Fantastic Four By Waid & Wieringo: Authoritative Action

New York Times best-selling author Mark Waid has worked for every major company in the comics industry in a nearly three-decade-long career, writing thousands of issues, including runs of Amazing Spider-Man, X-Men, Ka-Zar and Fantastic Four. His other works of note include his collaboration with painter Alex Ross on Kingdom Come, which earned an Eisner Award for Best Limited Series. Waid enjoyed his greatest outpouring of critical acclaim with the Eisner Award-winning Daredevil — which included a revered collaboration with frequent artistic partner Chris Samnee. He later took on such diverse pop-cultural icons as Princess Leia and Archie, and ushered in a new era of greatness for Earth’s Mightiest Heroes in All-New, All-Different Avengers. His Marvel work continued with Avengers, Black Widow, Captain America, Champions and Doctor Strange.

The late Mike Wieringo established himself as one of the leading artists in the comic-book industry with his work with writer Mark Waid on DC’s Flash during a run that included the debut of Impulse. Wieringo’s continued collaboration with Waid brought him to Fantastic Four in 2002; the pair kicked off their tenure with a history-making nine-cent first issue. Wieringo’s ability to translate dynamic action to the comic-book page made him uniquely suited to launch Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man in 2005 with writer Peter David.

Artist Howard Porter got his start in comics in 1988 as an inking assistant. Following his first penciling gig on The Ray, he went on to illustrate such titles as Lobo, Hawkman, Underworld Unleashed and, most notably, JLA. After taking some time away from comics, he returned in 2003 to pencil Fantastic Four.

A former animator for cult cartoonist Ralph Bakshi, Paul Smith penciled Uncanny X-Men during a brief but pivotal run that included Rogue joining the team, Storm’s controversial makeover, Wolverine’s near-marriage and Cyclops’ wedding to future villain Madelyne Pryor. He then moved to Doctor Strange, Marvel Fanfare and others, later drawing the acclaimed X-Men/Alpha Flight miniseries. With James Robinson, he created DC’s groundbreaking Golden Age miniseries, highlighting the publisher’s wartime heroes like few before or since. His work for other companies includes First’s Grimjack and Image’s Leave It to Chance; he returned to Marvel to pencil the miniseries Kitty Pryde: Shadow and Flame, revisiting some themes from his Uncanny work.