XO Manowar #9 Discussion

[pixierosa]

I'm also really glad I nabbed a pull-box variant... Really loving that Nord cover! SonicDan - is that on your art hit-list?

I got the pull-box, too. It's gorgeous.

I can't imagine what Nord would charge for this one... Are you FB friends with him? He posts his sketches and inks from time to time. There's some lovely flashback scenes coming up.

[Dr. Solar]

<snip> Maybe he will get absorbed into the armor and become integrated with its systems. I don't know...just speculating.

seriously hope not...it's already been done...

Errr... so has X-O Manowar.

[vaevictis]

I hope not either, but simply from the point that I don't see any reason to do it. Of course, I will leave all that up to the writers. They have been doing a great job so far and obviously read this board. Which also means that they are at least privy to our likes and dislikes.

[myron]

<snip> Maybe he will get absorbed into the armor and become integrated with its systems. I don't know...just speculating.

seriously hope not...it's already been done...

Errr... so has X-O Manowar.

true...but IMO it was after that point in the first go-round where X-O started falling flat...

[BugsySig]

I think it's more likely Aric becomes integrated with Shanhara then the other way around.

[carter3175]

Just read it and again I am very please and a proud supporter. This insane how they kick out these quality books!

[Dr. Solar]

<snip> Maybe he will get absorbed into the armor and become integrated with its systems. I don't know...just speculating.

seriously hope not...it's already been done...

Errr... so has X-O Manowar.

true...but IMO it was after that point in the first go-round where X-O started falling flat...

I meant my comment in jest, but I hear you. I think that the X-O series falling flat after the Pol-Bekhara incident was more correlation than it was causation. There was a drastic and noticeable shift in quality right after the Wolfbridge affair.

[grendeljd]

I'm also really glad I nabbed a pull-box variant... Really loving that Nord cover! SonicDan - is that on your art hit-list?

I got the pull-box, too. It's gorgeous.

I can't imagine what Nord would charge for this one... Are you FB friends with him? He posts his sketches and inks from time to time. There's some lovely flashback scenes coming up.

I follow him on Twitter - I think he posts his pics with Instagram, so I would imagine I'm seeing the same stuff as on FB? It's fun to see the pics of drawings as he works on them.

I would expect that cover art would fetch a hefty sum... $800-$1000 is a fairly standard starting point for an 8.5x11 color image in the general illustration industry, adjusted up or down based on demand for the artist & actual size - I wonder if this is on 11x17 illustration board?

Its really an incredible piece - the kinetic energy & gesture of the figures is just...

[pixierosa]

I'm also really glad I nabbed a pull-box variant... Really loving that Nord cover! SonicDan - is that on your art hit-list?

I got the pull-box, too. It's gorgeous.

I can't imagine what Nord would charge for this one... Are you FB friends with him? He posts his sketches and inks from time to time. There's some lovely flashback scenes coming up.

I follow him on Twitter - I think he posts his pics with Instagram, so I would imagine I'm seeing the same stuff as on FB? It's fun to see the pics of drawings as he works on them.

I would expect that cover art would fetch a hefty sum... $800-$1000 is a fairly standard starting point for an 8.5x11 color image in the general illustration industry, adjusted up or down based on demand for the artist & actual size - I wonder if this is on 11x17 illustration board?

Its really an incredible piece - the kinetic energy & gesture of the figures is just...

I'm willing to place money that it is on illustration board. It is a beautiful piece. I use it for my desktop background.

[chriskay99]

Great issue. Really love how this book is shaping up thus far.

I also made the pullbox cover my wallpaper at work. Such an awesome piece.

I didn't really follow X-O in VH1 so forgive my ignorant question -- but in the VH1, was there any belief in being "worthy" of wearing the X-O armor or did someone simply need to be in possession of the ring? They brought up the whole "worthiness" / worship thing in this issue so it got me curious about the original.

[Phoenix8008]

Great issue. Really love how this book is shaping up thus far.

I also made the pullbox cover my wallpaper at work. Such an awesome piece.

I didn't really follow X-O in VH1 so forgive my ignorant question -- but in the VH1, was there any belief in being "worthy" of wearing the X-O armor or did someone simply need to be in possession of the ring? They brought up the whole "worthiness" / worship thing in this issue so it got me curious about the original.

Whoever wore the ring was the one in charge of the armor, at least until Aric's second armor was created using a human host and an X-O seed. That experiment didn't work out so well.

[grendeljd]

I'm also really glad I nabbed a pull-box variant... Really loving that Nord cover! SonicDan - is that on your art hit-list?

I got the pull-box, too. It's gorgeous.

I can't imagine what Nord would charge for this one... Are you FB friends with him? He posts his sketches and inks from time to time. There's some lovely flashback scenes coming up.

I follow him on Twitter - I think he posts his pics with Instagram, so I would imagine I'm seeing the same stuff as on FB? It's fun to see the pics of drawings as he works on them.

I would expect that cover art would fetch a hefty sum... $800-$1000 is a fairly standard starting point for an 8.5x11 color image in the general illustration industry, adjusted up or down based on demand for the artist & actual size - I wonder if this is on 11x17 illustration board?

Its really an incredible piece - the kinetic energy & gesture of the figures is just...

I'm willing to place money that it is on illustration board. It is a beautiful piece. I use it for my desktop background.

I'm curious about the medium too... It looks like either all pastel or some of that mixed with water colour or gauche. Pastel would be tough to preserve & avoid smudging unless it is sealed! Could you imagine buying this and then ruining it while handling it?! Gah!!

[grendeljd]

Re-read this again last night... Just a damn fine issue. I started wondering what the reaction to the alien presence will be from general humanity. It looks as though only the one ship with the commandos is actually on earth, but showing up and landing in Manhattan... it's gonna be tracked by radar, or spotted &/or filmed by somebody.

That info &/or footage would go viral... And would not be easy to cover up by those in the government looking to keep the fact that aliens exist a secret. It's like first contact in the modern Valiant U... I hope we see some reaction to this across the titles. Despite the relatively fantastical characters in each title, the world is otherwise portrayed as a normal, realistic modern one similar to our own. Discovering aliens are real would be a pretty big deal within the VU, I think...

[pixierosa]

I'm also really glad I nabbed a pull-box variant... Really loving that Nord cover! SonicDan - is that on your art hit-list?

I got the pull-box, too. It's gorgeous.

I can't imagine what Nord would charge for this one... Are you FB friends with him? He posts his sketches and inks from time to time. There's some lovely flashback scenes coming up.

I follow him on Twitter - I think he posts his pics with Instagram, so I would imagine I'm seeing the same stuff as on FB? It's fun to see the pics of drawings as he works on them.

I would expect that cover art would fetch a hefty sum... $800-$1000 is a fairly standard starting point for an 8.5x11 color image in the general illustration industry, adjusted up or down based on demand for the artist & actual size - I wonder if this is on 11x17 illustration board?

Its really an incredible piece - the kinetic energy & gesture of the figures is just...

I'm willing to place money that it is on illustration board. It is a beautiful piece. I use it for my desktop background.

I'm curious about the medium too... It looks like either all pastel or some of that mixed with water colour or gauche. Pastel would be tough to preserve & avoid smudging unless it is sealed! Could you imagine buying this and then ruining it while handling it?! Gah!!

Hmmm...maybe you should ask Cary! I'm curious, too. It is a departure from what we normally see. It makes the scene feel different emotionally than the effect that traditional action colors have.

I live in fear of damaging art work. Keep it sealed but on display. I have nightmare visions of boogery little kid fingers touching the paper! It's true! Kids ooze sticky stuff from their fingertips. Only reason I can think of why every light switch and doorknob in my house feels crusty. Bleh!

[jmatt]

I think that the X-O series falling flat after the Pol-Bekhara incident was more correlation than it was causation. There was a drastic and noticeable shift in quality right after the Wolfbridge affair.

Agreed. Although my disappointment was grounded almost entirely in the death of Shanhara; that's when I truly began to wonder if they knew what they were doing. Like Lucas deciding he would throw away 25 years of people believing that "the Force" was attainable to them by simply ascribing it to "midichlorians".

The Wolfbridge Affair is when they went to the accelerated publishing schedule to juice the numbers for the sale to Acclaim. Feh.

[Stringer]

The confrontation with X-O commanders near the end of this issue was good, although I think it would have been a nice touch to add by-passers' reactions at the sight of that surreal scene. I mean, it felt as though they were fighting in a deserted town or something lol. It's not that big of a deal, but little things like that add volume to the story for me. Hopefully there's some of that in the next issue.

[manga4life]

This issue blew me away and has me absolutely pumped up for Planet Death, which looks like its going to be quite an epic in itself. The action in this issue was top notch, I loved how Aric found himself inside the Collective and how he and his former captor had some parting words for each other. And Gafti is alive!!!!!! Or is he? Hmmmmm.

Damn, this book is at the absolute top of my reading pile every month and with a set up like issue #9 had for the huge upcoming storyline..... who can blame me?

[400yrs]

I've yet to read the other comments in this thread to give a clean opinion.

This may have been my favorite issue of X-O thus far, but there are some big problems here for me.

The good - I counted 23 story pages, but this felt like a very nice, meaty read. I greatly enjoy the story with the Vine. This issue had the perfect combination of narrative and action to make it a nice well rounded read. This is definitely the least decompressed X-O issue I've read and because of that, I really felt like a got my money's worth in this issue for the first time in X-O.

The bad - Aric with a pony tail is fine. Aric with a pony tail and BANGS is NOT. The art was great in this issue, but I don't know who let the bangs get through. Without the muscles, Aric looked like a girl.

The confusing - I know more about the vine than I do about Aric. I'm more interested in the Vine than I am in Aric. I enjoy the Vine parts of the story more than the story with Aric. This is a problem. They've done a FANTASTIC job building the vine, but the Aric stuff is light. However, I'd love to see a zero issue or some kind of one-shot focusing on The Vine and their adventures before Aric.

Story 5/5
Art sans bangs 4.5/5
Bangs art 0/5
Overall 4.5/5


I went with the variant cover because the colors are beautiful on it.

[Dallow Spicer1]

This whole series has been top class since issue 1 and this issue again shows how good the comic book medium can be! Gafti's torture was gruesome, look forward to seeing how he survived the explosion of the Vine ship from an earlier issue?

The face off between Aric and Trill in the Gathering was fascinating, he is not intimidated by the XO armour in any way! I think Trill is shaping up to becoming a fantastic nemesis in the Valiant universe alongside Master Darque.

Plus Aric can speak the Vine language! Very interesting twist!

Is that a distorted version of Gafti on the cover if issue 10 manhandling XO?

5 out 5 issue!

[FormerReader]

Great issue. I like how we are begining to see the true power of the manowar armor and who the vine fear it so much.

[erwinrafael]

The confusing - I know more about the vine than I do about Aric. I'm more interested in the Vine than I am in Aric. I enjoy the Vine parts of the story more than the story with Aric. This is a problem. They've done a FANTASTIC job building the vine, but the Aric stuff is light. However, I'd love to see a zero issue or some kind of one-shot focusing on The Vine and their adventures before Aric.

I think it's because you are an old Valiant reader who already knows about Aric from his origin in VH1 which the VEI version remained faithful to. For new readers which VEI is targeting, issues 1-5 of X-O Manowar gives a lot of insight about Aric. His origin, his relationship with his father, his stubborn personality, his friendship with Gafti and of course his love for Deidre. That is the power of decompressed storytelling in the origin story. I just reread the initial arc and one can feel the poignancy when Aric just looked up silently to the sky after the Italian pilot informed him that there are no more Visigoths.

Basically, what I am saying is that for a new reader who does not have previous knowledge about Aric from VH1, there is already a lot of character development for Aric in this series.

[pixierosa]

The confusing - I know more about the vine than I do about Aric. I'm more interested in the Vine than I am in Aric. I enjoy the Vine parts of the story more than the story with Aric. This is a problem. They've done a FANTASTIC job building the vine, but the Aric stuff is light. However, I'd love to see a zero issue or some kind of one-shot focusing on The Vine and their adventures before Aric.

I think it's because you are an old Valiant reader who already knows about Aric from his origin in VH1 which the VEI version remained faithful to. For new readers which VEI is targeting, issues 1-5 of X-O Manowar gives a lot of insight about Aric. His origin, his relationship with his father, his stubborn personality, his friendship with Gafti and of course his love for Deidre. That is the power of decompressed storytelling in the origin story. I just reread the initial arc and one can feel the poignancy when Aric just looked up silently to the sky after the Italian pilot informed him that there are no more Visigoths.

Basically, what I am saying is that for a new reader who does not have previous knowledge about Aric from VH1, there is already a lot of character development for Aric in this series.

I agree. I feel like we've learned quite a bit about Aric via storyline and flashbacks -- not just through words but through the art. I seem to recall some readers complaining that there wasn't enough action in the first arc, but for me, spooling out the story as they did instead of "Wham-o! Instant carnage" made for a much better read and is a departure from traditional superhero stories.

[Carson]

The confusing - I know more about the vine than I do about Aric. I'm more interested in the Vine than I am in Aric. I enjoy the Vine parts of the story more than the story with Aric. This is a problem. They've done a FANTASTIC job building the vine, but the Aric stuff is light. However, I'd love to see a zero issue or some kind of one-shot focusing on The Vine and their adventures before Aric.

I think it's because you are an old Valiant reader who already knows about Aric from his origin in VH1 which the VEI version remained faithful to. For new readers which VEI is targeting, issues 1-5 of X-O Manowar gives a lot of insight about Aric. His origin, his relationship with his father, his stubborn personality, his friendship with Gafti and of course his love for Deidre. That is the power of decompressed storytelling in the origin story. I just reread the initial arc and one can feel the poignancy when Aric just looked up silently to the sky after the Italian pilot informed him that there are no more Visigoths.

Basically, what I am saying is that for a new reader who does not have previous knowledge about Aric from VH1, there is already a lot of character development for Aric in this series.

+1

[grendeljd]

The confusing - I know more about the vine than I do about Aric. I'm more interested in the Vine than I am in Aric. I enjoy the Vine parts of the story more than the story with Aric. This is a problem. They've done a FANTASTIC job building the vine, but the Aric stuff is light. However, I'd love to see a zero issue or some kind of one-shot focusing on The Vine and their adventures before Aric.

I think it's because you are an old Valiant reader who already knows about Aric from his origin in VH1 which the VEI version remained faithful to. For new readers which VEI is targeting, issues 1-5 of X-O Manowar gives a lot of insight about Aric. His origin, his relationship with his father, his stubborn personality, his friendship with Gafti and of course his love for Deidre. That is the power of decompressed storytelling in the origin story. I just reread the initial arc and one can feel the poignancy when Aric just looked up silently to the sky after the Italian pilot informed him that there are no more Visigoths.

Basically, what I am saying is that for a new reader who does not have previous knowledge about Aric from VH1, there is already a lot of character development for Aric in this series.

I agree. I feel like we've learned quite a bit about Aric via storyline and flashbacks -- not just through words but through the art. I seem to recall some readers complaining that there wasn't enough action in the first arc, but for me, spooling out the story as they did instead of "Wham-o! Instant carnage" made for a much better read and is a departure from traditional superhero stories.

I'm in agreement with you guys about Aric - I think there has been plenty of powerful character development so far. The first arc is such a great origin story, and all the quiet moments in the Ninjak arc were equally great. As I read #9 for the second time this week, I was really aware of the difference in how Aric speaks compared to Alexander... He sounds like he's from a different time without sounding like an idiotic barbarian. He sounds like an intelligent yet stubborn individual.

[manga4life]

The interaction between Aric and Xylem has really gotten me excited to see these two lock horns in battle and I have the odd feeling that Xylem is more powerful than we may think him to be. I also have the odd feeling that the priests are somehow going to end up helping Earth in the battle at some point because they don't want to see the armor destroyed, it's a weird gut feeling I've been having after reading this amazing issue 3 times now.