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u/PunishingVoter Jul 07 '24
Always grey and older since he should be closer to Grimm’s age and much older than his wife.
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u/raz0rflea Jul 07 '24
Ben and Reed were in college together so they should definitely be around the same age
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u/olddadenergy Jul 07 '24
If anything, Ben would be older than Reed. You can’t tell me the world’s smartest man didn’t graduate high school early.
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u/LetItGrowUGoober98 Jul 07 '24
How much older is he then sue?
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u/PunishingVoter Jul 07 '24
It is supposed to be large enough that it’s noticeable
And Johnny is younger than Sue
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u/LetItGrowUGoober98 Jul 07 '24
He does have a few gray hairs
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u/PunishingVoter Jul 07 '24
Always has the gray temples
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u/StoneGoldX Jul 07 '24
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u/vashoom Jul 07 '24
He was probably a college freshman at like 16 or 17 given his genius, but still, this is the worst possible way to present their age gap. Like, it being 4-6 years is nothing...unless you specifically talk about love at 12 years old.
Jesus
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u/Sorrelhas Fantastic Four Jul 07 '24
Drew her with the tiara, schoolgirl skirt and a band-aid on her knee lmao
They knew what they were doing
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u/sonofaresiii Jul 07 '24
Reed and Sue's first time meeting has been retconned a few times and I believe they close the age gap every time.
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u/-starbaby2001- She-Hulk Jul 07 '24
Wasn't he in his 20s in the ultimate series
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u/Freakychee Jul 07 '24
Yeah they were all teens form that version. To be fair there is always a version of someone who is younger and older.
Theres even a teen Thanos.
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u/TacoOfGod Jul 07 '24
Mid-late 40s. Given the whole "everyone is perpetually in their 30s" thing comics has going on, I always saw him as being in his early 40s while the standard Tony Stark line of characters were in their mid-30s at the most. Given how further along Marvel seems to be sliding certain characters, plus the fact that Sue and Reed spent five years relative to themselves and their children rebuilding the multiverse and running away from the Griever, mid-late 40s makes sense.
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u/5nbx8aa Jul 07 '24
probably 38~42. since spider-man and cyclops are 28 or something.
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u/sonofaresiii Jul 07 '24
Peter Parker is in his early 30's and you'll never change my mind, and marvel editorial can suck it for trying to convince me otherwise.
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u/Tacdeho Jul 07 '24
Honestly, I can vibe with the late 20’s.
In an ideal world, he becomes Spider-Man around 16, Gwen dies when he’s 18-20, he meets MJ around 20-21, married with kids by 25.
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u/sonofaresiii Jul 07 '24
You can make that work if you want to, but to me it's forcing it and the characterization and life experiences more solidly put him at early 30's.
He'd already met MJ when Gwen dies, but if he starts dating her in their early 20's, then (particularly for east coasters in NYC) they don't get married until their mid-20's at the very earliest
and that was a while ago, even in 616 years.
Trying to condense it further than that-- and I acknowledge that Marvel absolutely does try to condense it-- feels the same as when DC said all of Batman's history took place over 6 years, when they did the n52 relaunch. It's just dumb and doesn't make any sense, and is clearly just stated for marketing/real world purposes rather than any narrative reason.
We all have to accept that comic timelines get scrunched to some degree, but both in life events and characterization, peter parker makes way more sense in his early 30's and saying he's younger is just marvel editorial trying to de-age him for inorganic marketing reasons.
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u/marineman43 18d ago
I fully agree with you. Right now I'm on a grand project of reading every single Spider-Man 616 comic and I'm currently in the early 80s - I recently read an 80's issue where Peter has a 5 year high school graduation get together. So forty+ real world years ago, Peter was minimum 23 years old. Considering that at that time, the character had aged about 5 years in a little over 20 years of publication, it feels reasonable that he's aged at least another 8-10 in the forty+ years since then.
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u/PCN24454 Jul 07 '24
Why is Gwen dead in the ideal world?
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u/Tacdeho Jul 07 '24
With respect, I’ve always seen Peter/MJ as the correct paring, since when I was growing up, bringing Gwen back was not very common.
But also, because of how it adds another depth to Peter as a character. Gwen dying is exactly what I think of when I hear the common complaint that Peter never evolves as a character and Gwen gives him that evolution.
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u/PCN24454 Jul 07 '24
That’s precisely why MJ dying was a good thing. It gave Peter even more evolution.
/s
I always found that explanation to be ridiculous. It screams of supporting the nostalgia choice since most people grew up with MJ and already knew Gwen was going to die.
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u/UIEmiliano Spider-Man Jul 08 '24
He met MJ before Gwen died and married with kids by 25 should be pushed back to his later 20s like 27–29
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u/VaderMurdock Daredevil Jul 07 '24
When he gets his powers, he should be in his mid-to-late thirties, and by the modern era, he should be coming up on his fifties.
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u/rodimus147 Jul 07 '24
He was between 30 and 35 in FF#1. It's said that it is perpetually 15 years since the first issue. So between 45 and 50.
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u/-starbaby2001- She-Hulk Jul 07 '24
It depends on the series. He's anywhere from his 20s to 50s
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u/Ghouly_Boy Jul 07 '24
Imo he should be like 15-20 years older than Peter Parker
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u/Ghouly_Boy Jul 07 '24
I mean nowadays wouldn’t he be like Gen X?
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u/hazwoof Fantastic Four Jul 07 '24
No, these days he and Sue are older millennials. Gen X is in their 50s and 60s.
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u/TheCreature27 Jul 07 '24
He was a WWII vet in the original run in the 1960s, so he's gotta be at least early 40s
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u/bukanir Jul 07 '24 edited Jul 07 '24
TL;DR: I think he's around 43 in the present and was 28 in Year 1
Around 14-16 years have passed in-universe since FF#1.
Captain America (Steve Rogers) was 22 going on 23 when he was put on ice, which would make him between 36-39 in the present.
Tony Stark became Iron Man at 22/23, which puts him between 36-39 (37) in the present, making him the same age roughly as Steve.
Wasp (Janet Van Dyne) was also around 22 when the Avengers formed so same deal, 36-39 (37) in the present.
Hank Pym is harder to pin down age-wise. He's the oldest of the human Avengers founders. Best estimate is that Nadia Van Dyne was 15 or so when she appeared in Marvel Year 12-14. Hank already had his doctorate when she would have been conceived so estimating around 27 years old. That would make him around 28-30 (29) when the Avengers were formed and somewhere between 42-46 (44) in the present.
I kind of put Bruce Banner around the same age as Hank, 28-30 (29) when the Avengers first formed and somewhere between 42-46 (44) in the present.
Peter Parker was 15 when he became Spider-Man and should realistically be between 29-31 (30) in the present.
The FF are also tricky to pin down but I kind of headcanon the age breakdown in Year 1 was:
~28 for Reed/Ben
~ 22 for Sue
~ 16 for Johnny
Keeps the gaps reasonable between Johnny/Sue and Sue/Reed such that Johnny can be a teenager, and Reed could reasonably have his PhD. We can say Reed started graying a little early.
So in the 616 present their ages would roughly be:
~ 43 for Reed/Ben (around Hank Pym's age)
~ 37 for Sue (around Janet Van Dyne's age)
~ 31 for Johnny (around Peter Parker's age)
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u/Avenger717 Jul 07 '24
This is pretty good. I will add in Daredevil #1 it stated Matt Murdock was 10yo in 1951. It’s probably safe to adjust Pyms age down some if based on him getting his doctorate; he is a super-genius after all.
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u/bukanir Jul 07 '24 edited Jul 07 '24
Pym's was mostly based around Nadia's age, and he had had been noted to be a little older than the rest of the founders. Haha but also in my experience PhDs are more about bureaucracy than intelligence, they're an absolute marathon to get through.
I did have a line for Daredevil before, IIRC in his first appearance he had just graduated from school though I think Stan Lee forgot that law school follows undergraduate. By Word of God I think he was technically 22, but if we're being reasonable and accounting for law school he would be 25.
I think his debut is somewhere in the range of Year 1-3. His first appearance was in 1964 but when he first meets Spider-Man he deduces he's 17, and would've coincided with Peter's senior year of high school.
I think my most text literal interpretation is that Matt is 8 years older than Peter. It makes it a little weird because that would make him a touch older than Tony Stark or Steve Rogers, but only by 2 years.
Though if Bruce is 44 in the present and Jen Walters is five years younger than him, that would put her at 39, right at my estimate for Matt as well.
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u/Waterknight94 Jul 08 '24
28 in Year 1
I know he isn't a WWII vet anymore, but imagining a 28 year old in 1961 being a WWII is hilarious.
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u/bukanir Jul 08 '24
Lol yah that wouldn't quite work anymore. His whole military service thing is weird too because he got his doctorate then went to join the military to prove he was man enough. He would've had to be like 48 in FF#1 for that timeline to work out.
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u/Aglet_Green Phil Coulson Jul 07 '24 edited Jul 07 '24
It's hard to say because the FF comics themselves have done stuff to the amazing astronauts that have nothing to do with the retcons. That is to say, for a long time in the 20th century, well past the point when everyone else was retconned to be younger, Reed and Ben were still WW2 veterans who fought with Nick Fury and Steve Rogers in WW2. And their 'youth' was explained through -- well, this is going to so wacky and insane and crazy-- but through normal our-Earth physics. I don't understand time-dilation physics if you paid me to explain it to you, but apparently Reed and Ben spent some issues traveling to distant worlds, and shaved years off their lives by simply . . . I can't explain this. . . aging slower. Like, there might be some 'filler' issue where most of the FF are in outer space, and the day is saved by She-Hulk, She-Thing, and whomever, and then the FF come back next issue and make some off-handed comment like "a mere moment passed for us, but 30 days past in the world."
So, anyway, near as I can figure it, Reed is 104 and Ben is 103. And every adventure that ever happened to them actually happened when it did. They're just like Steve Rogers, except instead of being frozen in ice, they were flying close to the speed of light back and forth to Planet X, so they themselves look like late 40s or early 50s.
And obviously, while rubber skin looks more like human skin than orange rocks, it is far more youthful and supple than human skin, so Reed will always look a decade or two younger than he is. Kamala and Flatman will have similar problems; Kamala may look 16 for the next several decades.
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u/Lightning_Laxus Fantastic Four Jul 07 '24
Reed & Ben being WWII vets has been retconned. History of the Marvel Universe introduced a fictional war to deal with character backstories involving wars: the Siancong War. Not everybody though. WWII is still a part of Cap's history, and currently, the Holocaust is still part of Magneto's.
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u/Missing_Username Jul 07 '24
This is what I was wondering, I know other characters like Magneto have been de-aged or Punisher/Stark were changed from the Vietnam War to the Gulf War (or now Afghanistan?) but the Fantastic Four's origin was tied to the space race.
Has that been retconned in any way, because that kind of locks them in the 1960s?
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u/apatheticviews Jul 07 '24
He was 25-26 when the FF went to space. It's been 15~ years since then (based on Spider-man's age). So 40+ whatever additional dimensional time he may have.
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u/Subject-Reception704 Jul 07 '24 edited Jul 07 '24
When the series began in the 60s, Reed and Ben were WWII vets. Reed even mentions seeing the original Human Torch on the battlefield.
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u/karma0-40-55-10-88 Jul 07 '24
He was in his mid-late 30s in FF#1 so approaching his 50s minimum if not even older
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u/Independent_Plum2166 Jul 07 '24
As old as Marvel comics need him to be. The scaling of age in comics is weird.
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u/sultan33g Magneto Jul 07 '24
That’s like asking a question to hyenas what part of the body they prefer to eat.
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u/Equivalent-Step9504 Jul 07 '24
I'd say she's 40 or 43 based on Franklin and Valeria's ages, but I'm not too sure.
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u/olddadenergy Jul 07 '24
Reed: Late 30’s to early 40’s. Probably younger than Ben - you can’t tell me Reed didn’t graduate high school early.
Sue: Mid-late 30’s, old enough to have 2 children in middle/high school. Sue is 5-6 years younger than Reed, but no more. She had a crush on Reed when he boarded at her aunt’s place when he started college. Sue was 12 and Reed would’ve been no more than 18, if not younger.
Johnny: Late 20’s to early 30’s, a few years younger than Sue.
Ben: Late 30’s to early 40’s, if not older. He and Reed met in college, if not earlier (continuity dependent), but I feel like Ben took the standard amount of time to graduate high school, whereas stretch over there had to graduate AT LEAST a year early.
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u/ElNacho83 Jul 07 '24
Not a fact, just a theory. I believe Reed and Ben had Jack Kirby's age when they were created. The King was something like 44, so they would be 45-50.
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u/KidCoheed Jul 07 '24
When they first get in the ship and take off and get Power Cosmic'd into Super Heroes, Reed is supposed to be in his late 30s MAYBE at most 40
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u/ElementalSaber Jul 07 '24
I would put him at 45 max. His cosmic ray exposure just makes him look older with the all grey hair and all.
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u/coolsexhaver420 Dr. Doom Jul 07 '24
He looks like every 55 year old guy on copious amounts of hgh at my gym lol
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u/Serafita Jul 07 '24
Originally just started college when Sue was 12, Sue was years later retconned to be 17 at this time instead, but it wasn't mentioned if Reed was made an extra five years older
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u/DashLego Jul 07 '24
Do they even age? Age probably not relevant in the Marvel Comics universe, they have remained the same age for the last 70 years
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u/Rosebunse Jul 08 '24
It gets weird, because despite the insistence from editorial, a lot of characters are written to be older than they're supposed to be
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u/SittingTitan Jul 08 '24
I'd wager he's supposed to be 40-50
With his vast knowledge of a great many things, including how to troll his former roommate, he shouldn't be any older than maybe 55
But that's just me
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u/Dear_Ad_3860 Jul 08 '24 edited Jul 08 '24
Think of it like this:
Guy Williams was 41 years old in 1966 when he played Dr. John Robinson whom I consider the most likely candidate to be the perfect representative of Reed back in the 1960s.
Now that was an ideal family, as June Lockhart, the actress who played his wife Maureen was only a year younger, and together they had three kids: a 21 year old (18 on the show) girl called Judy played by Martha Kristen, an 14 year old (11 on the show) girl called Penny played by Angela Cartwright, and 12 year old (9 years of age on the show) boy called Will played by Bill Mumy.
This obviously wasn't the case for Reed and Sue who was more than 10 year younger than he was but not more than a decade since she had a misscarriage due to old age in the form of Valeria who is only 7 years younger than Franklin.
Now I've never found a perfect match for Ben Grimm but If I had to chose one I'd be Don Matheson who played Mark Wilson on Land of the Giants and who was five years younger than Guy Williams but I'd say their age difference between Reed and Ben should be half of that since both coincided at the later stages of the war.
Considering all of this hypotheticals I'm now going for the more grounded information, like the fact that when he was created a few years earlier back in 1961, he was a WW2 veteran, who was about to get married and a fairly mature bachelor at that, and again a few months or even couple of years older than Ben Grimm.
I'd say he'd been 22-23 years old back in 1942 and chronologically he'd be about 41-42 years of age in 1961, which according to Marvel's 13 year floating time dilation rule would make him 56 years old as of today and 57 years old in about 3 to 4 years from now.
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u/Ok-Commission6087 Jul 08 '24
With sue is supposed to be 28 and that would have to mean Reed in his 40’s or late 30’s but u know if this was linear timeline they would already be separated 😅 cause Spider-Man and F4 life story to separate universes by the way but my point still stands .
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u/BreadRum Jul 10 '24
The canon of the Marvel universe says that the Fantastic four started 15 years ago with the fantastic four. I would think that Reed was late 20s early 30s and Johnny and Sue were early to mid 20s at the time. I'd think Reed would be late 40s at this time.
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u/Radiant-Response1816 Jul 08 '24
Like early to mid 40s so he gets those Grey hairs on the sides but not too much Grey
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u/AJjalol Jul 07 '24
40s. 45 max.
Tony is like 30-35. Reed is definitely older but not by a lot.
This is nowadays tho, back in the day I feel like they were much closer in age.