Guardians Of The Galaxy #29: Review

Oct 1992

Jim Valentino, J. J. Birch

::: click cover to ENLARGE it :::

Story Name:

Let loose the dogs of war

Review & Comments

Rating:

Guardians Of The Galaxy #29 Review by Rob Johnson (October 30, 2021)

This is an official tie-in to the Infinity War mini-series connected to #3 and #4.

Spider-Man villain Shocker is the most well-known of Dr Octopus' gang this issue.
Puff Adder has been a Captain America villain as a member of the Serpent Society in many issues between CA#337 and #387. He also made a side-trip with them to X-Men Annual #13.
Gargantua was earlier known as Leviathan, working for Prof Power and the Secret Empire in Defenders #126,128 and CA#338. He changed his name to Gargantua in Acts Of Vengeance for a Wasp/Wonder Man tale in Avengers Spotlight #28.

The Guardians will hang around in the present for the next 4 issues on their mission to destroy the Badoon. Yellowjacket will accompany them back to the future in #34 and will stay with them until #60 when she'll return to the present. But when she arrives in Avengers: The Crossing she'll get killed by Iron Man. She'll have a last hurrah as 1 of the Dead Avengers during the Chaos War event.

From Our Blog:

Gwen Stacy, beauty queen of Standard High School, was Peter Parker's (alias Spider-Man) first great love.

Gwen Stacy: Classic Beauty

Synopsis / Summary / Plot

Guardians Of The Galaxy #29 Synopsis by Rob Johnson

The Guardians Of The Galaxy came from their future to the Earth-616 present to find that the Avengers are off in the Infinity War mini-series. Last issue they defended Avengers Mansion from a squad of Masters Of Evil sent by Dr Octopus. But Doc Ock himself sneaked in with 3 other villains and they now have as unconscious captives GOTGer Nikki plus Yellowjacket (Rita DeMara) who defected from the Masters to help our heroes.

Now Major Victory uses his seemingly encyclopaedic knowledge of old villains to identify Ock's backup as Gargantua, Puff Adder and Shocker. But Shocker and Gargantua team up to take down Charlie-27. Then Vance Astro tackles Puff Adder with Captain America's shield while Gargantua plays with Talon. The 2 females wake up in time to stop Shocker shocking the groggy Charlie.

Last issue Starhawk was distracted from the battle by encountering his evil Doppelganger (there's lots of them about in Infinity War). To avoid being absorbed he called on the help of his wife Aleta and they were successful. She shares their body with him but recently he's not been letting her have control. But now a replacement Dop appears and she refuses to help him again. And the Dop says the replacements will keep coming until he succumbs. Aleta reminds Stakar that when he was The One Who Knows he foresaw this event, but also that she would become the the more powerful 1 in their relationship. She demands that he let her take control.

Meanwhile Dops of the other heroes and villains start appearing. The real chars have to give up fighting each other to counter the worse threat. Gargantua is the 1st to defeat his Dop with a punch through the chest. Major Victory slams his Dop into Nikki's to take them both out.

Elsewhere Starhawk's internal conflict almost stops him from destroying his 2nd duplicate. But then #3 turns up and Stakar reluctantly hands over to Aleta. The Dop finds it can't merge with/absorb Aleta because it's not *her* Doppelganger. So she dispatches it with a warning to any others. Now free Aleta refuses to go back in the bottle and the internal conflict begins again. She screams ...

... and Vance Astro convinces himself he doesn't recognise the voice because he needs to concentrate on getting the heroes and villains to team up against the Dops. Doc Ock doesn't want to know but Charlie and Talon demonstrate the principle by throwing their Dops at Ock's causing all 3 to disappear. But then more copies port in. Otto Octavius agrees to the plan (but of course plans to double-cross them afterwards). Major Victory suggests taking on each other's Dops to confuse them (and avoid absorption). Ock starts the ball rolling by killing the Charlie-27-Dop. And so it goes.

Eventually the Dops stop coming (see why in IW#4). Ock tells his gang to turn on the Guardians. But his henchmen say the GOTG just saved them so they turn on *him*. They exit running. Jarvis insists the heroes help tidy up the mess.

::: click cover to ENLARGE it :::