- Written by: Tony Fleecs
- Art by: Justin Mason
- Colors by: Alex Sinclair
- Letters by: VC’s Joe Caramagna
- Cover art by: Nick Bradshaw, Rachelle Rosenberg (cover A)
- Cover price: $4.99
- Release date: May 21, 2025
The Thing #1, by Marvel on 5/21/25, finds Benjamin J. Grimm taking up a solo mission to find a missing girl connected to kids Ben knew from his childhood. His mission uncovers a larger conspiracy at work.
Is The Thing #1 Good?
Plot Synopsis
The Thing #1 begins with a brief montage of events four hours in the future when a faceless radio announcer broadcasts a bounty to the supervillain gangs of New York. The Thing is on the move, and there’s a lot of money waiting for the hang who takes him down. Cue the Walter Hill title card (that’s a The Warriors (1979) reference for all you youngsters out there).
Four hours earlier, the Fantastic Four battles an Alphamollusk in space. They win when Thing stops holding back and tears the tentacled beast apart. When the team returns to the Baxter Building, Ben heads straight to bed, but his rest is quickly interrupted when HERBIE wakes Ben up to deal with an intruder who claims to know Ben. The intruder is indeed an old acquaintance (one of a group of bullies who used to pick on Ben as a boy) named Marty Flynn. Marty anxiously explains he needs help finding the missing daughter of one of Ben’s old friends and Marty’s sister – Shelly Flynn.
Thing sets out to find Shelly’s daughter with a lead provided by Marty. The lead takes Thing to a bar where a drunken Melvin Potter, aka Gladiator, is slumped over in a drunken stupor. Gladiator drunkenly mumbles about somebody putting something inside him, which gives him superhuman strength. Thing asks Gladiator a few questions to find out what he knows, but Gladiator attacks Thing. During the fight, Gladiator mumbles a few words about the people who “put things in him” and may be connected to the disappearances.
The issue ends with Thing and Marty heading off to the next location from Gladiator’s ramblings and a bar patron making a call to the Kingpin.
First Impressions
Overall, The Thing #1 is not bad. Writer Tony Fleecs begins the Thing-centric miniseries with many of the classic tropes you’d expect, wrapped in a gritty, street-level drama. It’s not a perfect start by any means, but Thing fans will be well and truly pleased. If nothing else, The Thing #1 is worlds better than the last miniseries by Walter Mosley.
How’s the Art?
Justin Mason steps up for his most mainstream title in recent memory by putting the perennially-bothered Thing in the heart of an urban detective noir story. Generally, Mason’s artwork is solid. The brief fight between Thing and Gladiator is well done. The moody, long shadows greatly enhance the detective noir aesthetic, and Thing looks great. That said, there’s a disconnect between the art and the script. Most of the plot takes place in the morning (8:30 to 9:30 am), but most of the issue looks like it’s set at twilight or evening.
What’s great about The Thing #1?
A grounded, gritty tale that mixes hard-boiled detective work with loads of heart – that’s just what the doctor ordered to showcase why Thing is a popular character. Tony Fleecs presents Ben as a tough guy with a heart of gold and a touch of sadness. Plus, the little nods to quintessential NYC stories like The Warriors are a nice touch.
What’s not great about The Thing #1?
Besides the disconnect between art and script mentioned above, Ben’s opening dialog while battling the Alphamollusk is clunky and stiff. Readers not patient enough to power through it will miss out on a fine comic, but new readers who don’t know anything about Thing will be sorely tempted to close the book at page five.
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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Final Thoughts
The Thing #1 premiers a decent start to a hard-boiled detective story when The Thing gets a call to help find a missing girl. Tony Fleecs’s plot is a perfect match for Thing’s personality, keeping the story grounded within a superhero context, and Justin Mason’s artwork looks great. However, Thing’s opening dialog is rough (it gets better), and the artists can’t decide if the story takes place at night or in the morning.
7/10
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