Dread
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It is critical that you pay attention at this time. The second half of my reviews are in. Heavy spoilers, with a side of long text.
Dread's Bought/Thought for 9/24/08 Part II:
IMMORTAL IRON FIST: ORSON RANDALL AND THE DEATH QUEEN OF CALIFORNIA: It is official; someone at the Marvel editorial offices is out to create the longest title ever as a dare. Every few months we get a long one from some random comic. But beyond that, new IF series writer Swerczynski faces a crucial test for anyone who wishes to take over for Fraction & Brubaker; delivering an enjoyable (if not pointless) Orson Randall adventure one-shot. Alongside artist G. Camuncoli, he largely succeeds in presenting a pulp tale of Orson having a mystical adventure in Hollywood, circa 1928.
Orson, still trying to shirk his Iron Fist responsibilities and a serial boozer, ventures into Hollywood to track down the daughter of an old WWI friend of his, who the old man believes is in danger. While waiting in a diner for his pal, Orson runs across a lovely red-head named Galatea, whose kiss manages to magically intoxicate even someone at one with his chi. The mystery continues when Randall is set up for the murder of his wartime friend and goes head to head with Adam Simon, a mobbed-up movie producer and full time cult leader. He runs a cult for Baba-Fu and all of the women inside of it gain part of her terrible power, becoming lethally seductive.
Camuncoli's art is very impressive, able to make the story look vibrant and capture some of the images of the time (in an age before "talkies" would pop up). There is some action (including the best line in ages, "My nuts are perfect."), but mostly it is a standard noir tale of an iconic hero running across a fleeting femme fatale in the night whose single kiss transfixes him, but for one reason or another she can (or won't) be saved. The dialogue is kept crisp and Orson seems as he should, an unwilling hero who does the right thing, or tries, when the situation forces him. Still, considering he is dead in current times, there may be a limit to how much you can do with him in flashback stories. But I don't think we've reached critical mass with him yet.
Frankly, I've paid $3.99 for stories that were far less entertaining. It doesn't try to be more than a fun pulp diversion and Swierczynski continues to follow well in the footsteps of the IF launchers. It was a fun diversion and another appropriate adventure of Orson Randall pre-WWII, for the delight of IF fans and Marvel Handbook writers everywhere. If you need some Iron Fist fix this month, check it out.
NEW AVENGERS #45: The only dud of the week for me (shocking, a Bendis book, I know). It isn't offensively bad, just feels a bit tedious and pointless. It covers how Queen Verenke and Skrullojacket handle being stuck in 616 when that reality was briefly altered into House of M by Scarlet Witch.
Want to know how? They freak out and talk a lot, without doing a lot of anything. Fairly standard Bendis cut & paste theme there. Wasn't that worth $3 (or, basically, half a gallon of gas)?
This issue may be essential for the future Handbook Bio for Queen Verenke, but aside for that, serves little purpose than to employ Cheung for something besides cover art for books. As usual, he does a great job. If you genuinely care about Verenke and Skrullojacket as characters and not as "Skrulls waiting to die", then I suppose this matters. Or, if you are someone who cares for HOUSE OF M as if it was, I don't know, AGE OF APOCALYPSE or something. This is likely a minority of a minority of readers. And not me.
Some of the NEW & MIGHTY AVENGERS tie-in's to SI offered essential information or in-depth details on events that happened between the pages of SI itself. But as they have drug on for six months, it appears Bendis is out of relevant material and is pretty much sleep-typing his way through these. And yet this book still sells over 100k per issue. Incredible.
Next month hints at a Hood story. Lovely. Will he get to arm-wrestle The Watcher or something? While Bendis once was excellent in amping up a villain with Purple Man, he's overplayed his hand with The Hood and simply made him borderline ridiculous (or those who listen to him are). Hood had promise, but Bendis did too much too soon with him and now I can barely stand him and his ability to make otherwise competent or ambitious villains & heroes job to or for him.
Not much to rant about here. A skippable issue.
NEW WARRIORS #16: With the SECRET INVASION tie-in over (and sales likely due to slip back to prior levels), NW continues on what could be it's final arc, narrowing down exactly what Night-Thrasher has been planning since issue #1 over a year ago. With regular artist Paco Medina off on DEADPOOL, Grevioux is joined by Rielly Brown on art, and Brown does a good job. He works well with the designs of the Warriors (some of which are complicated) and conveys the action well without making his figures look too stiff or too loose. He is a worthy replacement for Medina thus far.
At the very least, Grevioux's superhero book here reminds us that, yes, the SHRA is in full force and someone besides the Thunderbolts are still working to enforce it. Tony Stark sends Sykes and Givens a SHIELD squad of hi-tech soldiers to deploy against the New Warriors, which Stark deems as a typical "reckless unregistered vigilante threat" deal. While the detectives are eager to enforce the law, there is a sense of SHIELD pulling their strings at the least, and manipulating & bullying them at the most. Of course, if these are NYPD officers, wouldn't it make more sense for the CSA to be bossing them around, and not SHIELD? Or is this one of the areas where things overlap? Oh, well.
Meanwhile, the New Warriors use digital hologram fakery to track down a group of random super-villains called the "Dread Dealers" (no puns, please) when they are ambushed by said detectives and their new "cape-killer" team. Donyell confers with Midnight's Fire that he now has all the elements that he needs for his master plan, and the attack by the squad puts those plans in motion when Ripcord and Skybolt are seemingly killed when one of the cape-killer soldier's tech explodes during the melee. Donyell's master plan was to use elements taken from Machinesmith, Diablo, and Sphinx (among others) to create a time machine. He plans to go back in time to 2006, or in Marvel Time, before Stamford and prevent it from happening to save his brother. He reasons that this should also save their dead teammates as well. Wondra and Sophia are less than convinced, but Beak, Angel, and Phaser seem eager to give it a try to save their fallen comrades (or understand that Donyell just wants to save his brother). Unfortunately, the cape-killers invade their lair before the time-portal seemed fully ready, and both the Warriors and Sykes wind up in a New York where Iron Man robots flock the skies and where Iron Man himself, presumably, is President of the United States.
In many ways, NEW WARRIORS has itself felt like a book stuck in the past, reacting to CIVIL WAR when the rest of the line has tried to go about things without as much knee-jerk reacting, aside for THUNDERBOLTS really. This was the last book where Iron Man was being depicted as a borderline fascist and all that. While I like the underdog, underground premise of that theme, it was time for things to come to a head, and with the status of the title after this year in doubt, this may be the perfect time. As it is, this series has lasted longer than I expected and I can only gather that Grevioux is being given time to end things on her terms, perhaps because there is interest in some of the characters editorially (like Jubilee/Wondra, the breakout star of the book).
In terms of sales (because JewishHobbit asked), in June before the SI tie-in, the book was barely selling above 20k a month and appeared to be losing about a thousand readers per issue; it was no longer selling within the Top 100, which usually equals death for most ongoings at Marvel. July's SI tie-in issue boosted sales about 58%, or to over 33k (and back within the Top 70), but the question would be, how many of those extra readers stay? While NEW WARRIORS can be a fun underdog superhero adventure with some unlikely B and C-Listers, it can be a hard book for those without the interest or a bit of past X-Knowledge to dive into. For some perspective, NEW WARRIORS #2 in July 2007, after a 19% drop from the debut issue, was selling nearly 46k. That is 13k more than the book is selling a year later, even with the aid of a crossover. If NW returns to pre-SI sales by this month, which is realistically likely, I can't imagine it lasting past issue #24, and even that may be a stretch. Low sales don't exactly kill books; sales that continue to bleed at a steady clip kill books, and losing about 1k per issue is not sustainable.
While I did like Skybolt, I wouldn't mind if they stayed dead as the cast on the book was still a bit large and I am curious where things stand after this arc, since obviously this title will not be used to retcon the last few years of Marvel history line-wide by preventing Stamford. Considering Dwayne's exact body wasn't found in the morgue (just his burnt costume and DNA, with that 60-something percent likelihood of death), it is possible that a time-warp thing could be possible. Maybe his body was not found because Donyell is able to save Dwayne, and had just not reached that point in the present yet where he goes back. Agh, time travel stories get complicated like that, which is usually why they grate on me. At any rate, it is possible that the NW & Sykes are actually in the future, or more likely an alternate future or past time (since, realistically, Marvel can't predict it's future so all time is fluid). The Warriors I care the most about are still Wondra, Decibel, Donyell, Sophia, and Beak & Angel, in that order. For getting Jubilee out of the X-Ghetto and making her a full fledged superhero and doing so in a way that really worked and made her likeable for me, the title alone has fulfilled a great duty. Wondra's awesome, and this is coming from a guy who used to be annoyed by "Jubes".
Still not for everyone, but I'm still aboard, and not regretting it.
NOVA #17: I don't usually do a "book of the month" thing and in all honesty, trying to choose between this book and CAPTAIN AMERICA this week is almost a Herculean labor. They're both terrific books with terrific characters on terrific runs. That said, this book from page 1 to page 22 was full of "win" as they say online. Aside for one continuity omission caveat, there's nothing but positives about this month's NOVA installment. Abnett & Lanning continue their co-writing Xandarian excellence, and regular artist Wellington Alves is helped out this issue by Geraloo Borges, who draws 7 pages worth of material. Both artists' styles flow seamlessly into each other, perhaps helped by Hanna's inks and Guru FX's colors.
The semi-major debate of NOVA readers last month was whether Super-Skrull's betrayal of Nova was genuine or just a ruse to get them out of being swarmed. The answer is the latter as the situation is resolved within about 3 pages so that Nova can return to Earth and Kl'rt can have adventures in SHE-HULK, which is mentioned in those things that Joe Q believes ruin the enjoyment of comic books, footnotes. Nova returns home to Long Island to check on his parents around when the Skrulls make their worldwide TV address, which was SECRET INVASION #2-4 (right?). This time around, his parents aren't freaking out about their "space cop" son and Rich's father especially regrets their last encounter. While they are safe, the most concern is for Rich's younger brother Robbie, who is now working for Project PEGASUS, which is under Skrull attack.
Rocketing to upstate New York, Nova seeks to help and runs head-first into the base's lone superhero protector, Darkhawk (as shown in the awesome cover). They both believe the other to be a Skrull until Robbie and a squad of guards break things up. DnA give Robbie a biting sense of humor that is genuinely funny and mocking of superhero conventions (such as the obligatory "initial fight" of superheroes before team-up's), while not feeling like it insults the reader and their enjoyment of them, but laughing with them. Trust me, this isn't something that is easy to pull off. Robbie and Rich's relationship is given the majority of the issue's focus and it is an interesting dynamic. While Robbie has more vast scientific knowledge than Richard has, he has always felt inferior to his "superhero" older brother and tries out all sorts of exotic jobs to keep up. Rich, for his part, is still in awe of his brother's intellect despite now housing the Nova Force unto himself.
Where things enter some continuity flips are where they involve Darkhawk, last seen the Marvel Christmas 2007 special with the rest of the Loners in California. While LONERS series writer C.B. Cebulski was still hopeful that he would get another mini at least, the market for the book itself is nil. After all, those FAIRY TALES books Marvel keeps Ceb on are selling like gangbusters (if by "gangbusters" you mean "worse than SPIDER-GIRL"). At any rate, between Dec. 2007 and now, it appears that Chris "Darkhawk" Powell registered to the SHRA and was recommended by Justice over at the Initiative for the PEGASUS gig, which Darkhawk considers "a paycheck". Granted, in THE LONERS, it was implied that Chris had already complied with the SHRA and registered; he was simply considered "retired" and thus escaped deployment within the 50 State Initiative (the only member of the Loners who wasn't registered was Lightspeed, although Mattie Frank may not have been, either, and Namie/Red Ronin DEFINATELY wasn't). It seems odd that Chris would return to New York considering he was in a relationship with Turbo (which was the catalyst for Phil Urich's flipping out and basically causing THE LONERS' main conflict). DnA manage to maintain the "violently aggressive" temperament that Darkhawk has in battle, as he quickly becomes unstable due to all the past horrors he suffered. So long as you don't think too hard about THE LONERS, it is pretty cool to have Darkhawk employed by PEGASUS and teaming up with Nova against Skrulls. They're both alien-empowered armored heroes who have their share of battle scars. Alves & Borges make Darkhawk look great and he offers a, erm, darker design when compared with Nova, which is visually interesting. Plus, former New Warrior team-up's these days are usually always cool (unless they involve Emo-Ball). The continuity with THE LONERS may not be 100% essential to NOVA's story here, but I liked THE LONERS and if I pick on bigger name writers for these sort of things, I have to be fair and note it when DnA lapse. I imagine it could be cleared up in a few lines ;"Needed a break from the East Coast didn't work out, decided to move back closer to my family". Chris has parents and TWO brothers, after all.
Despite all that, the team-up is very entertaining, with Darkhawk noting the change that has overcome Nova; he is more professional now in combat, which shows how much Rider has grown as a character within the past few years. Character development can be cool, right?
Nova meets Dr. Necker, who is involved with the Death's Head II/Minion project of the future Marvel UK lore, and while all of their PEGASUS technology is locked up from both themselves and the Skrulls, they have a "quantum flask" which is storing "living radiation" they plucked from the Negative Zone and want to use against the Skrulls. When the experiment, at least according to Necker and Robbie, may be able to revive Worldmind, Nova offers to help. And as some spoiler scans showed, while it isn't Worldmind that is seemingly revived, but Quasar. While I am curious how this effects Phyla over in GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY, Abnett & Lanning write that book too, so they could have it pop up is this is indeed Quasar. It is possible that Quasar is an energy being now like he was in that "Phalanx dream" from the AC crossover. I sincerely hope that this is the genuine article, especially as some new Corps are due to be developed soon. Could Wendall be one of them? Could Darkhawk?
In terms of sales, NOVA doesn't have a huge audience, but a loyal one; his book hasn't budged from the 29-28k sale range for all of 2008 (February was the only "skip" month thus far). That's a little better than RUNAWAYS used to average under Vaughan and is only about 3k less than DnA's other space book, GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY. Marvel's "space books" under the dynamic duo have a steady audience. Which is good for long term plans. And it's no wonder; NOVA and GUARDIANS are awesome books that instill that kind of loyalty, that "can't wait for the next 4-5 weeks for the next issue" mentality. Every issue is some level of "good", just some are better than others. This was the best issue out of the last 2-3 months, and I expect a lot more in October. Way to go, gang. It is books like these, and CAPTAIN AMERICA, AVENGERS: THE INITIATIVE and others that keep some Marvel fans like me who often are bitter and cynical about all of the wish washy actions done to many of our favorite franchises maintaining the "Make Mine Marvel" mentality and sticking around to read gem series like NOVA. Keep it up, DnA. Keep it up.
Dread's Bought/Thought for 9/24/08 Part II:
IMMORTAL IRON FIST: ORSON RANDALL AND THE DEATH QUEEN OF CALIFORNIA: It is official; someone at the Marvel editorial offices is out to create the longest title ever as a dare. Every few months we get a long one from some random comic. But beyond that, new IF series writer Swerczynski faces a crucial test for anyone who wishes to take over for Fraction & Brubaker; delivering an enjoyable (if not pointless) Orson Randall adventure one-shot. Alongside artist G. Camuncoli, he largely succeeds in presenting a pulp tale of Orson having a mystical adventure in Hollywood, circa 1928.
Orson, still trying to shirk his Iron Fist responsibilities and a serial boozer, ventures into Hollywood to track down the daughter of an old WWI friend of his, who the old man believes is in danger. While waiting in a diner for his pal, Orson runs across a lovely red-head named Galatea, whose kiss manages to magically intoxicate even someone at one with his chi. The mystery continues when Randall is set up for the murder of his wartime friend and goes head to head with Adam Simon, a mobbed-up movie producer and full time cult leader. He runs a cult for Baba-Fu and all of the women inside of it gain part of her terrible power, becoming lethally seductive.
Camuncoli's art is very impressive, able to make the story look vibrant and capture some of the images of the time (in an age before "talkies" would pop up). There is some action (including the best line in ages, "My nuts are perfect."), but mostly it is a standard noir tale of an iconic hero running across a fleeting femme fatale in the night whose single kiss transfixes him, but for one reason or another she can (or won't) be saved. The dialogue is kept crisp and Orson seems as he should, an unwilling hero who does the right thing, or tries, when the situation forces him. Still, considering he is dead in current times, there may be a limit to how much you can do with him in flashback stories. But I don't think we've reached critical mass with him yet.
Frankly, I've paid $3.99 for stories that were far less entertaining. It doesn't try to be more than a fun pulp diversion and Swierczynski continues to follow well in the footsteps of the IF launchers. It was a fun diversion and another appropriate adventure of Orson Randall pre-WWII, for the delight of IF fans and Marvel Handbook writers everywhere. If you need some Iron Fist fix this month, check it out.
NEW AVENGERS #45: The only dud of the week for me (shocking, a Bendis book, I know). It isn't offensively bad, just feels a bit tedious and pointless. It covers how Queen Verenke and Skrullojacket handle being stuck in 616 when that reality was briefly altered into House of M by Scarlet Witch.
Want to know how? They freak out and talk a lot, without doing a lot of anything. Fairly standard Bendis cut & paste theme there. Wasn't that worth $3 (or, basically, half a gallon of gas)?
This issue may be essential for the future Handbook Bio for Queen Verenke, but aside for that, serves little purpose than to employ Cheung for something besides cover art for books. As usual, he does a great job. If you genuinely care about Verenke and Skrullojacket as characters and not as "Skrulls waiting to die", then I suppose this matters. Or, if you are someone who cares for HOUSE OF M as if it was, I don't know, AGE OF APOCALYPSE or something. This is likely a minority of a minority of readers. And not me.
Some of the NEW & MIGHTY AVENGERS tie-in's to SI offered essential information or in-depth details on events that happened between the pages of SI itself. But as they have drug on for six months, it appears Bendis is out of relevant material and is pretty much sleep-typing his way through these. And yet this book still sells over 100k per issue. Incredible.
Next month hints at a Hood story. Lovely. Will he get to arm-wrestle The Watcher or something? While Bendis once was excellent in amping up a villain with Purple Man, he's overplayed his hand with The Hood and simply made him borderline ridiculous (or those who listen to him are). Hood had promise, but Bendis did too much too soon with him and now I can barely stand him and his ability to make otherwise competent or ambitious villains & heroes job to or for him.
Not much to rant about here. A skippable issue.
NEW WARRIORS #16: With the SECRET INVASION tie-in over (and sales likely due to slip back to prior levels), NW continues on what could be it's final arc, narrowing down exactly what Night-Thrasher has been planning since issue #1 over a year ago. With regular artist Paco Medina off on DEADPOOL, Grevioux is joined by Rielly Brown on art, and Brown does a good job. He works well with the designs of the Warriors (some of which are complicated) and conveys the action well without making his figures look too stiff or too loose. He is a worthy replacement for Medina thus far.
At the very least, Grevioux's superhero book here reminds us that, yes, the SHRA is in full force and someone besides the Thunderbolts are still working to enforce it. Tony Stark sends Sykes and Givens a SHIELD squad of hi-tech soldiers to deploy against the New Warriors, which Stark deems as a typical "reckless unregistered vigilante threat" deal. While the detectives are eager to enforce the law, there is a sense of SHIELD pulling their strings at the least, and manipulating & bullying them at the most. Of course, if these are NYPD officers, wouldn't it make more sense for the CSA to be bossing them around, and not SHIELD? Or is this one of the areas where things overlap? Oh, well.
Meanwhile, the New Warriors use digital hologram fakery to track down a group of random super-villains called the "Dread Dealers" (no puns, please) when they are ambushed by said detectives and their new "cape-killer" team. Donyell confers with Midnight's Fire that he now has all the elements that he needs for his master plan, and the attack by the squad puts those plans in motion when Ripcord and Skybolt are seemingly killed when one of the cape-killer soldier's tech explodes during the melee. Donyell's master plan was to use elements taken from Machinesmith, Diablo, and Sphinx (among others) to create a time machine. He plans to go back in time to 2006, or in Marvel Time, before Stamford and prevent it from happening to save his brother. He reasons that this should also save their dead teammates as well. Wondra and Sophia are less than convinced, but Beak, Angel, and Phaser seem eager to give it a try to save their fallen comrades (or understand that Donyell just wants to save his brother). Unfortunately, the cape-killers invade their lair before the time-portal seemed fully ready, and both the Warriors and Sykes wind up in a New York where Iron Man robots flock the skies and where Iron Man himself, presumably, is President of the United States.
In many ways, NEW WARRIORS has itself felt like a book stuck in the past, reacting to CIVIL WAR when the rest of the line has tried to go about things without as much knee-jerk reacting, aside for THUNDERBOLTS really. This was the last book where Iron Man was being depicted as a borderline fascist and all that. While I like the underdog, underground premise of that theme, it was time for things to come to a head, and with the status of the title after this year in doubt, this may be the perfect time. As it is, this series has lasted longer than I expected and I can only gather that Grevioux is being given time to end things on her terms, perhaps because there is interest in some of the characters editorially (like Jubilee/Wondra, the breakout star of the book).
In terms of sales (because JewishHobbit asked), in June before the SI tie-in, the book was barely selling above 20k a month and appeared to be losing about a thousand readers per issue; it was no longer selling within the Top 100, which usually equals death for most ongoings at Marvel. July's SI tie-in issue boosted sales about 58%, or to over 33k (and back within the Top 70), but the question would be, how many of those extra readers stay? While NEW WARRIORS can be a fun underdog superhero adventure with some unlikely B and C-Listers, it can be a hard book for those without the interest or a bit of past X-Knowledge to dive into. For some perspective, NEW WARRIORS #2 in July 2007, after a 19% drop from the debut issue, was selling nearly 46k. That is 13k more than the book is selling a year later, even with the aid of a crossover. If NW returns to pre-SI sales by this month, which is realistically likely, I can't imagine it lasting past issue #24, and even that may be a stretch. Low sales don't exactly kill books; sales that continue to bleed at a steady clip kill books, and losing about 1k per issue is not sustainable.
While I did like Skybolt, I wouldn't mind if they stayed dead as the cast on the book was still a bit large and I am curious where things stand after this arc, since obviously this title will not be used to retcon the last few years of Marvel history line-wide by preventing Stamford. Considering Dwayne's exact body wasn't found in the morgue (just his burnt costume and DNA, with that 60-something percent likelihood of death), it is possible that a time-warp thing could be possible. Maybe his body was not found because Donyell is able to save Dwayne, and had just not reached that point in the present yet where he goes back. Agh, time travel stories get complicated like that, which is usually why they grate on me. At any rate, it is possible that the NW & Sykes are actually in the future, or more likely an alternate future or past time (since, realistically, Marvel can't predict it's future so all time is fluid). The Warriors I care the most about are still Wondra, Decibel, Donyell, Sophia, and Beak & Angel, in that order. For getting Jubilee out of the X-Ghetto and making her a full fledged superhero and doing so in a way that really worked and made her likeable for me, the title alone has fulfilled a great duty. Wondra's awesome, and this is coming from a guy who used to be annoyed by "Jubes".
Still not for everyone, but I'm still aboard, and not regretting it.
NOVA #17: I don't usually do a "book of the month" thing and in all honesty, trying to choose between this book and CAPTAIN AMERICA this week is almost a Herculean labor. They're both terrific books with terrific characters on terrific runs. That said, this book from page 1 to page 22 was full of "win" as they say online. Aside for one continuity omission caveat, there's nothing but positives about this month's NOVA installment. Abnett & Lanning continue their co-writing Xandarian excellence, and regular artist Wellington Alves is helped out this issue by Geraloo Borges, who draws 7 pages worth of material. Both artists' styles flow seamlessly into each other, perhaps helped by Hanna's inks and Guru FX's colors.
The semi-major debate of NOVA readers last month was whether Super-Skrull's betrayal of Nova was genuine or just a ruse to get them out of being swarmed. The answer is the latter as the situation is resolved within about 3 pages so that Nova can return to Earth and Kl'rt can have adventures in SHE-HULK, which is mentioned in those things that Joe Q believes ruin the enjoyment of comic books, footnotes. Nova returns home to Long Island to check on his parents around when the Skrulls make their worldwide TV address, which was SECRET INVASION #2-4 (right?). This time around, his parents aren't freaking out about their "space cop" son and Rich's father especially regrets their last encounter. While they are safe, the most concern is for Rich's younger brother Robbie, who is now working for Project PEGASUS, which is under Skrull attack.
Rocketing to upstate New York, Nova seeks to help and runs head-first into the base's lone superhero protector, Darkhawk (as shown in the awesome cover). They both believe the other to be a Skrull until Robbie and a squad of guards break things up. DnA give Robbie a biting sense of humor that is genuinely funny and mocking of superhero conventions (such as the obligatory "initial fight" of superheroes before team-up's), while not feeling like it insults the reader and their enjoyment of them, but laughing with them. Trust me, this isn't something that is easy to pull off. Robbie and Rich's relationship is given the majority of the issue's focus and it is an interesting dynamic. While Robbie has more vast scientific knowledge than Richard has, he has always felt inferior to his "superhero" older brother and tries out all sorts of exotic jobs to keep up. Rich, for his part, is still in awe of his brother's intellect despite now housing the Nova Force unto himself.
Where things enter some continuity flips are where they involve Darkhawk, last seen the Marvel Christmas 2007 special with the rest of the Loners in California. While LONERS series writer C.B. Cebulski was still hopeful that he would get another mini at least, the market for the book itself is nil. After all, those FAIRY TALES books Marvel keeps Ceb on are selling like gangbusters (if by "gangbusters" you mean "worse than SPIDER-GIRL"). At any rate, between Dec. 2007 and now, it appears that Chris "Darkhawk" Powell registered to the SHRA and was recommended by Justice over at the Initiative for the PEGASUS gig, which Darkhawk considers "a paycheck". Granted, in THE LONERS, it was implied that Chris had already complied with the SHRA and registered; he was simply considered "retired" and thus escaped deployment within the 50 State Initiative (the only member of the Loners who wasn't registered was Lightspeed, although Mattie Frank may not have been, either, and Namie/Red Ronin DEFINATELY wasn't). It seems odd that Chris would return to New York considering he was in a relationship with Turbo (which was the catalyst for Phil Urich's flipping out and basically causing THE LONERS' main conflict). DnA manage to maintain the "violently aggressive" temperament that Darkhawk has in battle, as he quickly becomes unstable due to all the past horrors he suffered. So long as you don't think too hard about THE LONERS, it is pretty cool to have Darkhawk employed by PEGASUS and teaming up with Nova against Skrulls. They're both alien-empowered armored heroes who have their share of battle scars. Alves & Borges make Darkhawk look great and he offers a, erm, darker design when compared with Nova, which is visually interesting. Plus, former New Warrior team-up's these days are usually always cool (unless they involve Emo-Ball). The continuity with THE LONERS may not be 100% essential to NOVA's story here, but I liked THE LONERS and if I pick on bigger name writers for these sort of things, I have to be fair and note it when DnA lapse. I imagine it could be cleared up in a few lines ;"Needed a break from the East Coast didn't work out, decided to move back closer to my family". Chris has parents and TWO brothers, after all.
Despite all that, the team-up is very entertaining, with Darkhawk noting the change that has overcome Nova; he is more professional now in combat, which shows how much Rider has grown as a character within the past few years. Character development can be cool, right?
Nova meets Dr. Necker, who is involved with the Death's Head II/Minion project of the future Marvel UK lore, and while all of their PEGASUS technology is locked up from both themselves and the Skrulls, they have a "quantum flask" which is storing "living radiation" they plucked from the Negative Zone and want to use against the Skrulls. When the experiment, at least according to Necker and Robbie, may be able to revive Worldmind, Nova offers to help. And as some spoiler scans showed, while it isn't Worldmind that is seemingly revived, but Quasar. While I am curious how this effects Phyla over in GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY, Abnett & Lanning write that book too, so they could have it pop up is this is indeed Quasar. It is possible that Quasar is an energy being now like he was in that "Phalanx dream" from the AC crossover. I sincerely hope that this is the genuine article, especially as some new Corps are due to be developed soon. Could Wendall be one of them? Could Darkhawk?
In terms of sales, NOVA doesn't have a huge audience, but a loyal one; his book hasn't budged from the 29-28k sale range for all of 2008 (February was the only "skip" month thus far). That's a little better than RUNAWAYS used to average under Vaughan and is only about 3k less than DnA's other space book, GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY. Marvel's "space books" under the dynamic duo have a steady audience. Which is good for long term plans. And it's no wonder; NOVA and GUARDIANS are awesome books that instill that kind of loyalty, that "can't wait for the next 4-5 weeks for the next issue" mentality. Every issue is some level of "good", just some are better than others. This was the best issue out of the last 2-3 months, and I expect a lot more in October. Way to go, gang. It is books like these, and CAPTAIN AMERICA, AVENGERS: THE INITIATIVE and others that keep some Marvel fans like me who often are bitter and cynical about all of the wish washy actions done to many of our favorite franchises maintaining the "Make Mine Marvel" mentality and sticking around to read gem series like NOVA. Keep it up, DnA. Keep it up.
