SUPER QUICK REVIEWS: Nova 17, Magneto 4

Nova 17
Duggan (w) and Medina (p) and Vlasco (i) and Curiel (c) and Deschesne (l)

Sam wants to help his mother out of their financial woes but, as so many have learned before him, there's not a lot of money in superheroing. Meanwhile, his comings and goings have attracted the attention of plenty of UFO-seekers and his mom requests he keep a lower profile. They talk about the possible eviction and about his dad, who Sam tells his mother is alive, according to the news he received from the Watcher. Sam decides he'll talk to the Watcher more to try to get help (but he won't, because ORIGINAL SIN).

It's a little bit of a rest issue here after the long space-based arc with Beta Ray Bill but it does its work to ground Sam a little more. One of the challenges of such a book is to make sure that it still feels human, even with all of the space travel and such. It's helped by the fact that Sam is just a child so he's limited in how long he can go without returning to Earth. As such, it's a nice break issue and it helps to keep this series feeling pretty human, even if it means we're not seeing a huge advancement in the plot. The writing is still pretty strong and the characters get a chance to really shine through in this one. Medina and Vlasco do some solid work here as well, I don't usually have anything to complain about with them.

Total Score: 5/5


Magneto 4
Bunn (w) and J. Fernandez (a) and Bellaire (c) and Petit (l)

Magneto has found a base of Purifiers who have been taking unsuspecting mutants (particularly those with more evident physical mutations) to "a farm where they can be free" which, of course, means to their death so they can be studied. Magneto wrecks through the compound and adds the names collected by the Purifiers to his giant list of lost mutant names.

With the first arc over, we get a standalone issue here, a sort of standard "this is my mission" issue which finds Magneto going after standard hate-based enemies the Purifiers. It's not a bad issue, per se, and it's a good standalone of "this is what Magneto does," but it does feel a little perfunctory, as if it knows it's just filling space. Javier Fernandez does a pretty good job stepping in for Gabriel Walta but the art star here is Jordie Bellaire, whose colors take us all over the world to all sorts of environments and still she manages to keep the book feeling like the series has so far and make the art leap off the page. Full marks, as ever, to Bellaire.

Total Score: 4/5

Gillen leaving IRON MAN, Waid leaving HULK

Gillen from his fantastic blog post today
on how to pre-order a comic at your LCS

News has broken on a couple of fronts in the last few days as the August solicits have come out. Chief among it has been the odd disappearance of IRON MAN among those solicits (as well as THOR: GOD OF THUNDER - as yet, I've heard nothing on that one). Kieron Gillen (seen at left) confirmed today that he is indeed leaving the book after ORIGINAL SIN. According to Gillen, he's been offered a major opportunity at Marvel (very exciting) and he needed to make room somewhere. He realized that ORIGINAL SIN would be a pretty perfect spot to leave IRON MAN and pulled the trigger, making his total issue count (including the Annual) 31, the same count he left UNCANNY X-MEN and JOURNEY INTO MYSTERY after. Guess we can't ask for more than that. Extremely sad to lose him on IRON MAN after a very impressive run but thrilled to hear about his new opportunity and to see that Marvel continues to recognize his strong work and reward it with greater opportunities. I've seen no news yet as to whether IRON MAN will restart or who will take it over.

In the same vein, veteran Marvel writer Mark Waid has announced that he is leaving HULK after ORIGINAL SIN (conveniently, he and Gillen will work together on the OS tie-in series ORIGINAL SIN: HULK VS IRON MAN) and that writer Gerry Duggan (already writing NOVA and co-writing DEADPOOL with Brian Posehn) will be taking over on that book. As seen below, Waid assures his fans that there's no bad blood, that Duggan will be great, and that he simply wanted to get further ahead on his other projects, which is a lot to say in fewer than 140 characters.

.@GerryDuggan will do a spectacular job on HULK. Zero bad blood--I just want to get further ahead on Daredevil and http://t.co/vOHwbZDFMi!
— Mark Waid (@MarkWaid) May 21, 2014

Also worth noting, though it's not Marvel related so I'm hiding it here, at the bottom of this post, that Si Spurrier has announced that he's doing a book with Alan Moore and I think that's pretty neat.

Nova 13, Savage Wolverine 15

Nova 13
Duggan (w) and Medina and Vlasco (a) and Curiel (c)

Nova's feeling pretty good about himself after helping a stranded ship that needed a boost, not knowing that the ship was actually a slave trader's ship. These are the things that happen when you're a teenager. Beta Ray Bill, though, knew exactly who was on the ship and is appalled that a Nova would help them. He comes to investigate, having lost the trail on the ship anyway, and he and Nova quickly get into a fight. Nova stands up pretty well to Bill but eventually he realizes what Bill's argument is and the two reconcile, with Nova demanding to come with him to find these slave traders. Bill accepts his help and Sam makes plans for a babysitter, his friend Carrie, to come and watch his little sister while he departs into space.

Pretty solid book. It's largely a fight book pitting Nova against Beta Ray Bill but it gives a pretty good sense of both characters and a pretty good sense of where Nova stands in terms of his power relative to what we know of this universe. He's been up against a number of new foes which makes it hard to judge just how powerful he is (though, you know, destroying a Chitauri fleet in the first arc wasn't a bad read) and something like this, having him stand toe-to-toe with someone the Asgardians hail as a true warrior, worthy of his own Mjolnir-like hammer in Stormbreaker, gives us a sense of the sort of power he has. Their dialogue works pretty well together though the book revolves a lot around Beta Ray Bill's alien appearance (though, I suppose, it makes some sense. You look at that guy and it's gonna take you a little while to get over it). Also nice to see Sam take some responsibility and make arrangements for his mother and decide that he needs to see this slave trader business to the end. Good issue, nothing to particularly note as a downside. Not sure it super stands out but certainly good for the series. I talked about AMAZING X-MEN feeling like a book made for kids and making me roll my eyes at it but I'd say that NOVA is something of an all-ages book at this point and it feels fresh and fun, typically. Follow that model if you're going to make a book that's more accessible.

Savage Wolverine 15
Isanove (w, a, c)

With the death of Elias and the kidnapping of Sofia, Logan is left with little choice but to storm the compound at which Sofia's being kept. He takes out the guard and slashes the face of the outfit's leader, a a man named Sergio, sometimes called Marion while Peter, coming in behind him, shoots the Frenchman Pierre-Anselme in the arm. They hustle Sofia out of there and, with all the kids in tow, head to a brothel in St. Paul to lay low for a little bit. The brothel's owner Dolly, who had a relationship with Logan ten years previous, sets them up with a new car and points them towards Colorado to stay with family. Unfortunately, Marion and Pierre are on the lookout for them and come and interrogate Dolly, killing her when she won't give up any information. Pierre finds the sales slip for Logan's new car and his eyes and ears all over the country track Logan and the kids down by nightfall, with the police taking Logan and Sofia into custody.

Isanove's 1930s crime story continues but, in a somewhat strange if effective move, starts things on a ship headed to America in 1920 as Marion and Pierre, seemingly in their teens or thereabouts, meet for the first time as immigrants. We see their origin for about ten pages of the comic and it lets us understand their ruthlessness and their mentality, not to mention their hero-worship of Houdini, a man constantly in utter control of his body and mind. It's a bit of a jarring interlude as we're suddenly introduced to character's we don't know as young men and are forced to learn about them and about their families in their immediately complex background, not made easier by the fact that we have to pretty quickly learn to distinguish the multiple players on the ship. However, it's not too hard to follow if you can stick with it for its entirety and it rather does give us a good sense of villains who would otherwise be simple gangsters. Isanove's art is a good match for his writing style (helps when you know exactly how your artist is going to draw things and vice versa) though things do start to get a little bogged down here and there as people start to look the same, though constant name reminders (not in a particularly intrusive way, though, in the way where it's like "FIRESTAR will do it!" Geez, I really did not like AMAZING X-MEN this week, huh?). Definitely enjoyable as SAVAGE WOLVERINE, when it's on, continues to be pretty far and away the best Wolverine title.