Marvel Masterworks: Fantastic Four Vol. 5

In the early 1960s, the Fantastic Four billed itself as "the world's greatest comics magazine," and issues 41-50, collected here in the FF's fifth volume in the Marvel Masterworks series, actually live up to that lofty claim. A trademark of the Stan Lee-Jack Kirby years was their epic sweep, and these 10 issues encompass three different story arcs that are themselves connected. Issues 41-43 feature the Frightful Four (the Wizard, the Sandman, the Trapster, and Madam Medusa) in an elaborate plot to brainwash the Thing into turning on his compatriots, including a battle with Reed Richards in the story memorably entitled "To Save You, Why Must I Kill You?" There's a timeout for a light-hearted break in Fantastic Four Annual no. 3, the marriage of Sue and Reed, in which the most dizzying array of supervillains and superheroes--almost everyone in the Marvel Universe--drops in for a page or even a panel in order to stop or save the wedding. When Medusa returns in issue 44, she's not simply a member of a supervillain group, but one of the Inhumans, super-powered beings led by the mighty Black Bolt, and the FF must follow them to the Great Refuge. If all that's not momentous enough, enter the most noble and tragic character of all, the Silver Surfer, the herald for the almighty Galactus, who consumes planets not because he's evil, but because he must in order to survive. In a 10-issue span, it's hard to imagine a similar wave of classic characters and mind-bending concepts, and yet Lee and Kirby also take the time to make their characters achingly human. Simply put, comics never got better than this, and this Masterworks edition reprints every issue in its full-color glory. --David Horiuchi