Back in the day, the two can’t-miss Marvel comic books every month were The Amazing Spider-Man and Fantastic Four. I always made sure I had at least 24 cents in my pocket when I entered the comics store, so I could see what Peter Parker was up to and where in the universe Reed Richards, Susan Storm Richards, Johnny Storm and Benjamin J. Grimm were now. Especially the first 38 issues of Spider-Man and the first 102 issues of Fantastic Four were as good as it gets.
To be more specific, Fantastic Four #s 39 to 51 were (and remain) an absolute treasure. We moved across New Jersey when I was 10 years old, right after FF #24 came out, and it was 15 long months before we found a place that sold Marvel comics. Finding Fantastic Four #39 on a spinner rack, with Doctor Doom looming behind my favorite foursome and special guest star Daredevil, was finding water after a very long march across the desert.
The gang had lost their powers after an epic battle against the Frightful Four, and they were frantically trying to replicate their powers mechanically before some dastardly foe figured it out and came after them. Too late! Doctor Doom was just preparing an assault on his hated enemies.
With the help of Daredevil, who happened to be in the neighborhood, the Fantastic Four went on the defensive in “A Blind Man Shall Lead Them.” The story continued in issue #40, “The Battle of the Baxter Building,” in which The Thing defeats Doom in a most cathartic fashion, then quits the team, setting up “The Brutal Betrayal of Ben Grimm” in #41, the first in another epic arc that lasted the next three issues.
Before we could catch our breath, that was followed by the four-part introduction to the Inhumans, which was followed by perhaps the most legendary Fantastic Four saga of them all, starting with “The Coming of Galactus” in #48, which also introduced the amazing Silver Surfer. From the trailers, the new film borrows heavily from the Galactus trilogy.
After that came the most heartbreaking one-part F.F. story ever, “This Man, This Monster,” in issue #51. I am mortified to admit that I missed the next issue, in which yet another new character was introduced, by the name of Black Panther. But those 14 issues, which cost me $1.68 back in the day, were worth many times that in sheer entertainment value. Truth to tell, the comic continued to be excellent for many years after that, but those 14 issues were just so innovative and groundbreaking and just plain exciting. I had reconnected with the Marvel universe just in time.
When the movie Spider-Man came out in 2000, I was over the moon. Director Sam Raimi and company nailed the character and the tone of the comic books to perfection. If Spider-Man and Spider-Man 2 weren’t so great, then audiences might have been kinder to the subsequent movie Fantastic Four and its sequel, which were pretty good, but they weren’t as good as the Spider-Man films or the X-Men movies that came first.
A second attempt to bring the team to life failed rather miserably in 2015. The less said there, the better.
From the reviews, the new movie Fantastic Four: First Steps comes much closer to what Marvel fans have been waiting for all these years. That makes July 2025 a tremendous month for comic book fans in general, because the new movie Superman comes much closer to what we have been waiting for all these years. The superhero movie has life after all.
Because I’m a frugal old guy, Mary and I will probably be seeing the new film on $5 Tuesday, but my expectations are high — not sky high, because the F.F. has been here before and disappointed us — but high enough that I think we’re going to have fun.
