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| Comic trade paperback, n.pag. Published 2016 (contents: 2015-16) Acquired September 2016 Read January 2017 |
Writer: Tom King
Colorists: Romula Fajardo Jr., Tomeu Morey
Letterer: Pat Brosseau
In interviews about Threshold, Keith Giffen stated his intentions to bring in the Omega Men at some point. Clearly, we need to be grateful that he did not, because it might have prevented this comic from existing. Tom King and Barnaby Bagenda present the third incarnation of the Omega Men, but possibly the first to actually deliver on their potential-- they pick up on the morally ambiguous aspects of the Omega Men set up in the early issues of the 1983 Roger Silfer/Keith Giffen run to great effect. This version of The Omega Men is violent and harsh. Former Green Lantern Kyle Rayner comes to the Vega system to try to make peace, but finds that sometimes, violence is the only response to oppression. But this is a violence beyond that of most superhero-adjacent comic books. The nine-panel grid gives the proceedings a monotonous feel-- in a good way. It's like one of those movies where there are no cuts, you just have to watch the horrible things happen.
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| A prisoner of the nine-panel grid... just like he's a prisoner of THE OMEGA MEN!!! from The Omega Men vol. 3 #1 (art by Barnaby Bagenda) |
King was a CIA agent of some stripe before he became a comic book writer, and his depictions of the complications of the Vega system really benefit from this. The six worlds of Vega (gone are the umpteen worlds of the old days; Starfire's homeworld of Tamaran doesn't seem to be in Vega anymore) have been conquered by the Citadel. Vega is the only source of a precious mineral, and it's impossible not to see echoes of Western involvement in the Middle East for its resources. King and Bagenda depict a lot of local conflicts, too; it's not just Star Wars-style Evil Empire vs. Hapless Rebels. Each planet has its own factions, some of whom find merit in co-operating with the Citadel for whatever reason. You even have the planet Euphorix, where the Citadel resettled the Brahmins from another system to that planet, so there's its natives, plus the Brahmins, plus the Citadel. I liked the delving into religion, too: both the Citadel and Vega worship the same god, Alpha, the first cause, but the inhabitants of Vega also worship Omega, the end. There's a lot of nuance and story here.
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| Scrapps, the Patchwork Girl??? from The Omega Men vol. 3 #5 (art by Barnaby Bagenda) |
The End Is Here makes up one longer story, but each issue is its own standalone, too, another piece in the puzzle that is the true agenda of the Omega Men, and the slow unlocking of their backstories, and the slow breaking of Kyle Rayner. The first couple I felt were the strongest, maybe because that was when the book was new and fresh and I had no idea what could happen. It did eventually settle into a pattern, but still found ways to surprise me, like with Kyle and the Princess Kalista in hiding on Hny'xx, the market world-- suddenly it was a survival thriller, as we got a taste of what it's like to just live in Vega when you can't rebel.
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| Life in dystopia is always so much fun... from The Omega Men vol. 3 #7 (art by Barnaby Bagenda & Ig Guara) |
If there was ever an argument for the New 52, this book was it. In my review of the 2005-06 Omega Men revival, I commented on how the core premise of the series mutated over time-- and by the point the Omega Men were appearing in R.E.B.E.L.S., a return to the original hook would have been inexplicable and impossible. The New 52 lets DC do that. Like the best reboots, this is a different angle on something that was there all along. The Omega Men had become sort of impotent and toothless-- look at how Tigorr went from savage beast to a one-eyed cigar-chomping stereotype. Fun, but not exactly a feral freedom fighter/terrorist. In The End Is Here, King and Bagenda bring The Omega Men back, the way they always should have been.
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