Well, look who it is. Erik Larsen does a lot of odds and ends for Marvel at the turn of the century. Maybe Savage Dragon wasn’t quite paying the bills, maybe he just missed it, who knows? A Defenders book with Kurt Busiek, this, and more to come. A bit premature to call Spidey a soon-to-be Hollywood hero in 1999, but for once, they weren’t wrong. Apparently Joe Bennett was the regular artist on this, but this month, guest penciler Coy Turnbull steps in, and he’s inked by Larsen and Al Milgrom, with colors by Steve Oliff. Larsen’s inks are so heavy handed at times you’d swear he just drew the book. We open on Richard Rider, our hero, waking up in a confused panic in this lady’s bed, and her saying she’s pregnant.
A lot can happen in 5 issues, I guess! Rich calls some roommates to bring him some normal clothes, and we cut to… some… weird business. In short, it seems like someone was trying to do Atlantis, but with bird people instead of fish people. They live in a flying city and complain about the land dwellers, and Nova’s enemy the Condor is apparently a rogue one of them. Another one called Red Raven declares they should go to war with humanity, and then there’s this baffling page:
What’s happening? If they’re going to war, why do they seem to be going home instead? I’m so confused. Look at this next page. One would guess Larsen didn’t just draw it without credits.
I mean, jeez. It’s really hard to tell what this Coy Turnbull’s art looks like. Maybe once Milgrom starts inking. Well, Nova goes to his brother, who can’t help him, and then we cut to The Sphinx, last seen around here in The Hero-Killers in the Spider-Man Annuals of 1993, apparently returning after a long absence. But then we’re off again. Sphinx shows up in a later issue, seems like. Rich apparently plays baseball and goes to college now, and Robbie Baldwin, aka Speedball, randomly shows up at his game to ask if they can get the New Warriors back together, which Richard declines. Worth noting Justice and Firestar have been Avengers since the relaunch, and Nova thinks of that, and how rejoining the Warriors would be a step backward. Then our guy finally puts in an appearance.
Boy, does that NOT look like Erik Larsen at all! That kinda looks like Jim Craig, actually. Meanwhile, Rich is being a baseball hero when he gets the news that it’s his parents’ place on fire, and “some guys are having a big brawl,” so he runs out on the game to help. And now we can get this guest appearance started.
Boy, these are… some… guys. Badd Axe is a deeply Erik Larsen name.
Weirdly, other people start to look like Larsen again on the next page, but not Spider-Man.
The fighting continues, with Spidey learning Nova’s costume is alive (Uh, it is?) and Nova’s Mom inevitably being taken hostage by bad guys. Spidey saves Nova’s Mom while he saves the day, this being his book and all.
That’s embarrassing.
Well, that was a chaotic issue. Larsen was obviously a fan of Nova, given that he kept popping up in Larsen’s Spider-Man books, and he says in the letters (Which he answers, unusually for Marvel) that he’s been wanting to do this for years. A shame, then, that this book only makes it to issue 7! The numbers must’ve been BAD if it got canceled that quickly. Marvel probably wasn’t in a place to make Nova work again just yet. Still recovering from their bankruptcy and all. And Venom is the villain of #7, despite Larsen saying he hated him. Maybe he was hoping that would jolt sales, but I guess it came too late. Ah, well. Strange little detour. But I like poking my nose into other corners of the Marvel U just to see what was going on for a sec.