FANTASTIC FOUR #257

"FRAGMENTS"
Writing, Drawing, Inking: John Byrne | Coloring: Glynis Wein | Lettering: Jim Novak
Editing: Al Milgrom | Earthling: Jim Shooter

The Plot: In deep space, Galactus philosophizes and is visited by the living embodiment of death, then he devours the Skrull homeworld.

On Earth, Johnny Storm looks into renting a loft apartment. Meanwhile, Reed and Sue announce to Ben that the Baxter Building is unsafe for Franklin, and they plan to move to the suburbs and adopt secret identities even as they continue their careers as Mister Fantastic and the Invisible Girl.

Two days later, Sue goes house-hunting in Connecticut while Reed pays a visit to Avengers Mansion to check on the injured Vision. The Scarlet Witch leaves him alone with Vision and an intruder alarm sounds. When the Witch returns to the lab, there is a hole in the wall and Reed is gone.

Sub-Plots & Continuity Notes: Galactus has grown a conscience since Reed Richards saved his life, and has spent the past few months only devouring lifeless worlds or gathering nutrients from stars. But a visit with Death reaffirms his mission as a force of nature and, despite a desire not to, he follows Nova to the Skrull homeworld.

Nova, meanwhile, considers that she may be falling in love with Galactus.

As noted above, the FF are stretching their wings this issue. Johnny visits with Julie Angel and Sharon Selleck as he explores the loft which will become his apartment. He also refers to Sharon as “gorgeous”, desite the fact that Byrne takes every opportunity to make her look as homely as possible next to Julie.

Johnny declares that while the FF were in the Negative Zone for nearly four months, only four hours passed on Earth. This seems to contradict prior issues, which made it seem like a few days went by for Annihilus, Alicia, and Franklin.

Franklin is tended to by the Thing’s Uncle Jake, who also reveals that Sue is pregnant.

As stated previously, two days pass during this issue. The events of FANTASTIC FOUR ANNUAL #17, which we’ll cover next time, are accepted to have occurred in that brief span.

The Vision was deactivated by Annihilus’s null-field in AVENGERS 233.

Is It Clobberin' Time? Not in this quiet issue. It is Celebratin’ Time, though.

My Thoughts: This “quiet issue” is more in keeping with what I’d expect from John Bryne than his last outing in that particular arena. Though the FF see no action and instead spend all their time in sub-plot land, the story opens with a twelve-page scene spotlighting Galactus’s assault on the Skrull homeworld.

The idea of Galactus reconnecting with the man he once was and feeling remorse for the denizens of the planets he devours is a good one. Byrne is clearly playing some sort of long game with Galactus’s arc since taking over FANTASTIC FOUR. He’s made a few spare appearances, but they all seem to be building to something big. (And in actuality they are, thanks in part to Chris Claremont’s X-MEN – but we’ll cover that another day.)

Though for me the most intriguing thing to come out of the Galactus material is Nova's belief that she might be in love with him. This is a really fascinating idea, and I’m not sure if anybody beyond Byrne ever went any further with it.

And then there’s the more terrestrial side of the story, as the stars of the series prepare to go their separate ways. Apparently the Thing’s going to be living alone in the Baxter Building, though Byrne quickly quashes the idea that this will be another storyline about the FF splitting up. It’s made clear by Reed himself that the team is tied together forever, and there’s no point in pretending they could ever part ways again.

This is one thing I really like about Byrne’s run – he is a strong proponent of the “illusion of change” rather than of actual change. In my opinion, that’s really the best way to go in serialized fiction. Sometimes change works – see the “All-New, All-Different X-Men” or Spider-Man graduating high school for good examples – but for the most part I believe the status quo should remain the same forever in a serialized saga, with only the window dressing getting tweaked now and then, in order to preserve the characters and their situations for future generations.

A good writer can get plenty of mileage out of nearly any premise without the need to reinvent it, assuming that A) he or she is interested in that premise, and B) the premise wasn’t broken in the first place. As it happens, very few Marvel series were ever broken -- and on the rare occasions that they were, they were pretty quickly fixed by Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, and the rest. Byrne understands this, and write accordingly.