Unca Cheeks the Toy Wonder's Silver Age Comics Web Site!

(This page is dedicated -- with admiration eternal -- to Quentin Long: the "Reed Richards" of cyberspace; hands down, no contest.)

During its heyday (i.e., the years of Jack "King" Kirby; the first 100 issues or so, say)... FANTASTIC FOUR very nearly was as (self-)advertised, re: the breathless hyperbole plastered across the top of each issue's cover: "The World's Greatest Comics Magazine!"

Initially begun (as later confessed by Stan Lee) as a naked and opportunistic "swipe" of DC Comics' successful JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA, the FF series -- again, due (in chiefest measure) to the energies and innovations of artist and primary character wellspring Jack Kirby -- quickly mutated into something altogether different than its admitted progenitor, and very nearly (if never quite) as satisfying, taken on its own merits.

The series' artistic virtues were predicated largely, I think, on two storytelling fulcrums: family, and friends. With your kind indulgence... I'll extrapolate a bit on both.

Quite simply: the Silver Age FF enjoyed the continuous presence of the greatest cast of supporting characters ever to grace the inside of any ongoing monthly.

(Although -- as the page directly above aptly illustrates -- not all of these assorted friends and acquaintances actually got along with one another, 100% of the time. But, then: isn't that always the way, with one's own circle of friends...?) This bountiful supply of secondary characters meant that -- in the days of FF maestro Jacck "King" Kirby -- the FANTASTIC FOUR comic never seemed to be at any readily discernible loss for a new story arc or sub-plot, whenever the occasion for a new one organically arose. The latest conflict with world-devouring "Galactus" drawing to a close...? Time to start packing for an extended "vacation" to the Black Panther's mythical nation-state of Wakanda. Storyline after that dictates that Our Heroes sojourn once more into the trackless depths of outer space...? Great -- we haven't done much of anything with "the Silver Surfer," just of late; and the fans really seem to dig him. "Two birds with one stone," and all of that.

Later writers for the series -- for whatever reason(s) -- gradually drifted away from this essential series underpinning, by a slow (but painfully self-evident) increment of degrees, over the course of the post-Kirby decades. Sapped much of the vigor and vitality right out of the book, that did.

(If the preceding all sounds as if I'm advancing the claim that the FF's multitudinous supporting cast was -- by and large -- more inherently interesting than the title characters, themselves... welllll: I'll readily grant you, the interpretation is not entirely without merit, taken on its own bald-faced terms. However: much the same argument could be made [to a lesser extent, surely] re: DC Comics' SUPERMAN franchise, as well. It happens that way in comics, sometimes; it certainly isn't my conscious intent to defame the Fantastic Four on this page, in so noting. Just making the observation, is all.)

None of this, however, takes away (nor should it) the single, undeniable fact that -- where the FANTASTIC FOUR comic succeeeded most often, and most brilliantly -- was in its careful and heartfelt expplorations of the uniquely familial bonds which existed between the characters. This was never utilized to better effect, really, than during the extended sub-story arc which found its origin in the following panel sequence [see picture accompanying, below].

(... and it is worth noting, at this juncture, that the theme of family has long been one of the most potent and tell-tale hallmarks of direct "King" Kirby involvement with a comics series, whether as main conceptualizer; co-plotter; or scripter outright. See any Kirby-spawned issue of BOY'S RANCH; THE NEWSBOY LEGION; BOY COMMANDOS; THE NEW GODS; THE X-MEN; etc., etc., ad infinitum. One needn't be Nero Wolfe, ultimately, to notice the constant repetition of this particular stylistic bete noire... nor, I think, to draw the inevitable conclusions, upon open-minded consideration of same, re: the man's later claims to have authored much of what was most praiseworthy in this title.)

No discussion of THE FANTASTIC FOUR comic's manifold storytelling virtues, however, could reasonably count itself complete without at least passing reference made to their signal foeman, and Marvel comics super-villain ne plus ultra: the brilliant and monomaniacal "Doctor Doom." [see picture, below] With the possible exception of the Red Skull (let posterity mark it: yet another Kirby co-creation), the totalitarian monarch Victor Von Doom stands foursquare as the single most staggeringly brilliant villain concept within the storied length and breadth of the Marvel Comics canon. One could more easily imagine such a storytelling "universe" bereft of, say, the Incredible Hulk, or Thor, than one sans the scarred and self-deluded tyrant-king of Latveria; any attempted "Top 10" listing of The Greatest FANTASTIC FOUR Sagas Ever Told" which did not devote at least half its allotted space to Doom-oriented tales would not -- in my estimation, at least -- be worth the time and effort it would take to scan and scorn it.

One of the very nicest of these, however, was one in which neither Jack Kirby nor the shamelessly self-promoting Stan Lee had a hand: the classic denouement to the epic "Overmind" saga, as written by underrated Archie Goodwin, and penciled by the peerless John Buscema. [See cover, below]

In the course of this masterfully executed tale, the alien menace known as the Overmind mentally enslaves the FF's leader -- genius nonpareil Reed Richards -- into his malevolent, world-conquerinng service, leaving the rest of the team (effectively) all but rudderless, as a result.

With the Human Torch and the Thing both staging a desperate (and manifestly futile) "holding action" versus the combined forces of the alien conqueror and their former teammate... wife Sue Richards makes a frantic, last-minute appeal to the only man she knows of who is fully the equal of her ensorcled husband: the cruelly calculating Victor Von Doom.

The resultant sequence -- with its keenly observed and nuanced interplay between the two characters -- is worth savoring, in its entirety [see page below]:

(... and note, please: this epochal storyline serves as Illustration Perfect of those twin FANTASTIC FOUR plotting pillars referenced earlier: the concerns of family ["Our Leader/My Husband has been lost to us. I/We will do anything to bring him back... even if it means casting our lot with Satan incarnate"] and friends [only in the pages of THE FANTASTIC FOUR did you so often see the putative heroes of any series so regularly availing themselves of the aid and assistance of others within the Marvel Universe super-community. When the foursome had [in the course of an earlier storyline] lost their powers, and stood all but naked before the onslaught of the self-same Doctor Doom... it was the sightless adventurer Daredevil to whom they turned, in desperation [see the very first cover reproduction on this page]. How fitting, then, that they later recruited that very same menace to the side of the angels [however temporarily] in the course of this later adventure.)

Sadly -- upon the departures of both misters Goodwin and Buscema, later on -- the series fell forthwith into one of the most pronounced and longest-lived storytelling "funks" in all the annals of comics history; one not relieved (in good measure) until the arrival of writer/artist John Byrne, more than a decade later...

... but that takes us well and truly beyond even the most elastic interpretation of the term "Silver Age," surely... and is, thus, a chronicling effort best left to others, methinks.

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