OK So I know I am a few days late on this one…but Fantastic Four #600 is coming! I know I know I am appalled also readers! It’s one thing to hype up the death of a long time beloved character but it’s another thing entirely to brace everyone for the “end of an era” and then to just bring it back one year later. For those of you just now tuning in sometime in the last year or so let me catch you up…
We received months of hype revolving around two things: The death of Johnny Storm and the end of the Fantastic Four with the Future Foundation taking its place. So I picked up the Countdown to 3 storyline and then the “Final Issue” of Fantastic Four, #588, and watched Johnny get stuck in the Negative Zone and supposedly torn limb from limb by Zone creatures. Then I gleefully began reading because it seem like a new type of FF book and worth picking up. It’s been touch and go since then, with me always on the brink of stopping collecting the book (the Inhuman storyline has kept me around for a few more issues). And then I see the following picture...
We received months of hype revolving around two things: The death of Johnny Storm and the end of the Fantastic Four with the Future Foundation taking its place. So I picked up the Countdown to 3 storyline and then the “Final Issue” of Fantastic Four, #588, and watched Johnny get stuck in the Negative Zone and supposedly torn limb from limb by Zone creatures. Then I gleefully began reading because it seem like a new type of FF book and worth picking up. It’s been touch and go since then, with me always on the brink of stopping collecting the book (the Inhuman storyline has kept me around for a few more issues). And then I see the following picture...
Why Marvel? Why do you do this to us? After issue #11 of FF…we will then get to see Fantastic Four #600! And I know that the promotional pictures do not always give us an accurate representation of what’s going to happen in the issue, but COME ON! Spidey AND Human Torch are there?? After his heartfelt “death” in #588, are they really bringing back Human Torch already?? And while it’s very clever that issue #12 would be the 600th issue of Fantastic Four, they are not reverting back to the old book and numbering…oh no! They are bringing back Fantastic Four #600 AND releasing FF #12 so now people following them need 2 books to keep up!
We all know how I feel about rebooting, renumbering, reverting and all that…so I am sure you can guess what I think of this move… It seems like a planned-well-in-advance move to not just sell more copies but to lure readers into following new books also! It was one thing when books got cancelled and renumbered and later on the writers (or often the NEW writers) change their mind and revert, but this seems clearly like a planned out event since before Countdown to Three even started, like they knew they were only cancelling Fantastic Four for 11 issues. A cheap move Marvel, very cheap…or expensive I guess I should say! So I guess it’s now safe for me to hold my breath from Uncanny X-men #560, unless they decide to hold out until #600 for them too, leaving us collecting with a numbering gap that will drive many of us crazy.
Does renumbering really sell more? I mean sure I bought the last few issues of Fantastic Four to see Johnny die and the first bunch of issues to get to know the Future Foundation, but surely there were readers annoyed to see Johnny go and did not bother to pick up the new book. Is it really worth it to gain a few new readers for a few months if you risk losing long time readers of a book? I can already tell you that I'll be collecting until issue #11 (its nice to have an end date in site) and maybe #600 and one or two after and then I'm done. But how many of the loyal Torch fans left and may not come back? Priorities Marvel!! Priorities!
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