Wednesday, September 24, 2014

Guardians of the Galaxy #18 (HERE BE SPOILERS!)

Can I just say how nice it is to have the band back together?  Peter and Rich, joking about splitting rent on an apartment in downtown Cancerverse?  Drax being all crazy in his pursuit of killing Thanos?  [Sigh.]  I miss the old days.

Bendis doesn't actually reveal Nova's fate in this issue.  Instead, we see the moments leading to said fateful moment.  Peter begins to wonder if he's going to do more harm than good if he uses the Cube to kill Thanos, given the fact that Thanos himself never seemed to wield it correctly.  It leads Peter to hesitate in killing Thanos, and Thanos pounces on his uncertainty.

Bendis does a great job of showing us Peter's conflicting emotions as Thanos tells him that he might've been willing to die at some point, but he now wants to live.  Thanos offers to save him and his friends if he'll give him the Cube and, despite his assertions to the contrary, you can tell Peter considers it.  Although Peter doesn't buy it in the end, he's still unable to do the deed and the Cube beginning to assert its power over him as Rich tries to get him to drop it.

At first, I thought that we were going to discover that Peter accidentally sent himself, Drax, and Thanos home after Rich tells him to take Drax and flee.  It would've been an unconscious sin, the Cube plucking the wish from his mind.  But, it seems like it's going to be worse than that, that Peter willingly throws in his lot with Thanos.  We shall see.

My only real complaint about this issue is that it probably should've been a double-sized one.  The story ends at a key moment, but not one that lends itself to a cliff-hanger.  The momentum is just getting started, and it would've probably been better to keep it going until the final reveal.  But, I guess we're going to have to wait until next month instead.  

*** (three of five stars)

No comments:

Post a Comment