Posted - September 7, 2015

Previous: Annihilation War of the Gods

What has changed in the Marvel Universe after Annihilation?

Of the heroes, the Avenger and galactic guardian, Quasar, is gone. The power of the Quantum Bands have been inherited by the latest in the line of Captain Marvel, Phyla-Vell.

She managed to wrest the bands from Annihilus by giving the bands a choice: Cosmic powered cockroach or super-sexy Kree babe? I'm only half kidding, the choice - activated by touching the bands - was between good and evil. It is an interesting coincidence that this Captain Marvel is the third Captain Marvel of the line of Mar-Vell. and the Quantum Bands have their third wielder after Marvel Boy and Quasar. Neat.

Of the star-spanning civilizations, the Nova Corps is no more. All the worlds patrolled by the Corps recede into a scenario akin to the wild, wild West.

Of the Galactic Empires, the Skrull Empire . . . well. First, lets go back to Annihilus' hunters. These guys. Wielders of the Negative Zone Opposing Force, these Seekers, together with the elite warriors of the Negative Zone, the Centurions, and some surviving stragglers from the Annihilation Wave are still strong enough to pose a threat, but no longer strong enough to conquer known space. A truce, therefore, is agreed upon. The leader of the Negative Zone forces is the Seeker called Ravenous.

Incidentally, I hate this guy and look forward to reading a lot of comics were he gets his ass handed to him (preferably by Thor) - but that's for later. Ravenous and his Negative Zone ilk have been granted vast areas of the Skrull Empire to rule.

So the Skrulls lose their Imperium because of Galactus. They devolve into fragmented factions under different warlords. And now, they have effectively been invaded.

Next up, Galactus and his Heralds.

First, Terrax the Tamer. Conquered, controlled, and enslaved. Terrax is a ruthless lunatic and that's when he's in a good mood. Now?

First he destroys an Annihilation Wave capital ship.

Then he destroys an entire planet.

Yup. He's pissed.

Firelord. Firelord refuses to make peace with the enemy. Something that I'm very happy about. So he's going around the former Skrull Empire hunting down the Centurions in a mission of vengeance. This panel shows up our cosmic-powered vigilante nicely.

Red Shift dies during the height of the War.

Stardust, no longer the herald of Galactus goes back to his former master hoping to get the job back. He does. But so does the Surfer. From hereon Galactus has two heralds. Surfer is the active one and Stardust in reserve.

Now for the Surfer. His mission: Track down Aegis and Tenebrous and inform Galactus.

The Silver Surfer being the Silver Surfer, once he spots the pair he does this.

This is why I love the Silver Surfer! He's insane!

He keeps getting hit.

And he keeps responding with Cosmic head shots.

It all ends the way we expect.

In life, when your down, when it seems it is all over. Sometimes. You get an idea. Like the Silver Surfer. He realizes that he is very near the Crunch - the locus of primal energy that gave birth to Aegis and Tenebrous. The kind of energy that created them could also kill them. With that, the Surfer launches one last attack and it is something to see, because at last we get to see the Surfer surf the cosmic wave. Just look at this.

Wow. Beautiful. And deadly. Aegis and Tenebrous are no more. Wait. What?! How could the Surfer destroy Galactus-class beings?

I've thought about this for some time and you know what? Aegis and Tenebrous are NOT Galactus-class beings. They're referred to as proemial beings. Beings that existed at the start of the universe. So is Stardust, an ethereal being from the dawn of universal time - and Stardust is just a Herald of Galactus. From The The Last Galactus Story I recall that Galactus is the lone survivor of the universe before the current one. Therefore he predates even the ancient proemials and quite possibly surpasses them in power and, therefore, his Herald, the Silver Surfer can approximate the proemials in power and is thus able to defeat them. What do you think?

How did Aegis and Tenebrous beat Galactus enough for Thanos and Annihilus to trap him? Well, I would put that down to blind luck.

And so we have come to the end of Annihilation, and the universe will never be the same again.

Next: Artifacts