Aquaman #21: Pretty good art, okay story, interesting nod to pre-Crisis continuity. Mildly recommended. $1.75/$2.50Cn

Dr. Highwater Memorial Award to Aquaman #21

Aquaman "First Strike": Here's one of those echoes of realities that no longer exist mentioned last issue. Thierna Na Oge, the Celtic myth-like city from a Pre-Crisis Aquaman LS, is back. Thing is, that LS never happened in the new continuity. But thanks to their strong ties to magic, the people remember it anyway, and Nuada exiles Bres in time to welcome Aquaman to the city and offer the full support of her people.

Meanwhile, in circumstances not really explained, Aquaman is injured but Garth and Dolphin have gotten him out to the ship in time. And Strom's fine, the jerk. Everyone else is probably dead. One of those big skull meteor ships appears over the Himalayas and picks up Strom, who's probably more robot than cyborg.

Elsewhere, Atlan has managed to get out from under the rocks dropped on him and escaped, but Kordax feels this is only temporary.

Aquaman wakes in Nuada's arms (she must identify with him even more now that he's joined her in the one-arm club) and he tries to deal with a freaky half-remembered previous meeting. Then he invokes Murphy and we cut away to Bres joining up with the skull ship. And just in case things were about to go too well for Arthur, Garth steals a kiss from Dolphin. Thing is, he's STILL not over Tula, something the kiss proved to him. Unfortunately, he didn't TELL Dolphin that, so now she's probably a little confused.

Oh, and then the skull ship arrives. It's only a scout ship, but it's still horkin' huge. Arthur and his supporting cast rush to their ship to distract the skull while the Conclave summons up their magic to fight it off. There's a few tense moments, but the battle is won and Bres is boiled. Dolphin has a voice in her head telling her to kill Arthur, but she resists. But doesn't TELL anyone. This is starting to look like a Shakespeare tragedy...not enough communication.

And, apparently the fight went a little too rough on the victors, because Strom's laughing his robotic ass off at the results of this minor skirmish.

P.S. Kron "One Eye" gets a guest shot.