Imagine if you had the power to summon monsters to do your bidding. Since this is a comic, summoned monsters usually mean they will destroy cities and pulverize the planet. Monsters Unleashed #1 leaves nothing to the imagination in its title. Monsters get unleashed and the fun of this comic is to watch how the defenders of Earth deal with this global problem. For an origin story we don’t learn much about the monsters, just that they appear quickly and desire destruction.
The story quickly cuts from one battle scene to another. We start in Boston, then head to London, Wakanda, Seattle, Venice, and finally Springfield, Missouri. From one page to the next we are seeing a global invasion by beasts that even the superheroes can’t agree on a name for.
Writer Cullen Bunn has given life to a plethora of super heroes and allowed the readers to see how Captain America, Storm, Black Panther, Hulk, Thor, Karnak, Star-Lord, and the Human Torch deal when the world is invaded.
My Opinion
How can I best summarize Monsters Unleashed #1? Gigantic monsters smash world cities, and the superheroes have a difficult time defeating them. Cullen Bunn has written a tale that is global, and as you zoom through the pages of this comic, the reader gets to see a variety of heroes and how they would deal with the sudden attacks of these vile beasts.
Ever read a Spider-Man comic and wonder why he is the only one responding to a problem in New York when you know Daredevil and a multitude of other characters are around the block and could help out the situation. Monsters Unleashed #1 is a comic that creates a world problem in the monster form, and instead of seeing the problem in one city, localized to one hero, it happens everywhere and everyone must respond. Without the buildup of personality clashes, we only see the heroes in battle, and instead of focusing on the character traits of Captain America or Cyclops, it’s just the battle scenes.
For this type of a story, we don’t need long conversation pieces about the monsters, or why they might be coming to destroy Earth. We want to see the fight, and we can then see how the heroes interact in the battlefield. Two separate characters Kei Kawade and Elsa Bloodstone are probably the most interesting characters to follow. We’re not sure about either’s motives. There is a lot of mystery to what they really want.
Bloodstone ends her part in this issue in a cave in Peru where she sees in cave painting form from early man images that look like the monsters, and one man who stands at the center and appears to be controlling them.
This leaves us the reader to wonder who this is. There is some humor with Bloodstone jokingly talking about the many forms of apocalypse and how easy it is to lose track of the many ways the world has been predicted to end.
What makes me most interested in where this comic series is heading. Is Bloodstone’s reference to how David slew the giant Goliath an indication of future biblical connections? I like the blending and melding of traditional religious belief with the science fiction of our superhero world. I wonder if some form of David will reappear down the road.
Monsters Unleashed #1 should appeal to any comic fan. If you like to see a variety of heroes in one comic book, this is for you. If you enjoy solitary characters that are on the fringe of the normal, then this is your comic. If you were a fan of the 80’s video game Rampage and you like watching giant monsters destroy cities, then this