All-New X-Men Archives

Welcome to this week's Four-Color Bullet, the only comic book review column not getting a universe-spanning reboot. Let's look at the picks from this week. From the aforementioned folks at Marvel, the penultimate chapter of Spider-Verse is here, and the Inheritors may succeed in exterminating every Spider everywhere. The Spiders of the multiverse must rally or face their ultimate doom, in Amazing Spider-Man #13; Tony's actions become more questionable, and a beaten Daredevil tries to stop him, in Superior Iron Man #4; the X-Men continue their adventure with Miles Morales in the Ultimate Universe, in All-New X-Men #35 Over at DC, Batman and Robin are together again at last. But will the dynamic of the Dynamic Duo change now that Robin has super powers? Find out in Batman and Robin #38; the Amazo Virus has infected every member of the Justice League but one, and now Batman falls, in Justice League #38; Gotham City has a new crime-fighter! Introducing ... the Joker?! Find out in Batman '66 #52 And from IDW, Krang begins his invasion of Earth, and Donatello strikes a secret bargain with Shredder and the Foot for help, in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #42 Writer: Erik Burnham Artists: Nacho Arranz and Esther Sanz IDW PUBLISHING Back in 1999, the movie Galaxy Quest was a tongue-in-cheek, sci-fi action/adventure about the cast of a cancelled, cult-status, science-fiction television series called Galaxy Quest, who now spend their lives showing up at cons, dealing with their often-obsessed fans. Until, that is, an alien race called the Thermians watched the show, and believed it to be factual and historical. Believing that the actors were the real thing, the Thermians enlisted them in their fight against the alien despot Sarris, going so far as recreating the ship from the show, the NSEA Protector. It was a good movie, and funny, and had some lighthearted fun at Star Trek and its fans. Tim Allen played Jason Nesmith, who played Peter Quincy Taggart, captain of the Protector. Sigourney Weaver, Alan Rickman, Tony Shalhoub, Daryl Mitchell, who plays Tommy Laredo, a "Wesley Crusher" type character, now all grown up appearing at cons, and Sam Rockwell, who plays Guy Fleegman, who played a "redshirt" security guard that no one remembers on the show, rounds out the cast. For years, a sequel has been discussed but nothing ever came of it. Until IDW released Galaxy Quest: The Adventure Continues in comic book form. The story begins a few years after the actors' first adventure. Their actions in their fight against Sarris have affected another world, and there is a price to be paid. Erik Burnham, who is a favorite of mine from his work on IDW's fantastic Ghostbusters series, takes the writing duties on Galaxy Quest. And also like Ghostbusters, every character is written as we remember them from the movie. We're introduced to a new alien race, and we see the consequences of the Protector crew's actions concerning that race right off the bat. Some funny banter between the cast pretty much rounds out the issue, and it's a slow one. But I'm eager to see how the story plays out, as Burnham leaves us with a cliffhanger in the first issue. My only real dislike is the artistic portrayals of the characters. It's obvious that IDW wasn't given the rights to the likenesses of the actors, so Nesmith doesn't look like Tim Allen, Tawny Madison doesn't look like Weaver, etc. But artist Nacho Arranz doesn't do a great job showing differences in likenessses. Everyone looks like everyone else. I had to refer frequently to a "who's who" panel just to tell the difference between Nesmith and Dane Alexander, who plays the Spock-type character in the show, played by Rickman in the film. If it wasn't for the fact that Fleegman is drawn with facial hair, he'd look identical to everyone else. The rest of Arranz' work is good, however. Clean crisp scenery, action scenes nicely drawn. Just clean up those faces. In a nutshell, Galaxy Quest: The Adventure Continues #1 was faithful to the movie, but the pacing was slow and the art was mediocre at best. The second issue won't have to try very hard to be better than this one. And that concludes Four-Color Bullet for this week. Email and comment if you wish, and I'll be back next week with Wednesday's best. It's a good time to be a comics fan. See ya next week! -30-

SCI-FI for your WI-FI

Tag: All-New X-Men

Four-Color Bullet: ‘Galaxy Quest: The Journey Continues’ #1

Four-Color Bullet: ‘Wayward’ #5

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