Well, MarkAndrew suggested the topic, and I did basically bring it up, so let's play the game.
Marvel yesterday released a "Best of the Fantastic Four" collection.
It contained the following stories: Fantastic Four #1, #39 - #40, #51, #100, #116, #176, #236 and #267; Fantastic Four (Vol. 3) #56 and #60; Marvel Fanfare #15; Marvel Two-In-One #50; and Marvel Knights 4 #4.
So that is fourteen issues worth.
So if YOU had to choose fourteen issues of Fantastic Four for your "Best of the Fantastic Four," which fourteen would you choose?
Since I would, to be honest, probably just pick all Lee/Kirby issues, and I would just be called a Silver Age-loving fuddy duddy, I am changing the rules to state that no more than HALF (in other words, seven) of the issues can be by Lee/Kirby.
Here are my picks:
Astonishingly enough, when I look at the Fantastic Four, I find myself choosing seven issues...in a ROW!!
Fanastic Four #45-51 - Except for perhaps the early Amazing Spider-Mans, I cannot recall a more amazing stretch of issues as these seven.
#45-47 introduce the Inhumans with an awesome story with amazing art.
#48-50 up the ante with the introduction of the Silver Surfer and Galactus (or, as Peter David joked, Frankie Avalon and God), and then...
#51 rocks us from a whole other angle, as we see the effect that heroism can have upon even the most foul-hearted of people.
#236 the first Byrne doom story. Definitely classic stuff.
#247 Byrne's "How does Latveria view Doom?" story. Really cool idea.
Annual #17 where Byrne used the Skrull cow plot. Funny stuff.
#258 the famous Doom "interlude."
#267 when Sue loses the baby.
#350 and 352 the Walt Simonson FF/Doom fight, including one of the trippiest Fantastic Four comics ever - #352, the "time travel" issue, where Doom and Reed battle throughout time AND the comic (so that the fight travels from, like, page 2, panel 4 to page 7, panel 3 to page 3, panel 1. Stuff like that. Very trippy.
Well, those are my picks.
How about you folk?
It's probably sacriligious to say so, but I'd include the Art Adams drawn and spectacularly self-referential three issue story where Spidey, Ghost Rider, The Hulk, and Wolverine become the new FF. Along with, you know, all that other rightfully classic stuff.
ReplyDeleteHere's what I'd pick:
ReplyDeleteAnnual 3 - Reed & Sue get hitched
51 - My favorite Lee/Kirby story ever.
84-87 - Doom traps the FF in what is essentially The Village (though sadly, no #6)
258 - Probably the best Doom story ever.
267 - Sue loses the baby. Truly heartwrenching story.
296 - 25th anniversary story; also the only Mole Man story I've ever really liked.
334-336 - The FF vs. every loser villain in the Marvel Universe. Funny stuff.
510-511? - Don't remember the exact numbers, but the ones where they go to rescue Ben from the afterlife.
Benjamin, I think Marvel may have done a "Best of" in the past, as there WAS a collection before that DID have the Art Adams storyline in it.
ReplyDeleteI dunno if I feel right about including in a "best of the FF" collection a story that starred other heroes, but that definitely WAS a fun story!
Very nice art, as well.