Nova #5 Review

NOVA #5
Written by Andy Lanning & Dan Abnett
Art by Sean Chen

If a book has Annihilation of the cover, you should be reading it. End of story. While Annihilation was the best story of last year, Annihilation: Conquest appears to be the best of this year, with only Sinestro Corps War providing any kind of competition.

This issue picks up right where we left off last month with a new Nova, Ko-Rel, and Richard, our current Nova, lying in stasis with the Worldmind initiating some healing protocols. The action comes fast and hard as Gamora and her Phalanx squad arrive and immediately begin executing their orders to capture Nova. Ko-Rel deals with the initial assault of Phalanx with relative ease and chats with the Worldmind concerning explanations as to why her and orders for what to do. Apparently she will be Nova 001 and her primary duty is to protect the Worldmind and Nova Prime (Richard) while he recovers.

She is not given much choice in the matter and handles it as well as can be expected. When the Phalanx assault the Kree ship housing the recovering Richard Rider, Ko-Rel tries to lure them all away to spare the rest of her crew from further casualties. While an admirable plan, she did not account for Gamora and she stealthily infiltrates the Kree ship, killing multiple crew members, until reaching the barely conscious Nova. I will not spoil the end of this issue, but Conquest just ramped up and I can not really tell what is going to happen now as things are definitely not looking good for the good guys or the universe at large.

If you are not reading this book, or any Conquest for that matter, go out and pick up this and the Starlord and Quasar titles, as they are worth every penny. If you are worried about not knowing anything about the cosmic characters or hating cosmic stories in general, know that you are not alone and I hated cosmic stories and barely cared or knew about any of the characters from Annihilation or Conquest and both are now two of my favourite stories of all time from the past 20 years. Couple the current Sinestro Corps War with them and it seems like all my favourite stories are taking place in space. I did not manage to grab a copy of the sold out Green Lantern at my comic shop, so Nova will get the book of the week for me this week with basically no competition from the rest of my pull list. If I manage to get a copy of GL today at one of the other shops, I will try to update with a review as that appears to be a major contender from the buzz on the internet that I have been reading.

Verdict - Must Read

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