Annihilation: Conquest #6 Review

ANNIHILATION: CONQUEST #6
Written by Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning
Art by Wellinton Alves & Tom Raney

Annihilation: Conquest originated as a storyline for Nova, much like how Secret Invasion started as a New Avengers story. It's not surprising, then, that many of the problems with this event stem from the fact that many of the characters and their actions are completely inconsequential and only serve to take up space.

For instance, Ronan, Wraith and the Super-Skrull took up a lot of time and space with a four issue mini-series and many scenes with Ravenous and the modified Kree Sentinels. In the end, aside from Wraith's deus ex machina-like powers against Ultron, these characters did absolutely nothing.

In fact, the event was set up with a fairly epic scope, as the Phalanx were revealed and conquered all of Kree space and then the revelation of Ultron in A:C #1. From there, the series devolved into a rather mundane black ops mission by Starlord's team to destroy the tower, completely by passing the whole Phalanx army / conquered galaxy aspect of the series. Only in the last issue do we get the whole cosmic war aspect of the event and it comes from characters that haven't even factored into the story bringing in another deus ex machina style solution in the form of Warlock and his Technarch buddy, Tyro. To say the event underdelivered is an understantment.

However, while the event aspect of this series fell flat, that doesn't mean this was a bad book or a terrible storyline. If you can look past the enormous expectations after the original Annihilation and treat this as a regular storyline, this is actually a really good series in its own right.

That said, this issue delivered all the action this series has been severly lacking. If you aren't reading Nova, and you should be, you're left in the dark over the sudden appearance of Warlock and Tyro. Hell, you're left in the dark about Nova, Gamora and Drax and how they're back and no longer infected, but I digress.

This motley crew of heroes, with the aid of Groot's destruction of the Babel Spire, pierce the Phalanx space barrier that had engulfed and blocked off Kree space and proceed to save Starlord and company from Ultron and the Phalanx. Warlock's stomping of Ultron as he entered the fray was one of the highlights of the issue for me.

Meanwhile, with Kree space opened to the rest of the universe, the quantum bands that power Quasar are rejuvinated and it seems Warlock's, the cosmic one Ultron stole his new body from, not the Technarch one (confusing or what?), disembodied soul is now inhabiting the bands. Quasar is informed she must stop Ultron and return Warlock's soul to his body before it's too late.

As Quasar makes her way to the battle, Warlock, the Technarch one, uses his mutated techno-organic virus on Ultron, in Warlock's organic body, and Ultron's consciousness flees the body, leaving the husk on the ground. Quasar quickly revives Warlock by returning his soul to his body.

From here, things get a little too wonky for my tastes. Ultron's disembodied consciousness floats off into space and takes over the approaching Praxagora, as she, Ronan, Super-Skrull, Wraith and the army of Kree Sentinels approach the planet. Ultron then reprograms the Sentinels to be under his command and causes Praxa to detonate her star-like core, not before his consciousness flees yet another body. Apparently the entire crew survived the explosion with the Super-Skrull's invisible force field powers. Don't worry, they don't do anything else in this issue. Just there for random plot advancement.

That army of Sentinels? They return to the planet and form a giant Ultron body. His original body was made of adamantium, an unbreakable alloy. Now, he's simply cannonfodder robot armour. I guess this plan looked good on paper.

So, what's the big plan? Warlock, the cosmic one, not the Technarch, pours some of his power into Quasar's bands, she forms a new sword construct and, with Wraith's random powers doing some kind of mojo, slices Ultron, destroying his body. I guess his consciousness is floating in space or survived somehow, despite Wraith's powers supposedly keeping it locked down. The ending felt rushed and a bit contrived, but it wasn't absolutely terrible, despite my rather sarcastic tone in the description.

Oh ya, all those Phalanx? With Ultron dead, they all stopped moving. The Technarch duo went around later with Wraith and magically removed everyone's infections and, while the Kree are still quite devastated, everything is relatively back to normal.

Of note, the High Evolutionary seems to be set up as the next big bad of the universe or possibly a plot thread for the new Guardians of the Galaxy series. With Ultron and the Phalanx distracted, he took the army of Warlock pods he was entrusted with last issue and flees to continue his research. He could conceivably create an unstoppable army of sorts from this, so this will be picked up sometime in the future.

Verdict - Check It. I liked it, but I'm a bit biased with regards to this book. There's a lot of flaws I'm easily able to overlook that many might scoff at. While not a series I'd call a true event, this is still an enjoyable story. Disappointment over this not being as good or better than the original Annihilation is the biggest detriment and something most people will find hard to overlook when evaluating this series.

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