Rising to Robert & Jake's challenge, I decided to pick up something new I'd been thinking about grabbing for a while now. That is the Annihilation Vol. 1 Hardcover. For those not in the loop, Annihilation was an event that Marvel put together last year to showcase their "space" characters that hadn't been used in quite some time. Though this could have been just a thrown-off "let's just make sure the trademark's are renewed" mini-series, they really did something special here. Maybe since they were dealing with mostly C & D-list characters, it allowed far more lee-way in how they were ultimately dealt with. Plus, they didn't have to cross into any currently on-going series so they didn't have to worry about continuity problems.
The way it was marketed was with a Prologue special, followed by four mini-series that set up what the main heroes are up to, and then capped by the blow-out six-issue series. Before any of this there was the Drax the Destroyer mini-series that seemed to come out of nowhere a few years ago. Written by Keith Giffen with art by Mitch Brewister, I had picked up the original trade of this book and found it to be very good. Drax, most recently had been portrayed as a Lobo-esque murderer for hire and all around bad-ass, was on board a prison ship which crash landed on Earth near a remote Alaskan village. From there, it's essentially Drax versus his fellow inmates and he is befriended/annoyed by a young outcast girl. It's good, but not great and after it was over I thought it would've made a great pitch for a movie since none of the main marvel characters are in it or even referenced more than one line of dialogue in the second issue. I can't imagine it sold too well, so I forgot about it until Drax poped up again in the Annihilation Prologue issue. That one-shot sets up the current status. A mysterious force has come out of the crunch (the place where our universe borders with others) and is razing every system it comes in contact with. The Nova Corps. (essentially Marvel's Green Lanterns) is assembled and the force (or The Annihilation Wave as it is referred to) hits the Nova's home-world of Xandar. The planet and the Corps. are destroyed except for the last Nova Centurion, who is of course the Nova of Earth, Richard Ryder. I've long had a love for Nova, pretty much because he one of the few "new" characters from the 70's that I was able to get in on from the ground floor with. It's funny to hear him say that he's been a Nova for 5 years, when I've been reading his books for close to 30. Fuck, am I old. Anyhoo, the four issues of the Nova series are the best in this book and suffice to say there's a lot of outer-space blowing shit up with a little Luke Skywalker-esque whining mixed in, but not too much.
Overall, this book gets a hearty thumbs up and I can't wait to pick up the second volume as soon as I'm next flush.
So celebrate the Independence of our Country by picking something new and talking about it!
The way it was marketed was with a Prologue special, followed by four mini-series that set up what the main heroes are up to, and then capped by the blow-out six-issue series. Before any of this there was the Drax the Destroyer mini-series that seemed to come out of nowhere a few years ago. Written by Keith Giffen with art by Mitch Brewister, I had picked up the original trade of this book and found it to be very good. Drax, most recently had been portrayed as a Lobo-esque murderer for hire and all around bad-ass, was on board a prison ship which crash landed on Earth near a remote Alaskan village. From there, it's essentially Drax versus his fellow inmates and he is befriended/annoyed by a young outcast girl. It's good, but not great and after it was over I thought it would've made a great pitch for a movie since none of the main marvel characters are in it or even referenced more than one line of dialogue in the second issue. I can't imagine it sold too well, so I forgot about it until Drax poped up again in the Annihilation Prologue issue. That one-shot sets up the current status. A mysterious force has come out of the crunch (the place where our universe borders with others) and is razing every system it comes in contact with. The Nova Corps. (essentially Marvel's Green Lanterns) is assembled and the force (or The Annihilation Wave as it is referred to) hits the Nova's home-world of Xandar. The planet and the Corps. are destroyed except for the last Nova Centurion, who is of course the Nova of Earth, Richard Ryder. I've long had a love for Nova, pretty much because he one of the few "new" characters from the 70's that I was able to get in on from the ground floor with. It's funny to hear him say that he's been a Nova for 5 years, when I've been reading his books for close to 30. Fuck, am I old. Anyhoo, the four issues of the Nova series are the best in this book and suffice to say there's a lot of outer-space blowing shit up with a little Luke Skywalker-esque whining mixed in, but not too much.
Overall, this book gets a hearty thumbs up and I can't wait to pick up the second volume as soon as I'm next flush.
So celebrate the Independence of our Country by picking something new and talking about it!
(Image stolen from Ye Olde Comick Booke Blogge)
2 comments:
Hey - how's the Art Brut record?
It's very good actually. It pretty much sounds like disc 2 to their first record.
Although I can't listen to it now without hearing Shane bitch about it on Saturday.
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