posted 06-27-2001 11:19 AM               

In high school, I always liked Jim Lee's art, but that's moslty because I was going through puberty in high school. His writing I could generally take or leave -- I read the first few issues of WildC.A.T.S but never really got into it, and right now the only thing I really remember about it is that Grifter was moderately cool.

Lee has improved by now, plotting FF:HR and letting pal Brandon Choi take care of the script. Lee pencils as well, and gives us more of what we used to like him for in high school.

When DC decided they needed to figure out what the hell was going on with their characters and establish some sort of sensible timeline, they did it with the baffling Crisis on Infinite Earths, and ended up blowing up a few dozen parallel worlds (not to mention a few of my key synapses) to do the job. Marvel performs the task via a method that leaves plenty of questions and takes far longer: The make a few titles "reborn" and a few others "ultimate" a coupla years later. I'm still not sure what's going on, but really, that's neither here nor there.

"Heroes Reborn" was Marvel's way of updating some of their classic titles. We'll leave it at that and leave continuity for another thread.

Though his pacing seems a bit rushed, Lee does an altogether admirable job of pulling together much of the lore behind the FF into one big story.

Here's what happens: The pre-FF crew -- Reed Richards, Ben Grimm, and Sue and Johnny Storm -- each hold different jobs on a space exploration project aimed at analyzing a nearby anomaly. The project is hijacked by agencts of S.H.I.E.L.D., who aren't actually agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. but hired guns working for Dr. Doom. During the ensuing struggle, the Four obtain their Fantasticism, heroes are born, blah bling blah. Then it turns out the anomaly was actually a wormhole through which the Silver Surfer (!!!) was coming, and he's kidnapped by Doom (we never see how), who wants to harness his power, but then it turns out Doom's hired guns aren't hired guns at all but skrulls, and one of the skrulls takes the helm of Doom's Silver-Surfer-Sucking Machine and becomes the Super-Skrull. Also the Mole-Man makes an appearance. Also the Sub-Mariner.

Also Galactus is coming.

Did I say "a bit rushed?" Hmm. Maybe I should've used something stronger.

But it works -- really. Seeing the Super-Skrull created by means other than just the ghost-in-the-machine skrull technology Stan Lee came up with works pretty well, and the story reveals itself layer by layer, so we're not inundated by bad guy after bad guy. The Mole-Man -- the FF's weakest villain -- performs an essential task here in helping the team members realize their powers against an enemy that would be easily defeated by a more seasoned team. He's like a practice villain.

There's also a lot more background to the story than Stan Lee used back in the sixties, which should really come as no surprise to anyone. Stan toyed with the idea of Ben being in love with Sue during the first few issues, then abandoned it and never spoke of it again. Jim Lee treats the tension Grimm is feeling as something in the past that leaves a background buzz today, and quickly resolves the situation with the introduction of Alicia Masters. The Four fly Reed's ship -- the fateful trip that resulted in the development of their powers -- out of bold necessity, rather than as a pissing contest between Ben and Reed, as originally envisioned.

It's a good case for remakes. Where Stan Lee explored plot alleys, tried out new ideas and gave others up, Jim Lee is able to flesh out a lot of the character development pretty quickly. It's as if Stan made the pieces, and Jim is fitting them together.

A few complaints:

The Four adapt to their new powers very quickly, with not a whole lot of reaction or consequent soul-searching. Part of this is because they're forced to deal with an immediate threat, but if I were a playboy casino owner one minute and on fire the next, you can bet I'd have a hard time dealing with mole people. Reed mentions this later in the book, which is nice, but further explanations are presumably in later issues, which I don't have.

The script is passable, but uses The Thing's battle cry ("It's clobberin' time!") all too often. It wasn't that way in the sixties. He also has the Torch describe himself as "some kind of human torch!" when he gains his powers, which seems kind of lame.

Finally: Can we come up with a better explanation as to why bodysuits are able to stretch and turn invisible as their users do than "unstable molecules?" What does this even mean? I mean, yeah, if you're reading Fantastic Four comics, you're clearly willing to suspend your disbelief and forego hard science fiction. But come on.

Anyway. Good book. Read it.

[This message has been edited by Kevin Ott (edited 06-27-2001).]

(Edited by Dave to add Amazon info.)

posted 06-27-2001 10:57 PM               

I haven't read more than a few pages of Ultimate Spidey, but you're right -- it seems like familiar storytelling. But whereas Spidey's origin takes a while longer than the original -- which was only a few pages long -- this seems to compress the story somewhat. In Stan Lee's FF, we saw a Ben Grimm who was nearly emotionally destroyed by his transformation, one who was constantly struggling with his ugliness -- at least, until he found Alicia. In the new story, Ben meets Alicia pretty quickly, so the struggle seems somewhat stunted.

posted 06-28-2001 01:02 AM               

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Originally posted by Kevin Ott:
If you've never picked up an issue of FF before, or never even heard of the Four, this is a pretty good book to start out on.

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Would you say that even though this particular version of the FF only appeared in a total of 13 monthly comics? I mean, is there anything that would confuse someone who reads this, and then reads stories featuring the "standard" FF?

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If you're already a big fan of the characters (like I am)

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What is it about the characters and the concept that you like so much?

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this seems to compress the story somewhat

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Were they trying to cover more of the ground that the original series did, or just trying to strike out in a new direction as quickly as possible?

posted 02-26-2003 03:40 PM            

quote:

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Originally posted by Kevin Ott:
If you've never picked up an issue of FF before, or never even heard of the Four, this is a pretty good book to start out on. If you're already a big fan of the characters (like I am), it's a good read as well.

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