Fantastic Four: Life Story showcases the coming of Galactus’s unfeeling herald in a more terrifying way than his Marvel Universe introduction.
WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Fantastic Four: Life Story #4, on sale now
Fantastic Four: Life Story has been all about retelling the adventures of Marvel’s First Family throughout the decades. But rather than simple review, this story has dramatically altered the FF’s world, remixing the friendship between the Thing and Mr. Fantastic, Sue and Reed’s marriage and other pivotal events. Now, Fantastic Four: Life Story #4 showcases the coming of Galactus’s unfeeling herald, the Silver Surfer, in a much scarier way than ever before.
The Silver Surfer, even when working for Galactus, is usually a somber yet philosophical individual. Here, however, he’s a far more callous and foreboding precursor to a Galactus who’s even more uncaring. Here’s how the cosmic herald becomes far more of a threat than ever in the alternate continuity of Mark Russell, Sean Izaakse, Francesco Manna, Nolan Woodard and Joe Caramagna’s series.
This issue finally begins to build upon hardworking scientist Reed Richards’ long-standing fears concerning the coming of Galactus. Reed, Sue and Ben rush into outer space, having prepared beforehand to meet this cosmic alien threat head-on and protect the Earth at all costs. Recently, the usually morose Ben Grimm had also met and fallen in love with Alicia Masters, inspiring his heroism more than ever and sending him ready to defend the people that he cared for. Unfortunately, the threat that the now Fantastic Three (after the death of the Human Torch) faced was in some ways far worse than what they imagined.
Instead of the gigantic Galactus that Reed had for years had visions and premonitions about, the trio were met by his herald, the Silver Surfer. The Thing tries to attack the metallic man, kicking him when he’s unaware. While the Silver Surfer is somewhat impressed by the surprise attack, he remarks that it’s not nearly enough to do him in. He quickly makes his escape, touring around the world before showing up at the United Nations. He informs the citizens of Earth that he quickly and easily dismantled their petty defenses against Galactus, who boasts far greater power than he does. He also tells that they have 10 years to truly prepare for their inevitable destruction, leaving the planet on a somber note.
The Silver Surfer’s characterization here is much different than usual. He’s typically shown as taciturn yet noble, with his regard for life and innocence eventually making him turn against Galactus. Here, however, he’s far more malicious and disdainful toward humanity and those in his way, speaking in a way less like a philosopher and more like a demi-god disgusted with his inferiors.
Likewise, his timetable of ten years before Earth’s destruction, as well as his matter-of-fact way of presenting this warning, amp up both his own lack of regard for humanity’s survival and also the even greater threat of Galactus. Reed Richards, Tony Stark, the Mad Thinker and several other minds had come together to create technology to defend the Earth, with Richards working night and day to achieving this goal. The fact that the Silver Surfer, who only refers to himself as the much more straightforward name Herald, dismantles these creations without difficulty further illustrates how little of a chance Reed and the rest of humanity stand against their biggest cosmic threat.
While humanity had all but united together in some small way against the threat of Galactus, people finally starting to take Reed’s threats a bit more seriously with nuclear terrors no longer distracting them. With humanity seeing surefire extinction headed their way after uniting once and for all, Galactus’ is all the more horrifying.
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