These issues transition away from the creative team of writer George Perez and artist Scot Eaton and into the DeMatteis/Greenberg writing partnership, with art by Ron Garney.
It’s a bit of a mess.
It starts with Norrin leaving Zenn-La and Shalla Bal dying. I think.
Or it’s an illusion. Yeah, that’s what it was. I’m 99% sure.
From there, Surfer returns to Earth to find his “soul,” and for some reason that means looking for his Earth-based friends.
He is reserved, at first, around Alicia…But then he learns that Thing is missing they’re not dating anymore.
Norrin briefly gives Alicia Masters the power of sight (it’s not clear why). He fights the army, Hulk, and a big alien bounty hunter and meets the X-Men briefly. He talks with Kymaera who says she doesn’t know where Namor is. He meets with Doctor Strange.
It’s all over the place and I don’t really understand the fundamental premise of Surfer’s missing soul. But it ends with a version of Surfer created by Puppet Master getting the real Norrin’s memories and power, and swearing to kill everyone on Earth because they’ve been such dicks to Silver Surfer over the years.
And Norrin is a humanoid again, stripped of his power Cosmic. That will be the next tale.
The Silver Surfer returning to the Planet Earth to reconnect with his old pals the Fantastic Four and the Defenders does not mystify me at all. The Silver Surfer has been travelling the cosmos for untold millenia, and, to the best of our knowledge, the only friends he’s made in all that time is the Earth’s superhuman community. If he’s ever made any real friends anywhere else, ( besides Shalla Bal, and they’re “just friends”, now ) we have not been shown them. So, after all these years and all these adventures, if the Surfer is lonesome for companionship, it only makes sense that he would return to those friends he knew on the Planet Earth. It doesn’t make any difference who you are or where you’re from, or what your scope of travel is, you can’t do any better than the Defenders and the Fantastic Four for friends. No mystery there. What I can’t figure out though, is………….where is the Barrier-?? You know- the Barrier that Galactus established into the Earth’s thermosphere to prevent his rebellious herald from leaving the Earth. After several years ( Marvel-Time ) of trying to escape through the Barrier via conventional means/the ‘Direct Approach’, the Surfer manages to “side-step” the Barrier via highly-specious means which still leaves bile in my throat to this very day. ( ‘Silver Surfer’ volume 2, #1, 1987 ) Now, if YOU can buy that, ( I can’t ) how does that explain the Surfer’s highly illogical decision to return to the Earth, where an impenetrable energy-Barrier is STILL in force around the planet, just WAITING for the Surfer to foolishly return to the Earth for some asinine reason, and become trapped behind it all over again!! Remember- just because the Surfer found a way AROUND the Barrier in the first issue of his second series, does NOT MEAN by ANY STRETCH that that Barrier ISN’T STILL THERE!!!!!! Of COURSE it’s still there!! Has Galactus returned to the Earth and CANCELLED it-?????? Nooooooooooooo………if that has happened, then it got past me!! No, no- that Barrier is STILL THERE, which MEANS that if and when the Surfer returns to Earth, he’s marooned AGAIN!!!!!! At LEAST until Mr. Fantastic helps him around the Barrier, again!!! But it’s STILL THERE, a fact which Marvel Comics and all their collective writership has chosen to conveniently IGNORE for the past thirty-five years!!!!!! No, no- that Barrier is still there. As far as I am concerned, the Barrier is every bit as much as a character in the ‘Silver Surfer’ story as New York City is a character in ‘Spider-Man’, and Gotham City is a character in the ‘Batman’ mythos. What sets Marvel characters apart from their Distinguished Competitors is the element of tragedy they possess which makes their fictional existences poignant. Daredevil is blind, all the world’s most beautiful women throw themselves at him ( out of pity? ) but the irony is, he can’t SEE them to appreciate their beauty, because he’s blind!! The Thing, the Hulk, and the Man-Thing are all monsters, Thor has to spend most of his time as a 98lb. cripple, Spider-Man allowed his uncle to be killed, Cyclops has to be on guard at all times lest he accidentally blast somebody to smithereens, Professor X is a paraplegic, Iron Man is a drunk, the Human Torch is shallow, Mr.Fantastic is emotionally distant, the Ghost Rider is cursed, Daimon Hellstrom is the Son of Satan, the Black Widow is loose, and so on, and so on, and so on! The Silver Surfer’s tragedy, at least as he was originally conceived, is that, as a reward for his valor in saving the Earth from being eaten by his master, he has to spend the rest of his immortal life trapped on Earth!! The tragedy of the character was totally eradicated when he defeated the Barrier in ‘SS’ volume 2#1, and the pathos value of the character has not been present since! He should NEVER have been allowed to leave Earth, NEVER have been allowed to return to Zenn-La, and NEVER have been allowed to return to Shall-Bal!! Because that would have been the most realistic- and interesting- turn of events!! In real life, You-Can’t-Go-Home-Again. Ever. And the saga of the Silver Surfer would have remained INFINITELY richer, had that remained his status quo. I realize that comic books- even Marvel Comics- bear little resemblance to real life- but there WAS a time when Marvel tried to adhere to a certain level of realism, which they initially built their House Brand on. In the late Twentieth Century and early Twenty-first Century, Marvel is only one rung up the ladder from fucking Disney and ‘Harry Potter’ on the realism ladder. Even if Marvel were to realize the critical mistake they have made with taking the Silver Surfer back out into space tomorrow, I just don’t know how they could repair all the incredible damage of the past thirty-five years. It’s irreparable, unless Marvel would want to take the ‘Dallas’ season seven/Bobby Ewing Back From the Dead route. At this point, I have just given up on the Silver Surfer. So sad. Nuff Said.