Tripwire Reviews Fantastic Four: Full Circle By Alex Ross

Capturing The Spirit Of The House Of Ideas

Tripwire’s contributing writer Laurence Boyce takes a look at Abrams’ Fantastic Four: Full Circle by Alex Ross, out now from Abrams ComicArts. Warning: a few spoilers ahead…

Fantastic Four: Full Circle
Writer: Alex Ross
Artist: Alex Ross
Colours: Alex Ross with Josh Johnson
Letters: Ariana Mayer
Published by Abrams ComicArts

It is perhaps apropos that Alex Ross is behind the first title published by MarvelArts – the new collaboration between Marvel Comics and Abrams. As a celebration of the Marvel Universe and it’s long and rich history, the work of Ross would seem to suit proceedings down to the ground. With such works as Marvels and – on the DC side of things – Kingdom Come (co-written with Mark Waid), Ross – in both his art and his writing – has always revisited and reconstituted the past of comic history and looked at it with fresh eyes.  In Fantastic Four – Full Circle, he throws himself wholeheartedly into the past as – in ostensibly writing a sequel to one of their classic stories – he channels the spirits of Jack Kirby and Stan Lee in a way that is redolent of the past yet still feels fresh and exciting.

A rainy day in the Baxter Building. Ben Grimm is fixing himself a midnight snack. But all thoughts of his sandwich will soon be set aside when a familiar looking intruder breaks in. As Reed Richards examines said intruder, a swarm of parasites are soon attacking everything leaving our intrepid quartet of heroes to use all their powers to neutralise their assailants. It soon becomes clear that the nature of their enemy lies in the Negative Zone – the dangerous universe made up of anti-matter. Now forced to travel across the dimensions – a dangerous task in itself – the Fantastic Four may find themselves some familiar foes – and maybe even allies – in a quest to save the cosmos.

Working as a sequel to classic Lee/Kirby story ‘This Man, This Monster’ (published in Fantasic Four # 51 in June 1966) the story continues to explore the themes of identity and the nature of heroism and selflessness that were set-up but the original. While it might help for readers to read the original story to pick up on some of the numerous Easter Eggs that are scattered around the story, those who are coming in blind need not worry. For there is lots of exposition to help you catch up. And lots of exposition to explain the Negative Zone. Look: there’s lots of exposition, alongside portentous monologues and musings on the nature of being. For the more cynical, these narrative beats would be a bit clunky and melodramatic. But as a reflection of Lee’s tone they work wonderfully. Past of Lee’s genius (taking credit for other people’s work aside) was this sense of melodrama, his grandiloquence. It was pretentious and it did feel slightly silly. But that’s what made the stories so fun, as they were often contrasted with more subtler moments of all too human frailty. And that’s what Ross manages to capture so well here, and one can forgive a certain heavy-handedness in the dialogue and plotting.

But let’s not forget that we’re also here for the visuals. Ross eschews painting for flat colours and screentone and the colours give the garish beauty that typified much of Kirby’s work. There are a number of stunning splash pages – such as the attack of the negative creatures or their descent into the Negative Zone – that have the trippy inventiveness also associated with Kirby, an explosion of ideas and chaos that’s still manage to cohere into something that can often be breathtaking. But this is not an out and out parody of his style. With suggestions of the photo-realism that Ross has become renowned for, such as within the depictions of the Fantastic Four themselves, there’s a real visual sense of the humanity at the centre of this insane world of superheroes and negative universes.

This is a bright and spectacular celebration of Marvel which eschews much of the heaviness of today’s comics to tell a story of comic books of old with just a hint of modern day irony. Often spectacular to look at, and immense fun to read, you’ll find yourself being a true believer once again.

Fantastic Four: Full Circle is out now published by Abrams ComicArts