Fantastic Four by Ryan North vol. 1: Whatever Happened to the Fantastic Four?

Dan Slott’s tenure on this title was enjoyable, but not the expectation-defying home run I was hoping for after his legendary “Amazing Spider-Man” run.  Ryan North, a talented Eisnter-nominated writer who’s been working at Marvel for a while on “The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl” and a host of well-received miniseries, is now taking over along with artists Iban Coello and Ivan Fiorelli.  This new era for Marvel’s First Family is a dramatic departure from what has come before as all of the stories in the six issues collected here are relatively self-contained.  Which is why the first issue sees Ben Grimm and Alicia Masters stuck in a time loop where one day in 1947 keeps repeating for a particular town.  Subsequent issues have Reed and Sue Richards dealing with a town infested by Doombots, and Johnny Storm correcting labor injustices in his new secret identity of Johnny Fairweather.  Oh and then there’s the issue which seeks to explain the big question of this run:  Why does everyone in New York hate the Fantastic Four now?

North has long been a solid writer who has turned in quality work in just about every title he’s worked on – corporate or creator-owned.  So it’s cool to see him get a shot at writing one of Marvel’s A-list series.  The results are pretty solid as they showcase a good mix of his science brain delivering quality high-concept stories while balancing them with emotional storytelling.  That first issue is a great showcase of how good this approach can be when it’s firing on all cylinders, with quality work from the artist involved.  Iban Coello illustrates that issue and the following three and he’s got a good handle on delivering superhero action and managing the human drama as well.  Well, good enough to forgive occasional missteps such as Reed’s “crying” in  issue four which struck me as more performative than emotive.

Things don’t work quite as well in the final two issues which are the ones handled by Fiorelli.  I don’t think this is the fault of the artist alone as North’s setups become more talky and expository here.  Even though the team is reunited in these two issues, the stories don’t benefit from the added interaction between the cast.  If anything, they feel more ordinary compared to the stories which preceded them.  Still, there’s more good than bad here, and North is also laying the groundwork for some long-term storytelling in addition to the one-offs he serves up here.  I’ll be coming back for vol. 2, is what I’m saying here, but that would likely have been true even if the results had been less positive.  Why?  Because next time we’re getting the return of a “Fantastic” staple that I’m very interested in seeing the writer tackle:  Doom.