Remember
the good old days when you could expect a sixty-four page comic of your
favorite title once a year? And back in
the day (1991) it only cost $2.00!
That’s at least half the price of most comics nowadays ($3.00 less than
most Marvel comics). Ah the good old
days.
The
best thing about this issue (in my opinion) is that it’s written and drawn by
Jim Valentino. That means that Valentino
created not only the twelve 22 page issues that comprise a normal year’s worth
of publishing, but also found the time to write and draw a 64 page annual. Now I was not collecting the book when it was
released so I have no idea if the regular series was delayed while Valentino
worked on the annual, but I highly doubt it.
In twenty years we went from this (which was not the norm but far more
standard practice) to artists that could not finish six issues a year. Oh I miss the good old days.
The
real question here is, how is the comic?
Is it rushed or low quality because Valentino is also trying to push out
a monthly series? That’s the main thing
I will be trying to discern throughout this review.
These
annuals were usually so large and so much was packed into them that they needed
a table of contents/title page. This is
for a 64 page comic. Nowadays, 20 page
Marvel comics have title pages, sometimes spread out over two pages. Okay, sorry.
Enough of me showing how far comics has gone down the tubes and onto the
actual comic itself. Because the
Guardians of the Galaxy series started in the middle, with the team already
formed and on a mission, the Annual smartly goes back in time with its first
feature and tells the origin story of the team.
This is something that has been mentioned a few times before but was
never expanded upon like it is here. It’s
still only three pages in the Annual but Valentino packs a lot of information
into those three pages.
The
next story, the one that takes up the majority of the space in this issue, has
to do with the Korvac saga. Korvac is a
near god-like villain from the Avengers comic in the late 1980s (a comic that
the Guardians guest-starred in). This
annual seems to be one of the cross-over annuals that Marvel was fond of
producing in the 80s and 90s where each annual told a complete story, but they
were also part of a larger overarching narrative that, when pieced together,
created a huge story. Not many of these
were too memorable as I doubt the writers wanted to waste a really good story
on a bunch of annuals that readers may or may not pick up. 
The
main gist of this story is that the Guardians have gone back in time to try and
stop Korvac from being Korvac. To talk
some sense into him or strong arm him into not being a total douche. Korvac actually stole Galactus’ power and is
using it to make himself near omnipotent.
The Guardians get a shock when they go to confront Korvac and find that
they are instead confronting his father (Korvac is in the process of being
born) who wields the same power. What
the Guardians come to find out is that Korvac is more of a parasite than just a
normal villain. The power transfers from
the father to the son upon the son’s birth, killing the father. Dr. Strange and his apprentice, Krugarr, show
up and encase the baby in a bubble of mystic energy so that they can deliver
him to Galactus. Galactus doesn’t care
about the child as much as he does getting his power back (which he does) and
after that the Guardians have to deal with the moral quandary of letting the
baby live to grow up and become their enemy, and one that will do massive
amounts of destruction. It’s the same
philosophical argument people have when it comes to time travel. Would you go back in time and kill Hitler as
a child? Rick Remender (I believe) stole
the same plot for Uncanny X-Force a few years ago but involved baby
Apocalypse.
The
Guardians choose not to destroy the baby, instead delivering him back to his
mother, while also telling her that the father did not make it. As we leave her, we hear her telling the
child that he needs to grow up and take revenge on the Guardians for the death
of his father. I’m not sure if Valentino
is subtly telling us that women are the root of all evil, but I’m not totally
ruling it out either. Finally, just to
prove that all of this happens before the first issue of the regular series,
their mission for Captain America’s shield is set up in the closing pages of
this story. 
Next up
we have some interesting extra bits. I’m
not sure if Valentino jus needed extra stuff because he didn’t have enough
story pages or if this was by design, but it was an interesting addition. We get, in order: The difference between
Vance Astro and Marvel Boy, Guardians of the Galaxy Clip and Save villain
trading cards, a page explaining the friends of the Guardians, a pinup page of
Aleta, a double page spread of the team, explaining who they are, Charlie and
Nikki paper dolls (no really), Questions and answers about Starhawk and facts
about Martinex. This is one of the
better ways that I have seen to fill the space of an annual, and Valentino does
a great job of treating each page with the same care in terms of story and art
that he does with the regular story pages.
Our
final story is a prequel that goes back even further. This one seems to fit between the first two
stories, where the core four Guardians (Vance, Charlie, Yondu and Martinex) are
together but not yet officially the Guardians and without the other
members. The team is not cohesive as a
unit yet either and that comes through in their minor squabbles. This story shows how they got not only their
original costumes, but also their first ship.
They apparently lucked into an underwater base that not only has a
breathable atmosphere but also plenty of food and supplies for the team to live
for months.
All in
all, this was more than just a fill-in throw away book. It actually filled in a lot of information
that we missed out on coming into the series like we did. I don’t know about the rest of the annuals
(which we will get to) but the first one was required reading if you were a fan
of the series. Valentino does a great
job of staying consistent in terms of the story and art and also shows us
growth of character from one story to the next by cluing us in to just how
dysfunctional these guys were before they actually came together as a
team. A great effort with some really
impressive and unanticipated extras.
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