Reprints Nova #13-19, Defenders #62-64, Fantastic Four Annual #12 and Marvel Two-In-One Annual #3
Written by Marv Wolfman and David Anthony Kraft.
Penciled by Sal Buscema, Carmine Infantino, Bob Hall, Keith Pollard and Don Perlin.
Inked by Joe Sinnott, Dick Giordano, Tom Palmer, Bob Wiacek, Jim Mooney, Don Perlin, Frank Giacoia, Dave Hunt and Bruce Patterson.
Summary:
Richard Rider is in a bank withdrawing some money. Suddenly, a robbery occurs, led by the Sandman! Richard is in street clothes and can't turn into Nova. Thankfully, a new crimefighter, the Crimebuster goes after the villain. |
| Nova & Crimebuster foil a robbery attempt by the Sandman. |
They take out his henchmen and lock Sandman in a bank vault. But he turns to sand and gets away. When Sandman gets to his hotel room, he has a visitor waiting for him. The man claims to be a psychologist and says that Sandman's problems are all in his head.
Then he uses a device called the encephalogrammer to take control of Sandman's mind.
Nova stops a kidnapping near the United Nations headquarters. He learns that the target was a Dr. T'Kora, a nuclear scientist from Wakanda. Sandman shows up and captures Nova and T'kora. Nova is able to beat Sandman, but learns later that the brain behind the scheme is the villain know as Yellow Claw! Nick Fury and his SHIELD agents team up with Nova to fight Yellow Claw.
In addition to T'Kora, Yellow Claw has captured another nuclear scientist, Samuel Burley. The villain wants them to use their knowledge to create a tidal wave that will destroy New York City! It ends with Nova in hand-to-hand combat with Yellow Claw.
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| Nova battles Yellow Claw & tries to save New York from a tidal wave. |
Sometime later, Nova is flying around New York and notices the sky is getting dark in the daytime. He gets zapped by a ray of some kind. It's the work of a criminal named Blackout. After a brief fight, Blackout encases Nova in solid black light, then takes off.
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| Nova comes face to face with Blackout, winds up imprisoned in solid light. |
Through a flashback, we learn that Blackout was a criminal named Marcus Daniels. He volunteered to be a test subject in exchange for the government dropping charges against him. The experiment was an attempt to harness "the power of the black star", but it resulted in Daniels gaining superpowers. Blackout uses those powers to kill the scientists when they fail to cure his condition.
Nova goes after Blackout and they fight to the finish on top of a skyscraper!
Later, Dollar Bill, an aspiring filmmaker and friend of the Defenders, has made a documentary about the non-team of superheroes. The documentary is shown on a local tv station. In the film, Dollar Bill reveals the location of the Defenders' unofficial headquarters and says that since the Defenders have no formal rules or roster, anyone can join. This angers the team, since their existence is otherwise unknown to the general public. Nighthawk is especially angry at Dollar Bill, since the Defenders' HQ is also his home!
The next morning, more than a dozen superheroes, including Nova, knock on the Defenders' door. Since the Defenders roster is more or less open, all the heroes now claim to be Defenders. Nighthawk is furious and his anger leads to various skirmishes among the heroes.
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| Nova & Marvel Man play "cowboy"; Nighthawk chases the Falcon. |
But they come to their senses when they hear that New York is under attack from dozens of villains who also claim to be Defenders! The Defenders and "neo-Defenders" come to their senses and unite to stop the villains.
Lastly, Nova encounters a gigantic green humanoid standing on a street in New York. A flying saucer appears next to him and starts drilling in to the ground. Nova attacks the giant, but is no match for him. Realizing he's outclassed, Nova heads to the Baxter Building, home of the Fantastic Four, to seek help. The Thing joins Nova and they go after the giant. Similar "drilling" attacks are occurring in major cities all over the world.
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| The Monitors go on a rampage in Tokyo. |
An alien woman arrives and explains the scenario to the Ben and Nova. Her name is Milandra and she says the giants attacking Earth are aliens known as the Monitors. They visit planets throughout the universe to test the worlds to see if they "are fit to survive!" The Thing and Nova will need Milandra's help if they want to save Earth from the Monitors.
Plus, Nova's enemy the Sphinx battles the Fantastic Four and the Inhumans!
Review:
Nova Classic Vol. 2 isn't a bad book, but it's a step down from the previous volume.
Story:
Nova's creator, Marv Wolfman, writes all the Nova solo stories in this tpb. It starts off with a bang, with Nova and Crimebuster stopping bank robbers. Nova's battle with the Sandman is an exciting story. Sandman has and long been one of my favorite characters and Wolfman writes him well here. The presence of the Crimebuster makes things a bit more fun. I enjoyed his interaction with Nova, as they're both still learning how to be superheroes.
But the next part of the book is where things go a bit wrong. The Yellow Claw three-parter isn't very compelling. I just didn't care much about Mike Burley or his brother, or Yellow Claw's plan to destroy New York.
For that matter, Yellow Claw himself is problematic at best. He's a product of the "Yellow Peril" stereotypes found in Western Culture during much of the 20th century. But beyond that, I just don't think he's a very interesting villain. And the Yellow Claw story takes up 53 pages of the book (more than that if you count his shadowy "behind the scenes" appearances).
Things pick up a bit with the Blackout story. I've always thought his powers were pretty cool, and he battled the Avengers a few times in the 1980s. Blackout also recently appeared in an episode of Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., so Wolfman deserves credit for creating a villain with staying power.
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| Nova & Fury prepare to battle Yellow Claw's minions. |
The Sphinx/Fantastic Four battle really has no business being in this tpb. Nova only appears in one panel during Sphinx's flashback and this story doesn't directly tie in to Nova's series beyond that. Wolfman also wrote the Fantastic Four's series at the time and I'm guessing he wanted to tie his titles together, but it just feels like filler in this book. I reviewed the story in an earlier review when it was published in Fantastic Four: Reunited They Stand, so read that review for more details about the story.
The Defenders issues also have very little to do with Nova. He just briefly appears as one of the many superheroes who show up to be a "Defender For A Day", but it's a fun story. David Anthony Kraft writes great scenes of (mostly) B-level heroes bickering and sometimes brawling with one another. Plus, we get to see the Hulk learn how to throw a frisbee! I'll admit that I'm biased, since Defenders was one of my favorite series of the Bronze Age.
The final story, from Marvel Two-In-One Annual #3, also written by Wolfman, isn't that great either. The Monitors are generic aliens and Milandra isn't particularly interesting. But I enjoyed the interaction between Nova and the Thing. Wolfman wrote the Fantastic Four in the late-70s and always had a good grasp of Ben Grimm's character. I think it would've worked better as a regular issue of Marvel Two-In-One, rather than an "annual-length" story.
Art:
Sal Buscema pencils the first few issues reprinted here, delivering his usual high quality Bronze Age work. Carmine Infantino takes over after that and I don't have a problem with Infantino's art here. It reminds of his pencils in Star Wars, but Buscema and Infantino had such different styles at the time that the change is quite jarring.
Buscema also penciled the stories from Defenders and Marvel Two-In-One Annual. He's inked by several different inkers. Some inkers work better than others with Sal's pencils here, but Buscema gives us plenty of entertaining fight scenes.
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| Nova is attacked by Spider-Man, Hulk & Iron Man... or are they robot versions of the heroes? |
Keith Pollard and Bob Hall penciled the story reprinted from Fantastic Four Annual #12, with inks by Bob Wiacek. Their art is okay, not great but not terrible either.
How Does It Look?:
Here's a scan from a copy of Nova #16, courtesy of supermegamonkey:
And here's how it looks in the tpb:
Extras:
Several pages of original art.
Nova Classic Vol. 2 is a bit of a disappointment, since the first volume was a lot of fun. But the solid art from Sal Buscema makes up for some of the lackluster stories. I'm a huge fan of the Defenders, which earns this tpb a half-Sal more than I would've otherwise given. But if you're not a Defenders fan, you probably won't enjoy this tpb.
J.A. Morris' rating:
2 and a half Sals.
