Re-Reading: X-O Manowar #8 (Unity)

[xoken]

I thought we could do a book a day (that way people can read one every day or catch up on weekends), talk about it on its own, in the context of whats next, in regards to what expectations it creates and vote on how good it is. I don't have to be the one that posts everyday. If I miss a day or if someone wants to take over please do

For voting think of your single favourite comic book (not just VALIANT) as the benchmark - thats a 10 - and grade according to that.

Make sure to mention what you like'd about the book, what you didn't, what you wish they would have done, your favourite panels, lines of dialogue, little bits of trivia etc.

X-O Manowar #8

[jedimarley]

Mike Leeke's art is GREAT!

Seeing Aric get bit (almost) in half...Very Cool

[magnusr]

This time the armor could not entirely save Aric from his stupidity. At least he did do the honerable thing with the converter. An important issue with drastic events that other publishers would not manage. Here it is managed well. Good action, good dialogue and good charactarisations.

/Magnus

[Daniel Jackson]

Great story and lots of action. Aric learns some hard lessons in this one.

[xomanowarfan]

[Todd Luck]

Stop me if you've heard this one before...

A barbarian champion leads his people on a series of conquests and lootings. In the barbarain's mind he justifies this by saying it's for the good of his people but we know he's really enjoying the conquering. He gets too full of himself and takes on a people who are far too advanced for his men. All his men die in the fight, leaving him the sole survivor.

Yep, that the plot of the beginning of Eternal Warrior 1. It's also the plot here.

Does swiping work here? You betcha .

The plot makes sense for Aric. It also makes sense for a crossover that compares, contrasts, and parrallels the characters in it.

And there's more than enough here to make the story unique and unforgettable on it's own merits. I mean, who can foget Aric getting bit into 3 pieces?!?

Awesome stuff. A 9

Continuity Note: Gilad makes a remark that their's something familar about that barbarian in this issue...for, well, obvious reasons. Gilad dislikes Aric because he's the stupid barbarain that Gilad used to be.

Unfortunately later this gets rectoned in the X-O Yearbook and they revealed the two actually knew each other in the olden times. We'll get around that later unfortunately...

[magnusr]

Stop me if you've heard this one before...

Stop

Does swiping work here? You betcha

Brilliant.

Unfortunately later this gets rectoned in the X-O Yearbook and they revealed the two actually knew each other in the olden times. We'll get around that later unfortunately...

Not much later. That story was planned for publication in October and November 1992:

As we will have learned in UNITY, X-O and Eternal Warrior have been enemies since the early days of Western Civilization. Their disdain goes beyond the mortal word hate, and their battle with each other goes beyond what mortals call a good fight.

This two month, action filled event begins with Flip Book #0 - The Old Days. and continues with November on-sale Flip Book #00 - The NEw Days.

/Magnus

[xoken]

Not much later. That story was planned for publication in October and November 1992:

As we will have learned in UNITY, X-O and Eternal Warrior have been enemies since the early days of Western Civilization. Their disdain goes beyond the mortal word hate, and their battle with each other goes beyond what mortals call a good fight.

This two month, action filled event begins with Flip Book #0 - The Old Days. and continues with November on-sale Flip Book #00 - The NEw Days.

/Magnus

very interesting. So it was always planned that Gilad knew Aric

[Todd Luck]

Stop me if you've heard this one before...

Stop

Does swiping work here? You betcha

Brilliant.

Unfortunately later this gets rectoned in the X-O Yearbook and they revealed the two actually knew each other in the olden times. We'll get around that later unfortunately...

Not much later. That story was planned for publication in October and November 1992:

As we will have learned in UNITY, X-O and Eternal Warrior have been enemies since the early days of Western Civilization. Their disdain goes beyond the mortal word hate, and their battle with each other goes beyond what mortals call a good fight.

This two month, action filled event begins with Flip Book #0 - The Old Days. and continues with November on-sale Flip Book #00 - The NEw Days.

/Magnus

Do you know when this report was made? Since it indicates Unity hasn't been released it's possible Shooter was still in the office at the time they put this together. That would surprise me. Having one of only two immortals in the entire world just happen to get in a conflict with a barbarian who's going to get kidnapped by aliens and steal the X-O armor 2000 years later seems a bit much.

I wonder why the change in plans (you notice Valiant talks about all these miniseries and specials but never puts any out until Acclaim took over?) and why the story we did get much later kinda sucked.

[magnusr]

Do you know when this report was made?

"First presented at the Diamond Sales Seminar June 15, 1992."

I wonder why the change in plans (you notice Valiant talks about all these miniseries and specials but never puts any out until Acclaim took over?) and why the story we did get much later kinda sucked.

This is a very good question. Seems lots of things were still hanging in the air. Maybe they generally had decided "this is one universe, and it was so in early history as well - so Gilad and Aric could have met", and the rest was still open for interpretation. The yearbook does handle the coincidence rather well, having Aric and Gilad meet at such an important historic event as the siege of Rome.

/Magnus

[Todd Luck]

Do you know when this report was made?

"First presented at the Diamond Sales Seminar June 15, 1992."

Thanks .

That would put still put Jim in the office (very close to the end though). A lot of things got dropped during that time period, not just because of Shooter's depature I'm sure, but it was just a time of transition overall. I'm still trying to imagine that story being told in a way that would've actually been entertaining with Shooter at the helm. Sigh.