Comics this week

Dark Reign: The Hood #1- When we first saw Parker Robbins in his first mini-series, he was at first a criminal on the low end of the criminal totem pole. After he got the Hood, he worked his way up the totem pole. Then the series ended and when we next saw him, he was the Kingpin of Super-villains. That’s a big jump and I like the fact that Jeff Parker tried to explain how he managed to jump so high so fast. I also like the fact that Parker Robbins got some of his reluctance back. In the original Hood miniseries, he was a reluctant criminal who constantly got into trouble more often than not due to the company he kept. In the Avengers, he was a boss who thought nothing of shooting Wolverine’s balls off to get away. I like the original version better and that seems to be what Jeff Parker is trying to do to some degree. I’ll be back to see if he managed to do that.

Guardians of the Galaxy #14- I’m not a big fan of tie-ins. However Guardians of the Galaxy #13 was a good tie-in to the ongoing War of Kings, so I was hoping the same will happen this issue. Not quite but close enough. Continuing from last issue, we see the 2 Guardians groups attempting to put a stop to the escalating war. Warlock took on Vulcan after being separated from the rest of his group and while he lost, he did push the ridiculous Vulcan further than…oh ever. Star-Lord’s group got into more trouble than expected as the Inhumans refused to parlay and Phyla-Vell showed that she got a new personality more befitting her new name of Martyr. Look like the Guardians of the Galaxy are in a world of hurt next issue.

Nova #25- After too long of an arc, Richard Rider is back as Nova. Although it was fun seeing him trying to come to grips with the Quantum Bands, Richard works nest as Nova not Quasar. Writers Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning seems to have plans for the new Nova Corps which is good because I like to have the Corps back. The Worldmind is back too but it had to shut down and reboot, so it is using a new template to communicate with Rider. Not sure about that because I like the old version just fine. But more interaction between the mostly clueless Rider and the too-much-information Worldmind is always a good thing in my book. Now that Richard Rider is back as Nova and we are back in space, hopefully the series will get back on track.