KA-ZAR #7-11 (1997-1998): vs. Thanos

Ka-Zar and Shanna continue to try to stop Parnival Plunder from plundering tech necessary to preserve the Savage Land’s ecosystem and giving it to Thanos to help the megavillain escape an extradimensional prison. They fight off Plunder’s armored assassins but fail to stop Plunder from turning New York City into a new Savage Land…

…OK so that’s definitely cool and fun but no other superheroes are involved. How is that possible? Let’s put that to one side, though, because this a very fun comic and it’s 1997. Fun comics are extremely hard to find at Marvel.

Anyway, Thanos’ promise to Parnival for his support was to turn all of Earth into a new Savage Land and to let Parnival rule it all.

While trying to get to the source of the problem–a terraformer–Shanna and Zabu accidentally step through a portal and meet Thanos…

…And so we finally get to see Ka-Zar take down Thanos!

Ka-Zar steals Thanos’ necklace and has to run away with it, racing through portals and finding himself on the moon, on the skrull planet, and finally on Thanos’ home planet, Titan.

At that point, Thanos decides that Parnival has not been a great partner and decides to terraform him. Andy Kubert gives us a Sistine Chapel scene as Ka-Zar rescues his evil brother…

(Since this sequence pays tribute to one of the world’s most famous works of art, I’m tagging this as “fine art with superheroes,” below.)

Ka-Zar continues to run from Thanos, distancing the villain from the sources of his power, and then shatters the stolen necklace. Back in the Savage Land, SHIELD uses its weapons to blow up the terraformer, trapping Thanos in the void once again, but Shanna is caught in the blast and we get this cliffhanger….

With that, Andy Kubert leaves this series.

Excellent, excellent run and conclusion! One of my all-time favorite Thanos stories.