Fantastic Four #168
☆ Be the first to review + Add to your collection — Join freeFantastic Four #168 marks one of the most structurally audacious roster swaps in the title's Bronze Age run: Luke Cage — Power Man — formally joins the Fantastic Four as the first Black superhero to hold active membership on the team, a meaningful milestone in Marvel's evolving approach to representation during the 1970s. The issue also deepens the long-running emotional thread of Ben Grimm's complicated relationship with his own monstrous form, forcing readers to watch him become a liability rather than a hero once his powers are gone. Writer Roy Thomas used the FF's in-universe charter clause as a narrative engine to make the replacement feel organic rather than arbitrary, a clever piece of world-building that grounded the drama. Taken together, the issue opened a short but historically resonant three-issue arc that comics historians continue to cite as an early example of deliberate diversity in Marvel's flagship team book.
ComicBooks.com Value
Find on ebay
Read it digitally
Sell my copy
Have this issue — or a whole collection? Get a fair offer from us, skip the marketplace fees and the hassle.
We Buy Collections ▸History
The issue was written and edited by Roy Thomas with pencils by Rich Buckler and inks by the series' long-running embellisher Joe Sinnott, under editor-in-chief Marv Wolfman. It followed directly from the two-part Hulk crossover in issues #166–167 — the latter drawn by George Pérez — in which the Hulk inadvertently drained the cosmic radiation sustaining the Thing's transformation, reverting Ben Grimm to human form. Thomas used that plot consequence immediately, sending the newly human Ben into an awkward civilian life while Reed Richards hired Cage as a contractually mandated super-powered replacement; the story was released on newsstands in December 1975 with a March 1976 cover date. The National Book Store (NBS) edition referenced in the query is a Philippines reprint variant, part of a broad program in which NBS licensed and reprinted Marvel and DC titles for Filipino readers typically one and a half to two years after the original US cover date, without cover prices and often without cover dates.
Trivia · 9 facts
- Story title: 'Where Have All the Powers Gone?' (cover date March 1976; on-sale December 23, 1975)
- Creative team: Writer/Editor Roy Thomas, Penciller Rich Buckler, Inker Joe Sinnott, Colorist Phil Rachelson, Letterer Joe Rosen; Editor-in-Chief Marv Wolfman
- Luke Cage (Power Man) officially joins the Fantastic Four's active roster in this issue, replacing the newly depowered Ben Grimm — making him the third non-founding member of the team after Crystal and Medusa
- Luke Cage is identified across multiple sources as the first Black superhero to hold active membership on the Fantastic Four
- Ben Grimm's depowering is a direct consequence of FF #167, in which a battle with the Hulk caused a gamma/cosmic radiation transfer that reverted him to human form
- The antagonist in Cage's debut mission is the Wrecker; Luke Cage defeats him while a powerless Ben Grimm repeatedly needs rescuing, underscoring the issue's emotional core
- This issue uniquely contains two Marvel Value Stamps (Series B): #65 Conan and #66 Doctor Strange — the only issue in the series documented to carry two Series B stamps
- The National Book Store (Philippines) edition is a reprint variant produced without a cover price; NBS editions were typically published roughly 1½ to 2 years after the US cover date and are known to have occasional color-registration issues in later printings
- Issue #168 was reprinted in the 2011 trade paperback Fantastic Four: Extended Family (collecting FF #1, 81, 132, 168, 265, 307, 347, 384, 544 and vol. 2 #42)
Key issues in Fantastic Four
Reviews
Reader reviews
No reader reviews yet.