With the (very welcome) news that the Fantastic Four is returning, I couldn't help but get giddy. In case you couldn't tell from previous posts, I'm a huge fan of the franchise. The creative team announced to reintroduce the team to the Marvel Universe is no slouch either - Dan Slott and Sara Pichelli, both pretty well known for their work on Spider-man and helming pretty respectable runs for the character. That said, I was still a bit apprehensive about their work on a book so near and dear to me. Which is pretty stupid, since, let's say they end up creating one of the worst runs on the characters of all-time (they won't, but let's just say) - getting bad FF comics is still better than no FF comics.
This seemed as good a time as any to revisit some of Slott's older work with characters from the Fantastic Four. In 2005, a five issue mini-series called Spider-man Human Torch kicked off. It chronicled the development of Spider-man and Human Torch's friendship, with each issue loosely tied to different eras of each character. It's pretty well regarded and I was stoked to check it out.
The conceit is pretty awesome - we get to check in on these characters and see not just how they've changed, but how the Marvel Universe itself changed too. The early issues deal with pretty traditionally 60's era shit - these characters were still relatively new, so when Spidey pretends to join Dr. Doom to trick him, Johnny believes its for real.
The art even compliments the era its supposed to take place in, which is super fun, especially when you consider what else was going on at Marvel at the time. In 2005 Avengers Mansion just got blown up, a snap reaction from the mentally unstable Scarlett Witch made the population of mutants go from thousands to just shy of 200, the Winter Soldier just started running around, and if you listened very closely, you could hear the subtle drum beats of Civil War in the distance.
So, given all that, it makes perfect sense that a series like this would be loved. I just don't know if I loved it. I personally have a hard time getting into older books. I think their pacing is weird, their A story is inconsequential, and the dialogue is stilted. Most books from the 60's saving grace is the art, and as much fun as the two artists on the book (Chris Sotomayor and Ty Templeton) are, with all due respect they're not Steve Ditko or Jack Kirby. They're solid artists, but nothing in this book really wowed.
I know comparing people to the King isn't fair, especially since I struggle to draw stick figures.
You could tell the creators were having fun though, there's a lot of great jokes, a lot of funny pokes at some of the more ridiculous aspects of older books. But my problem with old comics, except for the ones that introduce new characters, is it feels kinda like dog years;
Like every 7 issues gets you the net advancement of one issue. And the same is true for this series. The coolest issue by far is the final one, where Johnny finally realizes that Spider-man and Peter Parker are the same person.
And the next part is... well, it's lame for a superhero book but I fucking love it. Y'know how you see tabloid photos at the grocery line checkout of Reese Witherspoon or Chris Pratt or someone getting a Coolata from Dunkin' Donuts and you're just like - whoa - "Kinda nice knowing Elle Woods is normal"?
No? Just me? That sucks, please still hire me though.
It's nice seeing a different side of the people you normally know for beating the shit out of each other. There are 10,000 comics about the Human Torch and Spider-man and it was really cool getting the last third of the issue about Peter Parker and Johnny Storm.
I wish the entire series had been shit like that instead. Like - that movie Interstellar was awesome, but don't you kinda wanna see the movie where Coop steals the ship to go and find Anne Hathaway? That sounds like a pretty rad movie too, right?
I know the book is fun, but I'm not exactly in a rush to re-read it anytime soon. I'm eager to check out Slott's other work on characters from the Fantastic Four in anticipation of his return to the series this summer with Pichelli, and this book did nothing to wane my interest.
There's a lot for someone to like about this book, but to me, it was just shy of hitting the mark.