Recently I did a blog post comparing and contrasting Jack Kirby's "Forever People" #1 with the relatively recent New 52 "Infinity Man & the Forever People" #1. Welp, I recently scored Joe Casey, Nathan Fox, Jim Rugg, and Ulises Farinas's "Captain Victory and the Galactic Rangers" #1, published by Dynamite. I read it yesterday, and I'm still not sure whether I like it or not. Anyway, I figured that if you're gonna walk in the footsteps of the greatest talent that ever graced our amazing medium with his genius, then you might as well stand in the reflection of that presence. Kirby's 70s work was never well received (GRAAAAAAAA!!!!!), and his 80s work even less so (even I have trouble defending it when I'm in one of my stupider moods), so Captain Victory was never hailed as a great work of comic art. But "weak" Kirby is still better than anything Marvel's published in the last decade (yeah, I said it. Prove me wrong), so there's that. Anyway, we'll do this the same way, I'll do a Kirby page, then a page of the new Joe Casey book, and we'll see what we end up with.
Kirby's Captain Victory Page 1: Splash Page. Captain Victory standing in front of a classic Kirby exploding universal motif. We get a fair amount of bombastic dialogue and text that explains nothing. Still, looks cool.
Casey's Captain Victory Page 1: 3 stack horizontal panels, 3 panels on bottom. I have no idea what I'm looking at in the artwork. Just a bunch of colors, really. Text block in the third panel tells us the fearsome warrior Mekkanos has tracked down and attacked the Dreadnaught: Tiger, and its leader, Captain Victory.
Kirby CV Page 2: 1-2-2 Panel Page. Captain Victory and Klavus discussing something. They are obviously on a space ship. Slow start for a Kirby comic.
Casey CV Page 2: Part of a double page splash. There is a shot of the Dreadnaught: Tiger (presumably). Under attack (I think). The words "Fire" "Bomb" "Kill" "Dead" form the panel borders. It looks neat, but I'm not entirely sure what's going on.
Kirby CV Page 3: 1-1 Panel Page. We get a shot of Tallant IV, a nice little planet. On the lower panel, we see that the planet has become a withered, lifeless husk.
Casey CV Page 3: I bunch of unrelated panels. There's a robot head, a swirly man, I don't know, an eye, an explosion, a hand reaching for a burnt hand. There's words, and an upside down Captain Victory yelling about how Blackmass is pulling Mekkanos' strings. I seriously have no idea what's going on.
Kirby CV Page 4: 4 panel page. Captain Victory and Klavus discussing their plan of action. Captain Victory heads for the bridge, despite the fact that Klavus warns him that that is where the attack will be focused. Again, surprisingly slow start to a Kirby comic.
Casey CV Page 4: 2-1-2 panel page. The bridge of the Dreadnaught as its under attack. We get introductions to the command crew of the Dreadnaught, namely Klavus, Tarin, Orca, and Mister Mind. The redesigns on everyone are actually pretty cool.
Kirby CV Page 5: 1-2 panel page. The crew of Victory's spaceship scrambling in preparation for battle. Captain Victory is outfitted with a portable command post, which looks kind of like a TeeVee you wear as a helmet. Ridiculous? Sure, but also very Kirby.
Casey CV Page 5: 1-2-1-1 panel page. There's an explosion and Captain Victory is incinerated and dies. Boom! Cool page.
Kirby CV Page 6: Splash Page. Captain Victory with his crazy box helmet on relaying commands while the crew of the ship continue to scramble. Cool page.
Casey CV Page 6: 2-1-4 page. Lots of close ups and yelling. There's stuff about Body Banks (which contain clones of Captain Victory), and a Body Bank explodes. All the yelling reminds me of something out of Star Trek.
Kirby CV Page 7: Part of a double page spread. Enemy ships explode out of the dead planet! The crew beg Captain Victory to leave the bridge, but the Cap will have none of that nonsense.
Casey CV Page 7: 1-2-3 Panel Page. Captain Victory's memories are downloaded into a new clone body. Two bodies are ejected into space. Klavus calls for a Star Drive to escape.
Kirby CV Page 8: Other half of double page spread. Troops scrambling and there's a giant cannon on the bridge. I love these kind of Kirby pages.
Casey CV Page 8: 2-1-1-2-1 Panel Page. The ship warps out. Klavus and Tarin check the wreckage of the Body Bank, and decide they need to try to find the Captain Victory clone bodies that got ejected.
Kirby CV Page 9: 1-1-2 Panel Page. There's an explosion on deck and Captain Victory is killed (whoa, de ja vu...). Tarin calls for Restorative Surgery, while Klavus assumes command and order all batteries to step it up to Rapid Fire!
Casey CV Page 10: 2-2-3 Panel Page. A flashback to Captain Victory first assuming command and discovering that he's got a bunch of Clone bodies as part of the job. Then Klavus kills him in a scene reminiscent of the scene from Fantastic Four when Dr. Doom steals the Silver Surfer's powers. I assume it was intentional.
Kirby CV Page 11: 1-1 Panel Page. Laser cannons Fire! Enemy Ships EXPLODE! BOOM!
Casey CV Page 11: 1-1 Panel Page. A trippy page about Captain Victory dying and being reincarnated. Very cool looking page. Thumbs up to Jim Rugg. I should look for more of his work later on.
Kirby CV Page 12: 1-2-2 Panel Page. The space battle continues, meanwhile, the enemy leader, the Lightning Lady escapes in a spaceship from the hidden side of the planet. I gotta admit, I have absolutely no idea why a race of Evil Alien Bugs would have a Lightning Woman as their leader. That makes no sense. Very Kirbycrazy.
Casey CV Page 12: 1-2-3-1 Panel Page. Captain Victory awakens in his new body. Not much to it, but, again, the page looks nice.
Kirby CV Page 13: 1-2 Panel Page. Lightning Lady and her crew of bug men discuss what to do next. Apparently, the ship is powered by the Lightning Lady herself. Maybe that's why she's the leader. Huh. Anyway, Kirbycrazy.
Casey CV Page 13: 1-2-1-1-1 Panel Page. Back in the present, the crew discuss the missing clones. Across the universe, a comet crashlands on what looks like Earth.
Kirby CV Page 14: 2-3-2 Panel Page. The Bug People discuss where to go. Sounds like they're heading for a certain familiar rock...
Casey CV Page 14: 5-1-3 Panel Page. What looks like a young Captain Victory climbs aboard a trash boat and passes out.
Kirby CV Page 15: Splash Page. One of Kirby's infamous Collage Pages. Yep, the Insect Men are heading for Earth.
Casey CV Page 15: 1-1-1-1-1 Panel Page. A naked child flies through the clouds. Wha?
Kirby CV Page 16: 2-1-2 Panel Page. The aliens (called the Insectons) head for Earth. Meanwhile, in the sick bay of the giant ranger vessel, Captain Victory's personality and memories are downloaded to a new Clone body.
Casey CV Page 16: 1-1-1-1 Panel Page. Uh, burning babies, and a giant Mister Mind. A kid wakes up. Trippy.
Kirby CV Page 17: 2-2-2 Panel Page. The newly awakened Captain Victory discusses the results of the battle with Klavus.
Casey CV Page 17: Half of a splash page. There's a cityscape and the boy is all ghostly and I have no idea what I'm looking at.
Kirby CV Page 18: 2-2-1 Panel Page. Captain Victory decides to use a WORLD KILLER to destroy the broken planet Tallant IV. Yeah. I'll say it again... WOOOOOORLD KILLLLLLER!!!!!!
Casey CV Page 18: Other half of the splash page.
Kirby CV Page 19: 1-1-2 Panel Page: The World Killer (which is an awesome Kirby Machine, by the by) is launched into Tallant IV. The ship gets ready to jump to Light Speed.
Casey CV Page 19: 2-1-3-1 Panel Page. The boy awakens in a room where he is looked after by a guy who kinda looks like Klavus. Coincidence?
Kirby CV Page 20: 2-2-2 Panel Page. Okay, for some reason, when the ship jumps to light speed, you either have to sleep for 100 years, or hang onto handles on the wall. Whaaaaaa???? I will freely admit, this sequence has never made any sense to me. Although I do think it's kind of a funny idea that people are blasting through hyperspace desperately hanging onto hand grips. Anyway, goofy page.
Casey CV Page 20: 1-2-2 Panel Page. The crew is still trying to figure out what to do. Also, they figure out that there's two clones floating around in space somewhere.
Kirby CV Page 21: 3-1-2 Panel Page. Tallant IV explodes.
Casey CV Page 21: 1-1-1 Panel Page. A comet crashes down on what looks like a wrecked industrialized world. Yokay.
Kirby CV Page 22: 1-2-2 Panel Page. Mister Mind shows up and tells the Captain and Klavus that the Insectons headed for Earth.
Casey CV Page 22: 1-2-1-1-1 Panel Page. A couple of aliens in grungy cloaks inspect the impact, while creepy drones float in the sky.
Kirby CV Page 23: 2-2 Panel Page. The crew prepares to head for Earth, and we learn a little about Mr. Mind.
Casey CV Page 23: 1-1 Panel Page. A twisted, burnt up clone of Captain Victory emerges from the wreckage. The End.
Kirby CV Page 24: Uh, hard to describe the panels on this one. Moving on... We're on Earth, and a couple of small town cops run into Captain Victory.
Kirby CV Page 25-26: A double page spread: The massive Dreadnaught Tiger emerges from cloaking and fills the night sky, immediately firing on a distant mesa. WOOOOOOO!!!!!!!
So, what do I think, now that I've been through both books?
Well, I kinda like Joe Casey's Captain Victory more now than I did when I read it yesterday. There's some really cool, really trippy artwork, which I like. The story is almost a shorthand version of Kirby's Captain Victory #1, but there's that whole subplot with the missing Clones, which I'm not sure I'm into. There's some cool stuff here, but there's also a lot of confusing storytelling and a whole plot that I'm not sure works. I'm a little worried this is gonna be another excuse for Joe Casey to twiddle his thumbs and pontificate on stuff, instead of a bad ass cosmic war comic featuring the adventures of Captain Victory and his bizarre crew. Still, I liked it better than DC's Infinity Man. I'll give it an issue or two.
As for Kirby's Captain Victory... well, it's Kirby. It's cool. I mean, that shot of the Dreadnaught Tiger is cooler than anything Marvel's done since... well, since Kirby stopped working for them. It's a little slow by Kirby standards, and some of it is just so odd... but I like odd. Although I consider the 80s stuff to be somewhat weak, it still gave us some really cool, killer stuff. So there's that.
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