"Obviously written for children by a man who thinks all children are stupid.

This isn't getting the 'from a simpler time' pass. It was published in 1961. Humanity had already rocketed some very expensive junk to the moon by this point. Humans had also proven time and again, over a course of centuries, their ability to craft sophisticated stories.

Why does the Invisible Girl turn invisible to rush to the Fantastic Four's rendezvous point? You'd think she would do so in order to sneak past any obstacles in her way, right? Nope. Apparently, she just did it to knock a bunch of pedestrians on their asses. It was almost as if she couldn't see them.

Quote from knocked down pedestrian: "Some-something rushed past me! Something UNSEEN!"

She sneaks into a cab while invisible. She opens and closes the back door to the cab, but the cabbie doesn't notice. The cab pulls away from the curb and takes her exactly where she wants to go. She gets out of the cab and dangles money in front of the driver's face and gets frustrated with the driver because he's stunned by the fact there is money floating in front of his face for no reason.

She's in a hurry, goddammit!

Then we meet The Thing. He's dressed in a fedora, sunglasses, and an overcoat to hide the fact that he's a big orange rock monster. He doesn't want to draw attention to himself. BUT as soon as he sees the signal in the sky for the Fantastic Four to assemble, he throws off his disguise and runs through the street in his underwear.

He rips a hole in the street, jumps into a sewer, and wades around for a while until he suspects that he may have gone far enough to be near his destination.

???

And, of course, he jumps up through the street and crushes a speeding car in the process. Oh, I forgot to mention that he jumped into the sewer to avoid the police firing bullets at him. He seemed worried about these bullets, too. But then he isn't at all worried about a fucking speeding car ramming into ass.

???

Then we see Johnny Storm. He's sitting in his hotrod at a service station talking to the mechanic while the guy fixes his engine. He's chatting with the guy about how much he loves cars. But when he sees the Fantastic Four signal in the sky, he doesn't step out of his beloved car to 'flame on.' He just melts the thing to slag and flies off!

(Remember, he was at a gas station, right next to a living human being.)

???

Jets are scrambled to take down this, this HUMAN TORCH. Johnny warns the pilots to not fly too close to him or their planes will melt and wonders why they aren't listening to him. It never occurs to him that they FUCKING CAN'T HEAR HIM.

Oh, and of course, the pilots, all of them, fly so close to the HUMAN TORCH that their planes melt because fighter jets typically swarm their targets like bees.

And it just goes on and on, with panel after panel of mind-crushing stupidity. It really does seem like Stan Lee thought to himself, "All right, I've got to demonstrate this guy's superpower. OK. I'll have him bust through a wall when he leaves this building. But, wait, the guy walked in the door without any problem and there is no reason he can't just take the door when he leaves. Well, fuck it, he's going through the wall anyway. Kids won't notice this shit. Kids are nothing but really dumb dwarfs anyway. Excelsior!"

Note: I like comics. I like the Fantastic Four. I like Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. But this comic is shit.
"

"i can understand why some people hate this book, but a time was had.."