Now don`t get me wrong here I love my Fantastic Fours, Sovereign Sevens, Seven Soldiers of Victories and my Secret Sixes but I just can`t imagine why a group of apparently intelligent (and in Reed Richard`s case highly intelligent) super-powered beings would go out of their way to lock themselves in to having a limited active membership.

I mean it doesn`t matter so much if you called yourselves the “Justice Dozen” because that gives you quite a large roster to begin with and leaves leeway for roster changes. I mean the super-villain team of The Zodiac are locked in at twelve members but lets be fair, 12 super-villains is overkill anyway so they probably didn`t regret their choice. And furthermore at a push i can understand how a team limited to six or seven could work.

But four?

At the outset Reed you are going to just limit your team to four members? That isn`t even the normal bare minimum for your average super team. Most start out with five or six and even then they expand out from there. I mean sure the Teen Titans and X-Men only started with about four or five members but they didnt call themselves by the number of members they had and they were sensible and they expanded the roster to face the increasing number of threats. Boy. Oh Boy. Did they expand the rosters..

But with the Fantastic Four they obviously decided that four people was enough for every eventuality, to the extent that every time they got new members like She-Hulk or Crystal someone had to leave the team so that the precious number four was preserved. I mean a quick check on wiki shows they have had eighteen members in the past, now wouldn`t eighteen superheroes be a more formidable force to field than four at any given time?

The whole Freedom Foundation idea seems like an improvement but its bound to not last and before we know it it`ll just be the original four again.

It`s just damn lucky most of the fantastic four villains were often as stupid as the heroes (Salem Seven were obviously the smartest) and never thought that overwhelming numbers might be to their advantage, ahem the Frightful Four.

I mean I`m just saying if i had been the Sandman at that inaugural Frightful Four meeting I might have had a differing opinion on the team size:

Wizard: So we are agreed then my fellow criminals? The Frrrrightful Four it shall be!?

Medusa: Yes.

Paste-Pot Pete: Indeed.

Wizard: It is finalised then! Let us destroy the accursed Fantastic fo-

Sandman: Hold on. Why are we limiting ourselves to just four?

Wizard: So that we can match the fantastic four, you cretin!

Sandman: But why just match them in numbers man for man. What are we going to do? Compete against them as a rival bowling league?

Medusa: The idea has been discussed..

Sandman: What?

Paste-Pot Pete: I will glue their pins to the floor, so they will never fall and they will lose utterly! Mwahaha!

Sandman: … who are you again?

Wizard: He is the mighty Paste-Pot Pete!

Sandman: … You are limiting us to four members and you are wasting one of the positions on the roster on this guy? A weirdo with a glue gun is our terrifying forth member?

Wizard: I don`t follow your argument…

Sandman: Look we are the bad guys! We rob banks, we kick puppies and we run with scissors all the time. Hows about we form the frightful fiends and we recruit a couple more villains who are looking for a regular paycheck, like say The beetle, Scorpion, Electro and The abomination and then we attack the heroes with a two-to-one advantage. Doesnt that sound better?

Wizard: No! Stop messing with the plan. The Frightful Four plan stays! I`m not a social person and three friendships are about all im prepared to maintain on a day to day basis.

Sandman: Fine…. Can we at least replace Pete?

Wizard: NEVER!

Sandman: But I just really get the impression that his glue gun is gonna be more of a detriment to my sand powers than to the fantastic four themselves.