Fantastic Four #37 (LGY#682)

[shakalooloo]

Johnny Storm re-unites with Peter Parker, and Ben Grimm does some parenting!







Dan Slott, writer; Nico Leon, artist; Dono Sánchez-Almara, colour artist

Comments

[onsokumaru]

I'm going to assume that Johnny can't melt in back together because he doesn't fully control his flame now.
Those Thing/Alicia and kids moments are great. I really hope that they are not thrown away for the holy status quo.

Johnny, on the other side... One of the first comics I've read was the original Secret Wars, where Johnny was an absolute ass to Zsaji, the alien woman he "played" with. The fact he is still a jerk to women shows how much Marvel Comics fail their characters. I could blame just Slott and his adoration of Lee&Kirby old stories, but he is far from being the only writer who refuses to let some characters grow up.

[shakalooloo]

Johnny never, ever gets to develop. His original character was 'the kid', and he's never been allowed to progress beyond that for long. It's especially noticeable when one sees how much the other three have grown from their original versions, Sue gaining confidence, Ben losing his anger, Reed loosening up...

Johnny's just the kid.

[lordultimus]

Cindy Brady syndrome at it's finest.

[mazway_75]

It really does seem a rule any new FF writer has to toss out years of progress and regress Johnny right back to immature jerk.

[sinisterlink]

I wouldn’t be so annoyed with the Johnny thing if it was actually consistent. Like, as much as it sucks,, some guys are just womanizers and they never grow out of it. The problem is that they keep making it seem like Johnny is finally growing up and maturing about relationships and then a new writer will show up and just cannonball the whole thing. It’s like whenever they make Spider-Man become successful in his career or something, it never lasts cause they always have to shove him back to being a loser again later on because of that good old “Parker Luck”.

[mazway_75]

As I recall, his infatuation was really a side effect of Zsaji's healing as evidenced by how fast Colossus fell for her. Wolverine calls it out with Nightcrawler while pointing out "alien culture, you think love means for her what it does for us?" So it was less "being a jerk" than just falling out of her influence.

[lordultimus]

I do like Ben and Alicia being officially married and them having adopted alien kids. Slott isn't a bad writer, he just needs an editor that's willing to say when he has a bad idea.

[blues32]

The worst thing about Ben and Alicia getting married is that it took so damn long for it to happen. My GOD, it's been, what? Fifty years? Nearly sixty? Here's hoping this marriage sticks as long as Reed and Sue's has.

[remial]

Ben: Come on, Johnny, if you really like Sky, don't give up so easy. So you turned her into a giant bird monster. In our line of work, these things happen. Remember when I took Sharon up in a rocket and turned her into a She-Thing? We stayed together despite that.
Johnny: Yeah, i guess so...
Alicia: (icely) Who is Sharon?
Ben: Ohgeelookatthetime,thekidsneedmegottago.

[sabertoothlotus]

I'm pretty sure Alicia knows who Sharon is... and in Ben's defense Alicia was dating Johnny at the time (if I recall correctly)-- sort of. She turned out to be a skrull, but Ben didn't know that.

[sinisterlink]

Johnny: So she broke up with me and went back to her home planet.

Peter: Man, that sucks. Reminds me of the time me and MJ sold our marriage to Mephisto to save my aunt.

Johnny: WHAT.

Peter: What?

Anyways, I thought this was a nice issue. Always fun to see Spidey and Torch hanging out and had a bunch of funny moments like the kids tricking all the adults into taking them out trick or treating separately and then having to return all the candy after Ben and Alicia found out. I did like how they addressed the slippery slope that Alicia has been on with the couple times she’s used the magic clay to control people. Puppet Master possessing the neighbor to tell Alicia that she needs to be a better person than him and that even he wouldn’t try to control his own child was a pretty effective scene.

[shakalooloo]

Good to see that Puppet Master's appearance last issue wasn't leading up to another attempt to sabotage the marriage. He's grown more than Johnny!

[sinisterlink]

I was impressed that when he mentioned how she had controlled him he was basically just like, "Yeah, it made sense why you did that". Most other villains would be doing more of the "How dare you use my own tricks against me!" thing.

He's grown more than Johnny!

Haha. God, that's sad.

[blues32]

Given how he treated Alicia like trash in his original appearance, I'd say Puppet Master changed a lot. He probably felt a bit of pride in her for taking up the "family trade", so to speak.

Still, he DID send the Hulk to kill Ben. And I'm not sure who's the bigger jerk. Puppet Master for sending the Hulk or the Hulk for CLEARLY not trying to fight the influence at all. And Hulk not fighting it got "the kid" in trouble when it was just him and Joe in his head.

[blues32]

There was a point in time when that wasn't true. There was also a point in time when he didn't need radioactive clay to do it. And it's radioactive, not magic. Or maybe it's irradiated with magic.

[blues32]

Jeez, Reed! Great suit you built there. How is Johnny standing so close to everyone in that last panel?

[arilou_skiff]

Reset of character development is bad and all, but the entire explanation of what happened is just peak comics. Where you can unironically say "And then she went back to her home planet..."

[blues32]

She had to go now. Her planet needed her.