Fantastic Four: Doomgate

Having never read any of the Marvel novels before, I wasn't quite sure what to expect. Something fairly enjoyable and minorly diverting, I guess. So, I was pleasantly surprised when this book took all my expectations and shot them through the roof.

This is very much a comic book novel with quite a lot of action, (though not much of the extremely graphic kind - even if there is a reference to ‘bunny-eating vampires') humor and not much detail to bog you down.

The basic story is along the lines of what you would find on the ‘World Greatest Heroes' animated show (and explained well enough that I don't feel compelled to add anything to it). However, there was some added depth and inner turmoil for the characters that you don't usually find on an animated TV show.

As for the characters themselves, you could tell immediately that Mr. Lang is quite the fan of Reed, Susan, Ben, and Johnny - I felt that he did a wonderful job with them. And the collection of ‘bad guys' was very well (and uniquely) written. Each one had their own distinctive personality. In varyingly minor roles were several of the other Marvel universe superheroes - which I thought was a nice addition to the story.

The book was very upbeat, and several times I found myself laughing so hard at some of the characters antics (or Mr. Lang's brilliant way of describing things) that I had to stop reading for a moment. The story changed perspective quite often, vacillating between the good guys, the bad guys, and a few of the guest stars - which worked unusually well to pull everything into a cohesive unit. Through most of the book the Fantastic Four were limited to only one or two together at a time and - while each member had their storyline to follow - I felt as though the story focused on Ben and Johnny a bit more than Reed and Susan.

This book is definitely a fast paced read, I think all the action in the book takes place on the same day. All in all, I found Doomgate to be a very nice way to revisit my favorite superheroes, and a entertaining way to spend two days.