{"id":9452,"date":"2013-01-05T08:00:20","date_gmt":"2013-01-05T08:00:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/?p=9452"},"modified":"2013-01-05T14:57:12","modified_gmt":"2013-01-05T14:57:12","slug":"fantastic-four-by-waid-wieringo-ultimate-collection-book-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/2013\/01\/05\/fantastic-four-by-waid-wieringo-ultimate-collection-book-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Fantastic Four by Waid & Wieringo Ultimate Collection Book 2"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"
\nBy Mark Waid<\/strong> & Mike Wieringo<\/strong>, with Casey Jones<\/strong>, Karl Kesel<\/strong> & Larry Stucker<\/strong> (Marvel)
\nISBN: 978-0-7851-5658-1<\/p>\n

The Fantastic Four has long been considered the most pivotal series in modern comics history, introducing both a new style of storytelling and a decidedly different manner of engaging readers’ imaginations and attention. Regarded by fans as more as a family than a team, the roster has changed many times over the years but one which inevitably reverts again to its original core group.<\/p>\n

Those steadfast stalwarts are maverick genius Reed Richards<\/em>, wife Sue<\/em>, their tried and true friend Ben Grimm<\/em> and Sue’s younger brother Johnny<\/em>; survivors of a privately-funded space-shot which went horribly wrong after Cosmic Rays penetrated their ship’s inadequate shielding.<\/p>\n

When they crashed back to Earth, the quartet found that they had all been hideously mutated into outlandish freaks. Richards’ body became astoundingly elastic, Sue gained the power to turn invisible and project force-fields, Johnny could turn into living flame, and poor, tormented Ben was transformed into a horrifying brute who, unlike his comrades, could not reassume a semblance of normality on command.<\/p>\n

This compilation gathers issues #67-70 of the 3rd<\/sup> volume (before the series reverted to its original numbering) and then #500-502 plus bonus material from the Directors Cut<\/strong> edition of #500, highlighting the spectacular run by writer Mark Waid and much-missed illustrator Mike Wieringo, gloriously celebrating their \u00e2\u20ac\u0153back-to-basics\u00e2\u20ac\u009d approach which utterly rejuvenated the venerable property in 2003.<\/p>\n

Key to that revival was a thorough reassessment and reappraisal of the team and their greatest enemy as seen in ‘Under her Skin’<\/em> (FF<\/strong> #67, May 2003, inked by Karl Kesel) wherein Victor Von Doom<\/em> at last abandoned his technological gifts and inclinations, rejecting them for overwhelming sorcerous might to humiliate and destroy his greatest rival Reed Richards.<\/p>\n

All he had to do was sacrifice his greatest love and only hope of redemption\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

This terrifying glimpse into Doom’s past and shocking character study in obsession was the prologue to a 4-part epic entitled ‘Unthinkable’<\/em> which opened one month later and would end with the resumption of the title’s original numbering in Fantastic Four<\/strong> #500.<\/p>\n

Waid’s greatest gift is his ability to embed hilarious moments of comedy into tales of shattering terror and poignant drama, and it’s never better displayed than here when the First Family of Superheroes suddenly find their daily antics and explorations ripped from them. The method is straightforward enough: Doom attacks them through their children, using baby Valeria<\/em> as a medium for eldritch exploitation and sending firstborn Franklin<\/em> to Hell, a payment to the demons to whom the debased doctor has sold the last dregs of his soul\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

A supreme technologist, Richards had never truly accepted the concept of magic, but with Master of the Mystic Arts Dr. Strange<\/em> oddly unwilling to help, the reeling and powerless Mr. Fantastic nonetheless leads his team to Latveria for a showdown, still unable to grasp just how much his arch-foe has changed.<\/p>\n

Invading the sovereign – if rogue \u00e2\u20ac\u201c nation, the team fight the greatest battle of their lives but lose anyway. The normally quicksilver mind of Richards seems unable to deal with the new reality and the FF are locked away in prisons specifically and sadistically designed to torment them. As a sign of his utter disdain, Doom locks his broken rival in a colossal library of grimoires and mystic manuscripts, knowing the defeated, dogmatic scientist can never make use of what is there. Big mistake\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

Before attacking the FF, Doom had ensorcelled Dr. Strange, but had greatly underestimated Earth’s Sorcerer Supreme. Struggling to free himself, the mage establishes contact with Richards and begins to teach the unbelieving ultra-rationalist the basic of magic\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

By the time Doom discovers his danger, Reed has freed his comrades and daughter and in the catastrophic battle which ensues the Iron Dictator replaces Franklin in as the hostage of Hell, but not before, in one final act of malice, he maims Reed Richards with a searing mystic retaliation, melting half his face by means which neither magic nor medicine can mend\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

Although victorious, the Fantastic Four are far from winners. Doom’s assault upon the family has scarred them all, but none more so than Franklin, whose time in Hell has left him deeply traumatised and almost catatonic. In the 2-part follow-up ‘5th<\/sup> Wheel’<\/em> (illustrated by Casey Jones), Sue and Ben desperately search for treatments that can break through the boy’s wall of silence whilst Johnny begins a campaign to drag Reed out of a post-traumatic funk. The only thing that seems to motivate the obsessively brooding inventor is a half-baked scheme to use Doom’s captured time-machine and visit the dictator’s boyhood\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

Meanwhile in the now, a visit to a funfair has resulted in a breakthrough – of sorts – forFranklin, but only reveals that the boy is still, in so many ways, trapped in hell. \u00e2\u20ac\u00a6And for Johnny there’s a terrifying realisation that his infallible, perfect Brother-in-Law is going to shoot the still innocent Victor Von Doom before the child can grow into the greatest menace in history\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6<\/p>\n

Superbly entertaining, immensely exciting and genuinely challenging, this run of tales was a sublime renaissance for the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153World’s Greatest Comics Magazine\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and this collection also includes a wealth of bonus material from the Director’s Cut anniversary edition, including a cover gallery, deleted scenes and outtakes, with commentary from Waid & Wieringo, pencil cover sketches, unused draughts and designs, a rundown of the creative process from script to finished page, Stan Lee’s original treatment for Fantastic Four #1, a tribute section from cartoonist Fred Hembeck, and a reproduction of every cover in the series’ monumental run.<\/p>\n

What more do you need to know?<\/p>\n