Reviewer: James Hatton
Story Title: Doom: Part 1
Writer: Warren Ellis
Penciler: Stuart Immonen
Inker: Wade Von Grawbadger
Colorist: Dave Stewart
Letterer: Chris Eliopoulos
Publisher: Marvel
Out of all the Ultimate titles, Fantastic Four is the weakest. Maybe it’s that these characters just weren’t ready for Ultima-zation, perhaps it just wasn’t the spin expected or wanted. The initial bits of it seemed kind of cliche for something out of the Bendis brain-trust. Whatever it is, they’ve put it into the hands of Warren Ellis. He of infamous Transmet, Global Frequency, Authority, and the so over-mentioned and oft reprinted Tales of the Witchblade #4.
They’ve now handed him Fantastic Four, and the first issue was on time. Blimey!
Story!
We are into our second story arc of the UFF, and they are now obviously trying to come to grips with their newfound abilities. The central focus of this story are Reed, Sue, and .. well the issue IS called Doom, so I’ll let that sort itself out in your head.
Sue & Reed are having a heart to heart about the physiological differences between pre-accident Reed and post-accident Reed. Obviously, Reed doesn’t want to go for testing and Sue is threatening him with sex. Lord knows that if Reed held out long enough, she would have to give in. He’s going to be Mister Fantastic for crying outloud, and I’ve had enough deviantly stupid comic book conversations to know that Sue has got the Marvel equivalent of Ron Jeremy for a boyfriend.
Anyway, we learn quite a bit about their personal relationship, and on the other side we get to start to flesh out Victor Von Damme, aka.. Doctor something or another. Ultimate Doom is the ancestor of none other than Vlad Tepes aka Vlad The Dragon aka Vlad Dracul aka Dracula. It’s good to see that in light of this knowledge, instead of turning on the Crow soundtrack and paling out his face, Victor does the right thing knowing his ancestry.. and becomes a deranged misfigured genius bent on perfection.
The science of the whole thing was strong, which explains alot as to why Ellis is going to be so decent on this project. What did bother me is when you take this man out of Vertigo, he seems to lose all of his creative insulting ability. Sue refers to Reed as both ‘Butthat’ and ‘King-Poop’.
> From the man that gave you the ‘bowel disrupting gun’, the best he can give
us is ‘butthat’. Totally thrown on that one.
Art!
Immonen’s art is pretty damned good (I almost wrote fantastic..), and Von Grawbadger’s coloring matches it. Everything is crisp and clean. The little twinkles in the eyes go a bit overboard, but that’s a nitpicky detail at best. Immonen seems to have the difference between the world of Von Doo.. *ahem* Von Damme and Richards down as well. Reed’s world comes in cold sterile hues, where Victor comes from an old world of tradition and grace.
Both the first and the last pages are things to behold, and show that dichotomy between the light and the dark, which is what this book clearly needed. Reed & Doom (Fine, I said it) are yin and yang, and their perspective on the world around them should show that, just as much as their characterization. I approve completely.
Overall!
It’s strong out of the gate for Ellis & Immonen. I’ve been continuing to read this book only because of Mark Waid’s strong run on the mainstream Fant Four, but it seems that this book has a strong lead where I didn’t feel that the Bendis/Millar combo was pulling it’s full weight.
