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Reading the Fantastic Four comics from the start. After spending the last few months looking some of the many FF-related spinoffs that Marvel produced in abundance from 2002 to 2005, we’re back to the main series and the return of a classic villain in issue #525.

What’s all this, then? Mark Waid and Mike Weiringo have ended their famous run on the series, but Waid’s co-writer Karl Kesel is sticking around, maintaining a similar tone. There’s a real sense of “Let’s keep the party going” in this issue’s tone. Tom Grummett is the new penciler, with Larry Stucker on inks, Paul Mounts on colors, and Randy Gentile on letters. Comics guru Tom Brevoort is still on as editor.

Alicia is babysitting little Franklin and Valeria when the FF return from an unseen adventure in the Microverse. Alicia tells everyone that NYC’s Chesler Hotel is being torn down, not by the city, but by the building’s residents. They’ve apparently gone insane and are holding hostages inside. Johnny flies to the building, where he finds all the residents are destroying the building from the inside because they’re searching for treasure hidden in the walls or under the floors.

A short fight breaks out between the residents and Johnny and Ben, before Reed breaks it up. The residents use the water pipes to attack Johnny, and Ben suspects something is up with the water. Reed has Sue turn the entire building invisible except for the plumbing. She reveals all the pipes are not ceramic or metal, but gold. Reed says the pipes were originally lead, which means someone turned the lead to gold. Sue exclaims, “Alchemy!” and on cue, the evil alchemist Diablo appears. They fight, until Diablo says he’s there to return the gold back to lead. He’s acquired the famous Philosopher’s Stone, and makes the pipes lead again.

Diablo retells part of his origin story. Back in 9th century Spain, he mastered the potions that gave him eternal youth, and he survived torture and captivity during the Spanish Inquisition. He swore revenge, and he says today is the day. He wants to use the FF’s time machine inside the new Baxter Building to go back and stop the Inquisition from happening. Reed refuses, fearing that Diablo really wants to go back in time to conquer the world. Diablo says he will transform parts of New York into gold each day until Reed relents. He gives them two days to think it over, and then he disappears.

Cut to the next morning, when everyone is concerned about what Diablo will do. At the breakfast table, Franklin describes a dream he had, where he was confronted by Doctor Doom. Ben describes a similar dream, like something out of an old monster movie, where he’s chased by torch-wielding villagers. Johnny interrupts breakfast, irritable and short-tempered. Sue urges him not to lose control and she tells him to take the day off, Diablo or no Diablo.

Reed has been up all night, running tests on a pipe from the building. He hopes to track transmutational residue from it back to Diablo’s location. Elsewhere, Sue is in the business office for Fantastic Four Inc., talking to chief financial officer Jian about Johnny’s ongoing work of co-running the company. Jian says Johnny is doing well, and customers like him and are attracted to him. “Like moths to a flame,” Sue adds.

The next night, Reed reveals to Franklin that he too had a strange dream. He saw himself carrying a huge sack of mail through the city during a blizzard, only to attacked by a bunch of the FF’s villains. Franklin then reveals that mailman Willie Lumpkin told him he had the exact same dream. Reed wakes everyone else up and asks about their dreams. Ben had a dream of losing control of the Fantasticar and falling, and Reed says that’s a common type of dream for a child.

Reed fears that the FF are all having each other’s dreams. Further, without their own dreams, they won’t be able to sleep properly, which will make then more and more irritable and unable to think clearly. Sue says they’ve got to go after Diablo, but Reed says, “I don’t believe Diablo had anything to do with this.”

Unstable molecule: Franklin’s dream of Dr. Doom included the sensation of not being afraid of Doom. This suggests that he was having Reed’s dream.

Fade out: In the office, Sue asks Jian about an invoice for Vibranium. Although Black Panther is a long-standing ally to the FF, I find it unlikely that Wakanda is selling its most important resource to anyone. The Marvel Wiki states there’s also an Antarctic Vibranium, which was involved in a She-Hulk story, so perhaps this is the Vibranium the FF are buying.

Clobberin’ time: Ben swallows a huge stack of pancakes during breakfast, a shoutout to him doing the same back in the Jack Kirby days.  

Flame on: The hotel residents manage to put out Johnny’s flame by dousing him with water, even though it’s been a long, long time since he overcame that weakness. My guess is that Johnny’s off his game due to the dream stuff.  

Four and a half: With all this talk of dreams, there’s no mention of Franklin’s former dream-based powers he had in his Power Pack days. Franklin is still powerless during this time, and will be for the foreseeable future.

Our gal Val: There are a few references to baby Valeria crying all night. Ben suspects that poor Val has been having his nightly nightmares.

Trivia time: What’s Diablo been up to? Remember that the last time we saw him in Fantastic Four, the elemental creatures he summoned drew him into an unnamed abyss. In a follow-up Avengers storyline, he sent a simulacrum of himself to Earth in search of artifact that could free him. Diablo got caught up in the Avengers’ battle against an army of Hulks (!) in which the duplicate was destroyed, and he remained in the abyss. That leads into this issue, with no explanation of how he escaped and made it back to Earth. The theory is that the Philosopher’s Stone was instrumental in his escape.

And what about that Philosopher’s Stone? Despite being a popular myth for hundreds of years before a certain boy wizard made it a household name, this storyline is the only time the Marvel version of it appears. The stone gets a mention in a 2020 Black Cat comic, however, so it might return someday.

Fantastic or frightful? Rather than a soft reboot with a flashy new #1 issue, the new creative team picks up where the previous left off, maintaining subplots and a similar tone. This is something comics don’t do anymore. But Kesel, Grummet, and company come out swinging with a fun issue full of action and mystery. Good stuff.

Next: More dream stuff.

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Reading the Fantastic Four comics from the start. It’s more manga-inspired action with 2004’s X4: X-Men/Fantastic Four. I was going to skip this series due to unavailability, but I found a copy at the last minute, so let’s get our mutant freak on.

What’s all this, then? The first issue cover credits Pat Lee and Dreamwave Studios, with the interior credits show writer Akira Yoshida, Lee on pencils, and variety of others on layout, backgrounds, and inks. Founded by Pat Lee, Dreamwave burst on the scene with super-cool comics such as Dark Minds and Warlands. They later got the license to the Transformers, and they were more or less the caretakers of the Transformers universe for a while. Dreamwave shut down in 2005, and there are a lot of differing and unfortunate opinions online as to why, with a lot of ugliness and people saying mean things to each other. It appears this miniseries came right at the end of Dreamwave, because starting with issue #3, the credits read “Dream Engine Studios” instead.

X4 begins in Earth’s orbit, where NASA space station Simulacra is welcoming home a Mars lander. Something goes wrong and, there’s an explosion. Cut the Xavier Institute in Westchester, New York. Wolverine is woken up due to the X-Mansion’s doorbell. With no one else around, he answers it and finds the Fantastic Four at the X-Men’s front door. Ben says, “Our big brain just wants to talk to your big brain.” Wolverine loses his cool, and he and Ben fight for several pages. Storm flies down from the sky, and then a fight breaks out between her and Johnny. These fights go on for a few more pages, in a classic excuse-for-the-characters-to-show-off-their-powers. Emma Frost then arrives and uses telepathy to break up the fight.  

The FF and the X-Men gather inside the mansion, with Reed explaining that he just had to make a request in person, rather than calling or emailing. Reed wants to speak to Professor Xavier, but Wolverine says the prof has taken off. Reed shows them footage of the Simulacra, saying that the station had an eighteen-member crew, and its unknown whether any survived the explosion. The Beast suspects that something was hidden on the Mars lander. Reed says he’s come to the X-Men for use of Cerebra, their advanced mutant-hunting computer.

Emma Frost says neither Cerebra nor any mutant telepath can reach space, and Cyclops suggests a team flying to space to get a telepath close to the Simulacra. The X-Men show off their new X-Jet, which combines human and alien tech, and capable of long-distance spaceflight. The FF are impressed, but there are only six seats inside. It’s decided that the team will be Emma for her telepathy, Ben and Wolverine for the muscle, and Sue, Nightcrawler, and Gambit for their “resources.”  They fly to the Simulacra, where Emma senses frightened survivors inside. The heroes enter the station to find a tentacled monster waiting for them.

Issue #2 begins with Reed and Beast comparing notes, with Reed saying he’s been tracking a cosmic irregularity that may be related to the incident in the Simulacra, and it’s similar to the cosmic rays that gave the FF their powers. Reed says he’s concerned about what cosmic rays might do to mutants’ X-factor that given them their powers. On board the Simulacra, the monsters are revealed to be the Brood, alien parasites whom the X-Men have often battled. The heroes fight off the Brood, and Emma coordinates everyone to split up, with one half of their group searching for survivors and one half further fighting the Brood.

Sue, Emma, and Gambit find the survivors, who have been implanted with Brood eggs. Sue wants to save them while Emma argues that the survivors are already dead. Sue undoes a Brood jamming device and contacts Reed, who tells them must evacuate because the cosmic storm is approaching. Sue agrees to leave, hoping to return and save the survivors once the storm passes. The X-Jet gets hit by the cosmic storm as the heroes depart. It is damaged, and comes crashing down to Earth, in the middle of a forest. The X-Men emerge from it, transformed into monster-like creatures.

Issue #3 begins with Reed, Johnny, Cyclops, Storm, and Beast searching the crash site in a Fantasticar. They’re attacked, only to discover their attackers are the four X-Men from the mission, now in their monstrous forms. More fighting breaks out, with Cyclops and Storm not wanting to harm their teammates. We see that Nightcrawler has gained Sue’s powers, and Gambit now has Johnny’s powers. Emma doesn’t speak, but lashes out at Cyclops her new diamond form – her secondary mutation – and mention is made that she’s like the Thing now. Wolverine’s arms are unnaturally long, meaning he has Reed’s powers.

There’s a lot more fighting, with Sue and Ben eventually revealing they are okay. With their help, the heroes subdue the four transformed X-Men. Beast and Reed start to talk about a cure when Wolverine comes to and flees into the woods. While the others stay behind to search for him, Reed and Beast return to the Baxter Building. Because Wolverine, Gambit, and Nightcrawler haven’t yet had a secondary mutation, Reed believes Emma’s secondary mutation could be the cure. Then Sue calls Reed with a more pressing matter. The space shuttle Titan is returning to Earth from its space mission, except it’s filled with Brood.

Issue #4 shows that the shuttle is headed straight for New York. Sue blames herself, as the Brood on the shuttle are what became of the survivors she left behind. Storm tells Sue not to blame herself and focus on saving New York. There are several pages of Sue, Storm, and Johnny working together to bring the shuttle down for a safe landing.

Beast worries that a larger team of superheroes will be needed to contain the Brood inside the shuttle, so he and Reed get to work curing the transformed X-Men. There’s another fight on the woods when Ben and Cyclops manage to subdue Wolverine. The take Wolverine to Reed’s lab for further work on the cure, when giant whale-like aliens appear in the sky over NYC, and the shuttle opens to let out the Brood.

The big battle kicks off in issue #5, with several pages of the X-Men and the FF fighting back a full-scale alien invasion. In Reed’s lab, Reed wonders if he can cure the X-Men when he’s never been able to cure Ben. Beast gives him a pep talk, saying the always-changing nature of mutation gives Reed the edge this time. The cure works, and Wolverine, Gambit, and Nightcrawler join the fight in the streets of NYC. With their help, the heroes fight back the Brood.

As for Emma Frost, she too is healed, and she and Reed return to the X-Mansion to use Cerebra. Reed uses his genius to amplify Cerebra’s power, and Emma says she will send the Brood on “a ‘trip’ they won’t soon forget.” Combining her telepathy with the new Cerebra, she makes the Brood think that both Galactus and Phoenix have arrived in New York as well. The Brood then retreat, fleeing in terror. The two teams compare notes, with Reed saying neither of them could have driven back the Brood on their own. Later, the FF join the X-Men at the Xavier Institute for one of the X-Men’s regular softball games. Sue and Emma have a heart-to-heart talk, in which Emma says it is good to have someone else looking out for her teammates, and Sue says, “That’s what being a family is all about.”

Unstable molecule: Reed says he’s unaware the X-Men are experiencing secondary mutations. But he’s saying that to Beast’s cat-like form, which is Beast’s secondary mutation! Maybe Reed was just being polite.

Fade out: Like many comic readers, Sue is perplexed by the relationship between Emma Frost and Cyclops. Emma tells her that the X-Men think of her and Cyclops the same way the FF think of Sue and Namor.

Clobberin’ time: I’d thought that the Reed-trying-and-failing-to-cure-Ben plot was resolved by this point (Reed can’t cure Ben because of Ben’s own mental blocks), but it’s referenced several times in this. In the end, Ben says he has faith Reed will find an answer someday.

Flame on: When Gambit has Johnny’s exact same powers, Johnny manages to defeat him not with fire, but by punching him right in the face.

SUE-per spy: The 2019 Invisible Woman miniseries revealed that Sue had a double life as a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent all along. When fighting the Brood in this story, she creates an invisible sword out of a force field. When did she have this kind of control? Could it be her spy training at work?

Trivia time: Where are the X-Men at in continuity at this point? Astonishing X-Men kicked off its “Danger” storyline, which the Danger Room went haywire, evolving into a new character named Danger. New X-Men was in the middle of its “Haunted” story arc, portraying the X-Mansion as a haunted house. (This was unrelated to the Danger Room stuff, it seems.) Uncanny X-Men had the mutants taking on the Hellfire Club in a confusing tale also featuring nanites. And in the adjectiveless X-Men, it was the Christmas issue (!) in which Wolverine’s clone X-23 became an official X-Man.

Why isn’t Professor X there? Never minding that he has a long history of taking off and leaving the X-Men on their own, in this case he’d left for Genosha in hopes of rebuilding it from a wasteland back into a working nation.

When the FF and the X-Men meet in the mansion, we see three Xavier School students eavesdropping. The Marvel Wiki reveals these are Elixir, Wallflower, and Wind Dancer, three recent additions to the school.

Why is the X-Men’s mutant-seeking computer Cerebra and not Cerebro? Cerebra is the newer, better version, developed by Professor X and Beast. In addition to mutants, Cerebra can also direct Atlanteans and vampires.

There are several refences to the Avengers not being around. This is more fallout from the Avengers: Disassembled event, where the Avengers disbanded for a time. But wait, New Avengers, which co-starred Wolverine, debuted at the same time as this miniseries. I guess we’ll have to conclude this miniseries precedes New Avengers.

Fantastic or frightful? The story here is very basic, and the idea of giving the FF’s powers to four X-Men isn’t explored as much as I’d like. Nonetheless, there’s a lot of good stuff here. The shuttle crash scene is very well done and cinematic, as the comic walks us through how the heroes use their powers to stop the crashing shuttle.  The sky whales recall the 2012 Avengers movie, to where I wonder if the movie was directly inspired by this.

Next: Back on main.

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Want more? Check out my new ongoing serial, THE SUBTERKNIGHTS, on Kindle Vella. A man searches for his missing sister in a city full of far-out technology and hidden dark magic. The first three chapters are FREE, so give it a shot! Click here for a list of all my books and serials.

It’s a holiday weekend, so here’s some Thanksgiving/holiday stuff:

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Want more? Check out my new ongoing serial, THE SUBTERKNIGHTS, on Kindle Vella. A man searches for his missing sister in a city full of far-out technology and hidden dark magic. The first three chapters are FREE, so give it a shot! Click here for a list of all my books and serials.

Reading the Fantastic Four comics from the start. Fantastic Four/Iron Man: Big in Japan was a four-issue miniseries attempting to bring some classic kaiju action to the Marvel Universe. Zeb Wells is writing, but clearly artist Seth Fisher is the one behind the steering wheel, because this artwork is something.

The FF visit Tokyo, enjoying their celebrity status at the ribbon cutting for the Tokyo Giant Monster Museum and Expo Center. Also present is Otetsukun, a skyscraper-sized robot that has protected Japan from giant monster attacks for decades. But there haven’t been any monster attacks in a generation, so Otetsukun serves as a sort of monument these days. The FF tour the museum, where curator Dr. Yamane tells them about scientific advances Japan has made thanks to studying the remains of the giant monsters. Just as Reed questions the ethics of this, billionaire Tony Stark arrives, hoping for an economic partnership with the museum.

Then some cow-like monsters escape their pens (I guess this museum is also a zoo for monsters) and more monsters escape and run loose. The FF fight the monsters, while Tony runs off to find his “bodyguard.” Monsters of all shapes and sizes run through the city. Iron Man flies in to help the FF fight them. Johnny says he can sense a mysterious hum, and then more kaiju rise from the ocean to attack the city. (This is when the comic uses the word “kaiju” for the first time.)

Issue #2 specifies that four of the monsters from ocean, Eerok, Giganto, Droom, and Grogg, are throwbacks from classic 1950s Marvel Comics. Sue fights Eerok, a Kong-like gorilla, while Iron Man battles Droom, a big dinosaur. Droom has a vision of Iron Man turning into an Ultraman or Jet Jaguar type of giant robot, and he befriends Iron Man.

Reed and Yamane return to the museum, where Yamane describes monoliths discovered under the polar ice caps which suggest there may be an intelligence behind the kaiju’s actions. Out in the city, Sue continues to fight Eerok while telling the locals to evacuate. Ben shows up with Otetsukun, controlling the robot by yanking wires inside its chest. Eerok and Giganto manage to overpower Otetsukun. Then Johnny reveals he is hiding inside Otetsukun’s mouth, making it look like the robot is breathing fire.

After removing a trachea from one of the monster museum exhibits, Reed uses it as a horn. This somehow allows him to communicate with Grogg, the dragon. Grogg says the kaiju once ruled the world, but they were driven underground first by the atom bomb, and then by the rise of superheroes. He refers to the heroes as “vanquishers.” Grogg says the kaiju have returned not to attack, but because they are fleeing something else. Reed convinces Grogg to turn away. Grogg agrees, saying that humankind will now face a “walking apocalypse” in the kaiju’s place.

In issue #3, The FF, Iron Man, and Yamane travel to the North Pole, searching for this threat the kaiju warned them about. They discover the remains of a paleontological expedition that vanished forty years earlier. They find what appears to be a giant structure under the ice. They enter it, and here’s where the artwork gets so wild and off-the-wall that I’m not sure what’s happening exactly.

The heroes explore rooms made of massive eyes, fingers, and teeth. They are confronted by “living shadows” called Kaa, who say they are waiting for a key. Reed says reality is warping, while the Kaa break the fourth wall and talk about turning pages. The Kaa are preparing something called “the tearing.” Dr. Yamane disrobes, revealing his body covered with eyeball tattoos (or maybe they are eyeballs). He says the paleontologists were secretly a cult who worshipped kaiju as gods. He is the son of one of them, and he’s here to complete the ritual. He does some weird dance, and time and space tear apart. This is depicted by having one of the shadows appear to tear through the comic page itself. The caption tells us this is a “5-D Mega-Gourb!” Sure, why not?

Then there’s several pages of what I can only describe as random craziness:

The heroes escape the tear, back out onto the North Pole. They’re pursued by a yellow-skinned cosmic being. The Marvel Wiki identifies this creature as the Apocalypse Beast. The creature crushes Yamane under its foot, with him celebrating that he’s fulfilled his purpose. The heroes fly onto the Beast’s toe and examine its pores (that’s how big it is), and Reed deduces that it has sealed its skin because it comes from a different atmosphere from Earth’s. (Never mind that it has two faces with open mouths.) The inside of the Beast’s body is toxic, so Sue uses her force fields to create an armored suit of compressed air around herself (!), and she and Iron Man enter the creature’s pore in hopes of stopping it from the inside. Then the Mole Man shows up, announcing that the creature is on its way to Monster Island.

In issue #4, we see that the Apocalypse Beast is indeed going to Monster Island, with Reed reminding everyone that the Mole Man has a history with that island and all the giant creatures who dwell there. A Moloid meets them there, with Mole Man describing them as nameless and mindless, but then we discover that they’ve formed a doomsday cult underground. Sue and Iron Man fight their way through the Beast’s body, Fantastic Voyage-style, depicted in more trippy weirdness. Sue has a vision of the Beast in space, and she concludes that something was removed from it, and the creature wants it back. Reed and the Mole Man find ancient machinery deep under the island that has been dormant until recently, when the Moloids activated it again.

Reed then deduces that Monster Island is not merely a giant machine in disguise, but a giant syringe (!). Johnny ignites the dormant volcano under the machine, Reed mans the machine’s controls, and Ben protects them from an attack by some other random monster down there. The volcano/syringe pokes the Apocalypse Beast in the eye, and all the Moloids fly upward into it. The creature turns inside out (!) and flies back into space. The Mole Man breaks down crying, remembering that at least one Moloid had a name… Noah.

Reed concludes that the Moloids were a virus all along, bio-engineered for the purpose of driving off the Apocalypse Beast. Reed and Sue are reunited, as she and Iron Man made it out okay. Cut to the year 12,425 A.D., where two Moloids discuss how their once-great civilization is doomed, and their world’s resources are all but spent. They place their infant child into a pod and launch the baby into space, in hopes that it will find a new home on a new world. No, the baby isn’t named Kal or Clark. His name is Noah.

Unstable molecule: Upon learning that all the Moloids were really a virus all along, Reed says, “It’s just as I thought,” to which Ben replies, “You’re telling me you expected that?”

Fade out: We’ve seen Sue surround herself with a force field armor before, but this time it’s different. It looks like an Iron Man suit, and the “condensed air” part of it gives the armor a blue glow, rather than have it be purely invisible.

Clobberin’ time: When Ben is able to control the giant robot Otetsukun, that could be a reference to his great piloting skills, or just letting the reader know he’s gained some engineering skills after working with Reed in the lab for so many years.

Flame on: Johnny is incredibly powerful in this one, using his flame to ignite a long-dormant volcano. It recalls the “Messiah” storyline from the John Byrne years, when a villain trapped Johnny deep underground to use his powers in a similar way.

Trivia time: Is this story canon, or isn’t it? The origin of the Moloids in this contradicts the one in the Marvel Wiki, where the Moloids were genetically engineered by the Deviants back in ancient times. But then, the Wiki adds an “Oh, by the way” and states the Deviants added the power to drive off this story’s creature as a bonus. But then, the Wiki further says maybe it was the Deviants or maybe it some other, unknown intelligence.

Who are these other monsters with ties to Marvel’s past? Grogg first appeared in Strange Tales #83, where he woke from an ancient slumber beneath a mountain in Russia, following Russian atomic bomb tests. Droom first appeared in Tales to Astonish #9, where he was an ordinary lizard accidentally given an experimental growth serum. Fantastic Four fans recognize Giganto as Sub-Mariner’s monster of choice way back in issue #4. He’s since gone on to be one Marvel’s go-to sea beasts. Finally, there’s Eerok the giant ape. This miniseries is his first and only appearance.

It’s also the first and only appearance for antiquated giant robot Otetsukun. That’s too bad, because it’s a fun design and interesting backstory.

Fantastic or frightful? If you’re going to read this one, it’s for the over-the-top psychedelic yet cartoony artwork. It’s like nothing else we’ve seen from Marvel. The art is so outrageous, though, it makes following the story a challenge. Every other page, you have to stop and ask “Wait, now what’s happening?”

Next: Back on main.

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Want more? Check out my new ongoing serial, THE SUBTERKNIGHTS, on Kindle Vella. A man searches for his missing sister in a city full of far-out technology and hidden dark magic. The first three chapters are FREE, so give it a shot! Click here for a list of all my books and serials.

Reading the Fantastic Four comics from the start. It’s the second half of the Fantastic Four: Foes miniseries from Robert Kirkman and Cliff Rathburn. We’ve got mind games, aliens, and Negative Zone action, but does it all tie together?

The first half of Foes introduced several plotlines that appear only sort of connected at this point. Fearing that the FF has made too many enemies to the point where they’ll be dead in two years, Reed begins plans on his own super-prison located inside the Negative Zone. He enlists help from Andrew Lewis, whose security firm works in the lower floors of the Baxter Building, and who worked on the Vault, Marvel’s original super-prison. After battles with Puppet Master and two clones of Annihilus, the FF are under attack by the Super-Skrull. He snuck into the Baxter Building disguised as Franklin to steal some of Reed’s tech to contact the Skrull homeworld.

Issue #4 begins with Sue defeating the Super-Skrull, demanding to know where Franklin is. Johnny says the school called during the fight, saying Franklin is still there. Sue casually goes to pick him up. Later, Reed meets with Nick Fury (actually a life-model decoy of Fury) where S.H.I.E.L.D. is keeping the recent villains in suspended animation. LMD Fury says S.H.I.E.L.D. is ready to start construction on the new jail.

Reed then comes up with a device based on all the villain DNA the Puppet Master and the Mad Thinker took in issue #1, which will allow the FF to track the villains’ movements. The team uses it to track down the Mole Man deep underground. They try to apprehend him while he’s sleeping, only for one of his subterranean monsters to defend him. After a big fight, the Mole Man surrenders when the cavern collapses. Reed has another chat with LMD Fury, admitting that he’s thinking more rational and less paranoid. We then join Andrew at home, where he’s been working overtime on the prison. And we’re reminded that he thinks his wife is normal, when she’s really a gross insect-like creature. What appears to be his actual wife’s corpse is sitting in one corner, creepily.

Issue #5 begins with Andrew taking a tour of the new prison, along with a tough guy known only as the “Warden.” Several of the FF’s enemies are already inside, and there’s several pages of the FF tracking down and apprehending their enemies, including Hydro-Man, the Grey Gargoyle, the Wizard, Klaw, the Trapster a.k.a. Paste-Pot Pete, and even the Molecule Man. We check in with Andrew, where his alien insect wife dons a necklace that makes her look human. She’s looking forward to her Andrew giving her a tour of the prison.

The villains learn what the FF is up to. When the FF move in to apprehend the Red Ghost and his Super-Apes, the Red Ghost has a trap set for them. It’s a big fight, but the FF wins and knocks out the Ghost and the apes. Back in Reed’s lab, he finds a strange transmitter hidden behind a wall. He shuts it off and can then think more clearly. When he goes to inspect the device, it dissolves in front of him.

Andrew takes his wife on a tour of the prison, despite the Warden’s objections. She reveals her true face, much to Andrew’s objections. She then whips out a gun and shoots up the place. She takes over the control room and sets all the villains free. Then the Mad Thinker shows up, saying he and the wife were working together the whole time, and all is going according to plan.

In issue #6, Reed tracks the strange device through the Baxter Building to Andrew’s office. In the prison, Maureen tells the Mad Thinker that when she returns to her homeworld, he’ll be rewarded as a hero. The escaping villains confront the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents at the sealed-up exit, when the FF teleport onto the scene alongside She-Hulk and Hercules. Sue creates a big wall with her force fields, and Ben and Hercules push it like a battering ram at the villains, which knocks out most of them. Others surrender, but a few make it to the FF’s teleporter and escape. Sue finds Andrew still alive, and he activates neural scramblers on the remaining prisoners, knocking them all out. Reed learns that Andrew’s wife was an alien, and he says he needs to get back to the lab.

Later, at another location in the Negative Zone, the Mad Thinker is hanging out romantically with Maureen, whose real name is Threska. The FF teleport onto the scene, and the Mad Thinker drops tons of exposition. He says he was getting sick of the superheroes vs. villains game. Then he encountered Threska, a powerful Negative Zone sorceress stranded on Earth searching for a way home. Taking the other villains’ DNA and the device to increase Reed’s paranoia were all in pursuit of his escaping to the Negative Zone with Threska. The FF take Mad Thinker back to Earth, with him saying he underestimated Reed, and that he has a renewed interest in destroying the Fantastic Four. Back aboard the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier, LMD Fury tells Reed that they told Andrew everything, and that he’s traumatized by it all. Reed wants to talk to Andrew, but Fury says not to, because Andrew blames Reed for the whole thing.

Unstable molecule: When Ben and Reed take a break from apprehending all the villains, Ben complains about being bruised, and Reed says with his stretching powers, he’s not able to be bruised.

Fade out: In addition to her battering ram move, Sue also uses a force field to close off the exit to the prison, keeping most everyone inside. (Klaw is the one who gets out.)

Clobberin’ time: When fighting the Mole Man’s monster, Ben boasts about being able to take on the Hulk. The Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe: Deluxe Edition does state that the Hulk is stronger, but who could actually win remains an ongoing debate.

Flame on: Johnny appears to burn the Red Ghost right in the face, but the Ghost appears unharmed in the next panel. I suppose Johnny just has that much control over his flame.

Fantastic fifth wheel: She-Hulk and Crystal both make appearances in reference to them serving as babysitters for the kids. Crystal says she has a date, but we don’t see with who. Similarly, She-Hulk has some blonde guy in her bed, and it’s not clear who that is.

Four and a half: Franklin gets a subplot about being stuck at school after his parents don’t come pick him up. He tells a teacher to try calling the moon, but the teacher suggests the Baxter Building again.

Our gal Val: Valeria is only in one panel in these issues, showing Crystal babysitting her.

Trivia time: Neither Andrew nor Threska ever appear again after this series. Threska killed the guy’s wife to get back to the Negative Zone, and she just gets away with it?

Fantastic or frightful? I don’t know. You can enjoy this on a pure heroes vs. villains slugfest, but I feel this series could have been so much more. It’s supposed to be a big villain team-up, but most of the villains are background cannon fodder, like they’re nameless henchmen. That’s disappointing considering how so many of them were legit threats in the past. Reed’s paranoia is also not emphasized as much as it could have been. I would have liked to see a real battle of wits between him and Mad Thinker, but this series is packed with so much other stuff that we don’t really get it.

Next: On main.

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