Yunno, I’m not sure why I have these.  I think I was going through my LCS’ back issue stash during one of their Shortboxtober promotions a year or two ago and threw them in there because I thought they might be fun to read.  I’d heard about the Damage Control series and I did like just about everything I’d read by Dwayne McDuffie, so why not, right?

The only problem here is that I have two parts to two four-part miniseries.  One of them is part of the larger “Acts of Vengeance” storyline for which I have no context beyond knowing that this is where Psylocke went from being British to Asian in the pages of the X-Men.  The other features the New Warriors and is a riff on the Infinity Gauntlet/War/Crusade crossovers that Jim Starlin was writing at the time.  I also knew that it was supposed to be played for laughs, so I went in expecting something along the lines of the BWAH-HA-HA era Justice League or perhaps Ambush Bug.

It works in places and doesn’t work in others.  I was really lost when it came to the second series, probably because of my lack of context with “Acts of Vengeance”.  But the third series was pretty fun, and maybe that’s because it didn’t have to tie into the then-current Marvel Universe events.  The New Warriors are a goofball of a team, at least at that point, and in issue #4 of that series, McDuffie is clearly having a lot of fun with the Marvel Cosmic stuff.

The art by Ernie Colon is solid, although it’s not his best work.  I found him to be way more solid on Amethyst and The Underworld over at DC, but here it’s like he’s trying to do a cross between Keith Giffen, Fred Hembeck, and maybe something you’d see in Mad or Cracked and it doesn’t always work.  Still, his ability to make the climax of volume three–a meeting between cosmic beings where they hash out their differences–fun and funny to read is definitely commendable.

All in all, it’s a split decision on these.  I’m not interested in pursuing anything from the second volume.  They were fun, and there’s some decent She-Hulk stuff in there, but I kind of shrugged at it.  Volume three is a series I’d like to complete because it does seem to be deliberately off the rails at points.

Keep, Sell, Donate, or Trash?

Volume 2:  Donate.  Volume 3:  Keep.