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By Jim Beard
“So it has happened at last!” exclaimed Susan Storm in the opening pages of 1961’s FANTASTIC FOUR #1. “I must be true to my vow! There can be no turning back!”
Though she appeared second in the cast of what became comics’ most famous family, fans soon learned that Sue took a back seat to no one. Adventurer, crusader, wife, mother, and now the leader of an entire people, the Invisible Woman stands as Marvel’s premiere super heroine and definitely one of the most popular.
“No one in the Marvel universe would underestimate her importance,” says Mark Bagley, artist of the upcoming FANTASTIC FOUR, issue #1 out November 14. “She's this great looking adult woman, not too built, not too stylish—a mom I'd like to get to know. I don't buy the whole ‘she's a scientist in her own right’ take. She's Reed's companion and the glue of her family. She is like a lot of women whose strengths are their quiet resilience and toughness.”
Sue’s powers, granted to her by the cosmic rays which bombarded Reed Richards’ spaceship on its fateful trip, have grown and transformed over the years, mutating from simple invisibility to full-fledged force fields. These endow her with enough ability for some to consider her the most powerful member of the Fantastic Four.
Bagley’s artistic look at the Invisible Woman seems to walk a line between traditional and forward-thinking.
“I'm not going with [Jack] Kirby's dotted lines,” he explains. “Technology lets the colorist really influence the look of the force fields and invisibility, so I plan on using that to inform my approach to [her powers].”
In FANTASTIC FOUR #1, readers will discover a new problem for the Richards family, one that threatens all that Reed and Sue have built since romance and marriage. But, if we know the Invisible Woman, she’ll be tackling any new challenges on the front lines, protecting her family and taking charge of the situation.
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