Armor Hunters: Aftermath #1

By Robert Venditti, Cafu and Brian Reber

It’s funny how quickly writer Robert Venditti has made us as readers do a complete 180 turn on Gin-Gr since that spotlight issue that showed her origins. Granted, aside from blowing up Mexico, she really hasn’t done anything too terrible, but with one simple panel shared between her and Livewire, you can’t help but like this giant space robot. Hopefully we get to see her in a larger, no pun intended, capacity as we move forward—like in the pages of Unity.

This was very much an issue about final closure for the Armor Hunters event and the beginning of a new era in the Valiant Universe. Venditti sets up stuff for not only X-O Manowar but a handful of other Valiant books as well. It’s fantastic to see everything coming together after two-plus years of this magnificent Valiant relaunch, and even considering all that has happened, this issue feels like the calm before the storm.

Artist Cafu and Valiant colorist extraordinaire Brian Reber combine for some fantastic art in, really, an action-lacking issue. No major fight scenes or explosions or acid puking space dragons (though he’s in it briefly) might be taken as a boring issue, at least visually, but these two craft brilliant scenes from a rather tame script. Something as simple as a conversation between two characters we’ve never met before looks great.

There’s so much more to come from these creators and there are so many things to do in the Valiant Universe that, again, this issue really does feel like the Sun peaking through dark storm clouds right before all Hell breaks loose. A good wrap to a great event and the start of so many new things, even if there was no real action, is just what the doctor ordered. Keep your eyes on not only this team but all of Valiant—the best is yet to come.