Aquaman: The Missing Peace
Title: The Missing Peace
Cover Title: Spirit And Flesh
Cover Date: 1988
Writer: Gary Cohn and Dan Mishkin
Pencils: George Freeman
Inks: Mark Pacella
Colors: Tom Zuiko
Lettering: Ron Muns
Editor: Barbara Randall
Cover: George Freeman and Mark Pacella
Cover Price: $1.50
Continuity: OUT
Note: With Special Thanks to Fred Little
OVERVIEW:
Aquaman, wearing the blue suit, wakes up on the moon. He starts to swim home through the vast reaches of space.
Aquaman, in his orange suit, saves mariners from a hurricane with Mera's help. Mera remarks on how peaceful Aquaman now is, and he thinks back to how his battle with Orm freed his calm side and settled his emotions once and for all.
On the ocean floor, an Atlantean Patrol is swallowed by a strange bubble.
Aquaman is trying to regain his throne again, from Vulko. During the discussion, news of the missing patrol is reported, and it vanished in the same zone where Orm was killed. Aquaman loses his cool and then runs off with Mera to find out what is happening.
He and Mera find the bubble on the ocean floor, and then are attacked by a Russian Submarine. They enter the sub and meet a scientist by the name of Yuri Popov, who tells them that he was studying mystic crystals with one Professor Vladimir Magus, who aligned the crystals to renew their power. When he approached the renewed crystals, he turned into the bubble, which has been swallowing things.
Yuri takes them closer to the bubble, who proclaims Aquaman a half-man, and challenges him. As Aquaman once again loses control, the bubble swallows him.
Inside the bubble, Magus tells him that the crystal artifacts are drawing the other half of Aquaman to them. Aquaman surmises that he must disrupt the artifacts' arrangement to defeat Magus. Magus warns Aquaman that his scheme will succeed, but Aquaman will also die.
Aquaman battles the artifacts, which take the forms of Taurus (the Bull), Capricorn (the Goat), Leo (the Lion), and Gemini (the Twins). He battles the Bull, Goat, and Lion and fails, then battles Magus who refers to Aquaman's astral twin, giving him the clue he needs to win. Aquaman pushes the artifacts apart, and the bubble deflates. While saving Magus' life, Aquaman's astral twin rejoins him and he feels whole again.
COMMENTS:
Um. what to say about this one... let's see.
The cover is uninspired and boring.
The plot was... thin, to say the least. At the start it seemed like we were starting off where the Pozner series had ended, with a strong, stable Aquaman who has at last dealt with his conflicting emotions. But he quickly goes insane for the sake of the plot, such as there is.
The Pozner series used the mystic artifacts to explore Aquaman's emotions and to settle him down. This book seemed like an attempt to do the same thing, only rushed and badly.
CONCLUSION:
Rating: 3
Avoid this one, folks.