Cartoon Logic

Meanwhile, in the offices of Hanna Barbera...

Producer: ...so the Fantastic Four has been a cartoon before and with the current interest in science fiction and fantasy especially on Saturday mornings, I think we can turn this into a winner.

Executive: I'm not getting it. Run this by me again. The leader is the guy who stretches? Mr. Elastic?

Producer: Er, Fantastic. Mr. Fantastic.

Executive: Right. Then, there's the Invisible Girl and the Thing. You know, the Thing has potential. I think the kids will like the way he looks. Maybe we could do more with him. Say, he's made of stones, right? So he could be in the Stone Age and meet the Flinstones.

Producer: Uh,...sure, sure, J.B.

Executive: The Invisible Girl sounds like a good concept, too. A little forward thinking by having a member of the team being a girl, right? But she turns invisible whenever there's danger.

HERBIE returns

Art by John Byrne

Producer: Well, she's the leader's wife, J.B.

Executive: So she's not really a girl, then.

Producer: No ... and you're missing someone. The Human Torch.

Executive: The Human Torch? Oh, right. The flaming guy. (pause) No, sorry, we can't buy into it.

Producer: What? Why?

Executive: C'mon now, this guy's on fire! We don't want the little tykes roaming around emulating this guy! We run Smokey the Bear ads for Christ's sake.

Producer: Well, we could switch to more Hooty the Owl. "The give a hoot, don't pollute" slogan is catchier than Smokey anyway and they both fulfill a public service.

Executive: No. Sorry, but I'm pulling this Fantastic Four cartoon from the line up.

Producer: Look, I need the money, J.B. Tell you what, we'll replace the Torch. We'll replace him with ... with ... a cute robot! Hey, there, how's that idea? Cute robots are all the rage these days!

Executive: Say, now, there's an idea. He could fly around and tell jokes, couldn't he? We need lots of jokes for Saturday mornings.

Producer: Sure, sure. He'll fly and tell jokes. In fact, maybe he can fill the Torch's demographic as well by dating girls and fixing cars.

Art by John Byrne

Human Error Results in Big Interstellar Epic

(Hey, kids make up your own acronyms for H.E.R.B.I.E.! It's fun and useless!)

Name HERBIE | View Acronyms

Reed designed and programmed the Humanoid Experimental Robot B-Type Integrated Electronics. Reed never was very good at naming things. So it came to pass that H.E.R.B.I.E. eventually translated into the comic book under the guidance of Marv Wolfman. Reed created Herbie to be his lab assistant, and the robotic pal of the cartoon became analytical storage unit of the comic book. Soon after Herbie's creation, the Fantastic Four embarked on an interstellar storyline involving war between the Skrulls and the planet Xandar, home of the Nova Corps.

H.E.R.B.I.E. accompanied the Fantastic Four on their trip to Xandar, where they encountered a number of super powered individuals, including two villains that would soon cause them trouble. One was the Sphinx, who after merging with the world computer of Xandar, felt himself the superior of Galactus, but was quickly defeated by him instead. The second was Doctor Sun, who went all but unnoticed during these storylines, but also experienced the knowledge of Xandar's computers. It wasn't long before Herbie was acting in ways that made Reed suspicious, but he never had the time to check up on the little robot. What had happened?

By Herbie Betrayed!

Herbie was possessed by the insidious Doctor Sun, who had stuck his consciousness in the world computer of Xandar! Apparently, the best solution for his troubles he could find in this incredible computer was to dump his mind in Reed's small robotic assistant. The next time you think you have problems, cheer up by thinking you are nowhere near as desperate as Doctor Sun. Of course, Sun (who we might point out was so inappropriately named because he was neither a physician nor cheerful) existed as a human brain inside a lanky robot body before this, so it must have seemed an improvement. No doubt he was plotting to move even further in the world by possessing R2-D2 next.

Art by John Byrne
Sun quietly bided his time inside Herbie (eeew!) until the time was ripe for him to strike. After he had time to analyze the Fantastic Four and the Baxter Building, he made his move.

To Save His Creator

Doctor Sun's attack came quite by surprise. Although he had calculated the Fantastic Four's strengths, the unexpectedness of the attack by their cute robotic sidekick was the significant factor in Sun's favor. He incapacitated Sue, Ben, and Johnny, then moved to attack Reed. Once Reed was down, Doctor Sun uploaded his consciousness into the Baxter Building's computer in order to absorb its large library of information and seize control of its defenses. (Hey, it worked on Xandar...er, sort of.)

Reed prevented Doctor Sun from transmitting his consciousness outside the Baxter Building. By this point, Herbie had regained his original programming and deduced that Doctor Sun would have nowhere to beam his brain save back into itself. Realizing that Sun was in the process of doing just that, Herbie set himself on a destructive collision with the Baxter Building's defenses that obliterated him.

Although Herbie had not been programmed for independent thought, a consciousness of a sort had been created within it through Doctor Sun's possession. Combined with its innate programming to support the Fantastic Four in their heroic endeavors, Herbie sacrificed himself to save his masters from the evil of Doctor Sun ... and kitcsh marketing gimmicks.

Art by John Byrne

Executive: I don't know ... this website isn't so much funny as it is whimsical. I think we need funny here.

Producer: Oh, you're right, J.B.

Executive: Look, lose the Mick guy. He's a bad role model. Prattling on about women and politics. We need power talent here. Get me Fred Hembeck.

Producer: I think Hembeck might be committed to other projects, J.B. I've heard that he's the last writer with any clue left, so he's busy straightening out the continuity of Spider-Man and Hawkman. But I've got this great idea for bringing in a cute, humorous robot!

Executive: Really? Well, let's hear it, man!

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