Fantastic Four #555 Review

FANTASTIC FOUR #555
Written by Mark Millar
Art by Bryan Hitch

I had nothing but good things to say about the first outing for Hitch and Millar last month and after this second issue, I'm still enjoying this book. McDuffie and the other various writers over the past couple years have had the odd arc or good issue, but these first two issues from M&H have been great. They aren't Ultimates good, but they're still incredibly fun and enjoyable reads.

As we saw at the end of last issue, Reed's old flame is building Nu-World, a man-made replacement for Earth, which, by their calculations, is going to be unihabitable in just 10 years time. Good to know.

I was hoping for a little bit more elaborate reason for this mass exodus homemade planet than basically global warming, but the reason is not that big a deal I suppose.

One thing I was a little disappointed about with this issue was the lack of Sue and Thing. Sue is nonexistant and Thing shows up for a panel or two. Johnny had a little screen time as he meets up with a super villain on his way to his band rehersal. She's hot and as they fight, they bust into an empty building and start making out. I got the impression this was staged and they've already met before, but it's never really made clear if this is the first meeting or not. Should be interesting to see where this ends up in half a year's time.

That left the bulk of the issue dealing with Reed and Alyssa on Nu-World. They're making the planet identical to Earth, which seems a bit stupid. I'd make it larger to accomandate the rapid growth rate of humans, maybe make a Pangea type super continent broken up by mass amounts of fresh water for crops and human consumption and so on. Cities would be redesigned for mass transit. Most cities grew from villages and towns into the sprawling mass of roads they have today. Traffic jams could be eliminated almost completely with a properly designed metropolis if people of Reed's level of intelligence were designing the cities. Instead, they are importing perfect 3D models of the cities on Earth, grime, graffiti, flaws and all. These are the dumbest smart people ever.

The only thing they are doing is eliminating deserts and replenishing rain forests. Oh, and building giant super sized Iron Man-like robots named after and painted in Captain America's colour. And the giant death robot will also replace all armies and law enforcement and punish anyone carrying weapons with impunity. Of course this robot goes rogue at the end of this issue.

I'm fairly anal over little things like this, but they are just nerd nitpickings. The issue and story are a fun romp of an adventure and I'm really enjoying it. Like I said earlier, this isn't the Ultimates and anyone coming in expecting that will be disappointed. My only real complaint is the lack of the Four in Fantastic Four with this Reed centric issue, but I'm guessing everyone will have issues like this over the run. Also, the art still has that magazine look to it's layouts, which I'm not enjoying. Most will probably overlook this small detail and I'm trying to myself, but it's still jarring to me at this point.

Verdict - Must Read. It's a fun read. Everything flows well and I'm just enjoying the hell out of this story, even with any and all nitpicks I have with the title.

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