Creative Staff:
Story: Joe Casey
Art: Nathan Fox, Benjamin Marra
What They Say:
The cosmic super-saga of the decade continues! As the Galactic Rangers risk destruction to find their lost captain, a legacy of violence catches up to our heroes – both of them! Plus, a special flashback sequence starring Captain Victory’s mentor, Argas Flane!
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Some series have portions where things don’t make any sense for any number of reasons. Other books just feel convoluted no matter what you do with them. I fell in love with the opening issue of this series but have largely felt lost and confused for a lot of it since. There’s been some really great pieces to it that have made it really enjoyable to read, but I’ve also found that it takes four or five read throughs in order to really figure out what’s being accomplished in a particular issue. This fourth installment makes it feel all the worse and I’m left really feeling unsure about what it is I just read, even if I really liked the visual design of it and think I may have a clue or two about what’s going on. Maybe.
The most coherent part at this point is those on board the Dreadnaught Tiger, where they’re close to finishing up the repairs and ready to really get moving again with what needs doing. The problem is in trying to track the clones that are out there as the system can do only so much. What they discover is a way to amplify things through space-doodads and technical mumbo jumbo to put it all together. They also do it with angst and tension as there’s some real interaction issues between some of the main crew, though we really don’t know enough or anything about them to really cement it in a meaningful way. It just comes across as play-acting more than anything else because of how little we really know of them. But in the end, they figure out a way to enhance the tracking that will give them a better chance of finding the clones and fixing all of this. Whatever “this” really is at this point.
A portion of the book is given over to the clone that’s working through his fight with the oversized worm that he’s been battling, which he now does from the inside after getting gobbled up to the dismay of others. It’s a series of nonsensical pages story-wise as it progresses since half of it is in an alien language and the rest is just bland and non meaningful dialogue. It’s visually beautiful with what it does in the artwork and colors, but it felt like padding overall. We also get a little more time back in the late 1970’s Earth where we see the struggling with his existence and what it means as he’s ending up in more fights and more trouble. This is run in parallel with the bacteria that’s been discovered by the scientists, which is also now busting out of their control and starting to show itself as being a real threat. Tying it to a discussion about the original Alien movie is amusing though.
In Summary:
Stuff happens. A lot of stuff happened previously. It’s apparently making progress, but it’s so mixed and convoluted on top of different art styles that it just feels like a mess. I’m hopeful for something sprawling here to all make sense at some point, but at the moment it’s just a series of interesting pages with appealing artwork here and there and intriguing ideas being toyed with but not followed through on effectively. I continue to want to really be on board with this book and its ideas, but it’s not making it easy. And not that it should. But it feels like it keeps setting up some high barriers with things that I should understand but haven’t been exposed to and it penalizes me for not figuring it out. There’s fantastic small moments here but it lacks a cohesiveness and vision to carry it through in the individual parts, making me feel like it would have been better off as an original graphic novel rather than a series of individual issues.
Grade: C
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: Dynamite Entertainment
Release Date: January 7th, 2014
MSRP: $3.99