Fantastic Four: Imaginauts

Rating:
Summary: Excellence.
Review: For years the Fantastic Four had been trapped in their own personal editorial hell, in which they were placed into the hands of incapable writer after incapable writer. The "World's Greatest Magazine" was no longer great, nor was it even good. It was horrible. Atrocious. Disgusting. No writer got the essence of this family (notice: FAMILY) and this fabulous quartet were nothing more than mere shells of their past. The artists never paid enough respect to the team and they never got the true feeling of them in their drawings. The Fantastic Four, ladies and gentlemen, were doomed.

Until now.

Until Mark Waid.

Until Mike Wieringo.

Until Fantastic Four: Imaginauts.

Marvel's first superhero team is having a family reunion, and all of us are invited. We can finally laugh and cry with them for all the good reasons, as the Fantastic Four finally return to their loving roots that's clearly presented within the first chapter of this book.

Ladies and gentlemen, the Fantastic Four haven't been this good since -- scratch that, actually. The Fantastic Four have NEVER been this good. Buy this book -- it's literally some of the best available. This is the ultimate tale of love and happiness, a huge contrast to the more popular "noir" and "dark" stories in every creative medium nowadays. If you read this book, maybe -- just maybe -- you'll begin to see that life's not so bad. After all, there's an imaginaut in everyone. All we have to do is listen to it.

(Note: As of this writing, there currently is no hardcover reproduction of this book. If there is one available in the near future though, get it. This work of art deserves the "deluxe Marvel hardcover" format.)

Rating:
Summary: Excellence.
Review: For years the Fantastic Four had been trapped in their own personal editorial hell, in which they were placed into the hands of incapable writer after incapable writer. The "World's Greatest Magazine" was no longer great, nor was it even good. It was horrible. Atrocious. Disgusting. No writer got the essence of this family (notice: FAMILY) and this fabulous quartet were nothing more than mere shells of their past. The artists never paid enough respect to the team and they never got the true feeling of them in their drawings. The Fantastic Four, ladies and gentlemen, were doomed.

Until now.

Until Mark Waid.

Until Mike Wieringo.

Until Fantastic Four: Imaginauts.

Marvel's first superhero team is having a family reunion, and all of us are invited. We can finally laugh and cry with them for all the good reasons, as the Fantastic Four finally return to their loving roots that's clearly presented within the first chapter of this book.

Ladies and gentlemen, the Fantastic Four haven't been this good since -- scratch that, actually. The Fantastic Four have NEVER been this good. Buy this book -- it's literally some of the best available. This is the ultimate tale of love and happiness, a huge contrast to the more popular "noir" and "dark" stories in every creative medium nowadays. If you read this book, maybe -- just maybe -- you'll begin to see that life's not so bad. After all, there's an imaginaut in everyone. All we have to do is listen to it.

(Note: As of this writing, there currently is no hardcover reproduction of this book. If there is one available in the near future though, get it. This work of art deserves the "deluxe Marvel hardcover" format.)

Rating:
Summary: This is an awesome comic!!!
Review: Mark Waid does get it. I have never been a Fantastic Four fan before, but picked this up on a friend's recommendation and it has become my favorite current comic and one of my favorites all time. It's just awesome: Great writing (plots and characterization are fantastic) and some really cool artwork make this a must-have for anyone who likes comics.

Rating:
Summary: Mark Waid gets it!
Review: Mark Waid gets it.

When he dies, that should be on his tombstone: "Mark Waid gets it." After years of trying to shoehorn the Fantastic Four into superheroic adventures and bloated cosmic storylines, Marvel comics finally gave the reigns of their premiere title to a writer who understands who these characters are: not superheroes, explorers. Adventurers. Scientists. Reed DOES have a heart, Sue DOES have a brain, Johnny IS a young man and Ben IS gruffer than he is often portrayed.

They're a family.

This volume collects the first several issues of Waid's run, including both the "Sentient" storyline and the "Small Stuff...Big Stuff" story. The artwork by Mike Wieringo and Mark Buckingham is all beautiful, showing off how good Waid's script is.

The book also contains two bonuses -- Waid's "Manifesto" on the Fantastic Four, which is a very entertaining read and can be summed up in three words: "HE GETS IT" -- and Karl Kesel and Stuart Immonen's story about the Thing exploring his own past, confirming for the first time (to my knowledge) that Ben Grimm is Jewish. Until Waid took over, the Kesel/Immonen story was the best issue of FF in years.

If you've ever loved the Fantastic Four, you've got to read this book. They're great again.

For now, anyway. Waid is leaving the book far, far too soon. But while he's there, it is once again a serious contender for the title "World's Greatest Comics Magazine."