The Battle is Over, but the War… FF#9 Review

History Note: Hickman’s run can get really confusing at times, so I’m going to do a little bit note each issue about a character. Today’s is on Black Bolt.

Power: His voice is so powerful, it can stop the Hulk. As such, he went through massive mental training to deter himself from speaking unless in the most dire of situations.

Note of interest: Black Bolt has his wife and distant cousin Medusa speak for him, since he can not. During their adolescent years, they learned to communicate with a special type of body language.

Recent events: He supposedly died in Dan Abbet and Andy Lanning’s War of Kings event, but he actually survived and was stuck in a time space fault, where Lockjaw found and saved him.

Importance to FF: He is the King with five wives prophesied to claim Earth in the name of the Universal Inhumans.

The Faculty

Writer: Jonathan Hickman

Penciler: Steve Epting

Inker: Rick Magyar

Colorist: Paul Mounts

Letterer: Clayton Cowles

Cover: Daniel Acuna/Stephanie Perger

Editor: Tom Breevort

Professor Martineau here, but I’d prefer Sarcasmic or Shaun. I just want to give a quick thanks to Brad Douglas, for the gig and a little nod to Brian Bradley and Two Bit, whose styles of review went into this one in some way, shape, or form.

The Lesson: The issue opens where the last one ended; Diablo and the Mad Thinker turning on Doom and trying to burn him amidst the War of the Four Cities. However, Doom emerges victorious and Mad Thinker tries to convince Doom to do the unexpected and let them go, but Doom thinks not.
Meanwhile, in Attilian, home of the Universal Inhumans, hovering above a war torn Forever City, Black Bolt has summoned Reed Richards, Nathaniel Richards, and Spider-Man. Reed is surprised to see Black Bolt alive and Medusa explains to Reed that the other Reeds’ plans do not match up with theirs and tells him to step aside while they capture the other Reeds.
Back at the Baxter Building, Valeria reveals her secret room to Bentley, who says it reminds him of the super villain base he will make for himself in the future. In this secret room is the device the alternate Reeds used to enter this world.
In Forever City, Mole Man escapes before the alternate Reeds attempt to protect the machine that will take them back to their dimensions and two of the three are caught by the Inhumans. They also take in the villains and offer Doom a chance to come aboard Attilian as a hero of the battle, but Doom declines. It turns out Doom had spotted the third alternate Reed, but when he tries to attack him, the Reed attaches a collar to his neck and tells him that if Doom ever tries to free himself, Reed will fry his brain completely, something Doom is familiar with to a certain extent; Issue Two of FF involves the FF fixing Doom’s deteriorating brain (Side note; Why didn’t Doc Octopus come to them instead of Tony Stark to fix his brain).
On Attilian, Black Bolt has pretty much put an end to the War of the Four Cities and dismisses Reed so he won’t be tempted by what they do to the alternate Reeds and since their vehicle is destroyed, Eldrac (a Universal Inhuman politician turned dimensional doorway) will be their transport, taking them where they need to go. Spider-Man asks how that works and then asks if they can go to the past, which Reed replies there is only one way to find out and the issue ends as Spider-Man/Reed/Nathaniel enter a vortex created by Eldrac.

The Unlimited Potential of a Child’s Mind: Once again, the art on this book is fantastic. The way Epting draws the new Future Foundation suits continues to impress me, with the color scheme changing to a darker color for combat.

You really get a sense of battle during the issue and the use of light and fire in this issue is fantastic, particularly in an opening scene with Doctor Doom.
It’s the children who steal the show in this title however. Although they only get two pages this issue, it’s the moral ambiguity of the children that interests me; Bentley is clearly planning to be a villain (Not surprising for a child clone of the Wizard) and Valeria’s grand plan is to kill Annhilius in revenge for Uncle Johnny’s death.

The Hit n’ Miss Creativity of a Child’s Mind: I really liked the opening of this issue with Doom, he came across as a real character and distinguished himself from the other villains in an almost heroic way, but by the end of this issue, Doom had been made into a chump and you could see it coming a mile away. Why, please do tell, would Doom, a man of magic and with a deadly arsenal, try and punch Reed Richards, his arch-nemesis? That’s just sloppy…
Sue and Ben are MIA in this issue and my favorite character of this series has been Sue, so I miss her presence. However, I am grateful for the lack of Ben Grimm’s “Woe is Me” routine.

The Simplicity of a Child’s Mind: This issue and series as a whole calls on you to know a lot about Hickman’s Fantastic Four run and who Black Bolt and the Inhumans are. Having read half his Fantastic run, the more you read, the better this series gets. But on the flip side, Hickman gave us two issues dedicated solely to Black Bolt’s return and those were a mess and all I really know about this villain from reading FF is he died and returned and he has a voice that is so powerful he can’t speak freely. A little more clarity on this would be nice, but Hickman rarely does anything simply. The whole Alternate Reeds’ plan really fell apart this issue and I can’t say I’ve been a fan of it or the War of the Four Cities since it was introduced in Fantastic Four 574. I highly doubt this is the true end of the War of the Four Cities, since Hickman’s run seems to revolve around it, but hopefully now we can take a minor break from it. But yeah, a pretty anti-climatic end to this battle of the Four Cities.

Sensational Moment: Although Spider-Man has a great one liner at the beginning of the issue about Black Bolt’s martial status, his shining moment comes at the end, when he suggests traveling to the past. Out of nearly every superhero, none are as remorseful and guilt driven as Spider-Man and the fact that he would want to fix his past is totally understandable and Hickman does not beat us over the head with it.

Looking To The Future: The issue was a return to prime for me and ends on several interesting notes; Valeria/Bentley’s potential rise to evil, Doom’s slavery, and three members of the FF potentially going to the past. The plotline I’m most interested in is the trip to the past and I wonder if this will play into the relaunch of Fantastic Four with issue 600 and the return of Johnny Storm. Still, the future for this title looks mighty bright. However, this issue is weighed down by the Alternate Reeds and the War of the Four Cities, so I’m giving it 3.5/5