Writing: Tom DeFalco
Art: Carlos Pachco
What Went Down: Dr. Doom’s servant begins by explaining to his master the Onslaught storyline up to this point, including the capture of Franklin and the EMP. Doom declares that this situation requires his personal attention.
At Four Freedoms Plaza, a number of heroes are trying to rest in between going out and fighting Sentinels. The Invisible Woman finds some of Franklin’s toys and feels depressed. Ant-Man, who is working for the FF at this point, regains consciousness, but he is too weak from the EMP frying his helmet, and because of it, part of his brain. The Beast also brings up the fact that he was recently rescued over in X-Factor. Mr. Fantastic’s father Nathaniel tells Sue that the FF need to flee or they will die; he knows this because he is a time traveler who has seen the future. Sue refuses without Franklin, and she goes off with her husband to have a talk.
Inside Onslaught, Franklin is using his powers to send projections to warn his family where he is. It is explained that he was tricked into luring Nate Grey into a trap over in Nate’s book X-Man. On the roof of FF Plaza, Hawkeye and Iceman complain about how boring recon is. Inside, Sue and Reed have a conversation about whether they’ve neglected their responsibility to their son by putting him in danger all the time. Mr. Fantastic swears they will figure it out after they defeat Onslaught.
The Thing contemplates how alone he is as he watches the Torch and Lyja talk alone; Ben has a crush on Lyja at this point. Alicia Masters and her father the Puppet Master show up to offer their help against Onslaught. In another room Ant-Man’s daughter Cassie Lang is busy talking with Kristoff Vernard, a twelve-year-old boy who had all of Dr. Doom’s knowledge and memories implanted in him. They discuss a friend of Cassie’s who was being abused, and Cassie says that he finally told a teacher and got help for him and his mother from his abusive father. Kang the Conqueror appears, but Kristoff punches him once and the Conqueror dissolves.
The Thing and Alicia talk, and he explains that recently he’s been utilizing a machine to change back and forth into a normal human. The couple is attacked by the Psycho-Man. Meanwhile Lyja explains that she has been posing as another woman to date Johnny without him knowing, but they are interrupted by Paibok and the Super-Skrull. Fortunately for them, the Inhumans show up to help in defeating the aliens. In another hall, Mr. Fantastic and the Invisible Woman fight Wizard, Mad Thinker, and Devos the Devastator. Namor the Sub-Mariner turns up to help.
Nathaniel Richards is being attacked by the Red Ghost, but he is saved by the Black Panther and members of the Fantastic Force. Reed realizes what is happening—these enemies are really projections from Franklin warped by Onslaught, and he goes off to build a machine that can stop it (just like every other FF story you’ve ever read). She-Hulk appears to help out the Thing against Tyros the Terrible. Reed’s machine needs a power source, so the Thing pulls the power source from the machine that lets him turn back into a human.
Outside the Torch is fighting Annihilus and the Dragon Man, but Doctor Doom shows up to save him. Johnny thinks Doom is another adversary to fight at first. The Invisible Woman is attacked by her Malice persona, but Agatha Harkness appears to rescue her. Reed flips the switch on his machine and all the villains disintegrate. Sue tells Reed that Harkness claims Franklin is still alive, and everybody gets excited. Johnny shows up and tells everyone that Doom is now on their side. The team does the traditional hands in the middle pose, and the series ends on a spread of the FF and all their allies, old and new, ready for action.
How It Was: Groan…yet another double-sized issue. Yet this one doesn’t feel as extraneous since this is supposed to be the formal end to Marvel’s oldest and longest running comic (at the time). Poor Tom DeFalco had obviously been doing a fine job of setting up different subplots for his characters that all had to be hurriedly rushed to completion in time for the end of Onslaught. Cassie Lang’s friend who was being abused by his father is all wrapped up with two panels of exposition, the Torch just forgives Lyja for impersonating another woman because there isn’t any time for a different resolution, and Alicia Masters is wheeled out randomly to bring some closure to the ongoing ordeal of the Thing’s loneliness. This all feels really, really rushed. I will admit though that I do love the part where the Thing tears the power source out of his changing machine, not just because I feel the machine lessens the inherent drama of a great tragic character, but also because it’s just a really great example of Ben Grimm stepping up and being a hero.
As for the plot, well… this has absolutely nothing to do with Onsluaght, and it doesn’t really fit the tone of the other crossover books. Instead DeFalco seems more interested in giving the Fantastic Four a proper sendoff by going through a number of past villains and having a bunch of allies show up for absolutely no reason at all. And really, without Dr. Doom or Galactus as potential adversaries, this book is limited to some pretty weak villains, even before you add in the part about dissolving with one punch. Tyros the Terrible? Devos the Devastator? These really aren’t the strongest characters from Marvel’s back catalog. And the Inhumans show up completely out of nowhere. Some of the appearances are kind of neat, but there are just so many that none of them feel significant in any way. And of course it has to end with Reed flipping the Deus Machina switch to save the day, although this comes off more as an homage to tradition, rather than purposefully stale writing.
The other major problem with the plot only matters if you read Avengers #400, which came out two months prior to this issue. In it Loki uses magic to attack a team of past and present Avengers characters with artificial avatars of villains from throughout the team’s history. Does that sound in any way familiar? Now I’m not accusing DeFalco of blatant plagiarism, after all I’ve read similarly structured stories in Spider-Man and the X-Men, but it still isn’t a really a stupendous issue. Plus all the Avengers and X-Men are completely ignored for the sake of giving the FF a proper sendoff; Iceman and Hawkeye are shown observing the villains approaching, then they are never seen again for the entire double-sized issue.
Pacheco is perfect for drawing this kind of issue with lots and lots of different characters. If you want to see how good he gets at drawing giant epic scale battles, go buy Avengers Forever. Still, his Onslaught looks even more out of place now that he isn’t drawing the “evolved” version of the bad guy, although he’s not really in the issue long enough to care. The art definitely elevates the story above the shallow plot structure and hurried subplot wrap-ups that DeFalco is editorially forced to endure. It’s not an ideal ending for the team, especially in the middle of a larger storyline, but I guess it gets the job done.
C-
No comments:
Post a Comment