Scenes from the Life of an Amateur Comic Book Collector (17)--Fantastic Four

I've gone back to the Fantastic Four lately. When I was a kid in the late 1960s, they were very big and I watched the cartoon series on ABC. I even read some of the comics though at that time I was more into DC than Marvel. Marvel stories were complicated and continued from issue to issue and sometimes from title to title. DC was very simple and straightforward--which explains why kids liked DC and teenagers and adults liked Marvel.

When I first returned to the comic craze in recent years, I was only interested in the first 100 or so issues of FF because they were drawn and co-created by Jack Kirby with his bold striking images. The Silver Surfer-Galactus-Watcher saga is unparalleled in comic history for its scope and sweep, taking on almost Shakespearian proportions as these gigantic figures bestride the globe and dwarf the FF. I still love to think of the dialogue between Galactus and the Watcher as they debate the fate of Earth. When the Watcher calles Galactus "Pillager of planets," I get a chill.

Then I went beyond that into the later issues with John Romita, George Perez, etc. I've just finished Essential Fantastic Four Volume 8 which goes up until issue 183.

The fascinating thing about the FF--and I think it's what inspires loyalty to them--is they seem to exist in real time and space, and exhibit human emotions. Yes, they are in a comic-book world besides the obvious of having superpowers and not aging as quickly as the rest of us. Reed Richards and Ben Grimm are veterans of World War II which would make them in their mid-80s to early 90s if they were real people. But in a lot of other respects, their experiences parallel the rest of us. They change, get married, have children, have sex even.

For decades, Superman and Batman existed in an adolescent arrested development phase. Girls like Lois Lane and Vicki Vale were icky and the heroes hung out with younger male pals like Jimmy Olsen and Robin--surrogates for the readers. (I know it's different now, I don't keep up with the current storylines, but Superman finally did marry Lois, yet Batman remains a bachelor, having gone through several Robins.)

Reed Richards and Sue Storm actually got married and had a child. There are scenes indicating they really slept together--in the same bed--unlike Rob and Laura Petrie. In one story arc Reed's double from a parallel Earth takes his place and presumably does the nasty with Sue. The Invisible Girl is shown getting out of a king-sized bed, wearing a sheer nightie, leaving a sleeping false Reed. Her doubts about her husband apparently centered on their lovemaking. To add a touch of reality, she walks in on houseguests Thundra and The Impossible Man--a Marvel version of Mr. Mxyzplyzt (however you spell it)--watching a rerun of The Maltese Falcon on late-night TV. Their home--the Baxter Building--has an actual location in the real world, 42nd and Madison in NYC.

The current FF, they are almost at issue 600, has housed a bunch of mutant kids in the Baxter Building. Sounds kinda boring, like a kiddie X-Men. But I am now anxious to go back and read through up till the present.