Fantastic Four 142
“No Friend Beside Him!”
Published Oct. 1973
Writer: Gerry Conway
Pencils: Rich Buckler
Inks: Joe Sinnott
Letters: John Costanza
Colors: Petra Goldberg
Editor: Roy Thomas
Cover: Buckler and Sinnott

Synopsis

The Thing, disgusted with Mr. Fantastic’s actions in the last issue, flies to Eastern Europe to join Alicia Masters, only to be attacked and subdued by the villain Darkoth. Meanwhile, a distraught Reed —accompanied by Medusa — attend his college reunion, where they are confronted by Dr. Doom.

What’s going on here?

The biggest development in FF 142 is the introduction of Rich Buckler as penciler, replacing John Buscema. Buscema, who took over with issue 107 and penciled almost every issue for more than three years, was responsible for establishing the post-Kirby look of the Fantastic Four, a style reinforced by inker Joe Sinnott, who kept the book’s art uniform even as it changed pencilers. I suspect many collectors wouldn’t have noticed the change if hadn’t been announced. Buscema will return to the FF several times over his career.

Buckler was relatively new to comics, starting in 1970, but would go on to have a long career, primarily at Marvel and DC but also at places like Archie. He may be best known for creating Deathlok, a cyborg killing machine from the future and an amazing character, and for drawing the notorious KISS comic. Buckler sadly died in 2017.

There’s no denying the dynamism of his art, and the Kirby influence:

The other newcomer of note is Darkoth, the villain. This is my first exposure to the character, despite owning a Steve Rude drawing of him and the Thing, for a playing card almost certainly inspired by this comic. So far as a villain, there’s not much to him. He’s got an odd set of powers, and he speaks with Gerry Conway’s over-the-top grandiosity. A little online research reveals there’s more to the character than meets the eye but we’ll deal with that if and when we get to it.

Here’s is my Rude drawing of Darkoth:

What I liked

This was a fun, satisfying issue. It’s been a while since we had the Thing in what’s basically a solo adventure, and it was well structured and paced, starting with the Alicia subplot established in the last two issues. The Darkoth fight was fun, and the jumps between Ben’s story and that of Reed and Medusa, Johnny and Sue, rather than distracting from the flow, added dimension and which all paid off in the climactic scene, the Doom reveal. Doom, of course, makes any FF comic better.

For those keeping track, Chris Claremont, John Byrne and Terry Austin used this same set-up, including the climactic last panel revealing the bad guy, in X-Men 111 about five years later:

As mentioned above, Rich Buckler’s art packs a (literal) punch. I really liked this splash (who couldn’t?):

What I didn’t like

Oddly, some of Buckler’s panels were annotated with arrows, pointing out details that readers might otherwise have missed. That seems like either a failing of Bucker to make his art clearer, or of Conway and/or editor Roy Thomas, not giving him better direction. Either way, I found them distracting.

Anything else?

Some more ads of note. I have no idea what iced cologne is, and even less of an idea why a 12-year-old comic reader would want some (reading more closely, it seems like an ad to entice women to become saleswomen in a vertical marketing scheme. Even more confusing for 12-year-old comic readers).

The Evel Kneivel toy, on the other hand, is exactly what 12-year old me would have wanted (and I think I did have some version of this as a kid).

Overall

Perhaps Gerry Conway’s best effort to date