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| PLANET HULK No. 1, July 2015 |
Despite Senior Editor Mark Paniccia’s back page
assurances to the contrary, it is very easy to believe that many of this
“Secret Wars” tie-in title’s 72,868 readers in May 2015 thought “Planet Hulk”
was going to be little more than a dissatisfyingly goofy magazine whose only
real selling points were “perhaps the greatest Marvel Team-Up yet” of Captain
America and Devil Dinosaur, and the fact that the storyline was set upon a
“Battleworld” island which was populated by numerous incarnations of Doctor
Bruce Banner’s famous green-hued alter ego. For whilst Sam Humphries’ actual
narrative concerns a rather serious assassination mission by Steve Rogers in
order to save the life of his long-time friend Bucky Barnes, the tales’s cringingly-corny
place names, such as Gamma Lake, She-Hulk Shore, Port Banner and Barrens of the
Tribal Hulks are at best uninspiring.
Fortunately however, once the Minneapolis-born writer’s script
moves beyond the shield-carrying Killiseum gladiator’s victory over “the
Wolverine clan”, and the Captain’s subsequent attempt to feed Arcade to his prehistoric
partner, matters become far less “crazy-cool” and actually settle down into a
somewhat enthralling adventure involving “the themes of friendship… loyalty,
idealism and nobility.”
Indeed the American author’s characterisation of an
especially sinister Sheriff of Agamotto, who seems to revel in the pain and
anguish of the chained former living legend during a tense scene set within “the
heart of Doomstadt”, is particularly well-penned. Especially when events within
the “Secret Wars” mini-series itself reveal that Stephen Strange knows very well who
his captive formerly was before Earth-1610 and Earth-616 collided and yet still
appears to smirk and evilly grin as the scarred ‘super-soldier’ is forced to
bow before Doctor Doom in humble obedience; “The people love to see you fight.
But they will love another. You breath now only by the grace of Doom. Since the day
of your birth, you have owed your life to Doom.”
Marc Laming’s artwork is also rather pleasing to the eye,
most notably his wonderful illustrations of Jack Kirby’s red reptile, even if
some of the Englishman’s actual layouts, such as when Devil Dinosaur supposedly
‘gulps up’ Arcade and Captain America, don’t necessarily clearly convey what’s
actually happening upon the first read.
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| The regular cover art of "PLANET HULK" No. 1 by Michael Del Mundo |
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