Marvel Previews Picks: November 2024
Above-the-Board Recommendation:
Get Fury
It’s 1971. The Vietnam War is still in full swing. And Nick Fury has just been caught by the Viet Cong. To them, he’s just another American officer. To the C.I.A., he’s someone who knows where enough bodies are buried to tip the balance of world power. So a rescue operation is immediately mounted, right? C’mon, man, this is the C.I.A. we’re talking about. Better to just kill Fury than waste resources on an operation with a marginal chance of success, and who better to do the job than the army’s greatest trained killer: Lt. Frank Castle.
Written by Garth Ennis, this re-teams him with “Punisher: Soviet” artist Jacen Burrows for a tale that fills in more blanks regarding the character’s history in Vietnam. The writer’s last go-round with the character in “The Platoon” tackled an earlier era and, now that I think about it, is probably the last time I was able to write about one of his projects with unmitigated praise. So yeah, it’s possible that the writer’s increasing unevenness works its way into this series as well. Or maybe we’ll get lucky and see that writing Frank Castle is still the one thing Ennis can reliably bring his A-game to.
Amazing Spider-Man #’s 61 & 62: Zeb Wells is out and Joe Kelly is in – for these and the next six issues at least. These two issues kick off “The Eight Deaths of Spider-Man” storyline which has current Sorcerer Supreme Doctor Doom delegating one of his responsibilities to the Ol’ Wall Crawler. Which means that it’ll be Peter Parker facing off against the Scions of Cyttorak for the fate of our universe. No sweat, though, as Doom has granted Spidey a special magic suit and eight extra lives! That sounds great and would be reason for optimism if it wasn’t for the fact that the solicit text for Issue #62 mentions that he’s already down one life. I’m on board for this, particularly since we’ll also have the great Ed McGuinness drawing these issues, and it won’t cost me anything to keep reading “Amazing” via Marvel Unlimited.
West Coast Avengers #1: Why revive the “West Coast” branding again? Because calling this “The Redemption of Ultron” makes for an awkward-sounding ongoing series. Which is what this series is all about as Iron Man, War Machine, Spider-Woman, and Firestar look to see whether or not the longtime Avengers villain is sincere about his efforts to reform himself. Gerry Duggan writes this series and it sounds more promising than his “X-Men” run already since he’s starting off with a strong core storyline to drive the series. So if Derek Kim turns out to be a strong artist as well, that’ll help sell this series even more for me.
Psylocke #1: Another month another new ongoing “X-Men” series launch; though, this one strikes me as a bit odd. Not that I don’t think writer Alyssa Wong and artist Vincenzo Carratu are a decent creative team, but… is Psylocke really someone who can carry an ongoing series? I’ve been wrong about this in the past – see the really good Legion-led run of “X-Men: Legacy,” but she’s always tended to work best as a character when she’s part of an ensemble, even when she was leading it as was the case in Rick Remender’s “Uncanny X-Force.” So let’s hope Wong and Carratu knock this out of the park and defy my expectations in the process.
Star Wars: Battle of Jakku – Republic Under Siege #1 (of 4): The second act of this maxiseries-in-disguise kicks off with a pretty impressive self-own by whoever wrote the solicitation text and provided the images to go along with it. By that I mean the solicitation text lets us know that the heroes are in a bind, but find themselves saved in the nick of time by a “fan-favorite guest star and ally.” It’s one thing to set up a non-cliffhanger like that if they’re counting on the identity of this character to be the real surprise here. Except that there’s a variant cover for this issue which spotlights a certain amoral archaeologist who would fit this role perfectly.
Star Wars: Crimson Reign Omnibus HC: Now you can enjoy the lowest point of the whole “Crimson Dawn” saga in hardcover form along with a bunch of storylines from contemporary “Star Wars” titles that don’t really tie into it directly. Things at least finished strongly with “Hidden Empire,” but this is still a rather odd omnibus collection to have since all of the other similarly-branded arcs from the titles collected here – “Star Wars,” “Darth Vader,” “Bounty Hunters,” and “Doctor Aphra” – are either continuing or starting their own storylines with only a guest appearance from Lady Qi’ra to tie things all together.
If you’re desperate to spend your money on one “Star Wars” omnibus this month, however, be advised that Marvel is reprinting the Star Wars Legends: The Old Republic Omnibus HC vol. 1 this month as well. It collects the entirety of John Jackson Miller’s “Knights of the Old Republic” series, primarily illustrated quite well by Brian Ching and Bong Dazo, with quality fill-ins from the likes of Dustin Weaver, Harvey Tolibao, and Scott Hepburn. Billed as a prequel to the classic “Knights of the Old Republic” videogame, this managed to stand on its own terms and became a real highlight for “Star Wars” comics published by Dark Horse.
Doom Treasury Edition HC: Hardcover edition of the “Doom” one shot from writer Jonathan Hickman and artist Sanford Greene released earlier this year, padded out by issues of Hickman’s “Fantastic Four” and Brian K. Vaughan’s “Runaways,” as well as some unspecified extras, to make the $30 price tag worth it. This would’ve been an easier sell at $20. Having recently read the “Doom” one-shot, I can say that it’s a fun alternate-future story that shows Doom and Valeria Richards teaming up against Galactus at the end of the universe. However, it’s best enjoyed for seeing how hard Greene goes in illustrating all of the crazy stuff he gives himself to draw as a co-plotter.
Star Wars: Darth Vader by Greg Pak vol. 10 – Phantoms: Easily the most uneven “Star Wars” comic I’ve read reaches its end with this volume. It didn’t start off great with vol. 1, improved with vol. 2, and then bounced back and forth in quality for a few volumes before finally(?) gaining some consistency with recent volumes. It’s not clear how things are going to wrap up from where I am now, but part of me wonders if Pak will find a way to tie Vader’s quest for power in this series to his resigned, “It is too late for me, my son,” resignation in “Return of the Jedi.” The man loves quoting from the films as text in this series, you see.
That said, I’m more interested in what’s going to happen to Padme’s former handmaiden, Sabe, at the end of this run. While we all know how Vader’s story ends, hers is a complete unknown. It’s also more interesting because of how she’s been tempted by power over the course of Pak’s series. Will she decide that Vader’s is the right way, or that the way of the Dark Side is for fools? I have a hunch which way it’s going to go, but I hope that Pak chooses the more interesting one.
Immortal X-Men vol. 5: X-Men Forever: Looks like Marvel is trying to have its cake and eat it too. People were wondering why the “X-Men: Forever” miniseries wasn’t solicited as the next arc of “Immortal X-Men” when it was being published, especially when its writer, Kieron Gillen, established it as such. It was never confirmed, but the obvious answer was that a tie-in miniseries with a new #1 issue would be an easier thing to sell as part of the Krakoan Era Finale event. Now that that’s over, “X-Men: Forever” can take its rightful place as vol. 5 of “Immortal X-Men” as everyone who was reading it in trade paperback form will now know to pick it up in order to complete their collection.