Byrne was followed by a quick succession of writers (Roger Stern, Tom DeFalco, Roy Thomas), but the next extended run was by Steve Englehart, who had Reed and Sue retire to try to give their son a normal childhood. The returned Thing's new girlfriend, Sharon Ventura, and Johnny Storm's former lover, Crystal, joined the team (though Crystal would leave within a year). Sharon was quickly turned into a female "Thing", and the Thing himself further mutated, developing jagged spikes after being exposed to cosmic radiation during this roster's first mission. Editorial disagreements led to Englehart finishing his run under a pen name, "John Harkness," and reverting Ben Grimm to his human form while returning Reed and Sue Richards to the team. Writer/Artist Walt Simonson followed up with a run where the FF traveled through time, encountering Galactus, a Josef Stalin robot, a dinosaur island that time forgot, and Doctor Doom, who was returned to new villainy while reverting Sharon to human form and Ben Grimm resuming his monstrous form.
Following Simonson was Marvel editor-in-chief Tom DeFalco. DeFalco nullified the Johnny Storm-Alicia Masters relationship by retconning that the Skrull Empire had kidnapped the real Masters during the first Secret War and replaced her with a Skrull spy named Lyja, with whom Storm unwittingly fell in love and married. Once discovered, Lyja, who herself had fallen for Storm, helped the Fantastic Four rescue the real Alicia Masters. Ventura departed after being further mutated by Doctor Doom, with whom she'd sought alliance after Masters returned.
Other key developments included Franklin Richards being sent into the future and returning as a teenager; the return of Reed's time-traveling father, Nathaniel; and Reed's apparent death at the hands of a seemingly mortally wounded Doctor Doom. It would be two years before DeFalco resurrected the two characters, revealing that their seeming deaths were orchestrated by Hyperstorm, the tyrannical futuristic offspring of Rachel Summers (daughter of the X-Men Jean Grey and Cyclops) and Franklin Richards
No comments:
Post a Comment