By Peter David, ChrissCross & various (Marvel Comics)
ISBN 0-7851-0791-6
This character has one of the most convoluted back stories in comics so if you are unfamiliar with him this might be a tad confusing for a first exposure, but light, fun super-hero comics are rare, so it is worth considering.
Captain Marvel was a soldier for a pan-galactic civilisation called the Kree. He was dispatched to Earth on a reconnaissance mission after the Fantastic Four destroyed a robotic Kree Sentinel left on Earth thousands of years previously. Adopting an Earth identity he spied on mankind but became increasingly disenchanted by Kree Imperialism and “went nativeâ€, becoming one of Earth’s greatest heroes.
Due to a cosmic accident his atoms were merged with professional sidekick Rick Jones. Only one of them could occupy space in our universe at a time, whilst the other was suspended in the anti-matter dimension called the Negative Zone. By striking together the “Nega†wristbands they each wore one could trade atoms with the other and live part of a single existence. Eventually they escaped their fate and separated. After saving the world and the universe a few times Captain Marvel died.
After his death his lover used his genetic material to create a son, named Genis (or sometimes Legacy) and he ultimately acquired the Negabands and inherited the title. He also found himself bonded to the cosmically unlucky Jones in the same situation his father had to endure – switching atoms and leading half a life. This incarnation devolves directly out of Avengers Forever (ISBN: 0-7851-0756-8) and reprints issues #0 and 1-6 of the third volume of the monthly comic – I said it was confusing, right? Now read on…
Bonded together, Jones and Genis are currently back on Earth and trying to reach an accommodation but the “Cosmically-Aware†hero is battling menaces and monsters that no-one can see, and the resultant collateral destruction is making the wrong sort of headlines. Either that or Genis is delusional and a menace himself…
There are guest appearances by The Hulk, Moondragon, Drax the Destroyer, and the Micronauts in a light-hearted and very funny string of adventures from Peter David, ChrissCross, Ron Lim, James Fry, Walden Wong, Mark McKenna and Nelson Decastro, and although this really is a treat for long-time fans with a good grounding in Marvel Minutiae, the determined neophyte might be rewarded with a hearty laugh and some angst-free thrills.
This volume includes a brief recap-cum-scorecard section so newbies might feel it’s worth a shot…
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