The Thing: Freakshow

(Marvel, 2002, 2005)
™ and ©2002 Marvel Characters, Inc.

It’s Clobberin’ Time! Fresh from an amusing battle with the villainous Wrecking Crew, Benjamin J. Grimm, a.k.a. The Thing, hops a train in hopes of finding a peaceful vacation spot. He ends up in Michigan, jumping tracks near Paul Bolk’s World Famous Freakshow. At first welcomed by the freaks and the local townspeople, events go dangerously awry when the townspeople reveal themselves as Kree and the freaks turn out to be Skrulls—two alien races who have had a space feud stretching back to early issues of The Fantastic Four. Stuck in the middle of yet another Kree/Skrull War, the Thing’s only ally is a sideshow freak he bullied as a boy.

Geoff Johns’ ever-lovin’ blue-eyed Thing is loveable and grumpy, but by no means perfect. He reveals Ben Grimm’s childhood to be troubled and Grimm himself to, at least once, have been a bully. After decades of Thing stories, it is to Johns’ credit that he can still add something fresh to the character.

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