Fantastic Four #18
“Magneto’s Body”
Writer: Ryan North
Artist: Vincenzo Carrara
Colorist: Edgar Delgado
Cover Artist: Humberto Ramos and Edgar Delgado
Publisher: Marvel Comics
The Fantastic Four have been shrunk, sent inside the body of Magneto, lost their memories, and have to work together to survive…
Sounds like a typical Wednesday.
Honey, I Shrunk the FF
The FF have not recovered their memories, but they instinctively know they can trust each other (I’m sure everyone wearing the same uniform with a big “4” on the chest helped). They’ve given themselves names that they’ll realize are hilarious when they do get their memories back. And they’re trying to complete a mission without remembering what it is.
I don’t think it’s spoiling much to say that they do complete their mission, are returned to full size (outside of Magneto’s body of course, otherwise eww), and recover their memories. The real fun is the journey, not the destination.
It’s-A Me, the Team Leader
Amnesia stories are so overplayed. And yet this was a blast.
Usually, when your leads have amnesia, the story is about them trying to remember who they are. Here, the FF just go with the flow, figure out what they can about themselves, pick new names, and roll with it. Which is a much healthier way to go about things. Mind you, it would probably make something like The Bourne Identity a lot less thrilling—wouldn’t be much of a movie if he just decided to become a security guard named Matt—but for the FF, it totally works.
I want to talk about the names they gave themselves here, because they’re great. Reed is “Pete,” and Sue is “Ophelia.” Ben is “Johnny,” and Johnny is “Doc”—the “balanced guy” and the leader of the team. Oh, and “Johnny” and “Doc” are brothers.
Okay, I’m going to go back to calling them by their actual names now. It’s just easier.
Seeing everyone find out about themselves, and each other, at the same time leads to a lot of fun character moments. Also some inferences about how Reed and Sue might use his powers. Kinky. Anyways, moving on. I love how Johnny decides he should be the leader because he’s a bit smart, a bit tough, and a bit powerful—he’s the Mario in Mario Kart. Which Ben immediately gets, but Reed and Sue are clueless.
Fun character bits aside, their journey to the center of Magneto’s body is actually way more dangerous than you normally expect in these types of stories. There are actual stakes. For example, Ben gets absolutely messed up by stomach acid—I think that’s the worst shape I’ve seen the Thing in for a very long time.
I thought a nice touch was how, even after they’re restored to full size and Ben is getting medical care, they’re living their new roles. You see, it turns out that Sue was the one who gave them amnesia by putting force-fields in their brains. Apparently Magneto’s body was making them all feral and attacking each other, so she did that to stop them. And even after they got back out of the body, they were so comfortable with each other they didn’t even think about restoring their memories.
Now that’s family.
Family Ties
Ryan North has fast become one of my favorite Fantastic Four writers. He always keeps the family front and center, even when they don’t remember that they are one. There’s always a basis of real science in his stories, such as Magneto’s body actually attacking the intruders here like a real body would. And he’s done so much great character work on Johnny in particular; I’m going to be really upset if the eventual next writer reverts him to a lovable idiot again.
That next writer better be a long way off.
Vincenzo Carrara’s art works very well for the story North is telling here. Magneto’s body looks like an alien world, yet still in line with what I remember from anatomy class all those years ago. And the body’s defenses are deadly. The FF haven’t taken this level of physical punishment in a long time, especially Ben. It’s hard sometimes to make it feel like their missions have actual stakes, but this one certainly did.
Edgar Delgado’s colors add to the alien feel of Magneto’s body and really help sell the damage that Ben takes. The various powers, especially Johnny’s flames, look great, and you can almost feel the heat coming off of him. The white blood cells and stomach acids look like what you’d expect and are also terrifying at the same time.
Fantastic Voyage
Fantastic Four #18 is a novel take on an amnesia story that still gives us insight into Marvel’s First Family while giving them a genuinely perilous mission. Seriously, I haven’t seen them this physically messed up in a long time. This is how you do a crossover tie-in: important events for DNX happened here, but the FF still enjoyed a proper adventure of their own at the same time.