PREPARE TO BECOME FICTIONAL!: Fantastic Four #605-611 + FF #16-23 Annotations

[Four Reborn]

FF #16 - "One Step Beyond" [3/28/12]

Val narrated chapter.
Fallout from the War of Four Cities and the battle with the Mad Celestials.
Future Frank and Galactus watch the sunset, Galen is happy he doesn't have to watch the universe end alone.
New and improved Baxter Building.
Space station called Foundation.
Johnny is going to move in with Pete!
Intervention with Valeria. She promises not to keep anymore secrets.
But she did keep a secret: she told Doom to stay alive, for there is something beneath the Council that is worth finding...
He finds the corpses of Suit-Reed and Beard-Reed and their Infinity Gauntlets, but he also finds the Hole with the lobotomized Dooms.
Here, I can build.

Fantastic Four #605 - "End of Line"

Fun little story where Reed and Nate go forward in time by 1000-year intervals.
3012: Franklin, Spider-Woman, a human torch analogue, and Ben Grimm lead the FF.
Ben only ages once a year when he's normal for a week.
4012: Franklin dips to hang with marvel cosmic.
5012: Ben is still alive, an old man, reminiscing about times past as he speaks to the memorial of his friends Reed, Sue, and Johnny.
6012: Ben's funeral attended by Franklin.

Fantastic Four #605.1 - "Origin Story"

Origin of Beard-Reed who is actually Nazi-Reed + how the Council came to be.
Hickman builds his own version of DC's Earth-X.
Loved the follow up to Beard-Reed having a little bit of Doom in him, mentioned way back in #571.

Fantastic Four #606 - "Adventures in Red"

FF #17 - "The Roommate Experience"

Hickman + Dragotta = Hilarious.
This was amazing.
Johnny has a portal to the Negative Zone in Pete's apartment. Pete's trying to get rid of him.
The get drunk on cosmic mare's milk. Pretty sure Johnny bangs Mary Jane.
The final straw is Pete finding Annihilus dropping bombs in his toilet.

FF #18 - "What Do You Call The Opposite Of a Field Trip?" [5/30/12]

Fantastic issue!
We wrap up the Negative Zone sub-plot with a field trip into the anti-verse!
Meanwhile, the Kree/Inhuman war is settled with both Franks fixing the Halan star. Future-Frank warns Black Bolt that he must be on Earth, for something wicked this way comes! Incursion hinting!
Punchline on that last page was hilarious.

Fantastic Four #607 - "Inert" [6/13/12]

Wakanda! Black Panther! Storm!
Recap for an event I didn't read: T'Challa renders all Vibranium inert in order to prevent Doom from exploiting it. However, T'Challa reveals in this that his process of liquidating Vibranium and investing it has kept the country's economy intact.
Crazy Egyptian pantheon lore! War between Amun-Ra and Anubis! Amun-Ra is beaten, but he hides his knowledge in his heart, which he gives to Bast to prevent from falling in the hands of Anubis. Bast goes to the Wakandans and drops the heart in a well. Using the remaining blood, she paints the face of one of them; red paste of knowledge. And so begins the reign of Wakanda.
The way things are... the burning cycle... the first and last hunt... the great circle...
The throne room is attacked by the soldiers of Anubis.
Equilibrium, harmonics, fate... everything lives... everything dies...
T'Challa and Reed arrive at a well... right before a temple of Amun-Ra
Storm, Shuri, and Sue go to meet with Bast.

Fantastic Four #608 - "City of The Dead"

Beneath Wakanda, behind the wall of knowledge, lies the Necropolis: City of the Dead, where all Black Panthers are laid to rest.
T'Challa has been guided by a dream, and he and Reed enter.
They meet with Bast who judges T'Challa. Reed's presence cements a bond between him and T'Challa that will never be broken.
We get some foreshadowing about Avengers vs X-Men (which I don't really care about)
T'Challa wants to be the Panther once more, but Shuri retains the position while T'Challa becomes the King of the Dead. He now has the strength and knowledge of every past Black Panther.
Meanwhile, Shuri Storm and Sue face off against Anubis in the spirit-realm. They get some good licks in while Bast finishes the job.
Dark Days are coming, and Reed and T'Challa must face them together!

FF #19 - "Safari"

FF #20 - "Deus Ex Inhuman"

House-keeping!
Inhumans return to Earth! Light Brigade is welcomed, they won the unwinnable battle!
Annihilus is drop-kicked back to the Negative Zone. Johnny keeps the control rod for leverage.
Bentley and Val blossoming friendship...
Future-Frank drops off Franklin at normal school, hinting at his future friendships.
Medusa interrupts Ronan and Crystal; Black Bolt has summoned her home...

FF #21 - "Ronance"

Hearts break!
More revelations on the peace between Black Bolt and Supremor: they agree on a ceasefire as a result of the oncoming death of everything.
However, Ronan has to return to Hala and break off his Ronance with Crystal.
Nerds cry.
At least Pete got a reunion with his centurion spitfire.

Fantastic Four #609 - "The God Ship" [8/8/12]

Wrap up the Nu-World plot threads. They use the corpse of the OML Galactus as a time vessel, a 'god-ship' that will take them lightyears into the future.
Banner Jr decides to rejoin them.

Fantastic Four #610 - "The Wizard" [9/12/12]

AIM buys the island of Barbuda. Cap, Pym, Tony, and Reed meet with the Prez.
Reed leads the Four to invade the island. They fight against the beekeepers bozos and The Wizard, but Scientist Supreme dispatches him and reveals a peace treaty.
Barbuda is now AIM Island, legally purchased, with Reed as their American ambassador. In exchange, the Four are given custody of Wizard.
Wizard is sick, he has a massive brain tumor, but he hints at Reed split by light and shadow before men of night and day...
Reed leaves Wizard to meet with his clone Bentley. Bentley presents the helm of the Wizard, but Wizard tells him to put it on...

FF #22 - "You Are Whatever You Want To Be"

Fantastic Four #611 - "Foundation"

Doom uses the Infinity Gauntlet found in the Council remains to rebuild its destroyed universe of origin in his own image!
However, the nature of a Doom universe betrays and imprisons him.
Future Val, Nate, and Reed go to save him.
They convince the six Doom-lords to release Doom, but one of them sends a Doom-dragon to stop them. Just as they cross the portal, the doom-dragon barely stops them, but not before the lobotomized dooms sacrifice themselves to save Victor.
Nate plans to visit all the multiversal reeds without dads to make up his penance while Val will apparently use the council dimension for her own designs.
Here, I can build!

FF #23 - "Run" [10/24/12]

So good!
Future Frank takes Leech and his younger self into a no rules adventure in the closet pocket universe. It's so much fun and Dragotta gets to stretch his legs really well.
Future-Frank says goodbye to everyone. Leech, Val, and even a happy hour with Ben and Johnny where we get a future preview of the Frank-tastic four!
Frank says goodbye to his parents, he needs to leave because two Franklins in the same time period will cause disturbances in the universe, especially with what's coming next.
Frank tells his parents they did a great job of raising him, and says goodbye.
When the threshold between who you are and who you can be presents itself, do not walk through... run!