This Week In Spandex
Written by Nicholas Yanes on November 23, 2009 – 4:17 pm -
Realm of Kings #1- “The Stars are Wrong”
- Writers: Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning
- Artists: Leonard Mano & Mahmud Asrar
- Company: Marvel Comics
War of Kings ended with the Shi’Ar broken, surrendering to the Kree, and a massive explosion that caused a rip in space/time – now called “The Fault.” The non-Earth bound Marvel Universe is now in turmoil. Though the Inhumans have technically won the war, they are still emotionally devastated from Blackbolt’s death and there are others that want to challenge their power.
With this set up, Abnett & Lanning now bring us Realm of Kings: a one shot that will lead to three mini-series Realm of Kings: Inhumans, Realm of Kings: Imperial Guard and Realm of Kings: Son of Hulk, as well as cross over into Nova #31-35 and Guardians of the Galaxy #20-24. While War of Kings was a battle between established characters, it seems that Realm of Kings is going to use The Fault as source of new opponents to threaten the Marvel Universe.
As usual, the art work on Abnett’s and Lanning’s titles is topnotch. Most artists (and particularly, most colorists) would struggle drawing so many different characters with wildly different designs and color patterns. Yet, this book looks amazing and is an example of what happens when artists and colorists work well together.
War of Kings was great, but I like that this series is going to allow other characters – like Guardians of the Galaxy and Quasar – to be the focus.
Beyond this, I truly like the idea of the new villains. On the other side of The Fault resides a universe over run by creatures only known as “The Many-Angled Ones.” These creatures being clearly inspired by HP Lovecraft’s monster, seemingly possess the ability to possess other characters and…something…? I write ‘something’ because at one point Quasar describes it as the entire universe, “disgusting! An Abomination! Pulsing with corrupt life! One Giant, twisted organic mass! Their whole universe is a deathless corpse! A cancer trying to metastasize into our reality!” So “The Many-Angled Ones” are evil – just a vaguely described evil.
A key aspect of “The Many-Angled Ones” is that they are somehow able to possess/corrupt heroic characters to create an army of evil Marvel doppelgangers. Though this is a common theme in comic books, Abnett and Lanning seem to have rejuvenated the cliché. For those wondering why I like these characters, there is a scene in which evil-Iron Man rips out the heart of evil-Hulk.
In short – awesome.
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- Marvel To Launch War Of Kings Sequel
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Tags: Nick Yanes, Realm Of Kings, This Week In Spandex
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