Fantastic Four #13

The Fantastic Four Versus the Red Ghost and His Indescribable Super-Apes!/Menace on the Moon!/The Watcher Appears/Duel in the Dead City!
Featuring: Fantastic Four
Release: January 3, 1963
Cover: April 1963
12 cents
Story: Stan Lee
Art: Jack Kirby
Inking: S. Ditko
22 pages

I read this story in Fantastic Four Omnibus vol. 1.

The great Steve Ditko provides inks for Kirby’s pencils. We last saw this legendary combination in Incredible Hulk #2.

This issue is the first to get to the heart of what I think the Fantastic Four should be about: exploration of the wondrous; an adventure into the imagination. Kirby is famed for his creativity, but this is the first issue where he’s really letting it flex. This issue is bursting with ideas, many tangential to the main story. The FF head to the moon, learn the blue area has a breathable atmosphere, find the ruins of an ancient civilization, battle a super-villain and his super-apes, and meet the enigmatic Watcher. Plus glimpses of the past and future, and of the destruction of a world. That’s a comic bursting with ideas.

Mr. Fantastic is experimenting with a new type of energy for rocket fuel propulsion and his lab blows up. I think that is consistent with the history of the invention of rockets. This new fuel will be powerful enough to take them to the moon.

We must reflect back on the somewhat confusing origin of the Fantastic Four. Mr. Fantastic was clear they were trying to do something ahead of the Reds, but it wasn’t clear what. Presumably they were just trying to beat them into space; but the comic ended up published after the first actual Soviet space flight. So in the second issue they clarify Reed was trying to get them to Mars. That implies he thought he could have gotten to Mars minus a cosmic ray mishap. So it’s a bit strange that he’s just now inventing something powerful enough to take him to the moon.

It’s particularly strange, as they have a spaceship. The took the spaceship from Planet X to get back to earth. Presumably they have it still and that could take them to the moon. They could have even stopped at the moon on the way back from Planet X if they really wanted to plant an American flag somewhere.

No matter what, it seems a bit odd that Reed is just discovering how to fly to the moon. And how excited Sue is that America may win the space race.

Earth has been invaded by entire fleets of starships a half dozen times in the last year, Sue. Perhaps it’s time to put national differences aside and work together for the good of mankind against this clear and present danger of constant alien invasions.

Also odd is when Reed says it’s too dangerous and untested and he can’t risk their lives. Seems like something he should have thought about 12 issues ago. Maybe he’s learned from his mistakes. Either way, his team isn’t having it. They’re all going together.

The conceit of the issue is that the space race will be a nail-biter, as the Fantastic Four take off at the same time as the Soviet Ivan Kragoff and his crew of trained apes. Kragoff has two goals; besides reaching the moon, he is hoping to absorb the same cosmic rays as the Fantastic Four.

His plan works. The gorilla gains super-strength (though it was already pretty strong), the baboon becomes a shape-changer, and the orangutan develops magnetic powers. He himself becomes invisible and intangible.

The Watcher is an old favorite character of mine. In my early days of comics reading, I read a lot of What If…? comics, stories about what might have been in the Marvel Universe had things turned out differently. The Watcher narrates these stories.

The Watcher explains that his people watch, but never interfere, never make themselves known. Until now, when the violence of earth has made its way to his doorstep. He warns the earthlings of things he has seen, of the path other worlds have taken and that earth seems to be taking, toward war and destruction. He insists on a contest to settle the dispute before large-scale conflict comes to his doorstep.

Its conflicted stance on the Cold War mars an otherwise masterful comic. Mr. Fantastic does say the right things, about coming together as fellow earthmen, but soon after recites some rhetoric about them being the free people. So there’s mixed messages here. On the one hand, there’s definitely a pro-peace message, while at the same time frequently reminding us the Reds are the bad guys.

Rating: ★★★½, 62/100
Significance: ★★★★★

A triumph of imagination; along with some good messages about peace muddled by some Cold War propaganda.

Characters:

• Johnny Storm/Human Torch
• Susan Storm/Invisible Girl
• Ben Grimm/Thing
• Reed Richards/Mr. Fantastic
• Ivan Kragoff/Red Ghost
• Super-Apes
• The Watcher

Story notes:

• Reed experimenting with new type of rocket propulsion; lab blew up.
• New fuel composed of substances from a meteor crater; inspired by a meteor that fell in Siberia.
• Thing shoves Reed into a jar.
• Kragoff has crew of 3 apes: a gorilla, a baboon and an orangutan.
• Two moon launches at the same time.
• Watcher from planet very far away; entire world is a computer
• Watchers roam universe in spaceships
• Watcher tells of race evolved from molten metal, of the death of worlds older than our galaxy, and of peaceful races that have become savage and warlike.
• Watcher must leave moon since man has reached it, and he must keep his distance
• Super-Apes turn on Red Ghost
• Watcher notes how easy it is for him to banish someone to limbo or transport them backwards or forwards in time.

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