Comics I Love - Byrne's Fantastic Four
The expectations were high for John Byrne when he took over Fantastic Four as the writer and artist, but he somehow managed to not only MEET them, but EXCEED them.
He did so by making Fantastic Four a title where, every month, in and out, you would have a rollicking adventure, and, not since the days of Kirby and Lee did you see the sheer amount of "What is going to happen next? Where is he going to take us NOW?" that took place in Byrne's Fantastic Four.
It did not hurt that Byrne might be at the peak of his artistic prowess at the time as well, effortless doing anything he wanted with the title, but at the same time, never wavering from an overall desire to tell a story - a good story.
Also, it was during his run that Byrne forcefully demonstrated his famous adage about how you have to do changes without ACTUALLY changing anything.
So he changed the FF's costume.
He changed Sue Richards' name.
He changed who Alicia Masters was involved with.
He changed the super-strong member of the FF.
But the stories always remained good, solid tales.
As for a single issue to encapsulate the run, I guess I'll go with Byrne's famous Doom story (since ignored by Ed Brubaker's Doom Year One) where Byrne reveals, quite cleverly, that Doom's scarring came from putting ON the mask, not the accident at college. Love that Doom issue.
He did so by making Fantastic Four a title where, every month, in and out, you would have a rollicking adventure, and, not since the days of Kirby and Lee did you see the sheer amount of "What is going to happen next? Where is he going to take us NOW?" that took place in Byrne's Fantastic Four.
It did not hurt that Byrne might be at the peak of his artistic prowess at the time as well, effortless doing anything he wanted with the title, but at the same time, never wavering from an overall desire to tell a story - a good story.
Also, it was during his run that Byrne forcefully demonstrated his famous adage about how you have to do changes without ACTUALLY changing anything.
So he changed the FF's costume.
He changed Sue Richards' name.
He changed who Alicia Masters was involved with.
He changed the super-strong member of the FF.
But the stories always remained good, solid tales.
As for a single issue to encapsulate the run, I guess I'll go with Byrne's famous Doom story (since ignored by Ed Brubaker's Doom Year One) where Byrne reveals, quite cleverly, that Doom's scarring came from putting ON the mask, not the accident at college. Love that Doom issue.
posted by Brian Cronin at 4:29 AM
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