Dread's Bought/Thought for 6/24/09: Part Three
NOVA #26: Officially surpassing the 70's record of a 25 issue run for a Nova solo series, Abnett & Lanning keep the tension cracked up and their titular hero as awesome as ever. Everyone gushes about Captain America or Iron Man on Earth, but everywhere else, man, little alien kids probably want to be like Richard Rider when they grow up. He's got outdated shoulder-pads, and it doesn't matter, because he's too busy stomping ass. He's sure come a long way from a guy who needed Spidey's help to beat Rhino in MARVEL TEAM UP some years ago. After a one issue break. Andrea DiVito returns to pencils, and as always he is excellent.
Considering that Abnett & Lanning have written about 96.5% of all of the books involved in WAR OF KINGS, from the core mini itself to side mini's and whatnot, each installment or crossover could simply work as one storyline where you have to buy EVERYTHING to make sense of stuff. Bendis working on SECRET INVASION, MIGHTY AVENGERS and NEW AVENGERS all at once comes in mind. Abnett & Lanning don't fall into that trap. Each ongoing that ties in is involved in various degrees, but still maintains it's own feeling and it's own subplots. GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY likely feels more outright connected, but it should; they're trying to protect the universe, and they would quickly find themselves in the middle of the war if they tried to stop it. NOVA, by and large, has been furthering it's own storyline with detail elements of WAR OF KINGS as a setting. Nova's not fighting Vulcan nor is he even interested in stopping the war, just cleaning up after the Worldmind/Ego debacle of deputizing hundreds or thousands of Corps-people and throwing them into combat. It works out quite well. I'd argue NOVA was more involved in ANNIHILATION CONQUEST than he's been in WAR OF KINGS. That point is all but referenced this issue.
Nova's entrance this issue was in the 5 page preview and it's awesome. Corps rookies are pinned down by Shi'ar, one of the Imperial Guard members (Warstar, who used to give Wolverine a hard time in the 70's), and in quick fashion Nova shows up and stomps ass. Aside for one word balloon error on page 6 (in which lines clearly meant from Richard are coming from another Centurion), everything is gravy. Nova is out to extract as many surviving Centurions as he can and ship them home; he claims a figure of "almost eighty-percent" having been found, which I guess means that maybe 2 out of every 10 that Ego recruited are likely fragged. Two of them who were named before this issue, Tre and Lindy, are eager to remain on the Corps and Richard allows them "for now". This is the way to do it. Having Richard run a squad of hundreds of nameless grunts would get old and likely be uncomfortable for him, but a handful of Centurions like the five we already met like Tarcel and Irani are fine. The new Corps weren't gathered under the best of circumstances, and against Richard's will, but it'd be a shame to dump all of them, after all. He has needed a supporting cast for a while.
Ko-Rel is still the Worldmind's core personality now, and makes no bones about reminding him of when and where she died. Having been unable to find his brother, Richard flies to Nil-Rast with Irani and Morrow to take a more direct approach. When they land they are immediately attacked by Triton's squad of Inhuman Elite warriors, at least until Ra-Venn, a minor Kree character who hasn't done much since the end of WRAITH's mini (nor has Wraith done much, has he) who recognizes Nova from their battle against Ultron and calls a halt to the fight. From there Nova finds a mangled Qubit and hundreds of Centurion helmets from the atrocity carried out by the Imperial Guard in general, and by Gladiator's psycho cousin Strontian. She may have been a creation of Chris Yost from KINGBREAKER, but Abnett & Lanning have run wild with her. She has all of Gladiator's power but none of his restraint. She lives only for slaughter; no wonder Vulcan likes her. She enters the issue pummeling Ravenous, who was bemused by Vulcan's insane battle plan turning him into an enemy when Ravenous would have gladly allied with Vulcan. Still sporting his "I got spanked by Ronan the Accuser" cybernetic half-face from the Kano collection, Ravenous is little more than a punching bag for Strontian until Nova shows up planning to arrest the mad woman for her war crimes (such as personally executing Suki, at least).
DiVito manages to get a touching scene out of the mangled Qubit on art considering he's a robot who can't change facial expressions; panel close ups on his mangled "face" help in this regard. Yes, he is SO a rip off of Booster Gold's Skeets, but it's taken Marvel a while to rip off Skeets. Besides, well, nearly everyone in superhero comics is a rip on someone. Whether other heroes or gods or 30's pulp novels, and so on. Yeah, executing Centurions who surrendered is bad enough, but mangling cute little robots? B**** is goin' DOWN, as they say on the streets.
Next issue promises to be quite the smack-down. I am curious if Ravenous would genuinely aid Richard in such a battle, flee, or try to pick off whoever wins. The fate of Robbie Rider is still unknown, which I imagine may be fodder for another issue or so and probably even an arc, the Search for Robbie. I wonder if the guy survived if he will stay a Centurion or if he may even become the next Quasar. At any rate I look forward to the outcome.
Including past ongoing attempts and his ANNIHILATION mini, Nova's been in about 70 issues of solo comics. I am only keeping check because unless they fathom a dumb reason to include NEW WARRIORS issues he was in, Nova is about another 2.5 years away from Marvel renumbering the issue to #100 to jack up the price $3.99. Hey, those of us with beloved comics that always deliver become cynical and expect SOMETHING to happen at some point. Aside for that, the future for the title looks excellent, so long as Abnett & Lanning stick around. NOVA has been their best and most consistent Marvel work. Damn shame only 26,000 readers a month agree, but I'm proud to be one of 'em.
TERROR, INC: APOCALYPSE SOON #3: A MAX series no one but me enjoys, this issue sadly becomes evidence that rushing to deadline with fill-in art can sometimes pooch up the effect.
As with all MAX titles, this sells very poorly. The first issue debuted at a measly 10k and the second issue fell to over 9k, back in May. To put that in perspective, that means Marvel maybe earned about $15,300 on the first issue's sales. That may barely cover the cost of the talent involved. There's cash from ads but MAX books usually have few, and ad revenue has dried. I only note this because many insiders have questioned for years now how in the world the MAX line makes a profit and whether it is worth keeping for Marvel. "Lines" of comics rarely create money anymore; a line is not the same as a franchise. MAX has delusions of VERTIGO, but most, if not all, of it's comics would be MARVEL KNIGHTS at another time and really are not much different in terms of characters or stories from mainstream Marvel, they just have more un-bleeped cursing and gore. That might have been edgy a decade ago, but in an era when mainstream superhero comics often involve intensely violent scenes of combat and rape, and where curses may be bleeped with symbols or stars, anyone over 9 years old who doesn't live with the Amish can figure out what swear is being cut, it isn't enough. MAX books were also the first to all be $4 a pop. VERTIGO comics are hardly DC's cash cow, but they've had a few critical and/or sales hits; HELLBLAZER has been going strong for over a decade. MAX, though, is under the radar in nearly every way. With a few minor, detail tweaks, the TERROR, INC. comics could have simply been yet another Marvel mainstream mini about an obscure character no one knows, that isn't promoted. Maybe at $2.99 an issue it might have a better time outselling Handbooks. It is possible the MAX line exists as Marvel's stab at being creative, but none of their titles there have even touched stuff like TRANSMETROPOLITAN or ANIMAL MAN or so on.
Koi Turnbull continues on his art run for most of the issue, as Terror and Mrs. Primo continue on their way through the Middle East, trying to stop a "typhoid mary" type boy from spreading this virus he has, or falling into the wrong hands. Terror's act of mercy while stopping a terror cell for Isreal in issue one unleashed the virus upon the world. Reminded of the Black Plague by the new bug, Terror is in search of where he hid an old enemy from that era, Zahhak, who claimed to have a cure for the Plague. Along the way the pair find themselves aided by "freedom fighters", and complaining about Terror's decomposing smell (he's a walking corpse who always needs fresh body parts to replace rotting ones). Turns out the boy, Aban, is a demon himself, unable to die and always spreading his virus. Terror finds Zahhak and releases him, and that is when things seem to go wrong, as usual.
The last few pages are drawn by someone named "Xurxo G. Penalta" and his art style clashes badly with Turnbull's. Now, Turnbull is hardly a John Romita; this issue especially has some odd figures and bares some sign of rush. But Penalta's is another story. It's very scratchy and saved a lot by the colors. This is one case of me not minding if the comic skipped a month so it could look better. As it was, it shipped twice last month.
This is David Lapham's second TERROR, INC. mini for MAX and while I was liking his first one more, this one isn't bad. Concludes next issue. The cover art is always awesome.
THOR #602: Is it that time of the year already? Yes, the unofficial bi-monthly (at times quarterly) THOR decides to ship this month, with Djurdjevic returning on pencils. He drew two issues a while back and while he needs some time, is seemingly faster than Coipel. Granted, so is Haley's Comet. While it may be issue #602 of Thor in general (which included JOURNEY INTO MYSTERY issues he wasn't in), this is issue fifteen of JMS' relaunch run on the title. The average launch team on many books lasts 16-18 issues, give or take, and with word of JMS leaving the title in September, that means we have about one or two issues left. This issue very much looks like someone quickly trying to wrap up about a year's worth of subplots in 2-3 issues. In this issue's case, the "Sif body crisis" which first popped up in THOR #5, which for the record, shipped Dec. 28th, 2007.
My mother read Thor for years in subscriptions when I was a kid, but that was the one title of hers I never bothered with. The JMS run was the first run where I hopped onto THOR monthly, and while it started with lofty ideas and some quality issues, JMS' back-breakingly slow pace coupled with annoying issue delays have pushed this near ASTONISHING X-MEN levels of annoyance. Next to INCREDIBLE HERCULES, this title is woefully serious, plodding, and is more about soap than action. Call it ALL MY ASGARDIANS, or DAYS OF OUR THOR.
The Asgardians have moved whole hog to Latveria, under Loki's master plan to exile Thor and rule Asgard, which he is under the puppet Balder. Included in this trip is Kelda's human lover, William, the burger-flipper from Oklahoma. And it very quickly seems that William is smarter than every Asgardian there, including Balder. He notes how insane it is to live next to Dr. Doom, or to trust him. He probably would have raised a fuss about trusting "the prince of lies" earlier. Balder tries to defend his actions/position with a story about how if this move fails, the Asgardians will be united against a common foe (Doom), and if the move succeeds, well, jolly for them. To be fair, it isn't a terribly stupid position for Balder to have. The problem is that it reads precisely as someone who has been clearly snookered, schooled, bamboozled and tricked coming up with an excuse to himself justifying it and going along with it, telling himself that he wasn't tricked, it was all part of his own plan, of course. I imagine Bernie Madoff victims did similar stuff before the spit hit the fan. It comes across as someone too spineless to admit error, or even to stand up for himself while he is being fooled and led around. He's been Loki's puppet all along, and when someone outside even hints at that, he boxes up. Maybe there was a reason his destiny was always to die on a bridge (or outside a gate, or whatever).
However, Thor hasn't been any smarter. He was the one who let Loki back into Asgard, and gave him free reign, and forgave him for all past crimes, including the LAST Ragnarok that only killed them all. For the sake of possibly offending his subjects in some far off time by treating Loki harshly, he directly and all but deliberately placed them in IMMEDIATE peril. When you have to choose between a rock and a hard place, you have to at least choose whatever keeps danger in the distance longer. Shame William wasn't around earlier.
I could have done without the bit where he's picked on by Asgardian bullies, which is rather cliche and predictable. It's not like they haven't met Thor's mortal chums before. Granted, maybe JMS doesn't write Asgardians so well after all; a few issues back (or a year ago real time), Bill was trying to teach them basketball and they all acted like the idea of a game was alien, that all they did was drink and stab stuff. The scene exists to mention the idea of the immortal Kelda perhaps seeing William as a "mortal pet" in her own way, but it could have been executed better. Granted, isn't that what everyone says about Bendis comics? "Good idea, crappy execution?"
Back to Thor. His hammer is still broken after his fight with Bor, which Loki suckered him into. Just when Thor/Donald Blake are pondering their actions, Loki decides to pop into their room and go, "Oh, yeah, Sif is dying, go save her, ******". While ****** is wondering how on Earth to find Sif, the old woman in NY starts to die and conveniently mumble Norse stuff to Jane Foster, the ONE doctor in the universe who would know and happened to be on call, who calls Blake to give him the word. Perhaps the strongest bit of the issue is Thor desperately trying to fly on his broken hammer, and then turning to Dr. Strange for aid. Dr. Strange is a character JMS is obviously fond of, as he popped up quite a lot during his 8 years on ASM. He got the chance to write STRANGE, though, and it was atrocious rubbish. Apparently Stephen is no longer in the Village, but in New Jersey; talk about a demotion after losing his sorceror title to Brother Voodoo. Dr. Strange is the only one who can possibly fix the hammer fast enough to save Sif, and the exchanges between he and Thor are good. In the end, it is an exercise to depower Thor back to his "pre Odinpower" levels since he needs to sacrifice that power to mend Mjolnir. This fixes the hammer, but further bonds the hammer itself to Thor's body and soul, i.e. you break it, you bought it, literally.
On the one hand, one could moan and groan about Thor being depowered considering that JMS really didn't make good use of his power levels and that a hero with high power levels isn't a burden to someone who writes him properly. On the other hand, Thor wasn't fought anything in his main title that wasn't Norse related since Iron Man, and other writers in other books like FCBD NEW AVENGERS and so on usually fail to appreciate Thor's new power level. It makes tactical sense to just revert Thor to his old power level, hedging bets properly that other writers can't and won't handle it well. It is thus ironic that Dr. Strange sets it up, since he is another figure who editors and writers who simply aren't good enough or unique enough to handle him blame all of his story woes on his power level. To me, creators who make excuses rather than be creative are not as creative as they think they are. If that makes sense.
Thor shows up in the nick of time and is finally reunited with Sif. I got the impression that Jane was left a little cold with Thor's inability to save the old woman who had to die in the process, but Donald Blake manages to bid farewell to her spirit, which was a scene I didn't mind too much.
Loki is also back in his male body. I am curious how long it will take before this trickles down into other books. Bendis usually takes 4-8 months to reflect little things like a Spidey costume change or Ms. Marvel being MIA in NEW AVENGERS, and Loki being a woman was actually kind of a subplot in MIGHTY AVENGERS (although to be fair, an illusion spell can work no matter the gender of the user). Since he was wearing a twisted version of Sif's body, I suppose it makes sense that he would lose it once Sif was about to either manifest or die, but it was very quick. I was looking at the page and shocked by Loki being male again, and no one around him caring or seeming surprised. I thought I missed something.
The contrast between INCREDIBLE HERCULES and THOR is stark. Hercules actually goes out and does stuff, vibrant, godly stuff. Thor does very little. Even THOR's covers are usually boring, just Thor standing or swinging. Hercules is directly involved in the mortal world, he fights villains from all walks of life. We are TOLD Thor "goes off and does his works" in Midguard, but we never see that. Or haven't since about issue #6 or so. Oklahoma had no villains, not even a crime cartel? THOR is a good book in theory, and has plenty of good moments, but it is a slow book, and JMS has pigeon-holed it quite a bit. INCREDIBLE HERCULES is much better able to mix comedy gold and dramatic, poignant character moments; THOR too often takes itself absurdly seriously. JMS has a decent voice for Thor, but he hasn't had him do much in a while but bump along Loki's crumbs of antics.
JMS is one of few writers who still has massive buzz in sales; no doubt THOR's massive sales success post relaunch has to be at least partly credited to him. Yet it seems he always leaves books in two ways; hanging, like THE TWELVE, or in shambles, like AMAZING SPIDER-MAN. The question in another issue or two is where THOR is left. Since I have purged my list of titles that usually leave me cold more often than not, THOR has become more of a weight. If the next writer doesn't get the hammer striking quickly, I may decide to call it a run. Which is a shame, this book had so much promise and quite a few high moments. The pace's killed it, along with JMS' rigid ideas. Given how quickly Sif's subplot has been resolved, I wonder if Loki's inevitable comeuppance will be worth the wait, if he gets one at all.
I'm glad Rich was open to keeping Tre and Lindy on, since they wanted to be Centurions and he could definitely still use them. Maybe that's a sign that the Corps will stick around after WoK, which I'm hoping for. It'd be nice to give Rich a stable supporting cast.
