Namor Visionaries: John Byrne, Vol. 2 by John Byrne

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This book collects Issues 10-18 of John Byrne's 1990s Namor Series and has four stories therein:

Issues #10-#12: The Invaders Fight Again: West and East Germany are reuniting as the Cold War ends but that leaves Namor (and to an extent) Captain America nervous about a possible resurgence by Nazis. Namor goes to Berlin to investigate and discovers that Masterman is already part of such a contingency and has captured the original Human Torch (Jim Hammond) as part of the scheme. Whe Namor himself is captured, he'll need some help from some old friends. Overall, a great story that serves as a very good reunion for the Invaders with so many wonderful and fun moments.

Issue #13: Trial of the Sub-Mariner: A necessary story that has the Marvel Universe dealing with Namor's behavior during the Silver Age. It rehashes quite a bit as well as cutting to stuff that will be dealt with later, but also helps set things up so that Namor can be used in other ways (such as being an Avenger) without having the absurdity of not dealing with the fact he tried to wipe out New York City.

Issue #14: A Child is Waiting: Phoebe Marrs reveals a lot about herself and her feelings to Namor. It's a well-developed back-story but is hindered by a fight with a griffin that turns out to be superflous.

Issues 15-18: Namor returns to where Atlantis relocated when he receives word that is long-believed-dead wife Dorma is alive. However, before he can be really sure he has to go to the Savage Lands to investigate what's heating Atlantis where he runs into a battle with the apparently resurrected Danny Rand (AKA Iron Fist.) Some problems with this, mainly that they spent too long in the book setting this up and Misty Knight's behavior is hard to understand. Still, this is a pretty good story.

Overall, a big step up from the first volume, with all the issues being well-characterized and the Invaders story being absolutely brilliant. Well-worth reading.



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