In some ways, it might have been more interesting if Johnny had become the Thing. It would have been an even greater tragedy than for Ben. How would the teenager who'd had everything have reacted? Ben, at least, was an adult and, presumably had experienced setbacks during his career as a pilot.

And, shortly after that an enemy taunted him with the "loss" of his power. And, Johnny pointed out that it was a regaining of control, not a loss of power. If he wanted to, he could go nova again. And, he did.

The problem that I think there is has to do with the fact that there are good Human Torch stories. But, there really isn't a good Human Torch series concept. The only way that I can think of that it would work would be for him to leave the team and New York, and start over with a new supporting cast, new setting, all new villians, etc.

Basically, a new title that just happens to use Johnny Storm for recognizability, but is otherwise different in every way.

And, I don't see that lasting, either. Because it is too different from what the fans would expect.

Theno

In the early days of Human Torch (or at least in the Essential volume) he has finite flame powers. Most of the peril came from him running out of "juice" at an inopportune time. He could only hit the nova level once in a blue moon and had some sort of time limit on how long he could stay in flame form (I forget the amount, it was probably just "whenever we need him to run out"). I think there was a future version of the FF somewhere (or maybe this was just a stunt in the late 80s, early 90s) where Johnny was stuck in Nova mode and it made him miserable. As Seavey said, he loves cars and women, neither of which are viable when your touch will incinerate them. I think it is an interesting point that can be explored more.

Also, I'm glad you pointed out that it was essentially a Thing/Torch comic after awhile. I have to admit, I did enjoy those stories more once Ben became a part of the equation.

And one thing to keep in mind, Paul, is that the Human Torch's powers have grown over the years as he's gotten more experienced using him. His flame used to be a lot cooler, didn't burn for nearly as long, and could be put out a lot more easily. Exercising his powers has increased their strength, just like exercising muscles makes them stronger; villains that used to be major threats for him are now pretty easy to handle. (And there was a storyline in Steve Englehart's FF run where Johnny lost the ability to flame off, due to the events of 'Inferno', but I don't recall how they handled eating and sleeping there.)

The 80s Thing book is a bad test of the solo Thing storytelling engine, because it spent around the middle year of the book abandoning it to tell stories of a Ben Grimm who has adventures on an alien planet and can change back and forth between forms at will. The Standard Catalog of Comic Books' entry on the series suggests that as the reason the book failed to keep its momentum after Byrne left, and I see no real reason to disagree. (Unfortunately, there don't seem to be any sales figures for either that series or MTIO, which is why I was consulting the SCCB in the first place.)

It was the leotard. Wotta revoltin' development.

But...

If Thing was so great as a solo, why did his stand-alone series in the 80's only go 30-some-odd issues? Don't give me "bad writing" as an excuse. Popularity has overcome bad writing for many, many series.

Maybe if Thing was given the solo book in the beginning instead of Torch, he'd be able to sustain his own series, but not now. But... they couoldn't have done that because he would have been too similar to Hulk at that point. No, Thing needs the other 3 to make it work.

In one sense, the FF are incredibly co-dependant. Without the other three, an individual character just isn't good enough to make it on their own. But I DO agree that if any of the them could make it, it'd be the Thing.

Spider-Man is miserable with guilt over his Uncle Ben (and later Gwen Stacy). Hulk is a ravaging monster half the time and a guilt ridden man of science the other half of the time. Batman has any number of things to make him miserable, the murder of his parents simply the greatest of them. Even shiny, happy, otherwise bright seeming Superman has the HUGE tragedy of the death of not only his birth parents, but his entire planet and culture hanging over his head.

And Ben Grimm has the reactions of people to him looking like a pile of rocks, an inability to probably ever have a normal relationship with a normal woman (I mean come on... seriously... what do we THINK Alicia and he did when the lights went out?) and maybe even some guilt from letting Reed talk him into flying that darn spaceship.

What does Johnny Storm have? Cool powers that don't seem to much interfere with him living a playboyish human life, girls constantly screaming over him, and no real darkness to his situation. Sure, he's got that whole batty Skrull ex-wife thing going on, but that's kind of tacked on to his story later on.

And Ben also has this "regular guy" vibe going on under the rocky skin that help his solo adventures "connect" to an audience. Johnny's kind of a rockstar, metaphorically at least, so reading about his solo goings on are kind of... like watching footage of Paris' Hilton's dumb friends on TMZ. Nice for a few seconds of peering in, but nothing we really care about.

Well, there were a few issues of Hulk team-ups in the '80s and the Aunt May/Franklin Richards team-up, but mostly Spidey from then on, anwyay.

Personally, I don't think that ANY menber of the FF would work for long as a solo character. There's just way too much team dynamic and usage of the other three as support characters for them to be sustained for very long. Then there's the problem of a rogue's gallery. Any familiar foe would be a FF foe, who generally needed all 4 to defeat them. Having 1/4 of the team defeat them just punks the villain.

Torch's feature in Strange Tales WAS pretty much a team-up book. In fact, Thing would eventually share billing with Johnny before being replaced by SHIELD.

I never considered the Human Torch's Strange Tales to be a failed series, but the character itself does have the unfortunate "Superman Syndrome". The Human Torch is one of the most powerful forces in the Marvel Universe. He's truly a living weapon. The Acrobat, the Beetle and any of his other antagonists would have absolutly no chance against a "flamed-on" Torch. Paste Pot Pete's glue would incinerate in seconds against a being who can go nova. Johnny can melt through steel and solid rock, but Namor can put him out with a spray of water? I think not. The only things on Earth that should really affect a "flamed on" Torch would be to submerse him in the ocean or estinguish his flame in a vacuum. (Maybe you could bury him in the desert, which was how the Original Jim Hammond Torch was incapacitated a couple of times, but you'd have to put out his flame first, and at that point, why not just shoot him?)

Which brings up the question, could Johnny decide to NEVER revert back to human form if he so desired, and thus be for all intents and purposes an all-powerful cosmic being? Would he need to eat, or sleep in his flame form? Of course he'd have to give up race cars and sex, which pretty much nixes this idea, given Johnny's preferred hobbies.

Now if there was only some character that encouraged Johnny to be a bit more mature and responsible. Somebody who Johnny cared about. Perhaps they could have some sort of relationship, and if they were from different societies we could try to see how they deal with their different points of view. But there's nobody on Earth that fits that description, is there?