Okay. Michael Allred’s cover to FF #4 might be one of the sweetest and creepiest covers of all time, at the same time.
Take a look at this.
So it’s She-Hulk, who gets more than her share of lascivious attention from comics characters and writers alike, reacting badly to a decapitated Moloid-kid’s lip-licking lustiness. And yet, the other Moloids are making cute little hearts with adorable little smiles, to maybe try and take the edge off of that weird center image. Chalk it up to maybe we just don’t understand how Moloids work.
Moloids do tend to get into this hero-worship mode – at least the ones in the Future Foundation do. With “The Ben” off with the rest of the Fantastic Four who knows where, they’ve transferred their attentions to “The Jen,” aka Jennifer Walters, the green knockout who’ll knock you out. Thus, when she goes out on a non-date with her ex-fiancé Wyatt Wingfoot, the Mole Kids are enamored enough to try to sabotage any romantic potential. However, that’s not necessarily in their nature,so they recruit Bentley, the sort-of-good child clone of The Wingless Wizard You Fool, to “teach us how to evil.”
What follows is a lot of wacky hijinks, as all of Bentley’s attempts to douse the atmosphere of Jen & Wyatt’s evening together only serves to enhance it, and turn the non-date into a rekindling of their long-lost romance. Very sitcom-esque in its shenanigans, but the fact that it’s three Moloids, a Moloid head in a floating jar and an aspiring supervillain who is bad at it pulling them all, it’s also quite endearing – and something about Allred’s bright and shiny pop art makes it all the moreso. But then it ends with an interesting twist – Medusa, current member of the FF replacement squad and former member of the Wingless Wizard You Fool’s Frightful Four, is actively encouraging Bentley to achieve his perceived supervillain destiny. What’s that about?
Also on the docket is the fact that Ant-Man Scott Lang, the perceived leader of the FF, wants to rededicate the entire focus of the Future Foundation to eliminating Dr. Doom forever, since Doom is the man that killed his daughter Cassie, but Alex Power and the rest of the kids are just not taking to him and getting in his face about it. Considering Doom also helped them save the world, and Valeria Richards refers to him as Uncle Doom, there’s going to be some conflict. Then there’s also the matter of the weird future Johnny Storm, who told them the Fantastic Four are dead and whose identity isn’t entirely believed by the sub-squad.
Matt Fraction is doing entertaining work here – I particularly enjoyed Blarrgh The Unliving – and he’s also working with old continuity and keeping it real, which I respect. Putting She-Hulk back in what might be the most real relationship of her life is a nice way to avoid the usual temptation writers have to just play around with her penchant for promiscuity (not that there’s anything wrong with promiscuity in general, as long as it’s done responsibly). Fraction is having a lot of good old-fashioned yet new-fangled fun in the FF universe. Let’s hope he keeps it up.
