Guardians of the Galaxy #1

After the events of Annihilation, the Guardians of the Galaxy have decided to take a break from things. Only, another universal threat has manifested. This time, Zeus and several cybernetically enhanced Greek gods have turned Mount Olympus into a warship that can transverse time and space. In order to power it, Mount Olympus must terraform planets at a level of destruction on par with Galactus. Normally the Nova Corps would answer the call to action. However, what happened in Annihilation led to the the Corps' membership to dwindle down to just two!

Richard Ryder comes to the Guardians for help. Tired, wore out and still recovering from their part of the battle, the Guardians decline. Except, the decision eats at both Peter Quill and Rocket who both sneak away to join the small team of Nova Corps, plus Moondragon and an Captain Marvel from another universe to stop these Greek gods from destroying the universe!

Marvel.com claimed that this issue was a Thanksgiving set issue. While Peter Quill does make a turkey for his friends at the beginning of this issue, he doesn't wish anybody a Happy Thanksgiving or anything like that. There are a couple jokes about how the turkey looks weird, which is funny based on the odd stuff Gamora and the other Guardians are preparing for their cookout. After like 3 pages, the turkey is gone, Nova comes asking for help and the story picks up steam from there. So, is this a Thanksgiving comic? I'm gonna say 'No!'

First of all, Thanksgiving is never mentioned anywhere. This variant cover nor the regular cover shows a Turkey Day gathering or any sort. Other than Marvel.com listing this as part of their Thanksgiving reads, I don't see evidence of this issue being a holiday book. Even the Marvel Wiki is noticeably quiet on this plot point. Maybe I got some bad advice. If so, that makes me nervous as I recently bought 3 other issues suggested from that online article. What if those comics aren't really set during Thanksgiving either? I'm going feel like I wasted my money.

The good thing is that I enjoyed this issue. Al Ewing's opening salvo was very action packed. I really wouldn't mind getting my hands on the rest of this storyline. But I think I'd only get it if I could check it out at the library or if I could find the trades for super cheap.

Worth Consuming. But boy was I disappointed.

Rating: 9 out of 10 stars.

Marvel Comics Presents #112

The Werewolf by Night/Ghost Rider story ends. I had to double check that Robert Kirkman didn't have anything to do with this story based on the level of red ink used. It's a bloody closing chapter is what I'm wittily trying to say.

Two new single issue stories appear in this issue. The first stars the Spider-Man villain Hobgoblin, who at this point in his career has been imbued by demonic powers and is known as the Demogoblin. Not really much of a memorable story. Though the real protagonist for this story is a NYPD task force of peacekeepers trained to take on meta human threats. I thought it was really groundbreaking for this group, called Code: Blue, to have a member who is a paraplegic. 

The other story is another Infinity War crossover. It stars Adam Warlock allies Pip and Gamora. Having both been obliterated by Thanos in the war, Pip and Gamora are exploring their new surroundings inside of Adam's Soul gem. It's a beautifully illustrated story by Rita Fagiani. 

And I've just got to talk about this Steve Lightle cover. It's a good thing the artist decided to use a silhouette because there'd be all kinds of bits and stuff hanging out. And there's not much left to the old imagination as Typhoid Mary gives Wolverine the slip and starts enacting revenge on some of the slimeballs who abused her as a youth. It hearkens to the 1980s Linda Blair retribution thriller Savage Streets in which Balir dresses and acts seductively to her friends' tormentors before serving a dish of ice cold revenge. 

Another mixed bag of stuff that was good but not really enough to make me say this issue was great.

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 7 out of 10 stars

Guardians of the Galaxy, Volume 2: Angela (Marvel NOW!)

  I've got to get my hands on the crossover event 'Infinity.' With completing volume 2 of Guardians, that will make it 4 'Infinity' tie-ins that I have read. If there's one thing I can tell you about that storyline is that I know Thanos is involved and he has his sights set on earth. Other than that, I am at a loss as to what that series really is about.

   Marvel's done a fantastic job getting just about every one of their series to tie-in together. The bullpen of the 2010s have built upon Lee and Kirby's philosophy established during the Marvel Age of Comics in the 1960s and exceeded that vision to the Nth degree. Events in this volume relate to important storylines in the various Marvel NOW! Avengers titles as well as Iron Man. I give major kudos to the editors at the House of Ideas for keeping all of these threads straight. I know I've would've made a few knots if that was all up to me.

  In this volume, the bounds of reality have continued to crack throughout the Marvel Universe. Star-Lord is plagued by a terrible vision of all his possible realities and now he seeks out his biggest enemy for answers. Meanwhile, the rest of the Guardians attempt to exercise some R & R  but when an Asgardian princess from an alternate universe that shouldn't exist attempts to kill Gamora, the most dangerous woman in the universe, it's back to business as usual. For the Guardians, that means rescuing SWORD from the clutches of Thanos' armies and eventually saving the earth from the Mad Titan himself.

    'Angela' sees the end of Iron Man's tenure with the team. But I suspect that with the appearance of the assassin of Asgard, the Guardians are going to have a new teammate albeit probably only for a short while. Having two deadly women on one team will make for some killer moments but eventually there's only going to be room for one alpha female.

   The art is dynamic and it matches the might of this action-packed volume. The array of variant covers is stunning as well. But I must say that as an EC Comics fan, I just adore the Weird Science variant covers the most.

   Now to get my hands on that Infinity book I mentioned earlier...

  Worth Consuming

   Rating: 9 out of 10 stars.
 

Annihilation: Ronan #1-4 (Annihilation Week)

Cover to Issue #1.

   Ronan the Accuser is no more! No, he's not dead. He's been stripped of his title after being falsely accused of acts of sedition against the new ruling house of the Kree Empire. (With the reputation of the attempted assassination of the Supreme Intelligence, those charges might not be so trumped up.) Now, Ronan faces death if he ever returns to the confines of the Empire.

   Betrayed and oh so pissed, Ronan is on the hunt for the woman who bore false witness to the House of Fiyero. That leads him to a distant planet that just happens to be in the path of Annihilus's Annihilation Wave and Gamora, step-daughter of Thanos!

    Will Ronan find his own personal accuser? Will he meet his doom at the hands of the Most Dangerous Woman in the Galaxy, Gamora? Will everybody become the next meal for the ravenous drones of the invaders of the Negative Zone?

    Of the Annihilation minis, this one wasn't my favorite. The art was as sketchy and poorly inked as was some of the art in the Annhilation Prologue. However, the story in that book was fantastic. This tale wasn't so great. Also, what little I knew about Gamora was obviously not much. I did know she had a soul sword similar to that Magik uses in the Uncanny X-Men. I didn't know that she was a crime lord of sorts over a gang of crazy Amazons called the Graces. And I had know clue that Gamora originally dressed like a necromantic pole dancer! Hokey Smokes!

   Rating: 6 out of 10 stars.

Up Next: Annihilation

Guardians of the Galaxy (Prelude to Annihilation Week)

Finally, I saw the 2014 film Guardians of the Galaxy. I'm not 100% sure why it's taken me this long. It's been a weird mash of financial shortfalls, injury, and surgeries that have culminated in me putting off seeing it and putting it off, and putting it off- until now. So, what changed?

  Recently at my local library, I found the Annihilation Omnibus. Having read it and granted a free PPV rental by DISH Network, I was finally inspired to check it out. More on this later. But first let's discuss the film.

  The movie begins with a young Peter Quill being abducted by aliens in 1988 after his mother dies of what is assumed to be cancer. We then jump 26-years to find an adult Quill now calling himself Star-Lord. When Quill finds a mysterious orb, he becomes the target of the Scavengers, a ragtag bunch of aliens who abducted Quill for some reason and now have a bounty for his capture, bounty hunters Rocket Raccoon and Groot, and Gamora, daughter of Thanos and associate of the crazed Ronan.

   After the group ends up in Nova Corps prison, they meet up with Drax the Destroyer whose got a blood lust against Ronan for killing his wife and child. With this fifth member, the line-up for the Guardians of the Galaxy is complete. Together they trek across the universe seeking to sell the stolen orb to the Collector. There, the Guardians learn that the orb contains another of the Infinity Gems and has the power to destroy worlds. When Ronan steals the orb, the team must race back to the Nova homeworld of Xandar to protect it and the rest of the galaxy from being destroyed by a now power-mad Ronan.
 
   With any superhero film that begins a franchise and an origin, the film starts off a little slow. It really isn't until the group finally all meet that it became an instant classic. Many consider lovable Groot, the living tree, to be the fan favorite of the film, but I really like Drax. He's very droll, but he's given some of the funniest lines. I felt like he stole the show though Groot does give the Destroyer a run for his money.

  Another element that stole this flick was its soundtrack. Peter has an old Sony Walkman that belts out some classic 70s tunes such as Blue Suede's 'Hooked on a Feeling.' It's these catchy songs that help make this cosmic odyssey seem more familiar and more like 'home.'

    One part of this film that I thought was hit or miss was the special effects. The home world of Xandar looked like Starfleet Academy's's wet dream. It was beautiful, but many of that's planet's residents looked fake. Some characters like Yondu, the Alpha-Centurian with the musical arrow, has blue skin. However, the skin looked like an FX computer tech just painted the image of actor Michael Rooker, in facial prosthetics, navy. I swear I was ready for him to move off screen quickly and his blue hue to follow him off screen. Zoe Saldana's green Gamora looked like that was her real skin tone but the pink-hued attendant to the Collector and many other characters looked like someone was playing around with the color on their computer monitor in order to get their desired effect and it just fell flat.

    There're lots of great Easter eggs in this film. The character of Yondu was a member of the original Guardians team from the year 3,000 (maybe this was his great-grandfather?) There's several minor characters in the background and zoo of the Collector (as well as a few baddies from previous Marvel Films.) Perhaps the biggest Easter Egg is that Thanos and his army are the same mystery characters from the first Avengers film. It's just another bit of evidence that though Marvel may not be following the comic books to an exact 'T' they do have an all-encompassing plan for their films and live-action series to help create a true live-action Marvel Universe.

Worth Consuming

Rating: 9 out of 10 stars.

(Wait a minute---- Didn't I say I was going to come back to Annihilation? About that- I was able to get my hands on a copy of the Annihilation Omnibus recently. In that massive 500-page plus tome, Star-Lord, Drax, Gamora, Thanos, Ronan, Nebula, Korath, and the Nova Corps play important roles. Since they were in that book as well as this film, I broke down and finally set aside time to watch GOG. 
    So, starting tomorrow I will begin a week-long review of the series Annihilation and its many prequels and companion pieces. 
     My friends, welcome to Annihilation Week.)