Fantastic Four #39: The Father and Clone Reunion – Comic Watch

Court is in recess in the hearing for custody of Bentley 23, the clone of the evil Wizard. The Torch is afire with impatience for Reed to find a way to reverse what Dr. Doom did to Johnnys powers. Reeds face is disappearing into that damn shabby-looking beard. Sue actually slaps her brother for losing his temper at Reed, and Johnny flies off, hurt, angry, and scared. Yep, its turmoil as usual for the Fantastic Four.

However, when the hearing resumes, it is with lawyer She-Hulks assurance that any legal attempt to take Franklin and Valeria away from Reed and Sue (the cliffhanger on which the end of the last issue dangled) will not have a leg to stand on. The FFs only real challenge is to prove that Bentley is better off with them and Dragon Man than with his father. This would be a much easier task if She-Hulk and the FF knew that the Wizard has tricked out Bentleys eyes with nano-fibre optics, the better for him to spy on the FF and learn Reeds super-science secrets, which is what the villain has really been after all along.

Testimony resumes with Judge Payne hearing stories about the Thing teaching Jo-Venn not to hide his identity from human kids with an image inducer, Valeria recalling a time when Reed rescued her from an antigravity experiment that got out of control, and Franklin telling of a session with mutant therapist Terry Ward, aka Trauma, in which Reed and Sue joined them and reassured Franklin through his insecurities and fears. Meanwhile, the Torch tries to extinguish himself in the ocean and provokes the wrath of the Sub-Mariner, then tries to snuff out his flame by flying out of the atmosphere and learns that his powers continue to work full-blast even in the hard vacuum of space. Is Johnnys situation truly hopeless?

At last, a surprise witness enters the court: a man announcing that he is the original, true Bentley Wittman, and that the man suing the Fantastic Four is in fact his clone! When the identity scanner backs up the new witnesss claim, the plaintiff in the lawsuit flies into a rage and flies out of the courtroom, right through the wall! Judge Payne, a superhuman who hates hearing superhuman cases, is fed up; she dismisses the suit and throws everyone out!

However, there is one twist in the case. Young Bentley has figured out what his father did to his optic nerves and reverse-engineered it to hijack all of the Wizards tech. It was Bentley 23 himself who created the surprise witness using the Wizards own cloning technology, making him such a superior clone that the identity scanner was fooled, and thus enabling the clone to secure Bentleys legal emancipation! Now it is young Bentley who takes on the mantle of the Wizard, but will it be for good or ill? Only time will tell.

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Fantastic Four #39: The Father and Clone Reunion - Comic Watch