Defenders #149-150 (1985): Cloud becomes a star


Andromeda, an Atlantean military leader, joins the team.  Iceman and Beast are kinda dicks about it.  If it was Sub-Mariner trying to join, I’m sure they wouldn’t have said these things.

The rest of this story is the end of Cloud.  We learn that the reason s/he is able to transition, when she takes human from, from male to female is because there are two actual people, who are in a hospital, whose body she uses.  She’s actually an alien from a species that exist only as nebulae, so taking a human form requires her to imitate something she can see—she’s not creating a new body, she’s copying one.  And she came to Earth for a reason that, up until this issue, she’d forgotten: She was here to save the stars, which are apparently disappearing, and a Cosmic Cube is what gave her the voice to speak for the stars.

So, the team goes against the “Star Thief” and save the day.  The Cosmic Cube no longer needs Cloud, and she says in space to return to being a nebula.

Along the way, we see that Interloper is still pursuing the team but we don’t learn anything.

There’s a seemingly harmless/cute backup story featuring Sassafras the dog, and the last panel reveals that Manslaughter is back.

I’m not a huge fan of Defenders-In-Space. I like them being grounded. But there’s a lot of imagination here–and unlike Avengers, Defenders is a great place for truly odd stories and characters, which keeps it fresh.

And Peter Gillis is a great writer for this book.

 

Leave a Comment