Comic Book Readers

[Magegg]

Last cosmic reads:

REALM OF KINGS



This is a banner for the cosmic titles, dealing with the consequences of War of Kings, basically the Inhuman rule over the kree, the rule of Gladiator as Majestor of the Shi'ar, and the time-space "fault" opened in the end of War of Kings.
The story is inaugurated by a one-shot ("Realm of Kings") runs through these mini-series:
-   Inhumans (5 issues)
-   Imperial Guard (5 issues)
-   Son of Hulk (4 issues)
And tie-ins on these series:
-   Guardians of the Galaxy
-   Nova
The Realm of Kings one-shot present us the idea that the fault open is a passage to the "Cancerverse", a Lovecraftian reality in which "life won", death doesn't exist and there are terrible Resident Evil-like tentacled creaturers, as well as mutant versions of some Marvel superheroes, trying to take over the universe (Of course!).

Inhumans deals with the now bitter queen Medusa trying to rule over the kree, while Gorgon tries to make a career as a champion and defender of the kree cities, and wins the affection of the kree.

Also, Ra-Venn (Wraith's girl friend from Annihilation Conquest) and Triton are sent near of the Fault to try to retrieve Black Bolt's body, but they encounter some Cancerverse monsters.

Pro: More Ronan + Crystal cuteness.
Con: Most of the issues were nothing but a pretext for the explanation of the final issue: Medusa was behind all the attacks of the kree cities, because she tries to make the kree believe they need the inhumans to protect them.
Pro: There was some nice scenes with some of the Inhumans, mainly Maximus and Gorgon.
Con: There's also a frankly shoehorned crossover with the Mighty Avengers; doesn't make sense, but it's kind of fun see Crystal meeting again his ex husband Quicksilver.
Pro: The transformation of Medusa into a bitter bitch queen borderline villainy is thrilling, so looking forward for the next event implied.

The other mini-series:
Imperial Guard, has Gladiator sending the Imperial Guard to investigate some things near the fault. We see more of the funny life of Gladiator as a ruler, and the rest allow us to behold more Imperial Guard action and how is the interaction between the members of the team. Of course, none of the characters of the Guard are anything special, I would say the comic book was decent but nothing to die for. Is basically a filler story.

By the way, I found a nod to the space jockey from the Alien movie:



And... the only titles worth reading are Inhumans and Imperial Guard.

Spoiler

Son of Hulk has practically nothing to do with the story and it involves the Micronauts (researchers Arcturus Rann, the robot Carl and princess Mari) fighting Hiro-Kala the son of Hulk (one of the most terrible and boring characters I've seen) who is ruling over a planet or something like that.
I know basically nothing about the microverse or the Micronauts history, so I basically didn't understand a single thing. The rest is boring mumbo jumbo in which it seems son of Hulk is going to become akin to Galactus thanks to Galactus or something... Nothing to see here .___.

The Nova tie-ins involve Nova and Darkhawk being transported to the fault by the villain The Sphinx, what takes them through time travel to an alternate dimension where they find Reed Richards, Black Bolt and Namorita alive.
Turns out they were brought there by the old Sphinx to fight his younger self, who wants to take the Ka Stone, which is a powerful mystic stone; young Sphinx already has one, but stealing the one of the older Sphinx would give him unlimited powers. So, they both select their champions to fight the other and...
It's just not interesting. There's a lot of mumbo-jumbo by the end, it's just a boring stupid cliché comic that probably gathers what I dislike the most about superhero comics. And it barely ties in with the previous events, so, not recommended.

Guardians of the Galaxy has some of the Guardians (Star-Lord, Drax, Jack Flag, Bug, Moondragon, Groot and Rocket), fighting some mutants created by the Fault, there are other characters introduced, the Luminals, basically a rival team, the neighbors of the Guardians that also live in Knowhere. Moondragon gets "pregnant" with a mutant. Weird stuff.
The other half of the team (Phylla, Gamora, Mantis, Cosmo and Major Victory) is fighting Magus, who is basically Adam Warlock turned bad, and wants to bring all the forces of the Cancerverse to our world...
And, I think this basically wraps up all this GotG run, about the Universal Truth Church and all that, but I didn't like that part of the GotG, so I missed many issues and I just didn't understand (and I'm not that interested into).

[close]

The final issue of this GotG volumen deals with Thanos resurrection, and that leads to the next Marvel Cosmic Event: The Thanos Imperative.


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THANOS IMPERATIVE



I read, not gonna write a because it was pretty not memorable. This is only 7 issues. It basically wraps up the Guardians of the Galaxy arcs. Thanos is resurrected, he fights Mar Vell from the Cancerverse. There are a couple Guardians deaths, as well as some others.
It also an attempt to launch a new galactic elite team, composed of Ronan, Nova, Quasar, Beta Ray Bill, Silver Surfer and Gladiator, called the Annihilators...



One that failed after having only one miniseries.

As far as I understand, this was the end of the considerably succesful Marvel cosmic line.

[KiramidHead]

Great comic, but I feel like it would work better for me if this wasn't the first thing I had read with Microchip in it. That, and Punisher War Zone has trained me to think of him as Dennis Nedry/Newman. Some of the supporting characters are kind of baffling, too, but in that bizarre Garth Ennis fashion. Oh, and Ink looks a lot like the Cinema Snob to me.

[First Blood]

Spoiler

At least he gets his head blown off in both the book and War Zone.

[close]

[KiramidHead]

Spoiler

At least he gets his head blown off in both the book and War Zone.

[close]

If only he made this sound:

Spoiler

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MxWmC31jdos#ws

[close]

[First Blood]

Started reading The Flash from the New 52 and its stellar. One could call it...an appetizer for next week.

[KiramidHead]

Started reading The Flash from the New 52 and its stellar. One could call it...an appetizer for next week.

Next week? Holy crap, I feel like I spaced out for most of September.

[First Blood]

Well two weeks. The 7th. I just didn't want to change what I said because it sounded sexy.

[Cal427eb]

I hate it when series aren't released weekly.

[Kimarhi]

released weekly?



in my day they were released monthly



nub

[Cal427eb]

Japanese manga has ruined me. At least Edge of Spider-Verse is a weekly release.

[KiramidHead]

Great comic, and a definite improvement over the first volume. Ennis somehow managed to cross the Punisher with his personal manifesto on why the IRA sucks, and make it work. It helps that the characters are all so... colorful.

[Magegg]

And here's my leftover readings of the main Marvel Cosmic series:

NOVA VOLUME 4 (36 ISSUES)



As far as I understand, this volume is seen as the highest point of Nova's publication history, and gosh, it is good. The only way I can define this series is as "heroic".

Everything seems to turn around Rich's struggles to do his hero job the best he can. Unlike other superheroes, there's very little of his private life, because, you know, he renounced it to become more or less a full time superhero. But still, there are parts in this series in which his links with some people on Earth are really important.
It reminds me of the Green Lantern comics.

And well, most of the series I read through the cosmic events, but there are some stories I missed. I like the most one dealing with a sort of magical infection in a planet ruled by aristocrats, and also the first modern appearance of Cosmo (pre-Guardians) and Knowhere

I really recommend you to give this series a shot if you're interested in superheroes. If you're not hooked from the very first issues, maybe superheroes is not your thing.


GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY VOLUME 2 (25 ISSUES)



OK, I read everything I had missed from GoTG. The biggest issue with this series is that is basically a whole story. Most of the things from the first issues don't generally have a solution until the Thanos Imperative event, following the end of the series. So, you spend about 30 issues reading the story without a clear feeling of where is everything going.

I agree with that thing some people said, that this is a "situation-based" comic book, it doesn't give you much of a focus on certain characters, it's mostly about the adventure, you don't know Rocket Raccoon, you don't know who Gamora or Star-Lord are, you only follow their adventures.

The story can be enjoyable, yet, as the book doesn't take itself that seriously, and the characters are generally likable. The revelations by the end can be a nice payoff, at least.

What I don't like about this comic is especially when it deviates into those "multiversal/timeline mumbo jumbo" that I hate so much about comic books. It can get really confusing and boring when they devote two or three issues on a row on this "let's fix broken time paradoxes" stuff.

So, I can't really recommend this series as a whole, but the tie-ins with events (specially War of Kings)... are a hell lot of fun!

[Nightmare Asylum]

I found myself absolutely loving the whole alternate timeline/future stuff, especially because the characters themselves were so put off and confused by it. I thought it really worked, and as a bonus it made for a fun way to bring the original Guardians back into the fold.

Totally get why it wouldn't be for everyone, though.

[Magegg]

Well, as for myself, the only good thing I can see about it is that it brought us this Starhawk costume design:



Much better than the "plain cheap spandex" classic version:



I'd say this "Ultimate-ish" more badass version, should completely replace it.



Too bad, for what I'm seeing in the upcoming "Guardians 3000" series, they're sticking with the "classic" version :/

[First Blood]

Great comic, and a definite improvement over the first volume. Ennis somehow managed to cross the Punisher with his personal manifesto on why the IRA sucks, and make it work. It helps that the characters are all so... colorful.

Great arc.