• Written by: Ryan North
• Art by: Carlos Gómez
• Colors by: Jesus Aburtov
• Letters by: VC’s Joe Caramagna
• Cover art by: Alex Ross (cover A)
• Cover price: $3.99
• Release date: April 10, 2024

Fantastic Four #19 takes a trip into an homage to classic B&W detective noir stories when P.I. Alicia Masters is hired to find a kidnapped scientist named Reed Richards.

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Is Fantastic Four #19 Good?

Fantastic Four #19 is a struggle. On its face, Ryan North creates an entertaining twist on detective noir stories by putting the heroes and villains you know in a different context that feels familiar yet looks new. As a bonus, this issue dispenses with North’s repeated attempts at using the FF to present a science lesson badly. That said, this issue is a struggle because it looks, reads, and feels like a cooldown issue in the middle of a run that appears to have no purpose or direction other than to satisfy North’s personal desire for experimental fiction.

The issue begins with a stereotypical femme fatale darkening the door of Private Investigator Alicia Masters. The “Trouble In A Red Dress” looking for help is Sue Storm, and she needs a talented dick (*ahem*) to find her missing boyfriend, Reed Richards. What follows is a series of detective noir tropes involving visits to lay enforcement (crooked and legit), gangsters, stool pigeons, and more to find out what happened to Reed.

Ultimately, it was Trapster all along when Peter Petruski got his sticky hands on a cosmic cube and wished to remake the world in his own image, accidentally creating a detective noir reality. Using her detective skills, Alicia finds Reed and the cube and wishes everything back to normal.

~The End~

“Wait! That’s it?” you may rightly wonder. Yes, that’s it. This is effectively an Elseworlds story that’s still within continuity. It doesn’t relate to any previous arc, and the revelation in the last issue that Nicholas Scratch is up to something big involving Franklin’s power is completely ignored. Momentum, it seems, is not the Marvel way.

What’s great about Fantastic Four #19? Seeing familiar characters portrayed as “different” characters is a tried and true novelty that still works. If you like picturing Namor as a staunch, rigid police officer, for example, you’ll get that kind of presentation here. In fairness, the mystery North constructs is relatively well done.

What’s not so great about Fantastic Four #19? I’m genuinely curious. How many cooldowns and one-shot issues in a row can a creative team produce before folks start tuning out? The purpose of an ongoing is to provide longevity and create a reason for readers to constantly wonder what happens next so that they keep coming back. These experimental stories that keep shifting focus, style, tone, and outcome might as well be a collection of short stories in an anthology that nobody bothers to read.

In other words, this issue is a struggle because it fails at doing the one thing every issue in an ongoing SHOULD do – give readers a reason to keep coming back for more. If North and Marvel Editorial are banking on their ability to tell a one-shot so amazing that readers can’t get enough, that presumption is sorely misguided. I’ll give credit to North for dispensing with the poorly constructed science lessons, but this issue may reveal that’s all North has to offer.

How’s the Art? Regardless of the extenuating circumstances, the art in this issue looks great. Gómez and Aburtov deliver clean lines, amazing costumes specific to the detective noir genre, and probably the most important aspect of any detective noir story, proper placement of shadows and silhouettes. Thumbs up to the art team.

About The Reviewer: Gabriel Hernandez is the Publisher & EIC of ComicalOpinions.com, a comics review site dedicated to indie, small, and mid-sized publishers.

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Bits and Pieces

Fantastic Four #19 ignores the events of issue #18 in favor of a cooldown Elseworlds-ish issue that puts Alicia Masters at the heart of a detective noir mystery. In and of itself, the issue is fine as a novel time waster, and the art is solid, but North continues to keep this ongoing series rudderless.

6/10