BHOC: NOVA #23

In the space of just a few issues, I had really connected with NOVA. From the original house ads that I had seen and the name of the series, I had assumed at first that it was some science fiction thing, like JOHN CARTER, WARLORD OF MARS, in which I’d have little interest. But when I finally sampled it, it was a super hero series, and one that was very much to my liking. It had a young protagonist, an ever-growing stable of colorful villains, and plotlines that built effectively over time. In short, it was an almost perfect synthesis of what I liked about both DC and Marvel’s books smashed into one. Its eventual unannounced cancellation would baffle me, and for months I awaited the next issue before eventually giving up and realizing that the title was gone.

As the book neared its 25th issue, writer/editor Marv Wolfman was beginning to set up his dominoes for a huge intergalactic adventure, one that would cross over with another book that he was writing at the time, FANTASTIC FOUR. When NOVA was discontinued, Marv had to juggle his plotlines on the fly, wrapping up as much of his NOVA business in the pages of FANTASTIC FOUR as he was able to before moving on. But anyway, that was all to come. In this issue, Marv had decided to pit the Human Rocket against a villain from a relatively strange place: Marv’s own TOMB OF DRACULA series. This was Doctor Sun, who was a human brain transplanted into an artificial body and who had clashed with Dracula previously.

Doctor Sun has an interest in Nova’s Xandarian starship, and in order to get his hands on it, he’s enlisted the unwitting aid of the Human Rocket’s old foe Diamondhead as an unwitting pawn. Having put Nova and his new ally, the 1950s continuity-implant hero The Comet, onto Diamondhead’s trail via a hologram made to look like the villain, Doctor Sun now intends to let the bejeweled criminal incapacitate his prey, and then spirit him away to learn the secrets of his ship. So it is that Nova and the Comet take Diamondhead by surprise in his hideout. But the villain is super-strong and as durable as his namesake, and so the pair have a legitimate fight on their hands.

And a one-sided fight it is, as Diamondhead swiftly pulverizes his foes, knocking the Comet blocks away into the distance and driving Nova into the ground. Seeing his opportunity, Doctor Sun uses his ability to remotely control machinery to possess a bulldozer and use it to dig up and convey the unconscious Nova to where he is waiting. Meanwhile, back at Richard Rider’s home, the Sherlock Holmes robot that was thought to be the creation of Rich’s younger brother Robbie is now retroactively revealed to have been the work of Doctor Sun. He uses the robot to disguise itself as Rich and allay the suspicions of his supporting cast. Nobody apparently wondered why or how Rich Rider had suddenly grown a large wheel in place of his legs.

Back at Doctor Sun’s laboratory, as Nova awakens, Wolfman calls a time out for two pages so that he can prevail upon his TOMB OF DRACULA partners Gene Colan and Tom Palmer to illustrate a short history of Doctor Sun. While this is a clear infodump, it’s also clear that this issue was running behind–Carmine Infantino’s pencils are inked by a bevy of different creators throughout the issue, including Walt Simonson, Joe Rubinstein, Klaus Janson and Terry Austin. And it’s definitely valuable information as I had no idea what had transpired in that series, as I wasn’t interested in horror or monster comics. Suffice it to say that, having become a disembodied brain, Doctor Sun got his clock cleaned at least twice while contending with the Lord of Darkness.

In the manner of all good villains, Doctor Sun explains to Nova just what it is he’s after, and he’s prepared for the Human Rocket well–Nova can’t breach the force-field that protects Sun. After some brief repartee, Sun teleports the pair to his objective: the Nova Prime spaceship that’s been in orbit around Earth since the first issue. Sun intends to drain the ship’s memory banks of their knowledge and power and add them to his own. Nova fights back, of course, and Sun summarily dispatches him, mentioning along the way that Nova possesses more powers than he’s even aware of and that he’s not yet discovered or learned to master. Either way, the Human Rocket is back to being unconscious and back on a slab once again. Not a great showing for even a novice super hero, really.

Doctor Sun begins the process of siphoning off Nova’s knowledge, intending to use it to access the Nova Prime ship’s computers. But before he can get very far, a dramatic voice rings out, saying that Nova is the property of another. And Doctor Sun turns to confront the Sphinx, the immortal nemesis who has been dogging Nova’s steps almost since the series began. So the question now becomes: will the two villains throw down, or are they going to team up, leaving the powerless and unconscious Nova in an even worse situation? We’d need to wait to find out the answers, as this is where the story is To Be Continued! From a vantage point several decades later, it’s a bit of a mess of an issue, one in which the lead character gets knocked on his ass repeatedly, and where the artwork obviously shows the crunch of time. It isn’t terrible, but it’s no better than good, really.