New Excalibur # 18 - To Rise Again, This Day! (Albion Prologue)
is a comic book published by Marvel Publishing & released on 5 / / 2007Plot Summary
This issue provides the back story for Albion, Excalibur's latest enemy.
At the opening of the issue, Excalibur is standing around a hologram of Albion trying to figure out who he is and where he came from. The scene switches to Albion and Lionheart sparring and at the end, he tells her his history.
On another Earth, Albion was a ranger in a centuries long war that spanned the globe. When he died in battle, Merlyn and Roma came to him and offered him the choice between an amulet and a sword. Unlike 616 Captain Britain, Albion chose the sword, the tool of destruction. Roma tried to take back the sword since he wasn't supposed to have taken it, but Merlyn stopped her and they left. Albion, now empowered, destroyed all his enemies on the battlefield and eventually got around to killing his enemies all over the world, ending the war entirely. Unfortunately, the long war had ravaged his world and people were starving and dying of diseases, enemies that Albion could not fight. Instead, he found another enemy, a man named Warlord who had apparent been the cause of the war. He discovered Warlord when the man was asking pan-dimensional traders (who had already given him tremendous power) for some more tools to take over the world. While the traders tried to escape, another Captain Britain arrived and stopped them. He didn't get there fast enough though, and Albion killed Warlord even after he surrendered. The Captain and Albion fought and Albion won. With the Captain and the traders at his mercy, he made them tell him all about the Captain Britain Corps. They tell him and Albion, still mad at Roma for trying to take his sword away all those years before, killed the Captain and vowed to kill all the other Captain Britains.
Back in the present, Albion and Lionheart meet and ally with Scicluna and the evil X-Men from earlier in the series.
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The glory days of Excalibur might be a thing of the past
Reviewed by The Outsider on April 11, 2007. The Outsider has written 127 reviews. His/her last review was for Part 2: Origins. 1 out of 1 users recommend his reviews. |
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I always feel bad when I criticize Chris Claremont's writing. He is responsible for the most famous X-Men story ever told (and others), and also had a hand in co-creating some of people's favorite X-Men. The problem is it's come to a point where it's impossible not to criticize his work.
The main problem is the dialog. It feels like a chore to read. This would have been great material back in the late 80s, but comic books have evolved since then, and sadly I don't think Claremont has. The story itself is kinda interesting, as it's basically Albion's origin. Unfortunately the uninspired dialog drags it down. Not to say the issue doesn't have plot holes exactly. Albion was given the same opportunity as Brian Braddock, but chose the sword instead of the amulet. Now we know what happened when Braddock chose the amulet and became Captain Britain... actually I could have used a refresher as to just what happened exactly... but it's never made quite clear what the big deal is that Albion chose the sword instead.
You can kinda figure it out during the course of the story, but it doesn't feel all that important. Their is no urgency to the matter, and it all sorta feels flat and unimpressive. It seems that the only reason Albion wants to take power away from Roma and destroy all the Captain Britains is because she didn't want him to have the sword in the first place... but she actually didn't do anything to prevent him from having it. Seems kinda odd to dedicate your life to destroying something that didn't really pose much of a threat to you in the first place.
Sadly I don't see this series surviving if something doesn't change soon.
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| Added by: | Buckshot |
| Date Added: | June 6, 2008 |
