Here begins the middle act of the New Voyages saga, where it ratchets up a notch into something truly special. Following their new adventures into the unknown, the Micronauts began to get pulled back into the familiar, with various concepts from the first series making a reappearance.
Micronauts: The New Voyages #9-10 (1985)
Pencils: Kelley Jones
Inks: Bruce Patterson
Picking up on Mantlo and Guice's final panel, ex Micronaut Devil finds himself reborn on a desolate ruined Homeworld. Essentially a pink version of the furry Beast, he shares a neverending life cycle with the pixie like Fireflyte, reborn once the other dies. The terrified Devil gets twisted in a transporter tube, psychically broadcasting a distress signal to Commander Rann. Devil's matrix ends up in the latest incarnation of Biotron (yes, Gillis brought the annoying droids back again, presumably chiefly for this plot device).
Rann, feeling his thousand year age and full of self doubt over recent errors in judgement, makes one more catastrophic mistake: he attempts to breach the spacewall that separates them from Homeworld, in order to save his former comrade. This does not go well, as the space god manifestation of the Enigma Force known as the Time Traveler resists his attempts quite violently, smashing the Dreaming Star fleet to space junk. And if you're wondering, yes, the spacewall is just a giant mesh barrier across three dimensional space, and no, I don't know how that could possibly work either.
Rann and Mari emerge from the battle both physically and psychically shattered; Mari can't move her legs, while Rann becomes the white haired old man he's been feeling like.
Also, enigmatic shape changer Solitaire officially joins the Micros, having unfortunately settled on a raven haired semi-clad leather and fishnet form. As I often say on this blog, it was the eighties.
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| Cheesecake with your philosophy. |
Micronauts: The New Voyages #11-12 (1985)
Pencils: Kelley Jones
Inks: Danny Bulanadi
The latter half of the run sees the return of veteran 1981-83 Micronauts inker Danny Bulanadi, who ironically was replaced by Kelley Jones on inks. There's little to choose from between Patterson and Bulanadi, although I feel the latter's bolder smoother lines are a better fit with Jones.
A now visibly ancient Rann retires to the Dreaming Star, where poets and psychotics alike can live out the rest of their days serenely floating in capsules, communing with the cosmos. This naturally doesn't sit well with a now crippled Mari. I always found Arcturus Rann a fascinating character, if hard to like; a man out of time, akin to Captain America. His origin mirrors (or copies) the Guardians' Vance Astro, an astronaut who journeys in suspended animation for a thousand years, only to find technology has rendered his travels pointless. They both then wind up leading a band of ragtag rebels. Rann is far less bitter than the suit encased Astro, but can be distant and lacking empathy. During the later Mantlo run, Rann took lengthy absences, so the team turned to Marionette for leadership. Gillis wrote him out more permanently here, presumably to make way for his commanding new character Scion. A Micronauts without Rann at the helm proves a very different and fascinating beast...
With Mari out of action and sorts, Acroyear takes the lead of the remaining Micros. A fortuitous encounter through the spacewall with his wife and former people, now space wanderers since Acroyear blew up their planet, is predictably awkward and inconclusive, although it furthers that subplot somewhat.
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| The spacewall covered in lovely space tech. |
In their continued bid to breach the wall, Acroyear, Bug and Huntarr investigate Breachpoint, a gigantic ancient station built on its surface. Although awe inspiring, their search proves fruitless. On returning to the Endeavour, they find a metal winged being in golden hotpants named Scion has seized control of the ship and team. Scion is actually an evolved form of the weird creature that hatched from the asteroid's egg in issue 8. As much as I love Jones' art, Scion's final grey form is a much better character design than this goofy intermediate stage he sports for much of his appearances.
Pompous and omniscient stranger Scion turns out to be an unpopular choice for new leader, with the male Micros rebelling to no avail. Intriguingly, Solitaire appears to recognise him as a 'brother'. Eventually, with help from Mari and Huntarr, Scion uses his nigh unlimited powers to finally breach the spacewall. As much I enjoy cosmic conundrums, three issues of trying to poke a hole in a wall is probably one too many.
With their strange and wondrous voyages coming full circle, the Micronauts return to a much changed Microverse...
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