X-O Manowar #37 a.k.a. the finale of Dead Hand

[wwise03]

I hate to say it because V-Ditti's run has been fantastic up to this point, but I think it is time for X-O to get a new voice. Venditti's voice is getting a bit stale for me.

[first_citizenx]

Could Mars become a world with life on it, similar to Earth now? That's what I got out of the ending. That would be really interesting, to have Mars as a "sister planet" to Earth and a big race to colonize it. Even setting it up with its own Geomancer!

Of course, I'm just probably off my rocker...

[Shadowman99]

Could Mars become a world with life on it, similar to Earth now? That's what I got out of the ending. That would be really interesting, to have Mars as a "sister planet" to Earth and a big race to colonize it. Even setting it up with its own Geomancer!

Of course, I'm just probably off my rocker...

Nah man, like others here I'm guessing that a terraforming of Mars is set to occur at some point in the reasonably near Valiant Universe future, very cool, looking forward to that. A race to colonise the place hadn't occurred to me, but my bet would be on the Vine colonising the planet thanks to a few well-placed words from Aric. Wouldn't necessarily want Mars to be "...similar to Earth" myself, I'd rather have an ally alien planet where the flora/fauna/civilisation is relatively different, but that's just me

As for having its own Geomancer-type character... Well, who knows eh?! Maybe all planets have spirits!

[rbarron]

I enjoyed the arc ok. I don't really look at the X-O book as one that is all that complex and has many layers really. For the most part, what you read is pretty much what you get ala Superman/Green Lantern style. Not saying this is a bad thing at all.

Somethings that did lead me to wonder is that all the armors said he would soon say "The Musketeer chant they said every time". So does this mean in the future for Aric there will be no free will.... or is this what makes him their King?

I don't know if I'm stating that correctly or not.

They pretty much said that sooner or later he would sub-come to the armors way, bc he hasn't then that is why the were fighting with him. Does this seem odd to anyone else?

[Shadowman99]

I enjoyed the arc ok. I don't really look at the X-O book as one that is all that complex and has many layers really. For the most part, what you read is pretty much what you get ala Superman/Green Lantern style. Not saying this is a bad thing at all.

Somethings that did lead me to wonder is that all the armors said he would soon say "The Musketeer chant they said every time". So does this mean in the future for Aric there will be no free will.... or is this what makes him their King?

I don't know if I'm stating that correctly or not.

They pretty much said that sooner or later he would succumb to the armors way, bc he hasn't then that is why the were fighting with him. Does this seem odd to anyone else?

I mostly agree with you with XO not being 'full of layers' in one respect. It's pretty easy to read at face value if one wants to, but if a person has any desire to read a little further into things on a month-by-month basis then it can have its interesting moments. Like during Planet Death when Aric was on his way to destroy Loam: because the spider-aliens had wiped out his people he felt it was justified to wipe out an entire race himself. That certainly begs a question or two, not to mention the eventual change of mind that occurred that signified character development. Like most things, it's there if y'look for it y'know?

Did wonder about the whole 'you will become one with us' thing myself. From Aric's dialogue in the comic I got the impression that he'll be able to resist the will of his armour because of something he said. Can't remember what exactly. Regardless of that, I'm not sure that the armours reduce their host to the role of mindless automaton anyway, because Aric tells them all to return to their planets as 'protectors': if the hosts had no say in the matter they'd be likely to carry on doing what they're doing regardless, which didn't *appear* to be the case. That's what I got from it anyway. Having said that, if the hosts are in fact subserviant to the armours and carry on going about things as per usual regardless of Aric's threat, then that sets up a future plot seed for Aric to become an Armour Hunter (of sorts) himself in the future...

My final point here is that even if the XO Manowar comic can be read as a fairly straightforward experience every month, Venditti's very good at sowing future plot seeds in the comic which are always well worth looking out for, especially as he always ties them up in the future as well

[Sven the Returned]

I hate to say it because V-Ditti's run has been fantastic up to this point, but I think it is time for X-O to get a new voice. Venditti's voice is getting a bit stale for me.

It could be because there is an event coming up and once that is over it gets better. It was a good issue, but i say the previous one was much better.

[BugsySig]

This did wrap up quickly (and Dead Hand was fairly easily defeated), but then again the Armors are the most powerful weapons in the galaxy and there were several dozen of them there.

Interested to see where the Mars thing is headed.

We are slowly learning more about the Armors, but I'd really like to slow it down for an arc and learn about how Aric actually interacts with Shanhara.

[Shadowman99]

We are slowly learning more about the Armors, but I'd really like to slow it down for an arc and learn about how Aric actually interacts with Shanhara.

Yeah, that'd be cool actually.

[leonmallett]

a bit underwhelming, this arc was built up to be the next big story and it ends with aric telling a guy to dig and then stabbing a single computer

aric also (as far as he knew) killed the last survivors of millions of dead species from the previous planets destroyed by dead hand

why was the last contingency plan for the armor hunters not actually equipped to deal with a small group of armors

why is it that four guys with a (relatively) small ship were better at killing armors than a giant armed planetoid

at least exodus will probably be good

Well-stated. Like Planet Death, Dead Hand failed to live up to its promise IMHO.

[leonmallett]

The arc ended, but there are some fun outcomes...
We know other X-O Manowar armors still exist, and so there are future storylines possible with them (past or future storylines).
Aric may be able to "summon" the X-O Manowar armors if the need comes up again.
The surviving species of those other planets are now on Mars, so we've got the possibility that Mars becomes a thriving home for those ... whatevers.

I'm not sure I would have expected anything else from a "that's no moon" Dead Hand that looks like the Death Star besides a very simple way to blow it up from the center.
Star Wars and Return of the Jedi set a pretty good precedent there.

I think that was the greatest positive in terms of newly opened possibilities. As a story though, it felt lacking and flat to me.