Uber: Invasion #17 - Avatar Press

UBER: INVASION No. 17, October 2018

There’s debatably a perturbingly palpable aura of hurried haste to the penmanship of this twenty-two page periodical which must have unnerved many in its audience, and unhappily given them the impression that the ongoing series’ British creator was probably desperate to bring his depiction of “an alternate World War II in which the Third Reich develops powerful superhuman soldiers” to as quick an end as possible. Indeed, artist Daniel Gete’s Propaganda Poster Cover illustration for Issue Seventeen of “Uber: Invasion” even comes boldly emblazoned with the wording “Let’s Finish The Job!” on it, as a triumphant super-swift Zephyr faces the Nazi remnants.

Sadly however, such a panicky pace to this comic’s narrative doesn’t arguably allow the GLAAD Media Award-winner to properly explore all the interactions between his large cast of characters as he would ordinarily, and as a result this book swiftly sees the disappointing demise of both the Allies’ latest acquisition, the defector Werner, as well as Japan’s sole Battleship, Yamato, in quick succession. Admittedly, these battle-worn Ubermensch had been somewhat relegated to the side-lines for this publication’s previous few instalments, and were in “far from perfect condition”, even if Gete’s does mistakenly pencil Siegmund with two arms instead of one as the disabled German crash-lands into a partially demolished Tokyo. But that doesn’t mean that a potentially promising lengthy bout between the two super-powered behemoths should have been substituted for a more ‘readily-condensed’ plot involving a uranium bomb which had apparently been previously “dropped on Hiroshima”, and the wheelchair bound Miyoko having his head simply removed from his shoulders by Cruisers Bravo and Bluestone.

Equally as unenjoyable is this book’s cumbersome conclusion, which arrives so abruptly that it doubtless had many bibliophiles flipping through its numerous back-paged “Crossed Trades” advertisements, unsuccessfully searching for the storyline’s final few panels. As aforementioned, this publication contains a couple of notable culminations already, yet when it comes to depicting Vernon and Freddy Rivers’ raid of the Imperial Palace and “the fanatical resistance” thrown at the Americans by the Japanese, the publication’s readers aren’t shown any of the animated action whatsoever, and are instead merely presented with an inauspiciously brief look at the Emperor recording a message for broadcast before being “extracted successfully within the hour.”

The regular cover art of "UBER: INVASION" No. 17 by Daniel Gete