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Ultimate Fantastic Four #1

Creative Team: Brian Michael Bendis, Mark Millar, Adam Kubert
Publisher: Marvel

Reviewed by Chris Ching

Remember The Simpsons epsiode with Poochie? The to the EXTREME canine was added to the "Itchy and Scratchy Show" to make it more hip, more edgy, more TO THE EXTREME! Poochie was later pulled due to lotal lack of public interest.

Marvel has been doing the same thing to much greater success with their Ultimate line; reinventing classic characters with a more contemporary flare and...dare I say it, edge. Spiderman, The X-Men, and others have been reborn, and now comes the first Ultimate issue of Marvel's first family, the Fantastic Four. Fans have been drooling oceans in anticipation especially with comic favorites Brian Michael Bendis and Mark Millar at the helm. Unfortunately, the long wait for this first issue is anti-climactic to say the least.

After a promising two page intro that gets the fanboy mojo working in anticipation of The Greatest Comic Magazine '03 style, the reader is privy to a whole issue of set up. And bland setup too. Hopefully the payoff will be in the next issue when the four become fantastic, but I was so bored by the end of the first issue, I'm not sure if I'll stick around to witness it. None of UFF #1 excited me. In Pooche talk, it certainly wasn't to the extreme, let alone Ultimate (Unless you consider revamping old timer mailman Willie Lumpkin into a so called Director of Mainland Development).

It all feels a little bit too much of "been there, done that". Reed is a shallow echo of Peter Parker from either the Classic or Ultimate universe. Recast as a school bullied wimp with a "gift", Reed builds a machine capable of opening gates to other dimensions. Interestingly, this is a part of Doctor Doom's classic Marvel origin, but I digress. Ben Grimm is the lunk who protects Reed from school bullies although as to the reason why, Bendis and Millar have yet to reveal (They'd better as relying solely on the dialogue and art, I kind of got the feeling Aunt Petunia's favorite nephew has a thing for school bullied wimps). Sue and Johnny Storm don't register so much as a foot note in the proceedings.

The Fantastic Four were always about a family who bickered just as much as they saved lives, but that theme has yet to materialize in UFF. Someone also better put a lock on the door of Dave Gibbon's imagination as UFF artist Adam Kubert pillaged it for his rendering of Reed's Dad, a figure eerily reminsicednt of the Comedian from Watchmen.

Bendis has written some of the best stories in recent years, so I should give him the benefit of the doubt. Out of respect, this issue gets one extra star.

Rating: (2 out of 4 stars)