Question: Why the fantastic four went to space in the comic book?

(Posted by: ernesto piedelesto on 2009-11-09 09:01:44)

The first story tells that they traveled into space not to let the russians be the first, but in the years the origins had slightly changed. in the movie they go to space to study the cosmic rays, but in the comics I remember that they went there just to test reed's spaceship, that could go to other planets. am I right? please answer only if you read the comic book, not only seen the movies.

Posted by: honky275 on 2009-11-09, 09:35:07

You have to realize that Fantastic Four #1 came out in 1961 - before any astronauts had been in space, or to the moon. So the origin in Fantastic Four #1 states something (I think) about being the first astronauts in space, and trying to beat the Communist Russians. Later on, when time passed, and real astronauts had been to space, and the moon, the origin was changed (since comic-book characters tend to not age in real time...) If the Fantastic Four were the first astronauts in space, they'd be very old now. So their origin was changed at some point, to emphasize the experimental nature of Reed's spaceship - and the study of cosmic rays (which gave them their powers) was added to the space travel. In the same way - Iron Man's origin used to say that Tony Stark supplied arms to the U.S. during the Vietnam War - but this would mean that if he was 20 or so in the 1960's, he'd be at least 60 now... So to keep the character young, in the current origins he created the Iron Man armor in Afghanistan, not Vietnam.

Posted by: Xavier on 2009-11-09, 09:09:15

You are correct. They were testing out Reed's experimental ship when it was hit by the cosmic rays.