For today’s comic book review I read “Prisoners Of the Pharoah!” the story contained within Fantastic Four #19. It is a breath taken tale of heroics in their raw form, going to great lengths to help a friend.

The story is centered around trying to help Alicia Masters see again,  Reed believing that he has found a hint to a cure for blindness on ancient Egyptian hieroglyph’s. needing more information than modern research can supply the Fantastic Four go back to Doom’s castle and use his time machine to go back in time to find the cure for blindness.

Story

I Feel this story is rich with both heart, and action as the fantastic Fours trip does not go exactly as they had planned.  having time traveled from our time to the past to discover that someone from further into the future is already there and serving as Pharaoh.

it is filled with both action and suspense, even if it’s a little cheesy in how The Thing gets free from the enslaving ray.

but perhaps the best thing about this story of all, is the ending. Not because things go as hoped or planned, or because our hero’s win and save the day. But because the ending is not what has become so common in the comic book lore of the day.

Artwork

I felt that the artwork of this story was well done, and the historic combat looked great for our Fantastic Hero’s.  in every panel we have all the depth and detail that one could hope for. In this issue never do I feel  an artistic shortcut was taken at the deterrent of the story.

Attached to this review, i included a panel that I feel greatly showed off the depth, the detail and level of excellence that Jack Kirby put into this issue.

Originality & Continuity

I feel that this builds up well on the continuity established, making reference to a Fantastic Four issue  from more than a year before! But then taking that information and weaving it into a story that fits the state of the ongoing series now, with Ben Grimm dating Alicia.

Characters & Development

The story develops the Fantastic Four world, and team  by showing just how much they care for each other, even their non member friends like Alicia . It also helps to support that while at times The Thing can have a tense relationship with the team, he is quite caring for each of them.