CAPTAIN MARVEL #7 (42)

By Tony Whitt     March 24, 2003

It appears that CAPTAIN MARVEL won the "U Decide" competition. No surprise there - ULTIMATE ADVENTURES, while not as execrable as Ron Zimmerman's other work, never had a feeling of permanence; and MARVILLE only convinced us how little respect Marvel has for the intelligence of its readership. But the real surprise is how quickly the whole "Genis goes mad" storyline has lost its fascination.

As a brief foray into uncharted territory, the idea that Genis' cosmic awareness could finally drive him over the edge is an interesting one (at least, it's uncharted territory for this book - heroes going mad are a dime a dozen nowadays), and the first six issues of the rebooted CAPTAIN MARVEL allowed writer Peter David to take his characters in some fascinating new directions. But after last issue's disappointing bait-and-switch ending, in which we think that Genis is going to avoid going mad altogether and then ends up doing it again anyway, the "brief foray" suddenly is looking more like a permanent stay. Does anyone else miss the sane Genis as much as I do?

There's also another problem with maintaining the madness angle: namely, longevity. Six issues was an amazing amount of time to watch our hero playing the anti-hero, but maintaining that stance for longer than that may prove to be a mistake. At what point will we get sick of watching a hero we've known and enjoyed being mad, bad, and dangerous to know?

Luckily, the current storyline "Monsters and Gods," in which Genis challenges Thor and the other Aesir for dominance over mankind, is only two chapters long - though we have to wonder which god or god-like being Genis will turn his attention to next. (Are the Eternals still around, by the way? Perhaps he could leap over to DC and take on the New Gods, while he's at it.) We have to wonder whether David's writing can keep us hooked on this character, even though he's become really repulsive in so many ways (and I don't mean the uniform, either).

We also have to wonder what happened to the artwork - Kyle Hotz did a brilliant job with the MAX limited series THE HOOD, but here, apart from a few striking images such as Genis hanging out on a cross, the artwork doesn't sit too well with the storyline. And at times, sadly, it simply doesn't look all that good - at one point, Rick's disembodied head looks more like a woman's with its long curly tresses; and when describing the threat of the Storm Giants, Thor looks more gob-smacked than fearful. There's also something disturbingly D&D about the look of this issue, which I suppose fits Asgard nicely - but how does it fit CAPTAIN MARVEL? Come to think of it, how does any of this fit CAPTAIN MARVEL anymore?

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