Uber: Invasion #11 - Avatar Press

UBER: INVASION No. 11, January 2018

It’s hard to think of a more depressing narrative which disconcertingly deals with a stunning victory over a one-time seemingly insurmountable evil, than that penned by Kieron Gillen for Issue Eleven of “Uber: Invasion”. Indeed, Stephanie’s “good news” message to Battleship Colossus that the German’s invasion force of America has surrendered to the Allies is probably the last thing young Eamonn O'Connor wants to hear, considering the horrific physical mutilation this comic book’s demoralising conclusion has cost him.

Equally as dispiriting though is the fate bestowed upon the Afro-American super-soldiers Vernon and Freddie by the United States Military, who, perhaps because of their evident prejudicial unease concerning the duo’s racial background, coupled with the pair’s previously recorded unwillingness to blindly follow orders, have ensured that the brothers have squandered most of their active service deployed on the West Coast, sat within an army hangar hoping “that Yamato would engage Portland itself, and walk into the trap.”

This ‘waste’ of U.S.S. Bravo and U.S.S. Bluestone at a time when civilian war-time casualties are increasingly insurmountable as a result of Nazi halo attacks would be perturbing enough on its own. Yet the Kerrang! Award-winner really drives the U.S. Cruisers mishandling home by proclaiming that the Japanese Uber they were supposedly ‘targeting’ actually departed for Asia in a submarine sometime before both “the final German encounter near Oak Ridge” and their friend’s life-changing injuries. To make matters even worse, the British writer even takes the time to reinforce the Generals’ concerns regarding the two men’s professional discipline by having Daniel Gete pencil them arrogantly challenging an M.P. when he catches the couple gambling within their barracks; “Yeah, we shouldn’t. Yet here we are.”

Of course all these quibbles are just a side-show compared to the main event between U.S.S. Colossus and his Third Reich rival, Siegmund. In fact, in many ways this entire publication's run has been geared towards the two fully-activated battleships cataclysmically confronting one another ever since Gillen first scripted the youngster surviving Miyoko Yoshiuki’s attack upon Okinawa, during the title’s first series. Disappointingly however, the pair appear to have been destined never to properly fight, with Razor receiving his gratuitous injuries as a result of specifically saving his defecting opponent’s life, rather than having them inflicted upon him during the heat of battle.

The regular cover art of "UBER: INVASION" No. 11 by Daniel Gete