Apr 7, 2012
Don! Don! Don! Don-Don-Don! Don-Don-Don!
(It's the Imperial March)
Welcome to Episode Eight of the Fantasticast! I can't believe we've been doing this for more hours than there are of television and film set in the world of Firefly! This episode sees veteran podcaster Donovan Morgan Grant (Amazing Spider-Man Classics, The Next Dimension: A Dragonball Z Podcast) jump aboard for two hours of mind-swapping madness and sticky goodness as we take a look at Fantastic Four #10 and Strange Tales #104. We find out how Doctor Doom survive the ravages of space, watch the team read some mail, and meet Paste Pot Pete and give him every ounce of respect that his first appearance deserves.
Send in your feedback to fantastic4podcast@gmail.com (we'll be reading e-mails in future episodes as your comments catch up with our recording schedule) or leave your comments on the libsyn page. Follow us on twitter where we are @fantasticast
Another quick note, this time about Johnny's mysterious "mirage power"...
Maybe this was an attempt to give Johnny a "power trick", or a use of his powers beyond just burning stuff. It's similar to the way that, say, the Flash had a variety of power tricks beyond just running fast, like running on water, creating whirlwinds by spinning his arms real fast, vibrating his body to pass through walls, etc. Granted, the DC folks (especially Julie Schwartz and his writers) seemed to do a better job at explaining the power tricks as applications of his base power, but that's one of the many differences in the approaches of Stan Lee and Julie Schwartz.
Anyway, carry on!
While listening to the FF portion of the podcast, I heard the digression into the Ultimate Universe events regarding what Ultimate Thing did to Ultimate Doom in the "Ultimatum" mini-series.
This leads me to a theory I have...
There were 3 mini-series set in the Ultimate Universe ("Ultimate Enemy", "Ultimate Mystery", "Ultimate Doom") which set up Ultimate Reed Richards as the Doctor Doom-scale villain of the Ultimate Universe. My theory is that Ultimate Doom switched minds with Ultimate Reed Richards, that Ultimate Ben killed Ultimate Reed while he was in Ultimate Doom's body, and that the gent running around causing trouble in the Ultimate Universe is really Ultimate Doom in Ultimate Reed's body.
Well, writing "Ultimate" so many times has left me fatiugued. I'll go listen to the rest of the podcast.
Carry on!
Nicely done episode fellows, as always - and it was great to hear an ASM Classicist talking Silver Age Marvel for the second show in a row. I have a particular fondness for the metafictional aspects of FF #10 (and the next issue is even more wonderful in that regard) and I think you engaged that material in a really interesting way.
Both issues played a major role in an piece I wrote as part of a possibly-never-to-be-finished dissertation:
http://motimelikethepresent.wordpress.com/2006/04/12/clobberin-time-escapism-engagement-and-the-dialectic-of-excitement-in-marvel-comics-1961-1966/
Also, I love that you're covering the Torch in Strange Tales - that's one series in which the company truly earned its "Mixed-Up Marvel" moniker!
Excelsior!
Dave