MR. FANTASTIC

MARVEL SUPER HEROES (TOY BIZ)

“Mr. Fantastic is the awe-inspiring leader of the Fantastic Four. Now only is he able to stretch and twist his elastic body into almost any shape, he is also a brilliant scientist! When he’s not fighting super-villians, he can be found either in his laboratory or workshop, creating new compounds or inventing new machines to benefit mankind!”

In more modern super hero storytelling narratives, super intelligence is often seen as a marker for, if not outright villainy, than at least being a real jerk all the time.  This was less the case earlier on.  Sure, there were mad scientists and all, but characters such as Reed Richards existed to make the world a better place, and look out for people.  Reed’s teetered on the edge of the good versus jerk thing over the years, but he almost always bounces back to good, because that’s really who he is at the end of the day…at least in the mainstream universe.  But that’s the one that counts, right?  Right.

THE FIGURE ITSELF

Mr. Fantastic was released in Series 3 of Toy Biz’s Marvel Super Heroes line.  This was Reed’s second figure, following his Mego from the ‘70s, and the first of only two figures under Toy Biz’s 5-inch run.  The figure stands just under 5 inches tall and he has 5 points of articulation.  Like both Ben and Johnny, he’s got a rather reduced articulation scheme for the line, especially notable in light of Sue getting the full load out.  In Reed’s case, however, this is actually linked to his “action feature.”  Dubbed “5-way” stretch, Reed can extend at the neck, waist, biceps, forearms, thighs, and shins to replicate his stretching.  It’s a sort of off look, of course, and also results in the figure being extremely fragile, but it’s an intriguing idea.  The sculpt is in line with the rest of the team, so he’s a bit more basic and rudimentary than later figures.  The nature of the stretching feature also makes him a rather stiff looking figure.  That being said, I think it’s a more Reed Richards-y sculpt than the later cartoon one, especially in terms of build.  Color work is very dependent on molded colors on this guy, and there’s a tendency in certain samples for the blues to be rather mis-matched.  On mine, they’ve held up okay, though.  The actual paint work proper’s alright; Toy Biz did always know how to do a solid job with a “4” logo.  Reed is packed with a blaster thing of some sort.  I don’t recognize it as a story specific element, nor do I know why Reed would need a gun (unless it were wooden and for the intended purpose of breaking Magneto’s mind), but there it is.

THE ME HALF OF THE EQUATION

My initial Fantastic Four line-up was comprised of whichever version of each character was most easily accessible when I started collecting.  In the case of Reed, that was this guy.  Well, okay, it was another copy of this release.  Remember how I mentioned he was fragile?  Yeah, my original gradually broke at just about every stretch point.  I always liked this version, so that was a bummer.  But, I was able to find a replacement a few years back, and I’m a lot more careful with my toys these days.  He’s stiff, fragile, and gimmicky, but this really is my favorite of the two Toy Biz Reeds.