World's Greatest Comic: The Fantastic Four Appreciation 2022

[Reviresco]

Marvel's First Family the Fantastic Four debuted in issue #1 of their self-titled comic in November of 1961 the same year that saw John F. Kennedy take the oath of office of President of the United States. Their origins are intricately tied to the birth of the Marvel Universe that we know today. From the depths of Atlantis to the Watcher's home on the Blue area of the Moon and to the fabled kingdoms of Latveria and Wakanda, the Inhuman's city fortress of Atillan and the antimatter universe of the Negative Zone, we saw the grand tapestry unfold through the eyes of these four adventurers, or Imaginauts as Mark Waid would later call them.

When Stan and Jack weren't busy creating new characters for the FF to meet, they also made sure that any new Marvel character from another fledgling title had to make their acquaintance with Reed, Ben, Johnny and Sue. Spider-Man wanted to try out for the team. The founding members of the Avengers and the Fantastic Four joined forces to try and hunt down a wayward Hulk. Reed and Ben's former Empire State University classmate Victor Von Doom would become arguably one of Marvel's, if not comicdom's greatest villain. Johnny would have a chance meeting with a bearded stranger in a New York flop house that would lead to the return of the Golden Age anti-hero known as the Sub-Mariner. Cosmic entities like The Watcher and Galactus are on speaking terms with the Fantastic Four. Oh, and as for my mentioning JFK earlier, even President Kennedy made a cameo appearance in FF #17.

Now on the eve of the publication of FF #587, we are told that the old order shall changeth. Not that it hasn't happened before...Ben was on the verge of giving up for good quite often before he became comfortable in his rocky skin. Reed was considered dead and was absent from the title for two years. Sue was estranged from Reed and left the team when Reed had to put power dampeners on their son Franklin. She Hulk, Luke Cage, Medusa were some of the more notable replacement members. But it always came back to the original four....until now. According to Marvel, one of them will die and the Fantastic Four title, dubbed by Stan Lee as "The World's Greatest Comic Magazine" will make way for the enigmatically titled "FF" in March of 2011. Roster changes are nothing new to titles like the Avengers or the X-Men but with the FF it's always different, more personal. It will be a loss of a family member.

Well, I guess I will just end this opening post with a little contribution paying tribute to the work of Jack Kirby, who along with Stan Lee co-created the FF. If a picture is worth a thousand words, I think Kirby has about 10 thousand or so packed in to this ...

-- Iron Maiden's first post of the original World's Greatest Comic Magazine thread.

[Reviresco]

FAVORITE FANTASTIC FOUR RUNS!
According to 5717 voters


1 John Byrne 28.0% 1599
2 Jonathan Hickman 24.8% 1417
3 Stan Lee and Jack Kirby 17.4% 995
4 Mark Waid 10.1% 579
5 Stan Lee 6.7% 383
6 Mark Millar 2.5% 145
7 Walt Simonson 2.1% 119
8 Matt Fraction 1.8% 103
9 Chris Claremont 1.2% 67
10 Tom DeFalco 1.1% 65
11 J. Michael Straczynski 0.9% 50
12 Roy Thomas 0.7% 41
13 Karl Kesel 0.6% 33
14 Carlos Pacheco and Rafael Marin 0.5% 29
15 Steve Englehart 0.4% 23
16 Marv Wolfman 0.4% 21
17 Gerry Conway 0.3% 16
18 Carlos Pacheco and Jeph Loeb 0.3% 15
19 Scott Lobdell 0.2% 14
20 Doug Moench 0.1% 3

READING LIST: The Greatest "Fantastic Four" Writers, Ever by Marc Buxton@CBR

[Reviresco]

COLLECTED EDITIONS


Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v01
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v02
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v03
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v04
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v05
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v06
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v07
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v08
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v09
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v10
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v11
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v12
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v13
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v14
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v15
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v16
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v17
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v18
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v19
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v20
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v21
Marvel Masterworks Fantastic Four v22

Epic Collections FF v1: The World’s Greatest Comic Magazine: FF #1-18
Epic Collections FF v2: The Master Plan of Doctor Doom: FF #19-32 & Annual 1-2
Epic Collections FF v3: The Coming of Galactus: FF #33-51 & Annual 3
Epic Collections FF v4: The Mystery of the Black Panther: FF #52-67 & Annual 4-5, material from Not Brand Echh (1967) #1 & 5
Epic Collections FF v5: By Ben Betrayed: FF #68-?, pending full issue range

Epic Collections FF v17: All in the Family (ISBN 978-0785188650): FF #296-307 & Annual 20
Collects Fantastic Four (1961) #296-307 & Annual 20 and Fantastic Four vs. The X-Men #1-4
Epic Collections FF v18: The More Things Change…: FF #308-320 & Annual 21
Collects Fantastic Four (1961) #308-320 & Annual 21; Incredible Hulk (1968) #350; and Marvel Graphic Novel: Hulk/Thing – The Big Change

Epic Collections FF v20: Into the Timestream: FF #334-346 & Annual #23
Also includes Days of Future Past material from New Mutants Annual 6, X-Factor Annual 5, and Uncanny X-Men Annual 14.
Epic Collections FF v21: The New Fantastic Four: FF #347-361, Annual 24, and material from Marvel Holiday Special #1.

Epic Collections FF v25: Strange Days: FF #403-416
Also collects Fantastic Four: The Legend, Onslaught: Marvel Universe, and material from Tales of the Marvel Universe

Fantastic Four Omnibus v1 Lee & Kirby
Fantastic Four Omnibus v2 Lee & Kirby
Fantastic Four Omnibus v3 Lee & Kirby

Fantastic Four Visionaries: George Perez v1
Fantastic Four Visionaries: George Perez v2

Fantastic Four Omnibus v1 John Bryne
Fantastic Four Omnibus v2 John Bryne

Fantastic Four Visionaries: Walt Simonson v1
Fantastic Four Visionaries: Walt Simonson v2
Fantastic Four Visionaries: Walt Simonson v3

Fantastic Four Omnibus Waid & Wieringo

Fantastic Four Omnibus v1 Jonathan Hickman
Fantastic Four Omnibus v2 Jonathan Hickman

Fantastic Four Omnibus Matt Fraction


The X-Men vs. The Fantastic Four
Classic Thing v1
Classic Thing v2
Thing () by Dan Slott
Thing Freakshow
Fantastic Four Unstable Molecules
Fantastic Four 1234
Fantastic Four True Story
The World’s Greatest Comic Magazine
Fantastic Four: Foes

Marvel Knights Fantastic Four v1: Wolf at the Door
Marvel Knights Fantastic Four v2: The Stuff of Nightmares
Marvel Knights Fantastic Four, v3: Divine Time
Marvel Knights Fantastic Four, v4: Impossible Things Happen Every Day
Marvel Knights Fantastic Four, v5: The Resurrection of Nicholas Scratch


Crushing Krisis Guide to Collecting Fantastic Four comic books as Graphic Novels

[Reviresco]

RECOMMENDATIONS


Fantastic Four #4 - the introduction of Namor the Sub-Mariner into the Silver Age
Fantastic Four #5 - first appearance of Doctor Doom

John Byrne, who, in addition to helming unarguably one of my utmost favorite FF creative runs, also penned and illustrated what I, about 95% without hesitance, proclaim to be the finest FF issue and story ever conceived in FF #236/"Terror in a Tiny Town." I can't express this enough: Read FF #236 asap. You won't thank me enough when you do...it is that thoroughly splendid an issue/story.

Besides the Lee/Kirby/Romita/Buscema and the Byrne run.
A very underappreciated run is the Thomas/Wein/Wolfman run from the late '70s.
FF #160 - #220

[Reviresco]

LINKS

Jason Young's Fantastic Four 9 Project

The Science of Reed Richards

Fantastic Four Forever tumblr

INSIDE LOOK: How ALEX ROSS Wanted to Reboot FANTASTIC FOUR

Billy Maximoff's Respect Thread for the Invisible Woman

Billy Maximoff's Respect Thread for the Human Torch



CBR Threads

Susan Storm-Richards: The Invisible Woman Appreciation 2018
Susan Storm-Richards: The Invisible Woman Appreciation 2019
Susan Storm-Richards: The Invisible Woman Appreciation 2020

The Ever-Lovin Blued-Eyed Thing Appreciation
Idol of Millions Ben Grimm The Thing Appreciation 2019

"Flame On!" Johnny Storm the Human Torch Appreciation

The Original Dr. Doom Appreciation (2014)
Victor von Doom: Doctor Doom appreciation 2018
Victor von Doom: Doctor Doom appreciation 2019
Victor Von Doom: Dr Doom Appreciation 2020




VIDEOS

[Reviresco]

Happy New Year, fellow FF fans!

First posts are still under construction. Iron Maiden has some cool things to add, and I've some updating to do, again.

But we are starting 2022 out with hopefully a bang in Slott's FF Reckoning War event!










https://www.marvel.com/articles/comi...-preview-pages

[CitizenXXX]

Reckoning War looks so epic!

[Thundershot]

*settles into the new home thread for this board*

I miss my old chair. (Name that quote)

I look forward to the Reckoning War, and also getting a couple more Epic collections this year. The only backlog one I’m missing is the Black Panther one (v5 I think) and it’s finally getting reprinted this year.