Scott's Take: Fantastic Four: A Family (Anti)Matter by Stacy McAnulty and Matt Kaufenberg (illustrator)

 

Fantastic Four: A Family (Anti)Matter by Stacy McAnulty, and Matt Kaufenberg (illustrator), is a book geared towards young readers that I read from my local library. Johnny is bored one day and accidentally opens a hole into the negative zone (an antimatter universe). It is up to him and the rest of the Fantastic Four to stop it before it destroys their universe.

 

The book is full of awesome artwork with fun background details and great characterization of each member of the team. This is a fun, if rather short read befitting the age group, that also includes scientific explanations for kids on what happened at the end. This is a light hearted read and was pretty enjoyable even for an older reader like myself.

 

Amazon Associate Purchase Link: https://amzn.to/4gn6epB

 

My hardback reading copy came from the Central, aka Downtown, Branch of the Dallas Public Library System.

 

Scott A. Tipple ©2025

Scott's Take: Fantastic Four by Ryan North Vol. 1: Whatever Happened To The Fantastic Four?

Fantastic Four by Ryan North Vol. 1: Whatever Happened To The Fantastic Four? is the best Fantastic Four story I have read all year. Something has happened and all the Fantastic Four have separated into groups. They all are off having their own adventures.  

Ben (The Thing) and Alicia (the Thing’s wife) get stuck in a time loop after they arrive in a small town.

Reed (Mister Fantastic) and Sue (The Invisible Woman) also arrive in a different small town and quickly figure out the all the people are Doombots. They think they are human, but they are all robots. Why would Doom build a whole army’s worth of Doombots and just leave them there?

Johnny (The Human Torch) has created a new identity and is attempting to live a low-profile life in New York City. But, Johnny being Johnny, low profile for him is not something he can do. 

Can the Fantastic Four their way back together? Can they get out of their various predicaments to even do that? Of course, they will, but how they go about it is the story. In fact, that is only part of the story, as once the band gets back together, things get even more chaotic.

The incident that broke up the Fantastic Four is very well handled. All the main characters are exceptionally well written and there is plenty of science, exploration, and great artwork. Ryan North is an author with a science background so he is able to write the science in an interesting and informative way.

The art is spectacular. The cover art is done by Alex Ross with the interior done by Iban Coello and Ivan Fiorelli. The interior art is exceptionally good. The art displays the individual powers of the Fantatsic Four really well. This is especially true with Reed, when later in the book, he does some very uncomfortable things to his body to figure things out. The ending is really interesting.

I am really looking forward to the next book, Fantastic Four by Ryan North: Vol 2: Four Stories About Hope.  That read is currently scheduled to be released in early January. I really hope that Marvel gives this creative team a long run that goes on for years. 

 

My reading copy came from the Central or Downtown Branch of the Dallas Public Library System.

 

Scott A. Tipple ©2023 

 

Sunday Movie Review: GUARDIANS (2017)

As I said last month when I reviewed  The Hurricane Heist, I am not that great at reviewing movies. My late friend, Glenn Walker, was the man as far as I was concerned on movie reviews. Still, when I see something and I like it, I plan on trying to tell folks. Such is the case with the 2017 release, GUARDIANS.

Synopsis:

During the Cold War, an organization called "Patriot" created a superhero squad that included members of various Soviet republics. For years, the heroes hid in the shadows, but now they must emerge to defend Mother Russia from a threat unlike any other they have faced before: the diabolical scientist Kuratov.

That synopsis comes from the Dallas Library system where Scott found it listed and thought it might be fun. It was! Basically, this is a Russian Marvel studio style superhero movie. Their budget was reportedly five million dollars. At times that shows a little bit as while the special effects are pretty cool and give Hollywood a run for their money, there are some things that needed a little more work. The dubbing of the voices works pretty well though they tend to sound a bit flat at times.  

All in all, we both enjoyed it. Has some funny laugh out loud moments, intentional and otherwise. Typical super hero movie so there is a lot of violence, explosions, buildings and objects destroyed, and the like.  Moscow takes a beating much like New York does in every single superhero movie. Decent origin story told through flashbacks as are a couple of other story plot points. There are rumors that they are working on a sequel. This one tied off pretty well so if they can't do a sequel, seeing this will not leave you hanging. Both Scott and I are hoping that they do get the sequel done as this one was pretty good. 

I went looking in the course of working on this review and was surprised Netflix does not carry it. They carry other flicks with the same title, so do not get fooled. They don't have it. While it does not come up in the Netflix system, if you can’t do it by way of your local library like we did, you can find it by way of Amazon, both to rent or own. Rental is $3.99 and we would say it is worth it.

We would recommend it. GUARDIANS is definitely a B movie, but it is fun and well worth your time. Not the greatest epic ever, but pretty good and fun. Popcorn optional.