Reading the Fantastic Four comics from the start. Writer Mark Millar’s dark and violent Marquis of Death storyline comes to a dark and violent ending in issue #569.

Gimmie a gimmick: This issue has a wraparound cover, a single image with Johnny and Ben on the front half, and Sue and Reed on the back.

Dr. Doom’s long-lost mentor the Marquis of Death has arrived after wreaking havoc across the multiverse. He dispatched with Doom by taking him back in time and feeding him to a dinosaur. Then he decided to meddle with the FF in various ways, ultimately summoning a bunch of other Fantastic Fours from other realities to attack the new Baxter Building.

This issue starts with some business where the rest of the FF think Reed is one of the alternates, as he’s just been teleported in from his experience with the Marquis. After the team sorts out that it’s the real him, the Marquis reappears. He explains that he gave the other FFs a choice, to destroy this FF or see their own worlds destroyed. Ben and Reed compare notes, that the Marquis is actually Clyde Wyncham, a man from yet another alternate universe with reality-bending powers. Reed says he could have killed Wyncham in the past, but refused to do so. Ben questions his own personal code, saying he can take the FF’s pogo plane to area 87, where this timeline’s Wyncham is being kept. Reed lets Ben go, while Sue, Johnny, and child genius Valeria shore up the building’s defenses. Valeria suggests using an energy-draining device, and old invention of Reed’s, and he tells her she’s not thinking big enough.

Ben arrives in the desert outside area 87. He says this will be more like euthanasia than homicide. The Marquis’ unnamed apprentice appears and attacks Ben. Ben punches him out with a classic “It’s clobberin’ time!” Ben enters area 87 and finds present-day Wyncham, still attached to the device mind/energy draining device where he ended up after the Marvel 1985 miniseries. Ben muses that it’s not very heroic to kill the bad guy before he becomes the bad guy, and then says, “I never been the hero type.” Back at the Baxter Building, Reed is overwhelmed by the alternate universe Reeds, only for them to get knocked out by a series of explosions. Ben and a revived Wyncham teleport into the building. He says there’s been a chance of plans, and that the comic-reading Wyncham is a big FF fan. The Marquis reappears again, saying that Wyncham now is nothing compared to what the Marquis will become in the future.

Time for everything to get all cosmic and psychedelic as Wyncham and the Marquis facing off. First they summon a bunch of Marvel heroes and villains, and then they summon some of Marvel’s godlike beings. Then they all fight. Whether this is actually happening, or if it’s all in their heads, or if it’s on some otherworldly plane of existence. The Marquis wins the fight, even though it drains him of some of his power. He boasts that he still has enough to defeat the FF, but then Reed says he uses his power-draining device to gain the powers of all the alt-universe FFs. He and his teammates now have the power of thousands of FFs, but their bodies can’t handle it. Reed says they only have twenty-three seconds before their hearts explode.

The clock ticks down as the FF use their new powers to pummel the Marquis. At fourteen seconds, Reed tells Johnny to burn at a temperature of ten to the thirty-second power, which he says is the temperature where time and space break down. The Marquis says this will rupture the entire multiverse, and Reed says, “You picked the wrong Fantastic Four this time.” Johnny unleashes the blast right at twenty-three seconds. The FF survive, and the Marquis is reduced to a weakened, skeleton form.

Then the Marquis’ apprentice appears (everybody’s just teleporting all over the place in this issue). He takes Dr. Doom’s mask back from the Marquis, and says he let Ben defeat him back in Area 87 to avoid suspicion. The apprentice punches out the Marquis, puts on the mask, removes his hood, and reveals he’s been the original Dr. Doom all along! He explains that he survived being in prehistoric times and lived throughout the centuries by mastering heretofore unknown mystical powers. He transformed every molecule in his body (!) so that his old teacher would not recognize him. He became the Marquis’ new apprentice, and bided his time until this moment, when he could take revenge and return to power.

The Marquis revives, and he finally says he’s proud of Doom. Responds by saying “Silence.” He then burns up the Marquis’ body. Ben and Johnny are ready for a fight, but Doom says his rivalry with the FF is over, and they are no longer of consequence to him. But then he says they will die if they cross him again.

But there’s more drama to deal with. It’s wedding day for Ben and Debbie Green. Except Ben is running late. No one can find him, and Reed is concerned. The FF wonder if supervillains are to blame, but Debbie sneaks away and finds Ben drinking at a nearby pub. She tells him that she knows the FF live dangerous lives, and she’s okay with that. He says, “I can’t do it to ya, Debs.” He reminisces about all the other superheroes who have lost their loved ones. The wedding party finds them at the pub, only for Ben to tell them all that he and Debbie are splitting. Everyone commiserates for a bit, and Sue and Debbie part with a hug. Reed and Johnny join Ben inside for another drink, with Reed saying, “I’m buying.”

Unstable molecule: All the Reeds from other universes monologue while attacking our Reed, who wonders if he sounds like that when he fights.

Fade out: Sue turns Debbie invisible to sneak her past the paparazzi at the wedding. She promises Debbie that they’ll always be friends.

Clobberin’ time: Despite threatening messages on the FF’s answering machine, Reed says all the superheroes have Ben’s back. We’re not told what villains are leaving messages, but one of them mentions owning a python.

Flame on: Johnny’s ‘roided up supernova flame is described as “planck temperature,” which is the opposite of absolute zero. I’ll take their word for it.

Fantastic fifth wheel: She-Hulk and Storm are seen in the Wyncham/Marquis cosmic battle. She-Hulk and Luke Cage are both guests at the wedding.

Our gal Val: We’re not told what the energy-draining device is that Valeria and Reed come up with, except that it has a history. My guess is that it’s from Fantastic Four #57-60. The power-stealing device from that story was never named. The Marvel Wiki has designated it “the power cosmic infusing machine.”

Trivia time: Does this issue mean that from now on, Dr. Doom is an immortal who’s been around since dinosaur times, and who has godlike arcane powers? Not so much. An Avengers story shortly after this would do a retcon, establishing that Dr. Doom actually time traveled to the future just after surviving the dinosaur, and then become the apprentice.

The comic doesn’t say if Wyncham is dead or merely knocked out. This is the final appearance of Wyncham and/or the Marquis of Death, so Wyncham’s fate remains unknown. This is also the final appearance of Debbie Green.

The FF’s old mailman Willie Lumpkin is at the wedding, with a pretty brunette girl sitting next to him. Could this be his niece Billie? She was the mail carrier during the team’s Pier 4 era (era), and there were unresolved hints that something sci-fi was going on with her. If that is her, it’s nice to know Marvel hasn’t forgotten her.

Fantastic or frightful? The idea of superheroes who’ve sworn never to kill has led to lots of great drama over the years, mostly with Batman, but also with goody-goodies like Superman and Spider-Man, when the go into a dark place and are pushed to the edge. I don’t know if this trope can be applied to Fantastic Four, however. Only a few panels are given to Reed and Ben wrestling with the morality of this, and it’s not really resolved. The better version of this would have Ben driven to the edge of killing Wyncham, and that being the catalyst for him calling off the wedding. That, plus the team being powered up for only a few seconds at risk of their own lives has little consequence. It just works, and that’s it? The story is more interested in the reveal of Dr. Doom as the apprentice, and it seems like everything else is hurried to get to that point and then wrap things up. In the end, the whole Marquis of Death story might be ambitious and provocative, but it just doesn’t work.

Next: Back under quarantine.

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