Thursday, November 19, 2009

Strictly speaking, not a Nexus artist...

...but Luke McDonnell did the art, and Mike Baron the story, for Crossroads #5. A five-issue, prestige format, limited series from First Comics, Crossroads brought together most of First's titles at that time, rotating two or more per issue: Sable, Whisper, Badger, Luther Ironheart (of American Flagg!, Judah Maccabee all appear; Judah also guests here with Dreadstar, Grimjack, and Nexus. When Vanth Dreadstar crosses over into the pan-dimensional junction Cynosure; the Merk is more than a little upset: he's an insane alien who tasks Nexus to kill mass-murderers, and Vanth destroyed his reality's Milky Way galaxy. (Back in Jim Starlin's Metamorphosis Odyssey, which is like the one chunk of Dreadstar I've never read; but frankly, it didn't come up a lot...) Calling Dreadstar "the Anti-Nexus," the Merk rather forcibly sets the reluctant Nexus on him. Vanth does have one piece of luck: running across John Gaunt, a.k.a. Grimjack. Gaunt gives Vanth the head's-up on Cynosure's hit-and-miss laws of physics. Determined to track down Dreadstar, Nexus blows up Munden's Bar; and I don't know why it is called that, since it's Grimjack's bar. After that, it's on, and a sidetrip to a no-power dimension later, Nexus gets a good deal of comeuppance. The whole issue could be subtitled "Honorable men can differ," and in the end Judah, Horatio, and John share a drink at a different bar; with Horatio promising full restitution. But, somewhat differently for a crossover series like this, there would be repercussions in Nexus' home book: this would be the final straw for Horatio, who would quit as Nexus in issue #52.

1 comment:

CalvinPitt said...

I just bought the entire Crossroads mini online a couple of weeks ago. It was pretty good.

As to why it's Munden's Bar, quick answer is it existed before GrimJack took ownership. LOng answer, I'd suggest GrimJack: Killer Instinct. It's quite good (the bit about the bar's name is just a little side bit, the actual story involves vampires, killer mimes, stuff like that.