What I Bought 7/1/09 - Part 2

While flipping through the channels last night I came across the Necessary Roughness on CMT. It's a comedy sports movie, which isn't terribly rare, but this has to be the only one that stars Scott Bakula, Robert Loggia, Sinbad, Kathy Ireland (as the placekicker, and I wish they'd spent a little time teaching her how to at least look fluid when kicking the ball, her motion was all herky-jerky, no follow-through) and Arrested Development's Jason Bateman. I wouldn't say it's a good movie, even by the standards of comedy sports flicks (I might rate it a little better than The Replacements, if only because I think Bakula's a better actor than Keanu. I know, damning with faint praise), but something about all those people in the same movie made me want to watch it. OK, enough yammering about movies.

Nova #26 - Several of the rookie Novas are trapped, and it looks like Imperial Guardsmen Warstar will be adding some more casualties when the words 'Authorize lethal force' appear on the page. Next panel, and Warstar is no more. Hell yes, Richard Rider is back on the field! He and a couple of the other Novas go looking for Robbie, and have to skirmish with the stupid Inhumans for a bit. We do find Robbie by the end of the issue, and I think he may have gotten in a bit over his head.

I really enjoyed this issue. Seeing Nova back kicking butt is always good, the way he handles things, and the fact that his reputation preceeds him and helps to stop that skirmish I mentioned. I like the dialogue, Richard's calm in battle, the rookies shock about learning they were being manipulated, and their resolve to keep fighting, Morrow trying to joke with Qubit some to raise their spirits, it's all good. Andrea DiVito's back on the art chores, which is fine with me. I like that DiVito will draw things (like Nova) upside down occasionally, because they are in space, so you might as well have a little fun with that. I am surprised Ravenous was being beaten up so easily. I know, this Stronitan is the Marvel equivalent of Supergirl, but Ravenous is supposed to be equal to a Herald of Galactus. You'd think he could give a better showing.

Secret Six #11 - The team learns what they're protecting, and why Smyth is building it, though there is still no sign of Mockingbird anywhere. Plenty of dissension amongst the team, which I'm glad at least some of them object. Not that it may matter next issue, they're probably all going to be beaten senseless.

This issue highlights the ongoing problem I have with this book. While I have no problems with anti-heroes (loved Ennis' Punisher, for example), some of these characters are too amoral. I'm not sure I'm supposed to see them as scumbags and want to see Wonder Woman kick their heads in, you know? Especially Deadshot. I would enjoy someone ripping that stupid mustache off his face. I know Ragdoll is right, they've taken jobs from people much worse than these fellows, but still, the total indifference he, Floyd, and Blake show grates on me. Do none of these imbeciles realize that they will probably end up inside the structure they're helping to protect? Hello, did you forget you have criminal records, and the heroes don't regard you as part of their little clique? Utter morons, I tell you. The above doesn't apply to Scandal, Bane, or Jeanette, obviously.

War of Kings #5 - Things are getting rapidly crazier. The Inhumans, well Black Bolt and Medusa, have settled on what they seem to think is some great plan, but is, honestly, stupid as hell. It didn't work in Cable/Deadpool when Anton Kruch wanted to turn everyone blue, it won't work here. Assuming it even goes off, since Vulcan has gone even further off the deep end than before. Speaking of crazy, Gladiator is running wild, killing all the pro-Vulcan folks, ripping off arms and such. Oh dear, he's become Superboy-Prime. Run!

You know, as much as I like a story of true love, I can't say I feel bad for Medusa. She's been so damn smug and overbearing throughout this whole mess, the idea her husband's going to blow himself up to bring about this stupid-ass scheme, and in the process leave her alone and sad amuses me. She's the one saying Crystal and Ronan are naive, and there have to be sacrifices and yadda, yadda, while she's sacrificed, risked nothing. She's the war movie stereotype of the officer who throws away his troops and justifies it saying "That's war", while of course, he sits safely behind the lines. So yeah, really not minding the idea of her getting a little comeuppance.

OK, I'm leaving town here shortly, and I won't be back until next Wednesday. I don't expect I'll do any posting between now and then, though you never know, but don't count on it. So, until next week.

What I Bought 7/1/09 - Part 1

Well, for the next several weeks, I'll be able to get my comics when they come out, same as you. Isn't that lovely? It was nice to visit the store and spend a little time shooting the breeze with the fellas. Apparently 4th of July isn't going to push next week's comics to Thursday, which is just super-peachy keen and neato. Sigh. It's rather sad that I've spent so much of my life being a smart aleck that even when I try to express enthusiasm, I look at it and think I'm coming off insincere. However, this is no time for moping, forward reviews!

Agents of Atlas #7 - So the Atlantean Council has dark motives for wanting Namor and Namora to get hitched, which leaves those two shaken. Namor gives Jimmy some advice about trying to run an organization, absed on Namor's years of trying to run a country, and Derek Khanata reenters the field. Then there's a second story detailing some of Mr. Lao the Dragon's past, which I didn't totally follow on the first reading.

I wonder whether Parker will revisit the Namor/Namora thing down the line. Sure, they feel manipulated now, but as Gorilla Man pointed out, if their feelings are genuine they should follow them. I like how Parker writes Namor. He maintains his regal bearing, and that tendency to be bossy, but he also counsels Jimmy once he gets to know him a little and starts to respect him. Namor's should pretty much always be arrogant, but he can also be friendly, given the proper circumstances. I'm still not terribly pleased with Hardman's work on the undersea portions, though I think it may still be the coloring washing out some of the detail. On the other hand, I love how Carlos Pagulayan draws Mr. Lao.

Exiles #4 - The team fights some machines, travels a bit, learns what happened on this world (in short, Hank Pym screws things up again). Blink teleports to find food, and the rest of the team is captured by Ultron, Vision, and Machine Man, though that may have been a blessing.

One thing this issue makes clear is that Blink may know more than the others, but she doesn't know everything. What that means, I'm not sure. Someone brand new is pulling the strings? Who? Casey Jones took over as artist, which I guess isn't a bad idea for the book, rotating artists as they traverse realities, but I'm not quite as fond of his work as I was of Espin's. There's nothing wrong with it, really, except maybe that Jones doesn't go quite as detailed on the surroundings as Espin, it's just not as much to my liking. For what that's worth.

Guardians of the Galaxy #15 - Let's see. Inhumans attack the Guardians, retrieve Crystal, then run away like wusses because they can't risk their king being harmed. I'm sorry, I thought Black Bolt was supposed to be tough. The Shi'ar try to annex Knowhere, Rocket hands a beatdown to the Braniac wannabe, Adam Warlock turns purple again in the process of killing that annoying mage, and the Shi'ar have to retreat. Moondragon frees Starhawk, and then Knowhere wakes up. Suppose I should have seen that coming, as if decapitation would really kill a Space God.

I really expected that to be more chaotic, but Abnett and Lanning seem to decide it was better to sort of split the fight up. So the Inhumans dominated focus early, the Shi'ar late, and Starhawk got her time in the middle. Either way, lots going on, and I want to see where it all leads. I think Brad Walker continues to do a fine job on the art chores, keeping things readable despite the number of characters involved. My favorite line was Cosmo's 'Are you God?' to Lockjaw after the Imperial Guards telepath knocked him for a loop.

Immortal Iron Fist #27 - Danny's company is destroyed, but HYDRA can't let things go, so we get a little fighting with them, then Danny prepares for the next phase of his life, with Misty Knight, which leads him to have a conversation with Luke, because they're buddies and buddies talk about stuff like this. Then there's a preview of the first issue of the Immortal Weapons mini-series, which um, was not quite what I was expecting for a story involving Fat Cobra.

So we see a little of what became of Wendell Rand after he left the Heavenly City, and how Danny may and may not be his father's son. I don't guess Misty's announcement was any surprise, since Swierczynski mentioned it in his first arc, but Danny's chief operating officer being a drunk is not something I remember. Granted, we didn't see much of him in "The Mortal Iron Fist", but his being too drunk to save the company seems a bit out of left field.

Foreman and David Lapham handle most of the issue, with Timothy Green II drawing the flashbacks, which I tell you, feels like a waste of Mr. Green. Still, he does a good job of giving Wendell an air of exhaustion and dissatisfaction with his life, which contrasts with the bright colors used in those sections, which contrasted with the overwhelming inky blackness of the HYRDA stuff. I was less enthused with the art through the rest of the issue. The inky seemed a lot heavier which did not help things, because the lines seem much too thick, and the backgrounds seem rushed or non-existent. Also, I can't figure why initially, there are large sections of white space between panels in Foreman's, then partway though, the space between panels becomes black.

That's all for tonight, three more reviews tomorrow.

Discussing The Invisible Man A Little More Seriously

Assuming "seriously" is the proper word to use here. I already did the jokey post about it a week and a half ago, but I felt like talking about it a bit more in-depth.

The gist is that Darien Fawkes (Vincent Vintresca) is a thief, he gets caught robbing the elderly fellow as I described, and is sentenced to life in prison. Fortunately, he has a genius brother who needs a human test subject for a government project, and it'll get Darien out of prison. The project being the insertion of a gland into Darien's brain that produces a chemical they call Quicksilver, which bends light, making the person, ta da!, invisible (and there are a few other benefits). Then they find out the gland also secretes a sort of narcotic that reduces Darien's inhibitions, making him kind of nuts, but of of the scientists has developed a counteragent that will temporarily (maybe six days) nullify that effect. Then we learn that scientist, Arnaud (Joel Bissonnette) is actually a weapons' supplier to terrorists, and he wants the plans for the gland, people die, Darien goes on the run, and ends up working for the Agency, who commissioned the project. It's not what Darien wants, but the gland can't be removed without killing him, and the Agency are the only ones he can get counteragent from, and he'd rather not go crazy.

So there are certain allowances that have to be made to continue the series, such as not being able to remove the gland safely. On any occasions when Darien might have a way to get rid of it, that avenue inevitably closes up. Likewise, the temporary effect of the counteragent provides a reason why Darien doesn't just accept that he has the gland and go do what he pleases, instead working for the Official, who he doesn't much care for.

One of the nice set-ups is that even though the Agency has apparently existed for quite some time, it is (currently, at least) a small, underfunded agency. They have two dozen employees at most, only five of which garner any significant face time (Darien, the Official, Eberts, Hobbes, and Claire, also called the Keeper). The underfunding is frequently used for comedic effect, as the Official and Eberts scramble to balance the budget, appropriate more funds, conceal where they spent $17 million (that'd be the Invisible Man project), and generally hamstring Hobbes and Fawkes in their various work by pleading poverty when a little cash needs to be spent, say Hobbes needing a calling card. The other side of it is that because they're always strapped for cash, they will take almost any investigation, including those from outside the government sector. It's a convenient way to provide a variety of conflicts for them to struggle against.

In Season 1, they are two recurring antagonists, Arnaud, and Chrysalis. Chrysalis is your standard shadowy multinational corporate entity that is working towards some purpose, in this case preparing for some major catastrophe (which they will probably help to engineer). Among their activities were trying to scare a superstitious South American president into approving a chemical weapon defense system for his country, kidnapping highly intelligent people from various private sectors and freezing them, and trying to get Fawkes on their side. They have at least one super-soldier of their own, a woman by the name of Allianora, whose lungs were altered so she can hold water and air in them, allowing her to walk up to people, liplock them, and then flood their lungs with the water. Creepy. She and Fawkes are supposed to have this romantic tension, possible because of some connection they feel over both being artificially engineered freaks, stuck under the thumb of their makers, but I didn't feel it as I watched the episodes*. Maybe that was the point, though, since they were constantly in conflict, or pretending to work together, on to backstab each other for their agencies, that whatever they might feel was trapped under all the requirements of the job. Or they just didn't have the critical chemistry. It happens.

I prefer Arnaud as a villain to Chrysalis. With Chrysalis, Allianora is the representative we see most often, and half the time she's helping Darien, so it undercuts her as a villain. Plus, their motives are vague, and I'm uncertain if in Season 1 we actually see the top dogs, or just the equivalent of a sectional manager. Aranud, in contrast, is his own man. He's alternately devious, charming, playful, and vicious. When he was part of the gland design team, he was the brilliant but funny scientist. He's also the guy who, when Darien caught him copying the files on the project onto his own flash drives, hit himself on the head with a fire extinguisher so it would look like Darien went Quicksilver mad and attacked him, thus discrediting the one person who realized what he was up to. And this is the same guy who can woo a neurosurgeon into believing he's a federal agent, so that she'll help implant a new gland into his head (when he pieces together how to make a new one). And when he was trying to retrieve a chip with data files on the gland which Darien forced him to swallow, he actually cut open his own stomach and removed it by himself, no painkillers obviously, since he'd want to keep a clear head.

Yet for all his class and viciousness, he's a bit like a child, growing frustrated that Darien saw through his act (because a con recognizes a con), and he prefers to engage in wildly elaborate schemes to get what he wants. For example, using a former Russian mobster to lead Fawkes and Hobbes to a supposed arms dealer, so Arnaud can chase Fawkes (Aranud is wearing thermal glasses of some sort), shooting at him, run out of bullets, then drop a gas grenade which actually contains some form of flu virus that will make Darien so sick he'll be rushed to a special hospital for government agents who can't afford to go under anaesthetic around people not cleared for what they might say, except, Arnaud has captured a killed a doctor who works there, so he can use said doctor's fingerprints and retinal scan to sneak and abduct Fawkes when the procedure is about to start. Whoo. Gimme a second to let my fingers rest. Ok, I'm good. But I love that. Yeah, it's ridiculously over elaborate, when Arnaud could just trail Fawkes, leap from a van, club him unconscious, then take him somewhere and operate**, but it shows class, style. Arnaud is not some common leg-breaker. This is a man who finances his weapons dealing by running a beautiful casino in Mexico, so he is going to do things a certain way. Really, I guess he figures the more he plans it out, the less likely some random factor will put the kibosh on things.

I might as well say a few more things about the characters. The nice thing about Fawkes is that he's not a brainless criminal, but he's not a genius. He did go to college for a time, but as he put it, it lost its luster after his brother earned his third doctorate. He's intelligent, with a love for quotes, and the pastime we most often see him engaging in is reading, one time a philosophy journal, another time he mentions he started subscribing to Scientific American***. Still, he's not all-knowing, so he can serve as the instigator of exposition, since espionage, interdepartmental bullcrap, and medicine (areas Hobbes, Eberts, and Claire are well-versed in) are not things he's familiar with. At the same time, his history as a criminal helps him see through people, which can be valuable, though it leads him to be needlessly secretive with both Hobbes and Claire, because he tends not to trust them when he should.

To be fair, in the early-going he has very little reason to do so. Claire (Shannon Kenny) insists he refer to her as the Keeper, even though she knows his name, and Hobbes (Paul Ben-Victor) resents that Fawkes makes more money, even though he's a rookie, and Bobby Hobbes has worked for practically every agency in the country (and been fired from them for various reasons), and he has to hold this rookie's hand. So in the early episodes, there's a lot of tension between Fawkes and Hobbes, sniping at each other, Fawkes eagerly pulling disappearing acts without warning Hobbes, so that Bobby's left standing there alone and confused, and a general inability to work well together. What's good is that over the course of the season, they do start to form a bond, as each one is willing to stick their neck out for the other, and they develop little patterns. So if Claire makes some comment about them not being able to understand the science behind something, they'll engage in a little back-and-forth about whether that was an insult, and it sure felt insulting to me, and I don't think she really means to be rude, all while she's standing there staring at them. In the last few episodes they start messing around with different high-fives and complimenting each other if one adds a little twist to it. So the series doesn't have them automatically become buddies, rather it's a gradual process, probably aided by the fact that neither one of them has anyone else to turn to.

Bobby's an interesting character. He probably should be a highly paid, highly decorated agent, but he suffers from rampant paranoia, and a tendency to need validation, so he shoots himself in the foot. Also, he has a bit of an ego, so he's his own greatest hero. The paranoia leads to odd proclamations, which leads people to dismiss him when they shouldn't, and the need for some positive reinforcement brings him into conflict with Eberts, the Official's right-hand man. They frequently snipe at each other, especially if the Official has just delivered a cutting remark in Hobbes' direction, which Eberts usually enjoys, and I think Hobbes is irked that he does all the dangerous work, and Eberts just shuffles papers. Still, Paul Ben-Victor gives Hobbes the right feel, where you can see he's dangerous and cool under fire, but he can also be a funny guy when the heat isn't on. And there's one episode where Hobbes gains super-intelligence, and Victor gradually removes the emotion from his voice, so he's speaking in this gravelly, dead sort of tone. Very spooky compared to how he'd been before.

Also, Bobby and Claire seem to develop a bit of a relationship over the course of the season, and it actually works. Maybe because it doesn't progress as far, or as fast as the Fawkes/Allianora thing, and because it lack the air of doom that hangs over that one. Hobbes has a tendency to make jokey come-ons to Claire, and as she grows more accustomed to he and Fawkes, she gets less bothered by them, and more amused, recognizing they're just part of his personality. I think maybe she responds to his loyalty to people, and they may bond over a mutual concern for Darien. All I know for sure is late in the season they're chatting and Hobbes abruptly comments that she looks great in those pants and she makes the sort of shocked face that's more "I can't believe you said that in public, you goof", and less "I can't believe you said that, you perv". So at the least, they've built a sort of camaraderie, which is nice to see, because it means everything isn't strictly about how characters react or get along with Darien, they have their own things going.

Holy crap, that turned out to be a lot more words than I expected. If you made it all the way through, I thank you.

* That has to be really hard though, to convey you and this other person are attracted to each other, when it's just a job, and you may not know anything about each other, or you may not really like the person.

** Fawkes points this out to Arnaud at the tail end of that sequence I described above, claiming when he gets the chance to kill Arnaud, there won't be any playing around. When Aranud leans down a laughs about that, Darien punches him right in the nose, then gets the crap kicked out of him by Arnaud's Brainless Thugs of the Week.

*** That had more to do with him trying to keep his eyes open for ways to remove the gland, though.

Place Your Bets For The Great Downfall!

Who is going to bring down Norman Osborn? It has to happen eventually. The New Avengers are after him. Spider-Man as a solo player is gunning for him. Throw in the Agents of Atlas, Moon Knight, Songbird, Iron Man, maybe Deadpool in a roundabout way, and I'm sure the X-Men will take notice of him now that he's going to start screwing with their reputation. Maybe Speedball gets out of wherever Moonstone shipped him off to and brings the hurt. Then there's the villains like Doom, who at some point will have to be fed up with being ordered around by a loon.

Maybe it will be a plucky reporter*, like Ben Urich, who will (again) have to educate the citizens of the Marvel Universe that hey, Norman Osborn is evil, and crazy, and it is a bad thing for Osborn to have any power, let alone as much as he does. Or Betty Brant, she's been working hard to be a big-time reporter, right? Maybe Peter Parker will bring down Osborn through the power of the camera. That would be pretty sweet actually. Norman's (mostly) hung up the Goblin costume, and trying to present a legit face to the public, so Pete beats him through his civilian occupation.

Norman could always just self-destruct, but that would be a weak payoff. After all he's done, I think it would be better for the readers if the heroes actively defeat Osborn, rather than essentially stall until his house of cards falls in on itself.

Maybe it will be some unforseen factor. Perhaps Rocket Raccoon will zoom down from space, shoot Osborn in the face, then teleport back out. Problem solved, and once again we are reminded that when you want something done right, call Rocket Raccoon.

* Please do not let Sally Floyd be the savior of the Marvel Universe. If my choices were between Ms. "Captain America is out of touch because he doesn't use MySpace" ending Osborn's Reign, and Osborn staying in power indefinitely, I will take the guy with stupid hair running the show. And this is coming from someone who has reached the point he really wishes they never brought Norman back from the dead.

The Legend Grows Slowly

Something else that interests me about The Question is how much of an unknown the character is to his city through the first 18 issues. Outside of Izzy O'Toole, who starts out as the dirtiest cop in Hub City, then becomes the cleanest, nobody seems aware of the Question's existence until they meet him. At one point when he's trying to protect O'Toole from a killer, he has to fight his way through some cops because they have no idea who he is. He doesn't inspire fear in the criminal element because they don't know who he is either. It usually takes a few pages for someone to notice he doesn't have a face.

Unlike Batman, who had people muttering about giant bats, and reporters asking cops if there was some sort of night vigilante, nobody seems aware of the Question. No reporters are asking O'Toole or any of the politicians about him. The criminals aren't discussing him in hushed tones, or making plans to draw him out and eliminate him. I think it's supposed to indicate just how massive a job improving Hub City is going to be, that one guy can only do so much, and his influence can only spread so quickly.

An Angry Question?

Some months back I bought the first trade volume of the O'Neil/Cowan Question series, and I bought Volumes 2 and 3 at the same time I picked up Essential Defenders Volume 3. The Question is what I'd call a solidly good series, at least through the 18 issues I've read, as it covers the difficulties in affecting change, on both a personal and metropolitan level. Denys Cowan's artwork is pretty nice too, more than capable of depicting Hub City as a grimy, rundown mess, and of illustrating the frequent fight scenes.

The series is giving me a lot to think about, but for tonight, I felt like talking about The Question #15 in particular. There will absolutely be spoilers, so now you're forewarned. There have been a series of murders in Hub City recently, each victim a black male, each left hanging. Into this enters Loomis McCarthy, a private investigator who visually reminds me of a more unkempt Harvey Bullock, and who is even more unpleasant as a person. Among his less endearing personality traits is a serious racist streak. Vic Sage figures Loomis might know something useful, but quickly finds the P.I. so distasteful he can't even hang around him long enough to dig for information. In fact, he comes to suspect Loomis, whose presence in town wasn't known until after the murders started, as the perpetrator.

Loomis seems oblivious to Vic's unease around him, always glad to see Vic when their paths cross. Until Loomis makes another racist joke in front of a black cop, who proceeds to kick Loomis' disheveled hind end, as Vic looks on. When Loomis wants to know why Sage did nothing, he explains he was being saved the trouble, which leads Loomis to use less than flattering terminology to describe him. Vic switches to his Question garb, now more sure than ever McCarthy is involved, and ends up trailing him to the man actually responsible, as McCarthy had pieced the truth together on his own. Sage then makes a news report detailing what he learned, and this is where it gets interesting.

Loomis shows up at the station, and tells Vic he didn't mean it yesterday when he said what he did, and he understands that Vic stayed out of it because he knew Loomis could handle it*. Vic loses his temper and lays out how much Loomis digusts him, and reiterates that if the cop hadn't thrown a punch, he would have. The man responsible for the murders appears, tries to shoot Vic, and well, Loomis takes the bullet. He can't figure out why McCarthy did it, and I find it pretty curious myself.

Why would Loomis McCarthy do that for Vic? The larger story reason is probably to illustrate that even people we might regard as terrible people are capable of noble acts. The fact he died for Vic, leading another person in the newsroom to describe Loomis as a hero probably served a purpose in tipping Sage off the balance he'd been working to maintain since his time with Richard Dragon. A man Vic had written off as scum, one the Question might very well not spit on if he was on fire, had turned around and saved Sage's life. If the people you think are the problem are capable of that, how does you figure out who you're supposed to be saving, and who you're supposed to be fighting?

In story, I think it tells us something about Vic Sage. Not so much his views on things, but more what's inside him. I think we can deduce that whether he admitted it or not, Loomis McCarthy was a lonely guy, as he has the sort of nature that would probably wear on people quickly, even if they agreed with his politics. The cosntant crude jokes and drinking would probably not be found endearing by many people. So why look to Sage as a potential friend? Sage has a lot of anger and self-rightousness inside him, it's a large piece of what drives him, and he has to struggle to control it or he winds up in trouble**. Maybe Loomis had a lot of anger inside as well, at himself, the world, whatever, and in Vic Sage, he thought he saw a kindred spirit. Sure Vic might say he wanted to pound Loomis' face in, but maybe the P.I. figures Vic just says that to maintain appearances, so he doesn't have to take a lot of guff from other people. Inside, Loomis might think Sage was just like him. If Loomis felt that way, contrast that with their outer appearances. Loomis is short, out of shape, constantly sporting stubble, he drinks, he smokes, his clothes are rumpled, and he works as a private investigator, which is probably not the most highly respected position. Vic is tall, athletic, reasonably attractive, keeps clean-shaven, wears clothes that are at least in good condition (I'm not the person to judge how fashionable they are), and he's a well-respected as a reporter that gets at the truth, and isn't afraid of speaking it. He may be what Loomis wished he was, or thought he could be, and so he wants to be around Sage, maybe some of that will rub off on him.

* Even though Loomis was pretty obviously losing before the cop's partner was able to restrain him.

** Which is the case over the next story, where Vic keeps behaving impulsively, because he's too angry to be calm, and it keeps getting him in over his head.

This Might Take The Nova-Green Lantern Similarities A Bit Far

Last month, in Nova #26, Garthan Saal appeared before Malik Tarcel as Tarcel was held captive by the Shi'ar. Tarcel was the one named Nova Prime after Richard Rider was booted out of the Nova Corps, and his active debut as Nova Prime went less than spectacularly. Saal was the last person before Richard Rider to house all of the Nova Force, though he did so without bringing the Worldmind along for help. Funny thing about that, Saal went nuts, and became a real terror for awhile.

Now, apparently, he's back*, and I am concerned. I kind of hope I'm wrong here, but I see the return of Garthan Saal as signaling the imminent formation of a Anti-Nova Corps, or a Super-Nova Corps. I could see Saal somehow having held onto some of the Nova Force he once wielded, so that he is actually a repository equal to the Worldmind, and he gets his own little troop together**. I know the Nova Corps is the Marvel version of the Green Lanterns (without the predilection for head trauma), and that's cool. Hey, I laughed when Richard said he doubted anyone would be foolish enough to bring a Living Planet into the Corps, wink, wink. I wonder if Richard having his own Sinestro Corps to have to contend with might be pushing it.

Now, there's a good chance that's not at all what Abnett and Lanning have planned, and even if it was, I trust them to make it work. Saal could set himself up in opposition to the Nova Corps, but do so by pointing out to the new recruits that the Worldmind manipulated them into joining***, then threw them into the middle of a war without sufficient experience and little regard for their lives. He could promise a "better" way of doing things if they joined up with him. He could still be running a peacekeeping force, but they'd probably be more aggressive, actively trying to shape events rather than just help those in need. Or Abnett and Lanning could go some other way and I would probably dig that as well.

I think I'd rather see Nova helping people in new locations, meeting new peoples, and new threats. My absolute favorite arc of Nova so far has been the two-parter on Knowhere, and other than the fact that Celestials (one of whom's head was the foundation for Knowhere) were previously established, I think all the characters in that story were new. Garthan Saal in charge of his own army is a new twist on an old enemy, but I don't know, I think I'd rather see Richard dealing with an intergalactic crime lord, for example. There have to be a few out there somewhere, and it would be a little different challenge for him. He's a cop, so crime lords should be within his purview.

* Assuming Tarcel wasn't hallucinating. It occurs to me that if the sane part of the Worldmind could communicate with Richard through it's memories of Rhomman Dey and Ko-Rel, then the Ego-tainted crazy part could communicate with Tarcel through the memories of Saal.

** Sadly, I remember someone on scans_daily complaining back when Rich briefly tangled with the Silver Surfer that Nova should totally not be outclassed by the Surfer, and providing examples of what Saal was capable of with all the Nova Force. Well, this would settle that, since it would mean Rich only had 50% of the Nova Force. Not that the concerns of random scans_daily member should be of that much importance, but it was something I remembered as I was typing this out, and I thought to myself, perhaps that explanation would shut their complaint-hole.

*** By controlling their thoughts, and controlling their endocrine systems so they'd be receiving a constant flow of endorphins, which would make them associate their positive feelings with being a Nova.