Spartan: Warrior Spirit

Man, Kurt Busiek used to really, really suck as a writer, didn't he? After reading the Spider-Man / X-Factor crossover miniseries by him and now this four issue mini, I'm starting to wonder if the 90's Busiek is the same person as the recent writing genius of this millennium that everyone has fallen in love with. It's really quite amazing how terrible some of his old stuff is that it's sad and amazing at the same time.

This story focuses on Spartan, the leader of the Wildcats, and his origin. One of the staple things to do with a team book in the 90's was to give each important character their own miniseries to explore the amazing circumstances that made them who they were. Apparently Spartan was a real person at one point (he is nothing more than a spirit embodied in a robot currently). He was tragically killed so some doctor decided to take his spirit and use it to power his latest creation. Spartan never knows this, however, since he was purchased by the owner of the Wildcats to lead his team.

The nifty thing about Spartan is that when the robot body he currently inhabitates gets destroyed, his spirit is re-downloaded into a new robt body. Well, in issue one Spartan gets destroyed but instead of returning to a body in the Wildcats headquarters he materializes in a body in some temple with no memories. The majority of the middle of the story consists of Spartan fighting some green cyber goblin people while he tries to come to terms with his lack of memories.

Turns out there was some plot to trap an evil power source to use it against the enemies of the people in the village where the temple is located. Eventually Spartan realizes this, then the Wildcats show up, then there's some more fighting. Lastly the evil power gets out and starts devouring people. Thankfully Spartan is there and talks the evil power away. In the course of a two page spread, Spartan's superior will convinces the evil demon thingy to just go away. Add a couple of pages for goodbyes and it's the end.

Seriously, this is not even close to being as good as anything that Busiek has recently written. It's not even close to being average. It's cliched ridden, mindless action, poorly drawn crap. It's mini's like this that made Image look like such a joke in the 90's. I feel dumber for having read this.

Ratings
Art: 2
Story: 1.5
Overall: 1.75