Carnage Reigns: Omega // Review
Cletus Kasady was dangerous enough. He had a longstanding relationship with the symbiotic alien organism that turned him into Carnage. Recent events have found him fusing with Tony Stark’s Extremus Virus...forming something with the rather comically named Extrembiote. Now, it’s up to Miles Morales, Tony Stark, and a host of villains to form a superhero team to defeat it in Carnage Reigns: Omega. Writer Cody Ziglar wraps up his big event with the aid of artists Julius Ohta and Rogê Antônio. Color comes to the page under the power of Erick Arciniega. It’s a big, silly battle, but it’s a fun one.
Some of the guys want to know if they’re like...full-fledged Avengers now that they’re working alongside Tony Stark. It doesn’t work that way, but he doesn’t have time to explain why. He’s got a plan to defeat this massive dragon-like symbiote entity, and it involves armor that kinda makes him look like a knight. So that’s cool. He HAS to get into the right frame of mind for it because...y’know...his plan is crazy. All he has to do is climb inside the thing and unleash an EMP to knock it out. What could possibly go wrong?
It’s all going to turn out okay. There isn’t much doubting that. Ziglar manages to make it look like a crazy last-ditch effort to save New York. What’s more: he makes it look like a completely NEW last-ditch effort to save New York. That’s kind of an accomplishment given that New York is in peril like...every other week in the Marvel Universe. Ziglar’s wit carries the Carnage Rules storyline to a fairly satisfying conclusion. It might feel fresh and new, but it’s not really looking to be anything other than entertaining. Ziglar is definitely having a good time telling a fun story.
Ohta and Antônio split up the action with interesting techniques. The central heroes in the book are Stark and Morales. The art team establishes the action with the pair of them navigating the landscape of Marvel Manhattan at night in contrasting splash pages. The effect nails a sense of breakneck action from the first page. The rest of the issue is solid forward momentum from beginning to end, with the occasional breather to assess what’s gone on so far and how things are going to move forward. It’s an issue-length conflict, but it’s a well-modulated issue-length conflict.
The action hits the issue in the first couple of pages and doesn’t really let up for the entire length of the book. There’s a kind of purity in that. Morales’s adjustment to the armor Stark has made for him is a fun addition to a story that features Stark doing something a bit more challenging than he is often called upon to do. Everyone seems to be reaching just a bit further than they normally would, which ends up being a lot of fun.
