The Thanos Imperative #6

***** (five of five stars)

Favorite Quote:  "You have hunted me down and brought me to my Death.  Literally.  She's right behind you."  -- Thanos to Mar-Vell

Summary

Mar-Vell takes up Thanos on his offer, summoning the Many-Angled Ones and preparing the necropsy to kill the Avatar of Death (and, as such, Death itself).  In "our" reality, Surfer warns the assembled heroes that, if Galactus fails to stop the Galactus Engine, "our" reality will fall quickly behind him in death.  Medusa informs the group that Blastaar has retreated and she sends in Quasar and the Nova Corps to back up Galactus.  In the Cancerverse, Mantis predicts the arrival of Nova, who then appears.  Pete directs Rich to take on Thanos, and Rich instructs Worldmind to give him the entire Nova Corps' powers so he can plow through the Revengers en route to Mar-Vell.  Mar-Vell prepares to finish killing Thanos, who informs him that he faced "our" Mar-Vell several times and that his failing was always that he was head-strong, acting without considering the consequences.  At that moment, Death appears, and Thanos informs Mar-Vell that he invited Death into the Cancerverse by trying to kill Thanos.  Death then obliterates Mar-Vell and all the undead beings in the Cancerverse.  (In "our" Universe, the Fault begins to collapse.)  Thanos begs Death to take him with her, but she rejects him, enraging him.  He promises to destroy another Universe for her, and Nova and Pete realize that he means "our" Universe.  Pete instructs the Guardians to teleport back to "our" reality, and they're furious when they arrive to realize that he and Nova stayed in the Cancerverse.  Rocket Raccoon demands that Major Victory send them back to Sanctuary, but Victory informs him that he can't, since the Fault has collapsed.  In the Cancerverse, Pete informs Rich that they have distract Thanos in the sixty seconds before the Cancerverse collapses so that he doesn't leave to destroy our Universe.  Pete pulls out the Cosmic Cube and the two engage Thanos.  Three days later, on Attilan, Medusa delivers a eulogy for Pete and Rich.  Quasar and Rocket Raccoon take a tour of the memorial garden erected in honor of those lost (Adam Warlock, Drax, Phyla-Vell).  Quasar informs Rocket Raccoon that the Nova Force disappeared with Rich.  He notes that, even if Pete and Rich survived, they're stuck in a collapsed Universe that can never be re-opened.

The Review

Given that I'm reading this story a year after it was published, I already knew Nova and Star-Lord die at the end of it.  Going into this story, I only hoped that their deaths would be awesome, that they would mean something, that they would represent everything they were as characters.  I'm glad to say I'm not disappointed.  DnA make sure that their deaths make sense in context of the story at hand and that they die with jokes on their lips and heroism in their hearts.  If I was going to lose two characters that I loved, I'm glad it happened this way.

The Good

1) I thought Mantis predicting the arrival of Nova and being confused about whether it actually had already happened was hilarious.  I always love DnA deft touches like this one, that reveal a character in a panel. 

2) I loved the denouement with Thanos.  I knew something was wrong, if you will, at the end of last issue with the idea that Thanos would ask Mar-Vell to kill him, given that the Cancerverse had extinquished death.  DnA show here that Mar-Vell probably should've thought something was wrong, too, since, by killing Thanos, he invited Death into the Cancerverse.  It was a truly brilliant twist.

3) Moreover, DnA did a great job reminding us, throughout the series, that, even though the Cancerverse was the biggest threat, Thanos was still a big problem, if you will.  As such, when the Cancerverse disintegrated, it made sense that Pete and Rich couldn't just leave Thanos to his own devices, like he had suddenly become a good guy.  That attention to detail is what made this mini-series so awesome.

4) I'm glad DnA dedicate a few pages to the memorial service for Pete and Rich.  These sort of moments usually get rushed as authors scramble to finish the story in as few pages as possible.  But, we get some really nice moments here.  Medusa had talked smack about Pete in an earlier issue, but, here, they're both recognized for saving the Universe, with no one else trying to pretend that they did it.  The final page, with its close-up shot of their memorial and Rocket Raccoon's quote ("Damn it, Pete.  Why'd you guys have to be such heroes?"), was the icing on the cake for me.  DnA took time to give us some closure, and the series is all the better for it.

5) That said, DnA definitely leave the door open to the heroes' return.  I mean, we did leave them with a functional Cosmic Cube and the full Nova Force.  If anyone would be able to make their way back into "our" Universe, it's those two.

Final Thoughts:  OK, DnA may have even surpassed "Annihilation" in terms of my favorite Marvel Cosmic event.  Although I'm totally bummed that Nova and Star-Lord are dead, DnA did it in a way that made sense in the context of the story and really drew together everything they've done with Marvel Cosmic.  However, they also added in some new twists and turns to keep it interesting and make it unique.  I mean, having an Evil Captain Marvel create a Universe devoted to worshiping evil demons just so he could avoid death?  Awesome.  I've always loved DnA's unbridled joy at resurrecting characters and concepts from the '70s and '80s, and bringing back a demonic version of Captain Marvel is a great example of that.  Like the best sitcoms, they end on a high note here, never resorting to telling terrible stories just to keep the money coming.  Hopefully, in a few years, they'll have a bunch of new ideas and we'll see our boys return.  For the time being, I'm just happy that I got to be along for the ride for all these issues.  So, in the end, thanks, DnA, for some of the best stories I've ever read and some of the best characters I've ever loved.