What, you say he has no economic experience? Au contraire, my friends. Back before many of us were even born, Richards and company had first hand experience with the mortgage crisis:
And it's not just a misleading cover:
Egads, how in the world did the Fantastic Four get into such dire financial straits??
Ouch...we're feeling your pain, Reed.But why can't the FF turn to the experience of other superheroes to find a way to raise capital?
Oh, yeah, right. (Of course, in fairness, the JLA's first HQ was in a goddamned cave in Happy Harbor, Rhode Island...I guess Manhattan real estate prices were a bitch in both universes...).So how did the FF get through their liquidity crisis?
Ah, of course...Now, it turns out the "S.M." in "S.M. Studios" stood for Sub-Mariner...when he heard they were broke, Namor actually went out and bought a movie studio (with "undersea riches") just so he could offer the FF a movie deal and entice them into a series of none-too-impressive death traps (SPOILER ALERT: all the traps failed). But he lived up to his bargain, paid 'em the money, and made the movie:
So there's the solution to our "crisis": everyone should just make a movie of their lives for a million bucks each!!Hey, does the Sub-Mariner still own that movie studio? Hmmm....
Bonus Disco Era Addendum: In the 1970's, Reed had a plan to make sure this little setback never happened again:
Man, can you imagine how much the IPO for Fantastic Four Incorporated would have gone for? It would have made Google look like a penny stock!!But Reed, you've gotta get better lawyers, because that charter is kinda whack:
D'oh!!Well, at least in got Luke Cage into the FF for a few issues...
Ye olde times shots from Fantastic Four #9 (1962). Ye less olde times segments from Fantastic Four #168 (1976).
4 comments:
One of the few issues of FF I own (a gift from a neighbor cleaning out his collection) has an alternate universe Reed giving the business to some guy named Arkon or something, and "our" Reed does the same thing. I don't know what happened to him, but it didn't end well for alternate Reed.
My very first FF (and later I had issues 1-400!)story was that Subby movie issue although it was from the 1966 reprint. Hooked me forever!
Shadow--that was the Reed Richards from Earth-A, the parallel world where Richards became the Thing and the were no other superheroes. Fortunately,the combined forces of "our" FF, Richards-Thing, and the armies of the "Fifth Dimension" (really) were able to thwart Arkon and restore all to normalcy. This was also the story that introduced the wonder that is GAARD!!
If I recall correctly, didn't that Sub-Mariner-owned movie studio come back to menace She-Hulk during the John Byrne era?
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