Biggest Screw-Up In The First Ten Issues of the Fantastic Four
In a post here discussing the ten goofiest plot points of the first ten issues of Fantastic Four, a poster with the screen name Gothos points out what he thinks was by FAR the goofiest bit from the first ten issues of the Fantastic Four. I differ with him, in that I do not think it counts as "goofy," as it is just a flat-out screw-up, however, it IS quite a doozy! Here, I'll share it with you all now...
As we know from the goofiest list, in #2, the Fantastic Four tricked the Skrull invasion fleet into thinking Earth was far too deadly to invade by showing them clips from science fiction comic books. What I didn't mention then was HOW the Fantastic Four got on to the ship - it was by masquerading as the very same Skrulls who were pretending to be THEM back on Earth, getting the Fantastic Four into all sorts of trouble at home!
Using the excuse that they had to stay behind on Earth, the FF got out of the dilemma of having to stick around with the rest of the Skrulls who were quickly retreating.
However, there was still the matter of convincing the authorities back home that it was the Skrulls who did all those bad things, NOT the Fantastic Four! To achieve this, they took the police to see the Skrulls that the Fantastic Four had captured earlier in the issue. Notice the dialogue - QUARTET of Skrulls.
However, when they all get there, there are now only THREE Skrulls!!
Now, all of a sudden, Reed is talking about the fourth one being with the rest of the invasion fleet! But that, of course, couldn't be true, because the fourth Skrull would know all about how the Fantastic Four TRICKED the Skrulls!!
Where,then, did the fourth Skrull REALLY go!??!
Likely, Jack Kirby simply forgot that there were supposed to be four Skrulls, and only drew three Skrulls the rest of the issue, and Lee added that little bit of dialogue to attempt to explain the fourth Skrull's absence, but of course, the explanation fell far short.
So there, that's the biggest screw-up in the first ten issues of the Fantastic Four!
As we know from the goofiest list, in #2, the Fantastic Four tricked the Skrull invasion fleet into thinking Earth was far too deadly to invade by showing them clips from science fiction comic books. What I didn't mention then was HOW the Fantastic Four got on to the ship - it was by masquerading as the very same Skrulls who were pretending to be THEM back on Earth, getting the Fantastic Four into all sorts of trouble at home!
Using the excuse that they had to stay behind on Earth, the FF got out of the dilemma of having to stick around with the rest of the Skrulls who were quickly retreating.
However, there was still the matter of convincing the authorities back home that it was the Skrulls who did all those bad things, NOT the Fantastic Four! To achieve this, they took the police to see the Skrulls that the Fantastic Four had captured earlier in the issue. Notice the dialogue - QUARTET of Skrulls.
However, when they all get there, there are now only THREE Skrulls!!
Now, all of a sudden, Reed is talking about the fourth one being with the rest of the invasion fleet! But that, of course, couldn't be true, because the fourth Skrull would know all about how the Fantastic Four TRICKED the Skrulls!!
Where,then, did the fourth Skrull REALLY go!??!
Likely, Jack Kirby simply forgot that there were supposed to be four Skrulls, and only drew three Skrulls the rest of the issue, and Lee added that little bit of dialogue to attempt to explain the fourth Skrull's absence, but of course, the explanation fell far short.
So there, that's the biggest screw-up in the first ten issues of the Fantastic Four!
posted by Brian Cronin at 4/08/2006 06:27:00 AM
4 Comments:
Wasn't the question of the fourth skrull a major plot point of Grant Morrison and Mark Millar's "Skull Kill Krew" miniseries in the 90s?
I think the fate of the fourth skrull formed the basis of the Roy Thomas/Neal Adams Kree Skrull War storyline in the Avengers...
I know the original three were involved, as per the famous line "Three cows shot me down..."
Oh, yeah, Thomas, like most plot points that did not make sense initially, later pain-stakingly explained it.
Just saying that, for that one issue, there was no reason.
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