Even
though this arc wasn’t released under the Totally
Awesome Hulk title, it’s still definitely an Amadeus Cho story. It follows directly from the events at the
end of the last volume, and it continues Amadeus’s internal struggle with his
Hulk (spoilers for the ending of My Best Friends are Monsters.)
Concerned
about his lessening control over the Hulk, Amadeus has sequestered himself in a
manned space probe where he can research and experiment far away from anyone
who might get hurt. But while he does
keep a wide berth from humans, the
self-imposed isolation is short-lived.
Amadeus follows a distress call to the planet Sakaar, a harsh world
ruled by the oppressive War Lord. Bruce
Banner’s Hulk was once a gladiator in Sakaar’s brutal arena, and now, the
planet’s subjugated clans call on Amadeus to be their champion, battling for
their survival and freedom.
The basic
set-up for Sakaar and the situation of its peoples is easy enough to
understand, but having seen Thor: Ragnarok gave me a quicker “in” to the
world and more immediate interest in the story to follow. There’s even a fun Ragnarok reference in the middle that made me laugh out loud.
The story
has some good points, but it does retread a bit. The last volume took Amadeus to a pretty
vulnerable place in regards to his Hulk and made it look like he was ready to
confront some of the darker truths to be found there, but this arc puts him
back in denial mode, insistent that he’s in complete control and can access the
Hulk’s power without facing up to the scarier side of things.
Still, it
does go to some interesting
places. Sakaar is a harsh place, and
many of the people there want the
monster. Time and time again, they call
on Amadeus to unleash the “world-breaker.”
In the fights set to him by the War Lord, they continually see him as
holding back, jeopardizing his chances of victory by refusing to kill. Considering the fact that all of their lives depend on him beating
the War Lord’s champions, this worries them.
At one point, Amadeus is even told that it’s selfish of him to risk
their lives for the sake of keeping his hands clean. Yes, it’s kind of a classic genre-hero
conundrum – how do the good guys win when they don’t kill, even though the bad
guys do? – but it comes off well, especially when combined with the prospect of
Amadeus, the one who always counts on himself to solve any problem, having to
give up total control of his mind and body in the process (even if only for a
short time.)
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