Look at those boys havin’ fun. We pick up literally the second after last issue.
Might be Ben’s favorite show! This is such a wacky one. Hydro-Man goes down the drain, literally, and the nearest building is the bathrooms, where Spider-Man tricks Johnny into charging into the ladies’ while he checks the men’s. But after all the ladies run out screaming, a watery fist comes out of a toilet and knocks Johnny back outside.
Johnny tosses Spider-Man Thing’s coat and reminds him it’s made of Unstable Molecules, and Spidey gets the message. They chase Hydro-Man, then split up so Johnny can herd him right into the nearly impregnable coat.
The Torch saves the mascot, and the crowd goes wild. And the mascot turns out to contain a lovely young lady who’s very grateful. And, inevitably…
The FF had really been through the wringer for over a year before this, one terrible experience after another. One of the all-time most insane Dr. Doom stories, an international incident. Ben even died, and Reed created a way for them to go to Heaven and get him back. God was played by Jack Kirby. And in the middle of all that is when Bill Jemas fired Waid & Ringo for not wanting to do his stupid idea where the FF lose all their money and move to the suburbs, only to rehire them due to overwhelming fan outcry and then get fired himself, a turnaround that happened so fast no other writer had the chance to over (Ringo was out for a fill-in arc when they were fired and rehired). After all they’d been through, this wacky 2-parter was just what the doctor ordered for the superteam, the creative team, and the book. And after all the crap I’ve read this block, it was just what I needed, too.