{"id":4696,"date":"2025-01-15T08:56:00","date_gmt":"2025-01-15T16:56:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.codedread.com\/comicbooks\/?p=4696"},"modified":"2024-12-15T17:18:44","modified_gmt":"2024-12-16T01:18:44","slug":"840-flame-on-for-sub-mariner","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.codedread.com\/comicbooks\/840-flame-on-for-sub-mariner\/","title":{"rendered":"840 – Flame-On for Sub-Mariner!"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\"Johnny<\/a>
Johnny Storm utters Flame On! for the first time in Fantastic Four #4, Feb 1962<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Last ish<\/a>, our fledgling Fantastic Four foursome had went splitsville as that hot-head Johnny stormed off because The Thing kept picking on him. Johnny hides out with some roadsters working on hot-rod engines and uses his famous “Flame On!” catchphrase for the first time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We get several pages of the other team members looking throughout the city for The Human Torch until Ben stumbles upon him in the garage and mindlessly trashes one of the cars in anger. Boy ol’ Ben Grimm really had some borderline personality disorder things going on in these first issues – already getting tiresome! Luckily for Johnny, Ben gets one of his un-Thing episodes, giving Johnny time to fly off. Ben rejoices once again until he realizes it’s only temporary and reverts back to Thing<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"Ben<\/a>
Ben re-things again in Fantastic Four #4, Feb 1962<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

I notice that this issue is rife with teaser lines on the bottom of every few pages about “The Hulk”… more modern Marvel characters that we know and love are just waiting in the wings!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Speaking of characters we know and love and also speaking of wings… Johnny stumbles next into a homeless shelter for the night, coincidentally rifles through a 1940s Sub-Mariner comic, then learns that one of the “bums” has extraordinary strength but also amnesia. Johnny gets the bright idea to shave the shaggy soul and guess what – it’s Namor, the Sub-Mariner!<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"The<\/a>
The Human Torch shaves Namor from the ash-heap of history in Fantastic Four #4, Feb 1962<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

We last saw Namor seven years ago<\/a> in Atlas Comics’ short-lived superhero revival in the mid-1950s. And this is the first time the Human Torch and the Sub-Mariner have “met-up” in 22 years<\/a>, but of course this is an altogether different Human Torch. Hurray for more characters in the silver age Marvel Universe!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Unfortunately for humanity, Johnny dumps Namor into the ocean where his amnesia is cured. The Sub-Mariner races to his underwater kingdom to find it abandoned, destroyed with radiation. He concludes that the humans have done nuclear testing and that his people have been scattered to the ocean’s depths. Namor hasn’t lost his ability to be a little bitch and abruptly condemns all of mankind.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"Namor<\/a>
Namor hate human! in Fantastic Four #4, Feb 1962<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

Johnny rallies his team mates and they quickly get to lots of punching and fighting with Namor. Namor finds a horn to resurrect giant sea creates and sends “Giganto” to attack New York, which is quickly evacuated. The Thing straps a nuclear bomb to his back and sneaks into Giganto’s mouth, dropping the bomb in his stomach, destroying Giganto and fleeing just in time. In the ensuing struggle Namor meets Sue Storm and offers to show mercy to the human race if she marries him. I’m saying a lot happens in this issue!<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"Namor<\/a>
Namor shows everyone how to propose to a girl in Fantastic Four #4, Feb 1962<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

The Human Torch acts quickly, whisks Namor out into the middle of the ocean, spins him around in a whirlwind and drops him deep into the depths. And that’s how our story ends this month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I found this a much better issue than #3 – they kept the pace, they avoided too much in-fighting, and they did a bit of world-building by bringing back one of their Golden Age characters!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last ish, our fledgling Fantastic Four foursome had went splitsville as that hot-head Johnny stormed off because The Thing kept picking on him. Johnny hides out with some roadsters working on hot-rod engines and uses his famous “Flame On!” catchphrase for the first time. We get several pages of the other team members looking throughout […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4697,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[754,303,591,91,641,90,92,294,748,660],"class_list":["post-4696","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-754","tag-amnesia","tag-fantastic-four","tag-human-torch","tag-in-fighting","tag-marvel","tag-namor","tag-team-up","tag-un-thing","tag-world-building"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.codedread.com\/comicbooks\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4696","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.codedread.com\/comicbooks\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.codedread.com\/comicbooks\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.codedread.com\/comicbooks\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.codedread.com\/comicbooks\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4696"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.codedread.com\/comicbooks\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4696\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4717,"href":"https:\/\/www.codedread.com\/comicbooks\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4696\/revisions\/4717"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.codedread.com\/comicbooks\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4697"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.codedread.com\/comicbooks\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.codedread.com\/comicbooks\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.codedread.com\/comicbooks\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}