Marvel Animation Age - Fantastic Four (2006)

Reviews
Episode #12: Revenge Of The Skrulls
Original Airdate: August 11th, 2007

Susan forces the rest of the team to take part in ‘Fantastic Fifth for a Day,’ an attempt to drum up a little good PR for the team. But the contest is interrupted by the return of the SKRULLS. The FF aren’t exactly worried by the awkward shape shifting aliens… that is, until they reveal the SUPER SKRULL! The team realizes they’re in trouble, especially when they learn the Super Skrull, who already possesses all of the FF’s powers, has teamed up with Ronan the Accuser! The FF’s only hope might lie in the hands of the ‘Fantastic Fifth…’ a nerdy teenager named Rupert.

Credits
Story By Craig Kyle and Chris Yost
Written by Bob Forward
Directed by Franck Miohel
Music by Noam Kaniel
Animation By Sunmin/ The Animation Studio/ Fantasta

Voices
Mr. Fantastic - Hiro Kanagawa
Invisible Woman - Lara Gilchrist
The Thing - Brian Dobson
Human Torch - Christopher Jacot

Review
Stu - If you’ve looked through any of the other sites on Marvel Animation Age, you might have noticed that I love ongoing stories and much prefer them to standalone, 22 minute mini movies. I think they allow for bigger, more epic stories to be told. There’s often the downside to this style of storytelling however, in that unneeded padding often wastes time and filler episodes occur – episode in which little happens so they can make a big impact in the season final. The later seasons of Buffy The Vampire Slayer was often guilty of this but Fantastic Four: World’s Greatest Heroes has proven to have the best of both worlds so far – each episode stands on it’s own perfectly, but several episodes have had little titbits and such which often lead up to later episodes. They’ve managed to do it quite well with Dr. Doom who seems to be stealing things related to the cosmic power (power cosmic?), which gave our four their fantastic powers. The better example however, would be the Skrull/Kree/Ronan storyline, which started in the show’s premiere, and has continued with My Neighbour Was A Skrull.

One of the biggest complaints thus far from the show from many is it’s lack or originality – a lot of the storylines have been done before in various other cartoons over the past decade or so, but that can’t be said about this episode. Now that a foundation has been built upon, Kyle, Yost and Forward are free to play more with their stories and the improvement is significant. Adding this to the exceptional strength of characterisation in the show and you’ve got an awesome episode. The show now appears to be working out some of the kinks found in the earlier episodes, the episodes airing on YTV have been much, much better than those that aired in Cartoon Network in the States. For those of you who have given up on the show, I’d highly recommend giving it another chance when it comes back on in time for the new movie – I don’t think you’ll regret it. I’d advise you to buy the DVD but the treatment the show is getting on disc is absolutely terrible and they should be ignored in hopes that FOX will re-release it and do a proper job of it this time around.

Another of the Fantastic Four’s extensive rouges gallery is introduced in this episode, in addition to the returning Skrulls and Ronan. Super Skrull is probably one of the show’s coolest villains so far, not only because a cool set of powers but he seemed permanently pissed off and bitter towards the Four – he even remarks that he could beat them much quicker but instead chooses to take his time and relish his victory. His big, bulky design makes a nice contrast to the almost child like designs of the normal Skrulls and as always, the visuals make great use of his powers. Speaking of the Skrulls, there’s a nasty scene in which one of them tries to bite The Thing’s arm and breaks all his teeth – it just looked and sounded vicious!

The episode isn’t short on the funny stuff. Everything from Ben, Sue and Johnny’s calm reaction to the fact the Skrulls were invading again to Rupert joining the group and Johnny failing to remember who Ronan is despite ruining his life got a good belly laugh from me. I also got a good chuckle at some of the fans who dressed up for the Fantastic Fifth contest, especially the guy who dressed up as Wolverine with cutlery as his claws (don’t pretend you’ve never done it!). Even Rupert was wearing the old Kirby FF uniform!

Another great episode of Fantastic Four: World’s Greatest Heroes. I hope the remaining episodes are as strong as this one!

Media

Back to Episode Reviews