We’re closing this block out with World War Hulk. A mere 3 months after Civil War 7 comes out, there is this. Which, granted, should’ve actually been 6 months later, but things went wrong. Still, 2 events that close together is pretty wild. But this one’s not as big as Civil War. Or the upcoming Secret Invasion, for that matter. It had a lot of tie-ins, but it doesn’t drag in the entire line the way the others do. So, back in the Illuminati one-shot we didn’t look at, we learned the Hulk had a rampage in Las Vegas, prompting the Illuminati to try to solve the problem of their friend. But the issue further fractured the group, as Namor was enraged by Reed & Tony’s plan to shoot Hulk into space. They found a planet that would support human life where he would be alone. But something happened, and he instead wound up on a planet called Sakaar, where he was forced to fight in gladiatorial combat. I didn’t read these Hulk comics, but they seemed absurd. Not only did whoever these people were enslave the unstoppable Hulk, they had the Silver Surfer, too. Seems improbable. Hulk rose through the ranks or whatever, eventually freeing the slaves, taking a wife, and being set up as big boss of the world or something. But then his ship exploded, killing his wife. And he was made to think the explosion was on purpose, a parting gift from Reed & Tony. So he marshaled his soldiers, some of the most dangerous fighters in the universe, and came roaring back to Earth for payback, and that’s what World War Hulk is. As Namor predicted, shooting Hulk into space is about to have terrible consequences. The action will inevitably pull in most Marvel heroes, but tie into almost none of their own series. The Hulk book tied in, but nothing else I read did. And, of course, the heroes participating include the Amazing Spider-Man, STILL in his black suit. It really defies belief. But World War Hulk 1 was published the same month as ASM 542, New Avengers 31 and Mighty Avengers 4, Spidey was very firmly “back in black” at the time. Truly ludicrous. Well, this event is written by then-Hulk scribe, Greg Pak, which makes sense, and drawn by, guess who, John Romita, Jr. The man is back! And he’s inked by Klaus Janson and colored by Christina Strain. Johnny drew what I believe is the first-ever Marvel event, Contest of Champions, an early 80s story that saw the Grandmaster and the personification of Death choose various Marvel heroes and make them fight for the life of the Collector. Not an all-timer, but famous for being Marvel’s first ever limited series. Now that events are becoming a big, big part of the publishing initiative, and no doubt smarting after the lateness of Civil War, Marvel turns to a guy who’s not only one of their most popular artists and Marvel royalty, but also a guy who’s known for his ability to draw multiple titles a month. They could be assured of no schedule slippage here! Uh, maybe. Probably. What if it’s just the last issue late by a month? Whoops! I don’t remember much liking this, but I’m sure not gonna complain about 5 more helpings of JRJR on the blog. This cover and I believe all of them are by Dave Finch. I think he was really starting to level up in this time period, a fact that probably coincides with him becoming primarily a cover artist, able to take more time. I don’t thiiiiiink he does any interiors again until a Batman book in 2011, but I don’t know. He might do some X-Men stuff.
Hulk spends some or all of his trip back to Earth standing on top of his spaceship, on the outside, yelling and punching asteroids. It’s very silly. Pretty sure even Hulk needs to breathe. This image of him riding on top of a spaceship was everywhere in the run up to this event. As some NASA guys on Earth pick up a blip on the radar near the moon, Hulk has landed there, so he can deal with Black Bolt first. Medusa warns Hulk that he’s fought Black Bolt before and lost, but Hulk doesn’t care.
This series turns on the old cliche “The madder Hulk gets, the stronger Hulk gets.” While he used to say this all the time, at some point, it was codified into actual fact, that he somehow has no limit to his power relative to his anger. And having lost his wife and his whole world to an explosion he blames on the Illuminati, well… he’s literally never been so angry. Also, they say his whole world was destroyed, but later they reveal his wife had a secret son who grew up really fast… somewhere. I don’t know, it’s very silly. It’s the Hulk, most Hulk things are very silly. Well, NASA has seen that explosion, and a scramble through the security network is trying to alert Iron Man and the president, but it’s all too late as Hulk’s ship appears in the sky above New York. And then…
Of course, anyone who’s seen the Marvel movies may recall that the name of the planet Sakaar (And nothing else) made it into Thor: Ragnarok, along with versions of Korg and Miek. Very different versions. Well, 24 hours. So, Iron Man tries to regain control of the satellites they used to make that broadcast, but almost loses control of his armor in the process. Then Dr. Strange appears to him in astral form and tells him they made this problem, and now it’s up to them to solve it. He says the New Avengers are working to evacuate Manhattan, as long as Tony won’t arrest them. Tony says they’ll all get a full pardon after this if they turn themselves in. Strange points out that that assumes any of them will still be alive.
Greg Pak doesn’t seem to understand the Sentry. He’s treating him like DC’s Captain Marvel, like Bob and the Sentry are somehow separate. Very weird.
We haven’t seen Romita, Jr. draw the black suit since 1987! That top panel is amazing, so much detail.
All beef temporarily forgotten amongst the heroes. This, to me, is the silliest part of the whole “Initiative” phase of the Marvel U. The Mighty Avengers and the government are out to arrest the New Avengers, and they encounter each other constantly, and there’s always some loophole where they don’t arrest the New team. They usually don’t even try! It’s like a Saturday morning cartoon, both sides fighting constantly with no resolution. Having them on the outs has the potential for a lot of narrative tension, but they keep putting their differences aside to fight symbiotes or deal with the Hood or this. It takes that narrative tension away. If they’re only going to see each other in situations where they put their differences aside, their differences don’t mean anything. Well, we skip ahead a bit, and now 5 million people have been evacuated out of Manhattan in 24 hours. Pretty impressive. Then Iron Man shows up in a brand-new Hulkbuster suit. Spidey sarcastically calls him “boss” one more time, then his Spider Sense goes crazy. Tony tells them all to keep remaining civilians back, and not to engage until he’s done with Hulk or Hulk’s done with him. As he says so, Hulk emerges from his ship.
I mean, look. This has always been a John Romita, Jr. fan blog. But who else could do this event? Who else has his impeccable storytelling chops AND his unique ability to convey mass and power? He’s the heir to Jack Kirby in these areas, and this is a book that really, really benefits from them. Incredible. We see people reacting to Tony’s seeming victory, the president, some regular joes, I think Rick Jones. Then Tony says he’s injected Hulk with nanobots that should negate his power, and he takes responsibility for what happens, and then some jets launch missiles at Hulk. Within the big explosion, Hulk yells the name of his dead wife (His SECOND dead wife, for the record!), flashing back to their life together and her death, and then emerges from the crater saying “You killed her.” Iron Man realizes he’s in trouble.
There’s some truly spectacular destruction as Sentry’s watchtower breaks loose and smashes down through Avengers Tower to the ground level, and as She-Hulk and emergency staff run toward it…
The other silly thing about this is Hulk can’t and won’t kill any of the people he’s here to kill, so what is this really about? Sure, the shocking death of Captain America just recently might’ve lent an “anything can happen” feel to events, but not on the level of killing Black Bolt, Iron Man, Dr. Strange and Reed Richards. None of them die. Hulk doesn’t die. No one dies. All sound and fury, signifying nothing. This event takes place in 37 comics, not counting various epilogues, including obvious tie-ins with Incredible Hulk, Iron Man, and the Initiative series, and less obvious ones like Punisher War Journal, Ghost Rider and Heroes For Hire, of all things. Plus miniseries like World War Hulk: X-Men, Gamma Corps, and Frontline. There was a series running alongside Civil War called Frontline, about reporters covering the conflict. It included a controversial Captain America interview, but I didn’t buy it. So they did that again with this. It’s a lot of comics, but like I said, it’s not interrupting almost every Marvel comic like Civil War did. It’s much smaller despite the stakes frankly being much bigger. Civil Wars was just 40-odd superheroes fighting each other for no good reason, this is an alien invasion by an unstoppable force fueled by justifiable anger. And yet this is somehow not nearly as big a deal.