You remember the Mole Man, the goofy-creepy Fantastic Four villain who lives underground? He runs with Moloids, the subterranean race that serves as his henchmen. Remember?
OK, so, some of those little yellow guys have been going to the Future Foundation, a fancy super-school that the Fantastic Four opened up in their skyscraper headquarters. And in the latest issue of the comic where they appear, something really moving and funny happens with them.
The Moloids living in the Baxter Building have generally been played for comic relief in this series. So the scene in this week’s FF #6 where the Moloid named Tong confides to his brothers that he is a she comes across as a quiet emotional tremor. Things shake but the folks inside the scene re-adjust.
This whole issue of FF is a melancholy one and really highlights Scott Lang/Ant-Man as a sort of anti-Reed Richards. He’s still a super-scientist, sure, but he’s a bereaved one who struggles to keep his new adopted family intact.
The scenes where he’s talking to pictures of his dead daughter on his phone are like a gut punch. The Fantastic Four are the family that gets through everything. And this sister series firmly frames the FF as a more dysfunctional, more relatable mirror image of Marvel’s first family.
Recently, a supporting cast member of DC Comics’ Batgirl revealed herself as transgender to that book’s main character. The publisher trumpeted the story beat with a round of publicity. It was a well-written scene but all the build-up robbed the sequence of its drama. So I’m glad that I didn’t get this lovely moment in FF #6 ruined for me in the same way.
What about you? What sequences or covers from this week’s comics made your eyeballs happy?
Leave a Reply