Marvel Masterworks: The Fantastic Four, Vol. 18

Marvel Masterworks: The Fantastic Four #18

by Len Wein (Writer), Pablo Marcos (Inker), George Pérez (Penciller)

The Fantastic Four have split up! Having gone their separate ways, you might worry that we'll have to come up with a new title for this book, but no, the evil machinations of Doctor Doom will reunite the First Family of Super-Heroes for the FF #200 extravaganza! All Johnny Storm's hot-rod racing, the Thing's demon bashing, Sue's dalliances with Namor and Reed's soul-searching culminate in a massive five-part saga that pits the FF against their nemesis in the series' greatest tradition! Who is Doom's son? How does he have the FF's powers? It's a fight to the finish in Latveria. Also featuring an outer-space adventure with the Inhumans, the return of the Mole Man and Quasimodo the Living Computer!

COLLECTING: FANTASTIC FOUR (1961) 192-203, ANNUAL (1963) 12-13

Genres: Comics, Marvel, Comic Book

307 pages, Hardcover

Published September 27, 2016

About the author

Len Wein was an American comic book writer and editor best known for co-creating DC Comics' Swamp Thing and Marvel Comics' Wolverine, and for helping revive the Marvel superhero team the X-Men (including the co-creation of Nightcrawler, Storm, and Colossus). Additionally, he was the editor for writer Alan Moore and illustrator Dave Gibbons' influential DC miniseries Watchmen.

Wein was inducted into the Will Eisner Comic Book Hall of Fame in 2008.

Reviews

[Little Timmy · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Avengers were Marvel's team concept and Spiderman was their loner hero. The FF was about family, now they were a family that fought monsters and villains but a family needs a hobby to stay together. This volume tells of one of the low points in the FF, they split up and go their separate ways. But as always the family comes back together to deal with things. Nice art and story. Recommended

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

The main, regular issues collected here are pretty good classic FF. But we also get a pair of well below par annuals making it the weakest FF Masterwork to date. Will this be the last of the series? The succeeding issues (Fantastic Four 204-206, 208-214) are already collected in Nova Classic Vol. 3. Of course Marvel overlaps material all the time. I'm not sure how willing I'll be though... perhaps if it's an extra fat Masterwork...

[Tomás Sendarrubias García · Rating 3 out of 5]

Y si en el último tomo habíamos asistido a la disolución del equipo y a como cada uno de los miembros había marchado por su lado, en este siguiente vamos a seguir los pasos de cada uno de los ex-componentes de los Cuatro Fantásticos... pero alejarse del equipo no significa que se alejen de las aventuras. Así, la Antocha Humana, que se vuelca en su carrera como piloto de coches de alta velocidad, se las va a ver con el mercenario Tornado Tejano, la Cosa va a colaborar con la NASA en unas pruebas de pilotaje que le van a llevar a enfrentarse con Darkoth (el falso demonio convocado por el Doctor Muerte y que ahora está bajo el control de un villano distinto), la Mujer Invisible va a dirigirse a Hollywood para lanzar su carrera de actriz en unos estudios cuyo dueño es Namor, y Mister Fantástico va a ser contratado por una enigmática empresa, que va a ser la cobertura del villano al que los Cuatro Fantásticos se van a enfrentar en la saga que lleva al número 200 de la serie, el mismísimo Doctor Muerte y sus planes para seguir gobernando Latveria, y que nos va a presentar un hasta ahora desconocido movimiento de resistencia contra Muerte por parte de sus propios súbditos.

Con Marv Wolfman a los mandos y dibujos de Keith Pollard y alguna aparición de John Buscema, la historia en este último tramo es bastante más entretenida que en algunos de los tomos anteriores, notándose especialmente el buen hacer del que estaba llamado a ser uno de los mejores guionistas de cómic de los años 80, y que alcanzaría el Olimpo con Crisis Infinita y los Nuevos Titanes, en DC. El tomo continúa un poco más allá del 200, hasta el 203, aprovechando esos números para volver a llevar a los 4F al Edificio Baxter (la famosa ilusión del cambio pero sin el cambio), así como un enfrentamiento con Quasimodo y con lo que parece ser el propio Iron Man; pero es evidente que el colofón de la etapa es el número 200. Y la verdad... se deja leer bastante bien.

[Justin Sundstrom · Rating 1 out of 5]

“Thank God that’s over.”
Marv Wolfman can really write a damn good story (see his Teen Titans run and his magnum opus Crisis on Infinite Earths). However, he SUCKS at writing FF! No WONDER he left! The only good one was Annual #13. THAT is what I wanted from this run. How much I wish he stopped after this volume, however I have lots more issues to read left before I get to Byrne’s critically acclaimed run.

[Raymond Paquette · Rating 5 out of 5]

The lead up to issue 200 was well done and perfectly played by Dr Doom. He had to destroy the FF at the hight of their powers not when they were weak. And his defeat at his own hand was excellent. As he descended further into madness and killed his own clone he destroyed himself. The only fitting end for a paranoid megalomaniac.

[John Peel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another collection of "The Fantastic Four" comics, this time from 1978, brings us past issue #200. Fun stories, and some excellent artwork (mostly by Keith Pollard, who is fairly new to me) keep this series as entertaining as ever.

[Brent · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5

Beginning with the estranged FF and ending that separation by giving Doctor Doom a sound thumping, this volume covers a lot of territory. Throw in a couple of annuals, and some issues where the FF get their superheroing life back in order, and you get a pretty fun volume.

[Ed · Rating 3 out of 5]

Masterworks 18 really steps it up from the previous collection and includes some of the best FF of the post-Kirby period. It starts off with the Fantastic Four having just broken up, so we get some solo-centric issues. We also get Len Wein slowly handing the book over to Marv Wolfman. 192 is scripted by Roger Slifer and drawn by George Pérez (who isn't long for the book); it's a fun Human Torch story where he races cars and fights the Texas Tornado. It also introduces Rebecca Rainbow, Native American race car driver, who is both a fascinating character but also kind of a racist stereotype. 193 passes the art duties over to Keith Pollard; the story and scripting is a mishmash of Wein, Pollard and Bill Mantlow. It turns out okay, though, as the Thing battles a ret-conned Darkoth and also goes into space. 194 has mostly the same creative time (but with Dave Hunt subbing on inks for Joe Sinnott). It wraps up the previous Thing story in a pretty pedestrian manner.

195 sees Marv Wolfman taking over the writing and beginning a very fruitful partnership with Keith Pollard. This issue is inked by Pablo Marcos, and the Marcos/Pollard combination leads to the least-Kirby art I've seen in the entire run of FF. It looks like the art you'd see in X-Men around this time than anything I associate with the FF. It's technically the Sue story of this run, but in practice it's a Namor story because of sexism. 196 is the Reed issue and also begins the reunion of the team and sets up the arc to come by introducing Doom.

197 through 200 are an incredible arc. Wolfman has written one of canonical Dr Doom stories here and it's just jawdroppingly fun. He even manages to make Reed Richards an enjoyable hero. His dialogue for Doom is absolutely flawless; both menacing and ridiculous. He also introduces Zorba, the leader of the Latverian revolution who has a dope cyborg eye because why not! Sinnott inks this and brings Pollard's art much more in line with the Kirby/Sinnott style. For both the story and the art, this arc really stands as classic, peak FF for me.

Everything after that is a puncturing of the balloon. Annual 12 (Wolfman and Pollard) is a pretty basic story that introduces minor villain the Sphinx. The Sphinx is suitably ridiculous and is also basically the late 90s take on Apocalypse. Annual 13 is done by an odd combo of Bill Mantlo, Sal Buscema and Joe Sinnott. It has the Mole Man kidnapping blind, disabled or ugly people and also stealing statues. It's pretty pedestrian until an ending where the Mole Man apologizes and turns good sends it into Golden Age levels of silliness.

201 & 202 are a pretty lame two-parter with terrible villain Quasimodo and a guest starring Iron Man. 203 is a truly terrible story about a mutant boy in a coma generating evil counter parts to the FF. It's pretty close to the nadir of the FF despite having the same creative team as 197-200.