Multiverse and non-causal are definitely bad sign words in the arvel Universe.
Creative Staff:
Story: Dan Abnett
Art: Nic Leon
What They Say:
Stranded on 21st century Earth, the 31st century Guardians finally have a chance to locate the anomaly that is ripping the past, present and future of the Universal Time-stream apart. But locating it is one thing…preventing it is something else altogether. Shocking twists and end-of-the-World action!
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
The Guardians 3000 series comes to a close here and it does so in a pretty damn interesting way, at least possibly for old school fans of the characters. The series has been one hot run since the start with the way timelines were collapsing on themselves in the future, causing wholesale rewrites and attempts to get it all figured out and fixed in the 31st century. The shift back to the 21st century as the focal point that took its aim at Michael Korvac definitely made for an interesting twist, especially since his attempt to do what he’s doing aligned with the end of everything because of the final Incursion that will take us firmly into the Secret Wars event.
What we get here is another adrenaline rush of material, both in dialogue and action, because the stakes are high but we also know that the end is here. For Geena and Yondu, trapped inside the house with Korvac initially, we get to learn of how he’s rewound himself to this period in time to attempt to bring stability to the multiverse and avoid the mistakes of the past. It’s an interesting approach and you can see heroes attempting this in other books from time to time, though not with as disastrous results. Amid the conversation where Geena tries to understand all of this, we get plenty of action on the outside with the two teams fighting the A-Sentience that Korvac has commandeered for his own, making for a lot of fun but also the simple fact of padding things out a bit to give it the necessary action component. It’s not bad as it has some fun commentary and the aftershocks of the time effect on costume and character changes is positively fun.
But the reality is that what seems to be going on here is the grand seeding of Geena Drake into the Marvel Universe as a key figure – something we’ve seen in a few other books going into Secret Wars with other characters. Here, Korvan refers to her as a singular entity across all the time streams and there is only her and no variation across them, which is why she hasn’t changed at all. His guiding her here to him was all about providing a stable reference point for what he’s trying to do, not realizing himself that there are grander forces at work that’s about to reshape everything. It’s a disturbing series of events really, as we get towards the end and the enormity of it all starts to sink in for Geena, as she realizes that as everything collapses around when it comes to reality, that she’s going to be living through it all alone.
In Summary:
Guardians 3000 has been one of my favorite Marvel books of the past eight months as it has an infectious energy to it and played with some grand scale and concepts, but also this really cool sense of fun and weirdness amid the plan. With that plan revealed and Geena now cast into some other role yet to be determined, it was really fun to see how the grand spectacle of all turned upside down for Korvac even as he thought he had finally won. The series feels like it’s designed purely to set certain things in motion and I’m hoping I can find it within the overall Secret Wars event itself, because I like these characters and I’ve grown to like Geena. I have no idea what the future holds for my Guardians 3000 group after Secret Wars, but I really, truly, hope there is a future. This has been a whirlwind of a run with some utterly fantastic moments that are hard to create. I want more of it and hope that there is.
Grade: B+
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: Marvel Comics via ComiXology
Release Date: May 13th, 2015
MSRP: $3.99
