Welcome to Unifying VALIANT, our celebration of the 25-year anniversary of VALIANT’s companywide crossover ‘Unity.’ A precursor to the now omnipresent annual comic event, ‘Unity’ and VALIANT changed the face of the comic industry in the early ‘90’s. In each entry we’ll be focusing on one of the company’s storylines until culminating at ‘Unity.’ Follow along as we dig deep and rediscover what made VALIANT the innovative and revolutionary company it was.
This week we follow along as the ‘Unity’ crossover continues to spiral out of control. In the last batch of books from the first month of the event, what new discoveries will cause dire results to the heroes of the VALIANT Universe?
It’s Place within VALIANT:
The ‘Unity’ storyline’s importance comes from the massive effort of the VALIANT creators to make an all-encompassing crossover without the restrictions and tie downs that both Marvel and DC had shown in the 1980’s. As the story continues to unfold we see how this effort truly took on a life of its own, as Jim Shooter and the other creators were not hampered with decades of continuity, or even a general adherence to specific characters. The freedom allotted by the originality of the stories and the discretion given the second and third tier nature of the intellectual properties is what made ‘Unity’ a memorable event.
The lack of consequence and the freedom that was brought to ‘Unity’ can be seen in these four chapters. The creator’s unbound restrictions bring about some very intriguing plot points. Quite frankly, I’d venture to say that many of these plot points would draw criticisms from modern-day reviewers. Luckily, ‘Unity’ resides within a timeframe in comics when daring creative work was simply seen as inspiring and not defamatory, as it is so many times today. Regardless, whether it be the death of entire civilizations, the ramifications of teenage pregnancy or the queasiness that only incest can bring, there are no stones too heavy to be overturned when it comes to these early VALIANT issues.
Given that the comics at hand had been running for several months, there were no real surprises in regards to the creative teams. Probably the only brow-raising fact remains just how much work David Lapham was able to produce in a short time. The newest of the comics, “Shadowman” saw distribution almost triple, with a print run of 120,000 units. The same would hold true for “Rai” and “Harbinger,” which would also see print runs of 120,000 and had been at similar levels. “Solar,” which had had a stronger showing as of late, would get a print run of 125,000 units, more than doubling the prior month’s output. While such levels would be market leading today, they remain modest for their times. Yet, the net effect that the crossover has had on the VALIANT line as a whole in incredible as sales have literally doubled and tripled.
Storyline Summary:
‘Unity’ Chapter #6-9
Publication dates: August 1992
Written by Jim Shooter (All), Faye Perozich (Shadowman #4), David Micheline (Rai #6)
Penciled by David Lapham (Shadowman #4 & Harbinger #8), Joe St. Pierre (Rai #6) & Don Perlin (Solar #12)
Inked by Tom Ryder (Shadowman #4), Kathryn Bolinger (Rai #6), Gonzalo Mayo (Harbinger #8) & Stan Drake (Solar #12)
Colored by Jorge Gonzalez (Shadowman #4), Mark Csaszar (Rai #6), Maria Beccari (Harbinger #8) & Mike Cavallaro (Solar #12)
Lettered by George Roberts (Shadowman #4 & Harbinger #8), Jade Moede (Rai #6) & Joe Albelo (Solar #12)
With an ever-growing reputation and a loose-lipped cleaning lady, a local man who had once trained as a Geomancer calls upon Shadowman for his help. As the Earth screams with the panic at what Erica Pierce if planning, the Geomancer takes Shadowman to a hidden dimensional portal. There, mustering every inch of courage and recklessness, Shadowman breaches the portal, finding himself in the Lost Land amidst the raging battle between Erica Pierce and Solar. With no true point of reference, and witnessing Solar pounding on Pierce, Shadowman makes an uneducated judgment call. Jumping into the fray and tackling Solar. Little did Shadowman know that contacting Solar would almost instantly burn his body to a crisp, and leave him on the verge of death. It would also give Pierce the opening she needed to counter Solar’s attack and disperse the energy which is the core of his being. Neutralizing her hated rival.
Continued below
Meanwhile back in 4001, Rai comes across the Geomancer of that time and the Eternal Warrior. Brought up to speed with the details of Pierce’s plan, the trio recruits Magnus before heading to the Lost Land. Leaving the Geomancer behind, the group is able to breach the portal, yet are instantly detected by Pierce. Determining that each of them poses little threat with the exception of Rai. Erica Pierce devises a plan to pit Rai in a moral conundrum and force him to withdraw. However, when faced with the death of millions over billions, Rai chooses the altruistic path, remaining to battle Pierce, while she crashes the entirety of Japan onto Earth, effectively killing millions of people.
With the immense ramifications of the battle and Solar’s apparent defeat, the Harbinger kids decide to retreat from the fray and devise a way to get back to their own time. The true reason for their withdrawal though is Kris’ pregnancy. Sting, fearing for the child that he believes is his, has hidden the team in the Lost Land. Yet, when the truth of her pregnancy and her prior tryst with Torque comes to life, Sting goes on a one-man rampage. As he demolishes everything surrounding him, Sting is confronted by Erica Pierce. Hitting her with everything he has, Sting falls short of defeating her and must be helped off the battlefield, having failed but buying the coalition of heroes valuable time.
Review:
The back half of the first month of the ‘Unity’ crossover can be summed up two ways. First, a lot of crazy stuff is going on in these books. Regardless of what you might think pertaining to the writing style or the general vibe of the comics, one thing is for certain. Jim Shooter and VALIANT pulled out all the stops and really put these characters in extreme situations for the betterment of the story. This general disregard for the long-lasting ramifications of the characters is extremely refreshing and one of the main driving forces behind the success of the crossover. I’d dare say that without these extreme concepts, VALIANT as a company would have failed to differentiate themselves.
Just think of the magnitude of the events from these four issues. First, Shadowman mistakenly takes the wrong side in the battle and is charred an inch from death. Next, Rai is a witness and powerless as the entirety of Japan crash-lands onto Earth and kills hundreds of millions of innocents. After that, we have the revelation that not only is Kris pregnant, she’s pregnant after having a short affair with the now deceased Torque. Finally, in “Solar,” we learned that Erica Pierce not only killed her other self, she’s had a strange romantic, quasi-incestual relationship with her alternate timeline’s son. Each of these taken individually could be the genesis for multiple issues worth of storylines and character development. Yet, here they are stacked one right after the other. Fodder for the ‘Unity’ crossover and VALIANT’s ability to make sure that this is a memorable and sales inducing event.
The second item that we can infer from these issues is that David Lapham is becoming an excellent artist right in front of our eyes. Drawing both “Shadowman” and “Harbinger” this month, the work is far and beyond his best from the VALIANT run thus far. It’s incredible how his work in “Harbinger” has progressed in such a short period. His pencils are tight and crisp, and gone are the strange out of proportion panels or sloppy backgrounds. It is a masterful effort that easily captures the emotional ramifications that are set forth in the story. It is wonderful to see the slight emotional twists portrayed in Kris’ character as her secret if unwound. More so as these panels range in a multitude of sizes, making some of these emotional reactions subtle tweaks to the art. I can’t say enough what an incredible job Lapham did his first two ‘Unity’ chapters.
Continued belowThe remainder of the creative contributions remain extremely solid as well. The combination of David Micheline and Joe St. Pierre are tasked with an almost impossible scenario in “Rai” #6. Yet, they pull off the murder of millions of innocents by capturing Rai’s emotions as every step of the crash is shown. It is a daring artistic angle focusing so clearly on a single character’s facial expressions to portray the immense sense of loss and self-blame that he must feel. I can only imagine that St. Pierre had a ton of facial models to work from as the amount of detail shown is outstanding. Meanwhile, Don Perlin’s work on “Solar” continues to be very solid. While some of his smaller panels suffer a bit from the overloading of action and thus, a small lack of detail, his larger panels are saturated with beautiful pencils showing exquisite detail.
The only gripe that can be mustered regarding this second set of ‘Unity’ chapters is a bit of untidiness in regards to the general continuity within the issues. Reading these back to back, it is easy to spot any actions that are not quite in synch with the arc. With so many of the action pieces being repeated from different points of views, it is easy to see where a slight plot hole or misalignment can occur. While the ones present are minor and can easily be dismissed or overlooked, when dealing with a crossover whose main selling point is the tight interconnectivity of the story, it can then be seen as a slight shortcoming whenever there is a hiccup. Regardless of how small it may be. Ultimately though, this is a small and insignificant gripe of a storyline that continues to be masterful in its planning and execution.
Coming up Next:
As things take a turn for the worse in ‘Unity’ we’ll read chapters #10-14. These will include “Eternal Warrior” #2, “Archer & Armstrong” #2, “Magnus” #16, “X-O Manowar” #8 and “Shadowman” #5. Erica Pierce is on the verge is extracting her ultimate revenge on Solar, can she pull it off?
