Fantastic Four 98 | Percival Henry: The Fantastic Four and more

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1970, Fantastic Four, Fantastic Four 98, jack Kirby, Stan Lee

Fantastic Four 98
“Mystery on the Moon!”
Published: Feb. 1970
Story: Stan Lee and Jack Kirby
Script: Lee
Pencils: Kirby
Inks: Joe Sinnott
Letters: Artie Simek
Cover: Kirby and Sinnott

Apologies for skipping the last two weeks! I was on a family vacation without much time for blogging. We should be back on track now.

Synopsis

In his lab at the Baxter Building, Mr. Fantastic is deciphering a message from aliens, but can only make out the word “tranquility.” When he sees the Thing’s newspaper article about the upcoming moon landing, he realizes it refers to the Sea of Tranquility on the moon, and believes it’s an attempt disrupt the landing. Meanwhile, a Kree sentry declares it his mission to prevent humans from traveling to space, and uses his beta-gun to raise an island from the Pacific from which it will use a “stimulator” to awaken a “nameless mass” on the moon which will attack any living things that land there.

Leaving the Invisible Girl behind (yet again), the three male members of the FF take a missile they borrowed from NASA (why they don’t just take their own plane is not clear) to the island, from where Reed has detected the signals, and after a hazardous landing, battle the Sentry. After it’s defeated, Reed and the Human Torch descend into the depths of the island where they encounter the stimulator. The machine emanates rays which weaken them, however, and with his fading breath, Reed summons Ben, who destroys the stimulator—saving the Apollo 11 astronauts—and rescues his teammates.

What’s going on here?

This isn’t a bad issue, and there’s a lot to like about it, particularly Jack’s depictions of the sentry and the man-on-the street scenes he does so well. He is assisted by the inks of Joe Sinnott, who returns after missing the last two issues. The story is brisk and straightforward, and is a fun attempt to tie current events into an FF story.

That, however, is the story’s biggest weakness. The moon landing, while a big deal in the real world even six months later, would seem to be a pretty minor event in the Marvel universe, given how often our heroes have traveled to space. Remember, the Fantastic Four visited the moon as far back as issue 13, and since they, and many other Marvel heroes, have visited multiple planets outside the solar system. Even if the rest of humanity isn’t aware of this, it’s not clear why Ben—who is frustrated he’s missing the televised broadcast of the landing—or the Sentry should much care.

Clearly, this is a case of Stan and Jack embracing the zeitgeist and just running with it, regardless of the continuity or logic problems. And Jack has a lot of fun depicting both the launch of Apollo 11, and the excitement it generated.

Again, Jack really excels at these crowd scenes. The Bridgette Bardot reference is a nice goofy touch.

To close the loop, here’s the rest of the landing, as depicted throughout the issue (the nameless mass is never revealed – a McGuffin).

About that cover

There’s some slight of hand at work here, because the the cover sure implies the FF are on the moon, which obviously never happens in the comic (in this comic, anyway). And yet, it never explicitly says they’re on the moon, and the island in the comic is described as looking like the surface of the moon. So technically accurate, if a bit sneaky.

The sexist seventies

Not only is Sue shunted aside again, she’s reduced to playing a housewife whose role is to cook for the team: