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By now, most Marvel fans are surely familiar with the Fantastic Four‘s classic roster of fan-favorite heroes. However, that iconic line-up once faced a major upheaval due to a single alteration to the team’s origin story. The tale of how the Fantastic Four unlocked their superpowers has been retold countless times over the years, but no version subverts the original quite like this one, since it replaces the entire team.
Marvel Adventures: Fantastic Four #25 by Fred Van Lente, Crystal Skillman, Cory Hamscher, Lee Loughridge, and Dave Sharpe featured a “What If…?” story that unveiled an alternate take on the Fantastic Four. When the Human Torch got sent to another reality, he uncovered a world where the team looked different from the one he knew.
The Fantastic Four became the Femmetastic Four in this universe, as the team’s usual members were replaced with an all-female roster that included Nova, She-Hulk, and Medusa. These changes were brought on by a massive rewrite to the Fantastic Four’s origin that overhauled their status quo.
Fantastic Four’s All-Female Roster Arrived With a Shocking Backstory
The Classic Fantastic Four Origin Story Received a Major Overhaul
The Femmetastic Four took the Human Torch into custody and brought him to the team’s fourth member, Ms. Fantastic. She was a variant of Sue Storm whose exposure to cosmic rays transformed her into the Thing in Ben Grimm’s place. As for Ben and the others, they hadn’t been granted their usual powers during their space expedition. In the main iteration of the Fantastic Four’s origin, Reed Richards brings his friends on a mission that exposes them to cosmic rays that unlock their powers. Unfortunately, fate had other plans for them in Ms. Fantastic’s world, as she revealed that the rays gave them a fatal virus.
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Ms. Fantastic explained that the cosmic rays targeted the germs within their bodies, and it created a disease within Reed, Ben, and Johnny’s bodies that “only infected men”. According to Sue, the ship’s crash landing back on Earth caused this virus to spread, and before long, every man on the planet had died off. Therefore, only women remained to join the Fantastic Four, and Sue collected an impressive bunch to join the ranks in lieu of the usual suspects. While She-Hulk, Medusa, and Nova have all been members of the team before, they’ve never been the sole members like they were in the Femmetastic Four.
The Most Underrated Fantastic Four Roster Deserves a Comeback
The Fantastic Four Could Use More Women, In Addition to Invisible Woman
It seems unlikely that the Femmetastic Four will ever make its way to Marvel’s primary timeline, but that doesn’t mean these women can’t become mainstays in the team at some point. Invisible Woman is frequently the only female member of the roster, with others temporarily joining on occasion, so it would be nice to have another woman accompanying her. She-Hulk’s strength, Medusa’s versatile hair, and Nova’s flame powers could all prove valuable to the team, after all. If any of the Fantastic Four‘s men ever need a break, Invisible Woman should give these powerful ladies a call and make the Femmetastic Four a reality once more.
“}]] The Fantastic Four’s line-up underwent a huge shift. Read More