The Official Fantastic Four Thread - They're kind of all right.

[The Mast]

Reed has lost a brother-in-law and friend, Sue has lost a brother, Val and Franklin have lost an uncle and Ben has lost a best friend.

If you have to ask why that would cause a disconnect...

[runawayboulder]

Originally Posted by Scourge2099

It was because Johnny and Reed were secretly lovers.

No, that's Johnny and Daken!

[Dread]

Reposting my review with spoilers:

Originally Posted by Dread

FANTASTIC FOUR #587: Unless one has avoided TV, newspapers, and the internet for the past 24-48 hours, you know the major moment of this issue already; Johnny Storm/Human Torch dies. The rest of the subplots of "Three" are tied up, but the death of Johnny gets all of the attention, as it deserves. To be fair to writer Jonathan Hickman, until he and Marvel leaked the spoiler to the media, Hickman had done a fair job of making it difficult to tell which of the Four was due to die. I thought Reed would bite the dust again, but the Torch is the one member of the team who has never left the team or seemingly died for an extended period before. During the "Three" arc, the Four had been properly set up by a series of subplots that inconveniently came to a head at once. Sue was busy trying to properly organize an underwater meeting between the Lost Kingdoms of Atlantis and the hot-headed Namor. Reed was busy trying to save the citizens of Nu-Earth after Galactus decides to feed on the other dimensional earth. And Johnny was stuck holding down the fort with Ben (who was in the midst of one of his brief powerless phases), Franklin and Valeria Richards, Alex Power (of the Power Pack), and the rest of the kids from the Future Foundation (Reed's think tank for super smart, skilled, or weird kids) against the insect hordes of Annihilus.

Spoiler!!! Click to Read!:

The subplot with Sue takes a very interesting twist (or counter-twist from the previous issue) which ends with Sue actually having more responsibility as well as proving that she's more than a match for Namor. Reed's subplot finally seems to wrap up the leftover scraps of the Nu-Earth story from the Mark Millar/Bryan Hitch run on the series (which had resulted in a FANTASTIC FORCE mini series that nobody bought). Most of the extra sized issue (28 pages) focuses on the conflict against Annihilus, as one would expect given who has to die at the end. Given the amount of media hype as well as the loss of the major surprise, it would be easy to hate this story or attempt to nit pick it from all angles. While it is far from a perfect story, Johnny's death scene is executed in a proper manner. He is given a chance to step up and make a final stand to save Ben and his niece and nephew, along with their friends and New York in general. Often written as aloof at best and pathologically immature and moronic at worst by other writers, Hickman seems to have pegged that Johnny has been a superhero since 1961 and thus may as well be competent at it. Ben's reaction to the death as well as the final page of resolution helps sell it tremendously. Most of the action is kept off panel and there is no gore - in a way it is easy for a cynic to see how Hickman can work his way out of it in perhaps a year's time. Superheroes have recently come back from far more grisly, definitive deaths - if not for the hype, text, and reactions, it would be difficult to tell that Johnny was dead and not merely knocked out. Plus, this is a team that literally stormed heaven to get a member back once.

Still, it is hardly the sort of "random sacrificial lamb" death that Brian Bendis has written in such tales as DISASSEMBLED, HOUSE OF M, SECRET INVASION, or even his run on ULTIMATE X-MEN way back. Mark Millar teased about killing Sue during his run on the Four, but couldn't bring himself to ice any of the Four. The artwork is by regular artist Steve Epting as well as frequent collaborator Mike Perkins (the two used to share duties on CAPTAIN AMERICA for years) and Nick Magyar, with dazzling colors by Paul Mounts. The next issue will be a bit of a "wake" issue and then the series as FANTASTIC FOUR will end (for now), and be replaced by a series titled "FF" by the same creative team. Make what you will of the marketing and editorial strategy, but the story isn't half bad. Johnny, a hero who is often written as a child, at least died like a man. It will be surprising if he is still dead by the end of 2012, however. FANTASTIC FOUR #600 is due March 2012 (assuming Marvel counts up FF issues into that tally), and it would seem daft to commission that without a reunion of the full team. The death of a long running team member is usually a sign the writer is out of ideas on the Four, which is why it seems to happen once or twice every decade; at the very least, this has been effectively executed. It isn't perfect. We could all nitpick about how Johnny could have battled better and all that, but I liked Ben's reaction to it and that final panel of him crumbled on the floor with the kids is good stuff. Even if Val is still a complete cold snob, and I wouldn't mind if Dr. Doom made him his familiar again.

The real challenge I think comes out of how Marvel sells the mourning. For at least half of the past decade, Johnny was written as a moron, a fop, a hero with ADHD who was the weakest link of his team. People have been joking that he could be replaced by Jim Hammond or Toro right now (thanks to INVADERS NOW!) because of this. It is akin to killing Iceman in X-Men; literally any other character with similar abilities would be able to replace him because he's usually "the funny idiot" character. Reasonably, you would expect these characters to grow and mature, perhaps as the Wally West Flash did, but Marvel has been less consistent about that sort of thing than DC. Part of me fears that everyone will treat Johnny like Steve Rogers when in many stories he was akin to a TMZ celebrity with super-powers - famous for getting into jams almost as much as being a hero. And the shame of it isn't Johnny's fault, or even Hickman's fault - he did his best to not write Johnny that way. I imagine we'll see this loss the worst through the eyes of Franklin and Sue (and to a degree, Ben).

Is Johnny coming back? Of course. In a way I wasn't too miffed that the death itself wasn't grisly because I have no doubt he'll be back by about March 2012 or soon after; why write yourself into a corner by showing him get drawn and quartered when you'll only have to undo it later anyway? If you want a comedic take on the many options for resurrecting him, I did an entire Sprite Comic slideshow about it at Examiner here: http://www.examiner.com/comic-books-...series-picture . I didn't think Marvel was bold enough to off Johnny and then try to build him up and act like he was important to them, but they are. Spider-Man may join the Four and that would be great next to BIG TIME. Some good stories may come out of it; the Four don't have much else to do. I say bring it on.

[mjdiddy1]

Originally Posted by The Mast

Reed has lost a brother-in-law and friend, Sue has lost a brother, Val and Franklin have lost an uncle and Ben has lost a best friend.

If you have to ask why that would cause a disconnect...

Exactly

[Scourge2099]

From the images I've seen of Johnny's last stand , I thought it was awesome he died like a man. Not too many characters die fighting an army of billions by themselves.

[Thingfan]

Originally Posted by Scourge2099

Iceman would kill the s*** out of the Human Torch. Iceman would practically be a god if he cut loose. Human Torch couldn't destroy him at all because Bobby would keep on coming back. All he'd have to do is freeze Johnny's lungs and that's the end of the fight. Silver Surfer could just absorb all his flames and let him fall. A bunch of heroes and villains could take out Torch.

"A huge majority" of them does not mean every one of them. Marvel has hundreds and hundreds of characters so theres no reason why you couldnt find dozens that are more powerful and yet my quote be correct. Obviously a cosmic-powered character like the Surfer, who could fly through the sun if he wanted to, would not be much threatened by the Torch. Sorry, I just feel the story of his "death" was poorly done. Thats the point I've tried to express. And I'm still really glad it wasn't the Thing.

[Dread]

Originally Posted by Scourge2099

From the images I've seen of Johnny's last stand , I thought it was awesome he died like a man. Not too many characters die fighting an army of billions by themselves.

Yeah. While it is easy to nitpick, he had a better "death" than Wasp or Vision. Or half the Dead Avengers.

[Varient]

Originally Posted by Dread

Yeah. While it is easy to nitpick, he had a better "death" than Wasp or Vision. Or half the Dead Avengers.

"Word"
Some deaths just "sucked big wind"

[imdaly]

Originally Posted by Dread

Yeah. While it is easy to nitpick, he had a better "death" than Wasp or Vision. Or half the Dead Avengers.

To be fair, at least we SAW those characters die.

[Scourge2099]

It's hard to top Skurge the Executioner's death. He stood alone against the forces of Hela armed with two enchanted machine guns.

[TheCorpulent1]

Not enchanted, just machine guns. And then he started batting those f***ers away after he ran out of bullets.

Johnny's death was all right. I would've preferred to see him put up more of a fight, rather than just flaming on and then immediately getting overrun. But as major comic deaths go, it was pretty solid. Looking forward to how his loss affects the team.

[Scourge2099]

For some reason I always thought they were enchanted. Oh well. It makes him even more of a bad a** then. I wonder if they'll ever kill him off like that on Avengers : EMH ?

[TheCorpulent1]

I doubt it. I'd be surprised if they had the time to focus on developing him beyond just the Enchantress' enforcer, actually. It's not a Thor cartoon, after all, and they've got a ton of other stuff to cover.

[Dread]

Originally Posted by Varient

"Word"
Some deaths just "sucked big wind"

Indeed.

Originally Posted by imdaly

To be fair, at least we SAW those characters die.

But those sorts of deaths just feel cheaper when they're undone. Best to keep it ambiguous.

Steve Rogers was totally shot and killed point blank range with a handgun. Those were not "time bullets" and you can read CAPTAIN AMERICA #25 a million times and never see what Brubaker would later claim was there. Batman's death was even worse. Darkseid blasted him to a skeletal husk. Yet now he's back running McBatman, trying to find the Batman of Norway (which admittedly might be cool). Johnny's death at the very least is obviously not going to last from how it was depicted. I'd rather a writer not write himself into a corner.

I always wondered why the original Vision couldn't just be slapped back together again. Jonas merged his AI with Iron Lad's? Can't he just upload a back up? Victor Shade was once completely disassembled to string-like scraps and put back together again; being torn in two is nothing. Red Tornado considers that a slow weekend. I understand the functional reason for why Victor Shade has to stay dead (because having him and Jonas share names/designs would be redundant; the market doesn't mind 15 versions of top tier characters like Batman or Hulk, not the Vision), just not the story reason. But, I digress.

Originally Posted by TheCorpulent1

Johnny's death was all right. I would've preferred to see him put up more of a fight, rather than just flaming on and then immediately getting overrun. But as major comic deaths go, it was pretty solid. Looking forward to how his loss affects the team.

Most of Johnny's stand was kept off panel. We only saw Ben and Annihilus' reactions to it. So for all we know it was pretty boss.

Use your imagination, kids!

[kguillou]

I dont care what Brubaker says, the whole "time bullet" crap was totally made up at the last minute, and i'll never forgive him for that. lol

That said, I kind of like Torch's ambiguous death. We KNOW he'll be back by #600, so its best not to insult our intelligence by showing Johnny get ripped to shreds or anything explicit like that. Thats sorta how Colossus was able to get away with it, wasn't his death pretty ambiguous too?

[roach]

saw the preview for the next issue and i may be nitpicking but what parent lets their kid hangout on the roof of a skyscraper....is no one watching the kids?

[Varient]

Originally Posted by roach

saw the preview for the next issue and i may be nitpicking but what parent lets their kid hangout on the roof of a skyscraper....is no one watching the kids?

Well,... I don't think you can just "jump" off the baxter building if you are a child of the FF,.. Reeds not THAT addlepated.

[NightBeetle]

ADVANCE PREVIEW: "Fantastic Four" #588

[Dread]

Originally Posted by roach

saw the preview for the next issue and i may be nitpicking but what parent lets their kid hangout on the roof of a skyscraper....is no one watching the kids?

Reed is a father who has a portal to a horrible dimension of giant bugs in one of his rooms and he literally had a giant COMA INDUCING RAY GUN that he blasted Franklin with, Cable-style, when he was still just a toddler because he feared his power. In the last issue, Reed literally had Leech bunk with the kid to depower him. I don't think he is worried that Frank will jump (or fall) off the roof.

Interesting preview. I know Spider-Man is just trying to be a supportive adult figure, especially since Franklin is a fan, but oh so many people will use this for pedo jokes. I do wonder how Spidey learned about it so fast. I guess either this isn't the first 6 pages exactly or there'll be some media announcement about the death.

I imagine his wake will feature a small army of trashy one date wonders all either sobbing or chewing out his ghost for never calling back. There'll be extra brownie points if the woman he "almost" had a baby with from that annual a year and change ago will be there.

I imagine all the FF enemies will mourn - the team's weakest link is now gone. Now beating them will be even harder.

FYI, remember Lyja the Laserfist? The Skrull who was sort of married to Johnny in the 80's until it was revealed that the "Alicia Masters" he thought he married was really her? But she really loved him sort of anyway? Well, guess where she last was at the end of SECRET INVASION: FANTASTIC FOUR #3 back in July of 2008? The Negative Zone. Hickman actually has a damn fine resurrection story with star crossed love on his hands if he knows his continuity. I don't expect it, though.

[highguard]

Well, it is the end of an era. So I should say something on these boards that I peruse and enjoy so much, the long term contributors like the Corpulent1, Dread, Franklyn Richards and Vartha are always around. Today however I think I will add my two cents. Heroes are a rare thing in this world. The guy lauded by the president at a recent memorial as a hero put his life on the line to save the life of a shooting victim instead of running to safety. He was not the only one to run to help but he lived, others died. That is what heroes do despite the possible mortal outcomes. Everyday men and women in the armed services, policemen, firemen, and others risk life and limb to save others, they too are heroes. They are the bravest, selfless souls who bring cheer and inspiration to so many of us.

And so we come to the idea of Super Heroes, as spider man often recalls, with great power must come great responsibility. I loved the idea of super heroes from the time I was a child. I loved the Fantastic Four, loved their bright blue costumes, their family dynamic, the squabbles and the heart warming banter found in every family. Reed and Sue were the adults and if truth be told Johnny and Ben were the children even before there was Franklyn and Valeria. At times they were reckless, immature, thoughtless and annoying and yet we all loved them so. This was a true family, the first family of comics.

As I grew older Reed Richards became more of a favorite with me, but when I was a kid the human torch was my hero. His powers were bright and flashy and visually stunning. I still thrill to the awesome visuals of the torch provided by Jack "King" Kirby, big John Buscema, Rich Buckler, George Perez and even John Byrne whose style grew on me and who can forget Joltin Joe Sinnot the inker supreme. These guys brought me much joy in their portrayal of my childhood hero. I also am humbled by the care these writers brought to these characters, Stan the man Lee and Roy Thomas, Len Wein, Byrne, Claremont, and now I must add Johnathan Hickman to the list of greats.

I think Mr Hickman did not show the final stand because obviously it leaves us with some hope and that is a stunning achievment for a writer of fiction. Some writers are hacks, because they have not taken the time to see the potential of what they have but I now see a glimmer of what Mr Hickman is trying to do. Many complained about the pace of his book but I begin to see a possible masterpiece. He knows the death is but a tease, that the hope of this story is yet to be told, that people want to be inspired, to hope to dream. For many kids that is what comic books were, a vehicle to take us away to magical places, hopeful lives, and heroic people.


It seemed fitting that Johnny would stare at a billion to one odds and shout his defiance into the black abyss before him. I hope for the day when Mr Hickman will show us the true extent of his battle with the bugs. The last page was black, but the Human Torch was always about fire and light, Johnny was never the hero that spider man was, or Iron Man or Thor my current favorite hero but his potential is undeniable.

He is the man child with the fearless heart who always ran off before thinking to the oft consternation of Reed or Sue, the guy with the power of the sun who could fry the flesh off of wolverine without breaking a sweat if he really wanted to. The guy that possibly could take out a billion enemies on one continent. As a child these were the questions I had, why don't they show his true power, the power of the sun, the flame, the fire. Well given what I suspect Mr Hickman is about to do, maybe we will get to see Johnny Storm in all his blazing glory. I hope you survived Johnny, and I thank you Mr Hickman because I suspect that by the time you are done with this story, the Fantastic Four will have changed, and the Human Torch will finally take his place among the greats.

So thank you Mr Hickman for making us and others who may not have grown up with this character care about what happens next.

We are waiting Johnny Storm, find your way back home to your family.

[TheCorpulent1]

Originally Posted by Dread

Most of Johnny's stand was kept off panel. We only saw Ben and Annihilus' reactions to it. So for all we know it was pretty boss.

Use your imagination, kids!

Show, don't tell, storytellers!

Originally Posted by roach

saw the preview for the next issue and i may be nitpicking but what parent lets their kid hangout on the roof of a skyscraper....is no one watching the kids?

Kid's got the powers of God. I think he'll be fine even if he falls.

[roach]

Originally Posted by TheCorpulent1

Show, don't tell, storytellers!

exactly

[Tron Bonne]

I can't help but wonder if anyone who comments on Batman's 'death' actually read the 'death' in question. I mean, **** a whale guys, it wasn't even a 'death'.

Oh, and I though Johhny's death was fine. Whatever, we didn't see him get his inwards ripped out and eaten, who cares. The moment was still pretty cool.

[roach]

Originally Posted by TheCorpulent1

Show, don't tell, storytellers!


Kid's got the powers of God. I think he'll be fine even if he falls.

I wasnt sure if had access to them
Besides who'd think Cap die from a gunshot, Hawkeye die from a quiver explosion, Superman die in a fist fight, Phoenix die from adamantium claws....

[Tron Bonne]

Originally Posted by roach

I wasnt sure if had access to them
Besides who'd think Cap die from a gunshot, Hawkeye die from a quiver explosion, Superman die in a fist fight, Phoenix die from adamantium claws....

Outside the last one, honestly, all of those deaths are pretty viable in context.