantly surprised. Instead what I got was a rousing story filled with action, suspense, and weird pseudo science.
Oh. And the death of a major Marvel character. I got that too.
