In our
continuing look at the saga of the true
Guardians of the Galaxy (the one without the talking tree or Bradley Cooper) we
bring you issue two of the Jim Valentino series in which shit just got real. Instead of giving a breakdown of the cover,
story and art (because it’s not like that will really influence your decision
to purchase a comic nearly twenty-five years old anyway) I’ll provide more of a
synopsis of the story that will include quips about the story and art in it as
well from here on out.
Taserface,
while being a stupid name and sporting a silly-designed costume, does seem to
be a badass character, on the cover at least.
In the interior though, he is pretty much incapacitated after getting
his ass kicked in the last issue. What
we do get to see is a good number of The Stark amassing upon the Guardians of
the Galaxy, attempting to return the favor.
The Stark seem to be doing a decent job of it as well (and if you
haven’t read issue one yet, within the first few pages Valentino will catch you
up on all you need to know) as they take out both Vance Astro and Yondu (who is
then left at the mercy of the local populace, who is none too friendly. Astro’s suit is damaged which exposes his
thousand year old skin to the elements, where it starts to age immediately
(kind of like credit card interest after a special promotional period
ends). This is halted by Martinex who
puts a sheath of ice over the wound, encasing it and preventing it from being
exposed to the air.
It's just a 1000 year old flesh wound.
Before
we can see what happens to these team members, we are hurtled into space and
come across Firelord. Remember him? Herald of Galactus? Don’t worry if you don’t he’s only seen for
two panels and looks to be there to move us from the action on the planet to
the introduction of everyone’s favorite peeping tom: Uatu, The Watcher. The one good thing about Uatu is that he is a
treasure trove of knowledge and a go-to explanation of previous events. Because this comic takes place in the 31st
century, Uatu plays a very important part in giving us the entire history of
The Stark. Valentino actually makes this
work incredibly well and instead of some contrived flashback sequence, we
get Uatu telling us a story.
Thanks
Uatu, you’re a peach.
Once we
learn the story of The Stark (which is basically a cautionary tale of over-industrialization)
we are taken back to the action where we learn that in the society of The
Stark, women rule, which is why the warriors fighting the Guardians are taking
it easy on Nikki apparently. Charlie-27,
the bruiser of the group then calls out to Starhawk (the “one-who-knows” who
apparently didn’t know this tidbit of info) to change into Aleta, his wife that
shares his body (don’t ask, I don’t remember the explanation). Starhawk immediately changes because, well,
the guy with the fists and low center of gravity told him to. That would be akin to The Thing telling Mr.
Fantastic how to get to the Negative Zone, right? Okay, I’ll suspend that logic for a bit. It does work though as Aleta starts to beat
on the flying Stark until she accidentally kills one. She is so bent out of shape over this that
it’s quite possible that the whole superhero gig is not really the thing for
her. Seriously, I know a huge part of
superhero comics is to avoid senseless killing (at least it used to be, thanks
Mark Millar) but to have someone so bent out of shape that someone she hit died
shows a character flaw that should probably remove her from the superhero
game.
At this
point, we see that Taserface has been stripped of his moniker for falling in
battle. How is this not a good
thing? With a name like Taserface, I’d
let my opponents win more than this year’s Houston Astros. Apparently the only way for Taserface to
reclaim his name is to kill Aleta for killing one of the Stark. At this point the creepy Stark leader makes
it a point to mention that Aleta would “join my sister-Stark in Hades”. Little did we know that Iron Man’s armor also
came with a full collection of Greek Mythology.
Who knew Tony Stark was so well-read.
We are
then given quick updates on Vance Astro (he’s fine, just can’t move his right
arm) and Yondu (still lying on the ground under the knife of the universe’s
slowest assassin) before Taserface grabs Nikki and threatens to Nikki unless
the Guardians surrender. No wonder
Taserface is so lowly regarded in the Stark community, he can’t even grab the
right girl. Then we are treated to the
obligatory ‘everyone stand with your mouth hanging open’ shot. At this point Aleta decides to change back to
Starhawk because her powers are pretty lame in comparison, and as she is doing
that she is shot by all of the lasers in the Stark arsenal. 
We’ll
have to wait until next time to find out what happens, because not only is
there one, but two cliffhangers to this issue (remember Yondu, he’s not dead
yet). Valentino does a great job with
the story, moving it along while filling it full of details to fully flesh it
out, while the art is still very good, even though the designs of the Stark are
fairly primitive and the overuse of shots of half of a character’s face become
more of a distraction 
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