Fantastic Four/Fantastic 4 Annual 1998

[Col_Fury]

FANTASTIC FOUR/FANTASTIC 4 ANNUAL 1998
By Karl Kesel & Stuart Immonen

APPEARANCES:
Human Torch, Invisible Woman, Mr. Fantastic, Thing, Franklin Richards

SYNOPSIS:
Thing wakes up for a midnight snack and chats with Franklin. Johnny steals his sandwich. Ben checks in on Reed, but leaves when Sue starts smooching with Reed. Feeling left out of the family, Ben goes looking for the kitchen again, but instead finds Reed’ particle accelerator and gets zapped. He wakes up and seemingly meets another reality’s Fantastic Four and Avengers. After some hijinks, Thing wakes up surrounded by the Fantastic Four, who say he had a dream about the Wizard of Oz. Ben finally eats his sandwich and shares it with Franklin.

NOTE:
Thing could have been transported to an alternate reality, but with the Wizard of Oz comparison, and that the Wizard used the alias “Oz” there, and that when Ben passed out in the Baxter Building in his dream but woke up on Pier Four (even though when he got zapped in Pier Four he appeared on the docks and had to walk to the Baxter Building), I’m willing to lean toward dream for now. If these versions of the character ever appear somewhere else it’ll be easy enough to add them in then.

This hit the stands the same month as FF3 14 (indicia-dated February 1999, but in stores in December 1998). A continued story started in FF3 13, so howsabout right before that?

This was the year of team-up Annuals, but this particular Annual’s cover only says “Fantastic Four” in the title (whereas all the other ones this year say both characters on the cover in the title spot, like “Iron Man/Captain America,” “Captain America/Citizen V,” “Generation X/Dracula,” “Silver Surfer/Thor,” etc.). The indicia, however, says “Fantastic Four/Fantastic 4 ’98.” I’ll suggest the abbreviation “FF/FF.”

Placement suggestions:

HUMAN TORCH II/JOHNNY STORM
…
SUP/FF
*FF/FF ’98
FF3 13
…

INVISIBLE WOMAN/SUE STORM RICHARDS
…
SUP/FF
*FF/FF ’98
FF3 13
…

MR. FANTASTIC/REED RICHARDS
…
SUP/FF
*FF/FF ’98
FF3 13
…

RICHARDS, FRANKLIN BENJAMIN
…
SUP/FF
*FF/FF ’98
FF3 13
…

THING II/BENJAMIN J. GRIMM
…
SUP/FF
*FF/FF ’98
FF3 13
…