Fantastic Four #48

Featuring: Fantastic Four
Release: December 12, 1965
Cover: March 1966
12 cents
Stan Lee, writer without peer!
Jack Kirby, penciller of the year!
Joe Sinnott, inker most sincere!
Artie Simek, how’d he get in here!
20 pages

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Tales of Suspense #78, Story B	Reading order	Fantastic Four #49
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My journey is ended! This planet shall sustain me until it has been drained of all elemental life! So speaks Galactus!

There’s a lot going on in this issue, and a lot to say. So we’ll break it into sections.

The end of the Inhumans saga

We were reading the Inhumans saga in Fantastic Four #44–47. And it wasn’t done. Maximus, the mad would-be king of the Inhumans, was just about to wipe out all humanity with his weapon.

Despite this cliffhanger, we left the saga behind to check in on the rest of the Marvel Universe. We’ve read 70 other stories over the 9 months since we left ourselves hanging. The story concludes this issue. Prior to issue 44, the longest FF saga was 3 parts in the previous 3 issues, #41–43, clocking in at 60 pages. Before that, the longest FF saga was the 2-part #39–40, clocking in at 40 pages.

We’ve already ready 4 issues and 80 pages of the Inhumans arc, and we’re not done! Here we are on the 5th issue. Since this issue is another 20 pages, does that mean it’s a 100-page long saga?

I would say no. I would put it at about 86.7 pages.

That’s right. There are less than 7 pages left.

The Fantastic Four have found the Great Refuge within the Andes. Black Bolt wants them to leave immediately. Reed wants Black Bolt to stop hiding from humanity. Crystal and Johnny want each other.

And Maximus… he fires his “atmo-gun”, which will send vibrations that only affect humans into the air, leaving the Inhumans the rulers of the world.

And the resolution of this apocalyptic moment?

If Maximus is to believed, his plan worked and all of humanity is dead now.

I like how Black Bolt just slaps him.

Actually, humanity isn’t dead. Maximus’ weapon was a dud. Produced some shakes and otherwise had no effect. The end.

Well, that’s a bit anticlimactic.

Well, it’s not quite over. Maximus’ plan to destroy humanity failed, but he can still stop Black Bolt’s plan to bridge their two worlds. He reverses the atmo-gun to create a Negative Zone around the Great Refuge, an impenetrable barrier.

The Fantastic Four need to get out before it seals, separating the Inhumans from humanity forever. Johnny doesn’t want to be separated from Crystal, nor she from him. But Thing pulls Johnny out and Gorgon holds Crystal in. Johnny is quite angry with Ben over this.

“I got a feelin’ I’m never gonna think of ‘im as a kid again!” thinks Ben.

Why did Maximus’ plan fail? Because the humans and Inhumans are really all one species, so his device meant to affect one but not the other couldn’t work.

Then a weird thing happens. The Great Refuge begins to sink into the ground. They don’t really explain why or spend more than a panel on it.

Then an even weirder thing happens. On the 5th panel of the 7th page, we meet the Silver Surfer, and a new and totally unrelated story begins.

Can we make sense of the Inhumans saga?

The story began with Medusa, living on an island in a cave fighting off authorities when the Wizard found her. She joined the Frightful Four and seemed sufficiently dedicated to murdering the Fantastic Four. Her teammates had all been defeated by Human Torch in the past, so their motives sort of made sense. But Medusa’s were not explained. It’s enough to know that she was evil.

Or was she?

When her teammates were imprisoned, she came to the Fantastic Four now for aid, seeking help against Gorgon. Gorgon was trying to… capture her? And ready to destroy Manhattan to do so.

Once with Gorgon, she no longer seems as desperately concerned. He apparently just wanted her to come back to their sanctuary. Along with Black Bolt, Crystal, Triton, and Lockjaw. In this sanctuary, they were hiding from humans, but also from the Seeker.

The Seeker had been sent by Maximus to find them and bring them back to the Great Refuge. But apparently the Seeker had no idea who he was looking for, as he thought Dragon Man might be one of them. They all fear the Seeker, so they retreat… to the Great Refuge. Exactly where the Seeker wanted to take them.

Or did he? Black Bolt had been exiled by Maximus. He wasn’t supposed to return. But maybe the rest were? Maximus has been king since the incident–perhaps an accident, perhaps caused by Maximus– where Black Bolt lost the ability to speak. But now Black Bolt reclaims his throne.

Maximus definitely wanted Medusa back to marry her, but Maximus sent Gorgon, not the Seeker, after Medusa.

Unclear how elections are handled in the Great Refuge, but Black Bolt seems to become king again by merely taking the crown off of Maximus. At this point the dynamics become a little clearer. Maximus wants to destroy humanity so the Inhumans will inherit the Earth. Black Bolt wants to hide from humanity. Reed wants them to reveal themselves to humanity and live in peace. Johnny and Crystal have their own needs, as young teenagers in love.

It’s not clear that any of that made all that much sense. And it’s confusing that it ended on such an anticlimax, with Maximus’ gun just not working. And it’s confusing that it ended on page 7.

Learning more about the nature of Black Bolt’s silence will confuse things even more.

The saga of the Silver Surfer

Page 7. Panel 5. “But, life goes on–” says the narrator, trying to handle the extremely awkward transition from panel 4.

Who is the Silver Surfer? His name is pretty descriptive of what we can see at a glance. He doesn’t surf on oceans, but the starways, from galaxy to galaxy and across the universe.

This implies he can travel impossibly fast, far faster than the speed of light. Or that he has other ways of traversing distances, perhaps be traversing subspace, as the Fantastic Four did in issue 37.

The Skrulls fear him, and black out their entire solar system to escape his notice.

But it’s not necessarily him the fear. It’s someone called… Galactus.

The Official Marvel Index indicates that Skrull is the same Skrull King we have met before. I don’t quite agree. That King looked different and always wore a distinctive crown. This character is referred to as “my Lord”, and has the authority to black out a solar system, so that’s evidence in their theory’s favor. I think this might be one of those script/art dichotomies. Perhaps Stan wrote this character as the Skrull King, but that’s not who Kirby drew.

I’m going to trust my own impressions and not include “Skrull King” in my character listing below. But I recognize I may be wrong here. I am definitely outvoted.

On the way home from the Andes, Thing sees two suns. Odd.

Then one sun expands into a wall of fire that fills the sky. Odd.

“Oh, my darling! We’ve left a desperate, soul-searing adventure– only to retreat to something that seems far more dangerous– far more terrifying!”

This is a great image of the crowd panicking from the flame and blaming the Human Torch. Johnny describes it as “a world gone mad”.

“An’ now, as my dear ol’ Aunt Petunia mighta said– It’s clobberin’ time!” — Thing, rescuing Johnny from a mob.

The Silver Surfer finds what he was looking for– our sun.

Stan gets the science correct here. Our sun is a G-type star, and that fact is part of why life was able to form here.

A common issue in Reed and Sue’s marriage will be that he is busy with work when she wants attention, or is concerned for his eating and hygiene. This is a particularly odd moment for Sue to insist on a date. The sky was literally just on fire.

“The world won’t come to and end if you take time out for dinner!”
“I wish I could be sure of that!”

Indeed, if they’d just look outside, they would see the sky is filled with stones.

The Watcher appears to reveal he is behind the fire and rock.

The Watcher is a complicated character. He’s one of a handful of “comic beings” we’ve met, mostly aliens so advanced as to seem like gods to us. The Stranger is another like the Watcher. We’ve also met Dormammu, a demonic sorcerer so powerful as to be basically a god. And Eternity, who as best I can tell, is a god.

The Watcher is pledged to never interfere. Yet, almost every time we meet him, he takes some action that seems suspiciously like interfering. This is perhaps the most extreme example, where he’s literally filled Earth’s sky with fire. That’s a bit more than just transporting someone home.

But this time he’s willing to acknowledge that what he’s doing violates his oath. The danger is too great. The Watcher explains that Galactus drains entire planets of their elements and leaves them unable to support life. Silver Surfer is Galactus’ scout.

The Watcher has apparently grown fond of Earth, for he does not wish this to be our fate.

Despite the oddities in his characterization, the Watcher remains one of my favorite comic characters.

To emphasize how powerful Galactus is, the Watcher says Galactus is as powerful as himself. The Watcher claims Galactus is the only being who can match his power. I’d like to test that. I could believe the Watcher is more powerful than the Stranger. But Eternity looked pretty darn mighty.

I’ve noted that the one thing Stan has never used in any of these hundreds of comics we’ve read is a period. He likes to end sentences with (one or more) exclamation points, even when wildly inappropriate.

“He and the F.F. have met a number of times in the past!” Calm down, Stan.

After a lot of preamble, the Human Torch confronts the Silver Surfer. Completely ineffectually, as the Surfer is too fast for him. And the Surfer summons Galactus.

We don’t get to know the Surfer well this issue. He says nothing. We see no thought balloons. He remains entirely enigmatic. We’ll try to parse out who his character is in the coming issues.

We then get one of those pages that’s always exciting. Where Kirby is experimenting with a mix of artwork and photo collages to achieve a unique effect. Galactus’ devices over a New York cityscape.

And, at last, Galactus himself.

The FF suggest he is a giant. The Watcher explains he is what he wishes to be. I take this to mean his humanoid form is for our benefit, and his size is malleable. What we are seeing isn’t his “true” form, but how he appears to our mortal eyes.

What color is Galactus’ outfit?

The red and green are not the colors most people associate with Galactus. The coloring in this digital version is pretty close to the original. But coloring was just wonky in 1960s Marvel. There didn’t seem to be clear paths of communication between the artists and the coloring, probably due to constantly pressing deadlines.

Here’s two scans of the original look of Galactus, found on online auction sites.

But other reprints over the decades have colored this page differently. This was found on the internet, recolored into his more modern look. Not sure of the provenance.

Here’s a scan from my copy of Essential Fantastic Four vol. 3. The black and white allows you to focus on what Kirby and Sinnott actually drew. The color gets in the way, especially when the colors may not have been what was intended.

Absent the coloring, we see the look Kirby had for Galactus hasn’t fundamentally changed much across the decades. It just took a bit to sort out the coloring.

We’ll see Galactus is recolored for his next issue, and then yet again for issue 50.

I actually own Fantastic Four #50, so will be confident the coloring we see then is the original coloring.

While we’re talking about the costume, presumably the G on his chest stands for Galactus. Or is it a subtle hint that this next foe of the Fantastic Four is them fighting God.

Per accounts, the germ of the idea Stan had for this story was to “have the FF fight God”.

Who created the Silver Surfer?

A lot of discussion of superheroes centers around the idea of creating a character. The question of who created a character has financial and legal ramifications. Sometimes movies will note a character’s creators in the credits, and other times they won’t. Again, for legal reasons. If you watch the credits for Marvel’s recent series Echo, you will see “Echo created by David Mack and Joe Quesada”. Most Batman movies featured in the credits, “Batman created by Bob Kane”. Only in the last decade has that been amended to say, more accurately, “Batman created by Bob Kane and Bill Finger”. The Wonder Woman movie credits her creation to William Moulton Martson, but Wikipedia notes more accurately she was created by William Moulton Marston and H.G. Peter.

Let’s look to Wikipedia to see who created what superhero characters:

• Spider-Man: Stan Lee and Steve Ditko
• Dr. Strange: Steve Ditko (Interesting!)
• Hulk: Stan Lee and Jack Kirby
• Iron Man: Stan Lee, Larry Lieber, Don Heck, Jack Kirby, and Steve Ditko (that’s quite the list!)
• Wolverine: Roy Thomas, Len Wein, John Romita, and Herb Trimpe
• Punisher: Gerry Conway, John Romita, and Ross Andru.

Wikipedia is my best approximation of a consensus opinion on a controversial topic. Disney’s lawyers will have their own opinions.

What does it mean to “create” a fictional character, especially characters who are in a constant state of being created.

Let’s look at the history of Wolverine. He was conceived corporately. Marvel’s editor Roy Thomas and art director John Romita conceived the basic idea of a Canadian superhero with claws, and Romita drew the first sketches of him. They assigned Len Wein and Herb Trimpe to have the character show up in their Hulk comic. So Thomas and Romita conceived the character, without Wein and Trimpe present. But Wein and Trimpe fleshed him out, drawing and writing him in action, putting words into his mouth for the first time. Romita drew the first sketches, but Trimpe drew the first finished, published renderings of the character. So I think it’s fair to give credit to all four of those guys. But another argument might say that only Thomas and Romita deserve the credit.

But there’s another argument. That the character of Wolverine introduced in the pages of Incredible Hulk doesn’t feel anything like the character we know today. Because there was more “fleshing out” to be done. Wein brought Wolverine with him to X-Men, with artist Dave Cockrum. Claremont took over the writing and did a lot to develop Wolverine’s character. His character developed further when Byrne took over on art, and depicted Wolverine’s savagery, but also his questioning of his own moral code. These themes would be explored further when Claremont took Wolverine to his own series, with the art of Frank Miller, where they imagined him as a “failed samurai”. Barry Windsor-Smith would later tell the story of the experiments that gave Wolverine his claws and metal skeleton, creating iconic images forever associated with the character. Hugh Jackman would quite literally bring Wolverine to life, portraying him in films for two decades, and reshaping our collective image of the character in the process. I would argue all these people have created Wolverine, Jackman as much as Thomas or Romita, and that the “creation” of Wolverine is an ongoing process.

But that’s obviously way too complicated an answer.

Let’s peek at Iron Man, with the crazy long list. There’s something similar to what’s going on with Wolverine. The initial drawing came from Kirby, possibly based on some discussions with Lee. But it was Lieber and Heck who told the first Iron Man story. That’s how we get to 4 names. But where does Steve Ditko come in? He was not present for the creation of Iron Man. He did take over as the artist for Iron Man later in the series. Much as Cockrum took over the character of Wolverine early into his history. Why give him credit? Well, under Ditko, Iron Man got a new look, one forever associated with the character.

Let’s look to Dr. Strange. That’s a shorter list. Only Steve Ditko. What about Stan Lee? Ditko conceived Dr. Strange, plotted and drew the first story without any input, but Lee added the dialogue, put the words in Dr. Strange’s mouth. Isn’t Lee as much a creator of Dr. Strange as Wein is of Wolverine?

Which brings us to Silver Surfer. Created per Wikipedia by Jack Kirby. And not Stan Lee.

Which is weird. The truth is, the early Marvel offices have no good records. People were busy and nobody thought it was important enough to make notes of who said what or first suggested the idea of what. All we have are the imperfect and biased recollections of these people from years later in interviews.

But in the case of Silver Surfer, Stan Lee does something uncharacteristic: he doesn’t claim credit. He claims credit for the idea of Galactus, even though his idea for the story was probably about a sentence long, leaving Kirby to go dream up what “God” would look like and do. And when Kirby sat down to plot out the story, he decided the “God” should have a herald.

Stan says their initial discussions didn’t mention a herald, certainly not one on a surfboard! “There, in the middle of the story we had so carefully worked out, was a nut on some sort of flying surfboard”.

Stan Lee may not have been sold on the Silver Surfer initially, but he soon would be. Stan and Jack would have very different visions for the character, but Stan would essentially adopt the character and make it his own. (Again, this question of “creation”.) Stan would turn the Surfer into something very different from what Kirby intended.

And, for decades after Stan had retired from regular comics writing, he would pop in every few years because he just had one more Silver Surfer story to tell.

I will say there seems to be no better example of Kirby distilled to a microcosm than a silver dude on a surfboard flying through space. Delightfully weird, and the sort of concept that’s entirely nonsensical but that Kirby makes seem perfectly natural.

Why is this issue in such a wonky structure?

Why does this comic seem to have two completely unrelated stories? Why not make the Inhumans saga a little shorter? Or a little longer?

Weirdly, the Galactus saga will only take about 46 pages to tell. 13 pages from this issue, all of next issue, and then 13 pages of the next issue. Which will leave 7 pages for completely unrelated material, mostly about a struggling college football team. It’s weird structuring.

A lot of times when something weird happens on the page, the answer lies in behind-the-scenes disagreements. Lee and Kirby were often not on the same page, often disagreed or miscommunicated. And the final product is the synthesis of visions not always in sync.

Did that happen here? Maybe. In truth, I have no idea.

The internet is full of no shortage of speculation, though. I’d like to share one theory, not because it’s a theory I subscribe to. But because it’s interesting.

A gentleman named Chris Tolworthy has a site where he argues that the first 28 years of the Fantastic Four form The Great American Novel. (I have an idea in my head that the Fantastic Four story is only one thread of an even larger and greater novel.)

You can read Tolworthy’s theory and his other thoughts on this issue here. He argues these are not two unconnected stories at all, just that Lee’s dialogue screwed up Kirby’s story a bit. (This does happen often, we know). He argues that Maximus’ weapon was not really a weapon, that he was sending a signal to Galactus. So, in this theory, the device didn’t fail at all. It did exactly as intended, to bring Galactus to Earth and so bring about humanity’s doom.

This then connects to his next action. Sealing the Great Refuge in the Negative Zone barrier wasn’t then a petty act after a failure, but all part of the plan to make sure the Inhumans survived Galactus’ devastation.

It’s an interesting theory, and one that would make this issue a bit more coherent.

My concern with this theory comes down to these two panels from page 4.

In the comic, this is where Medusa shows Maximus his plan failed and the humans survived. But even if we remove all the dialogue and just look at the artwork… what else could be happening here? Medusa points to living humans and Maximus looks surprised.

I have difficulty looking at Maximus’ face in that panel and thinking that everything is going according to plan.

In film

Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer is one of the very worst superhero films I have ever seen. Doug Jones gave form to the Silver Surfer and Laurence Fishburne provided the voice. Galactus also sort of appeared as like a cloud or something. It’s hard to tell what he looks like because he’s destroyed in under 30 seconds. Some cosmic threat.

If you haven’t seen it, I must highly recommend that you simply don’t.

Rating: ★★★★½, 89/100
Significance: ★★★★★

A tricky rating. The Galactus saga is pretty close to the best Marvel story I’ve ever read. This is an odd beginning to it, with the first 7 pages dedicated to the Inhumans saga, which is kind of a mess. Particularly with Maximus’ secret weapon just not working. Kind of ended with a whimper. Then it was an awkward transition to the story of the Silver Surfer. So, the start of one of the best stories ever, but with enough articulable flaws to dock it a half star.

Still part of the Best We’ve Read. It will come at the expense of Fantastic Four #13, the introduction of the Watcher, perhaps the first hint of greatness within the Fantastic Four comics. The loss of such a great comic makes me think that 100 comics is no longer enough to track the best of our reading. I’ll look into starting an Honorable Mentions page for comics like FF 13, great comics that don’t quite make the top 100.

I read this story in Fantastic Four Omnibus vol. 2.

Characters:

• Thing
• Mr. Fantastic
• Invisible Girl
• Human Torch
• Karnak
• Crystal
• Gorgon
• Medusa
• Black Bolt
• Maximus
• Seeker
• Silver Surfer
• Watcher
• Galactus

Story notes:

• Maximus’ vibrations from the Atmo-gun failed because they are the same race, humans and inhumans.
• Medusa shows him on the video scanner that humans are still alive. Maximus looks shocked his plan failed.
• The Inhumans will one day rejoin the human race under Black Bolt’s leadership.
• Medusa will give her heart to Black Bolt, but only after he fulfills his destiny. He looks at her longingly.
• Maximus reverses the charge on the Atmo-gun to create a Negative Zone around their land.
• Nothing known to science can penetrate a Negative Zone, per Reed.
• Thing knows that Reed will never give up trying to free the Inhumans.
• Barrier sinks lower and lower into ground.
• Fifth Quadrant of Andromeda Galaxy… home planet of the Skrulls.
• The Skrulls black out the entire Skrull solar system to hide from the Silver Surfer.
• Galactus cannot be far behind the Silver Surfer.
• Although the sky is on fire, Torch notes nothing is hot and nothing is burning; flames then disappear from the sky.
• Thing speculates the fire advertises a Joseph E. Levine movie.
• Silver Surfer headed to the Milky Way.
• Silver Surfer finds our sun, a G-type star. He knows there must be a world there that contains the energy and elemental resources necessary to Galactus.
• Thing calls Alicia on the phone.
• Sue sees on the video screen that Reed is unshaven and likely starving.
• Sky fills with space debris.
• Watcher is responsible for sky phenomena with his Matter Mobilizer.
• Watcher substituted space debris for fire-shield after panic was incited.
• Invisible Girl reminds Watcher of his pledge to never interfere with other worlds.
• Silver Surfer is the advance scout for Galactus, who drains entire planets, and then leaves them dry, unable to support life. Watcher would not let this happen to Earth.
• We are reminded Watcher is a being from another galaxy, from a far older civilization, whose mission is to watch and record the history of the cosmos.
• Silver Surfer navigates the debris and realizes some power has tried to conceal the planet from him.
• Silver Surfer easily dodges Human Torch.
• Watcher describes Silver Surfer as “him who rides the skyways”.
• Things throws Surfer off the roof, but the Watcher notes that falling was Surfer’s choice.
• Galactus’ universe-spanning sphere enters Earth’s atmosphere.
• Testing devices emerge from sphere to sample Earth’s elemental composition.

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Tales of Suspense #78, Story B	Reading order	Fantastic Four #49
Fantastic Four #47	Fantastic Four	Fantastic Four #49