Issue(s): Fantastic Four #142, Fantastic Four #143, Fantastic Four #144
Cover Date: Jan-Mar 74
Title: "No friend beside him!" / "The terrible triumph of Doctor Doom!" / "Attack!"
Credits:
Gerry Conway - Writer
Rich Buckler - Penciler
Joe Sinnott / Frank Giacoia - Inker

Review/plot:
When Jack Kirby left the Fantastic Four (and Marvel) it probably felt like the end of the world, but John Buscema was as strong a replacement as you could find. But with these issues John Buscema is replaced by Rich Buckler. Buckler is actually a decent artist, but there's a certain amount of legitimacy that was needed for what was Marvel's flagship title, so Buckler was actually encouraged to swipe scenes from Jack Kirby, i guess to ensure that the book retained a very classic look. Shar at Panelocity has done an amazing job of documenting this. I find that Buckler adds a John Buscema quality on top of the Kirby swipes, so for example you'll see that Mr. Fantastic is a lot more muscular looking than Kirby drew him. In fact on my own i always felt like Buckler was more of a Buscema clone than a Kirby clone, but again if you look at Panelocity there's really no denying how strong an "influence" Kirby was. This isn't meant as a knock at Buckler, since he was obviously told to do this (and Buckler will demonstrate an ability to draw well on his own, when he's free to do so on other titles). But it's worth noting how important it was to Marvel that the FF retain a certain look.

Storywise, after some kind of interesting if not always well executed stories delving into the foundational relationship problems between Reed and Sue, Gerry Conway with this arc gets into a really bad Dr. Doom story.

Alicia has been lured away to an Eastern European country with the promise of a cure for her blindness, and the Thing goes to visit her and gets attacked by a demon creature called Darkoth.

The Thing temporarily defeats Darkoth and Alicia's operation can continue.

Ben's relationship with Alicia is also looking shaky. He is of course nervous that if she gets her sight back she won't love him any more. But he even gets suspicious of Alicia because the demon knows things about the FF's recent split-up, and the only person Ben told that to was her. But that's all forgotten when Alicia goes into "surgery", which soon turns out to be a sham. Alicia is kidnapped.

Thing encounters Darkoth again on the trail and eventually gets captured.

Meanwhile, Medusa convinces Reed to go to his college reunion even though Sue has left him. It kind of looks like Conway was setting up a situation where Medusa was moving in on Reed now that Sue was out of the picture.

Reed's reunion turns out to also be a sham. The only other person who shows up is Johny and Wyatt's coach Thorne, revealed in this issue to be a classmate of Reed's. The reunion is hosted by Dr. Doom (compare to here or here).

Doom has already captured the Thing, and he's imprisoned Darkoth as well.

And he's got a Vibration Bomb device that makes people susceptible to mind control.

Meanwhile, the Human Torch has quit the FF due to the fact that Reed 'zapped' Franklin when the child displayed his mutant powers. He and Wyatt wind up in jail for causing property damage, and while Reed and Medusa are negotiating with Darkoth, Doom busts open their jail cell.

The issue ends with Darkoth realizing that he's not actually a demon, he's just one of Doom's former henchmen that Doom transformed into this shape.

He turns on Doom and joins up with the FF (note the Apology about Medusa suddenly appearing in costume).

Doom sends another creature, a robotic Seeker with "nuclear discharger prods" for arms, after the FF.

They defeat it and then bring it back to the Baxter Building. While Reed tinkers with it, the Thing and Darkoth bicker like little children. Very annoying.

Reed then sends the Seeker after Doom, and then Darkoth and the FF attack as well. Doom runs away, calling it a minor set-back..

...but Darkoth pursues him and ends up causing an explosion in Doom's building-shaped escape rocket.

The story ends with the Thing being upset and walking away, because that's what's supposed to happen at the end of an FF story, right?

Doom is losing a little of what makes him special with each subsequent appearance by low quality writers. At least he is still creating super-villains and awesome robots like it's no big deal. But his plot is generic and he's defeated way too easily. As you can see above, Doom is even looking goofy in the art, although not always.

The above image also looks like a possible swipe example.

The art is the least of the problems. This is FF-by-the-numbers, with the in-fighting, the angst, the introspection all overwhelmingly irritating, and the plotting uninteresting, which is worse when the villain is Dr. Doom instead of, say, Annihilus in the previous arc.

Quality Rating: D

Historical Significance Rating: 2 - beginning Rich Buckler's run on FF

Chronological Placement Considerations: The very beginning of issue #142 actually takes place in the immediate aftermath of issue #141. But then Marvel Team-Up #17 and #18, featuring Mr. Fantastic and the Human Torch, respectively, occurs before the rest of issue #142. I've placed this arc after MTU #18.

References:

• The Human Torch says sometimes he's as dumb as the Hulk, and a footnote says "Who Johnny just met in Marvel Team-Up #16". It was actually Marvel Team-Up #18.
  
• Reed 'zapped' Franklin in Fantastic Four #141.

Crossover: N/A

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A

"Compressed in a secret ring compartment" refers to DC's Flash.

This was a great run by Conway - one of the best comic writers of all time! 'Nuff said!

fnord, thanks for the shout-out! :)

I actually didn't mind Buckler's short run in the FF, even though there were the obvious Hulk swipes in Giant Sized Superstars. Doom looks okay to me here,if not too rounded off in the body armor. I find Reed's face in the above panel ("Good lord, man -- no!") to be melting. Artist or inker? Sinnott inks Buckler nicely except for that Reed face there.

Conway should have created a real love triangle between Reed, Medusa and Sue. Such would have been a spectacular story line!

Did you notice that the scene with Doom and Richards attacking him, at the dinner table, is quite the same scene (more after) than Vader at the dinner table attacked by Solo in the Cloud City in the Empire Strikes Back?

The "On another occassion" panel might be based on the "Come no closer, you over-zealous oaf!" one from THOR #182-183 (which fnord included in his review).

In the opening scene of Roger Zelazny's 1969 novel, Creatures of Light and Darkness, the protagonist fights a man-monster called Dargoth. I would not be surprised if that creature inspired Darkoth's odd name.

Rich Buckler died of cancer on May 19, 2017.

I was sad to hear that Buckler had passed away. I realize that some readers were critical of Buckler of emulating Kirby too closely. Admittedly it was not such a good idea to have done so many swipes of Kirby's work. But if you look at Buckler's work on his Deathlok stories, which were done around the same time, you can really see his versatility and inventiveness as an artist on full display.