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Topic: The 1980s Fantastic Four Comics by John Byrne: Revamping the First Fam Post Reply | Post New Topic
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Michael Penn
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 12 April 2006
Location: United States
Posts: 13032
Posted: 10 February 2025 at 3:08pm | IP Logged | 1 post reply


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After the awkward growing stage of the 1970s (after Stan Lee and Jack Kirby left), the 80s was a turning point for Fantastic Four comics. 

Early on, writer Doug Moench and artist Bill Sienkiewicz have a run that focuses on the internal dynamics of the team. Sienkiewicz starts developing the style he would use for New Mutants, Elektra, Stray Toasters. 

John Byrne takes over with Fantastic Four 232 and tells the story of the First Family for half a decade. Byrne humanizes many of the characters. 

Giving Reed Richards an origin, making Sue Storm the most powerful member of the team and focusing on Johnny and Ben. 

Doctor Doom becomes more regal and menacing while Galactus is humanized in a way that wasn’t seen since Thor 169 by Jack Kirby. One of the best parts of this decade is She Hulk taking over from The Thing after Secret Wars. (Also how does Shulkie’s creation relate to movies and TV?)

After Byrne departs for DC Comics, writer Steve Englehart, artist Keith Pollard and inker Joe Sinnott (with artist Rich Buckler) take over for the rest of the decade. Mr. Fantastic and Invisible Woman leave to raise their son Franklin, so The Thing takes over as the FF’s new leader. Chaos ensues.
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Mark Haslett
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 19 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 6939
Posted: 10 February 2025 at 4:18pm | IP Logged | 2 post reply
Does the narrator sound bored to you? So much passive aggressive
criticism is baked in to these kinds of videos that I resist diving in and only
tried this on the fact it was posted here. Why observe things in this manner:
“…other than his own issues, Byrne acts like the stories from the 70’s never
happened…”. WTF? Do other writers constantly bring those stories up or
something? Wasn’t “This land is Mine!” A multi-issue story built on FF 200?

Why get things wrong and sound so above it all? It seems it’s just to bow
down to the “Byrne is a bad person” crowd. Having established this myth,
there seem to be people whose lives are dedicated to maintaining it.

I wonder if it has a psychological value in maneuvering the disconnect
between loving his work and never wanting to see new comics done that
way again.
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Jean Voulis
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 05 February 2025
Location: Canada
Posts: 113
Posted: 10 February 2025 at 5:26pm | IP Logged | 3 post reply
Will check this out later! I am always down for a nice retrospective video while I cook (plus it seems to contain some older JB interviews I have never seen).

A personal fave was the Nathaniel Richards arc - tying into the Kang arc by the great Roger Stern in Avengers (I really loved how JB and Roger had casual little tie in between the 2 books back then: Terminus, the Skrulls, Kang, etc)

Would have loved to see a follow up by JB and/or Roger Stern.
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James Johnson
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 16 March 2009
Location: United States
Posts: 2213
Posted: 10 February 2025 at 10:41pm | IP Logged | 4 post reply
A personal fave was the Nathaniel Richards arc - tying into the Kang arc by the great Roger Stern in Avengers (I really loved how JB and Roger had casual little tie in between the 2 books back then: Terminus, the Skrulls, Kang, etc)

Count me as Stern/Byrne fan. They could do no wrong on any book.
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Jean Voulis
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 05 February 2025
Location: Canada
Posts: 113
Posted: 10 February 2025 at 10:57pm | IP Logged | 5 post reply
JB - did you have plans to follow up the Nathanial Richard's story in FF?

Or any plans for Kang vs the FF (that would be fun)?
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Matt Hawes
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 16629
Posted: 11 February 2025 at 9:12pm | IP Logged | 6 post reply
 Mark Haslett wrote:
...Does the narrator sound bored to you? So much passive aggressive
criticism is baked in to these kinds of videos that I resist diving in and only
tried this on the fact it was posted here. Why observe things in this manner:
“…other than his own issues, Byrne acts like the stories from the 70’s never
happened…”. WTF? Do other writers constantly bring those stories up or
something? Wasn’t “This land is Mine!” A multi-issue story built on FF 200?


In an interview published in "The Fantastic Four Chronicles" fanzine, I recall that Marv Wolfman and Len Wein both complained about JB "ignoring" anything that happened in the series after Lee & Kirby's run. Maybe this fellow is parroting them?
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Mark Haslett
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 19 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 6939
Posted: 11 February 2025 at 9:47pm | IP Logged | 7 post reply
Matt: ...Marv Wolfman and Len Wein both complained about JB "ignoring" anything that happened in the series after Lee & Kirby's run. Maybe this fellow is parroting them?

**

It's a dumb comment no matter who makes it. J.B. picked up and carried other writers' threads about Johnny/Frankie Raye, Doom/Latveria, Franklin Richards, Terrax/Galactus, even the owners of the Baxter Building. That's about the first 15 issues of the run.

That's pretty thorough acknowledgment of what came before.
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John Byrne

Grumpy Old Guy

Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 135181
Posted: 25 October 2025 at 5:37pm | IP Logged | 8 post reply
Len and Marv complained about what Stan and Jack did, so I’m in good company.
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