Issue(s): Warlock Chronicles #6
Cover Date: Dec 93
Title: "After math!"
Credits:
Jim Starlin - Writer
Kris Renkewitz - Penciler
Pat Redding - Inker
Craig Anderson - Editor

Review/plot:
This is technically the third part of Blood and Thunder, but the issue starts back in time and deals with an unrelated matter, and it ends at the same moment as the last chapter. I'd argue that the purpose of this was to sneak in some plot development for the book's own story, which has been in crossover mode since it launched. But the fact that it's been in crossover mode from the beginning means that it's hard to say what the book's own story is, especially since anything relating to Adam Warlock or the Infinity Watch could be covered in, well, Warlock and the Infinity Watch.

This issue focuses mainly on Maxam. The book starts with him having voluntarily submitted to an attempt by Moondragon to read his mind - she can't, but confirms that it's not because he's resisting her. Pip then takes Maxam to a country and western bar in Manhattan, where Maxam experiences racism for the first time.

I dunno. A country and western bar in Manhattan? I feel like they're all probably just LARPing.

Meanwhile, Eternity alerts Warlock to the situation with Thor. He kind of denies that he wants Warlock to do anything about it but says that he knows that Warlock will, in part because Warlock likes putting powerful people in his debt.

So Warlock calls Pip and has him teleport him to where Thor is about to kill the Silver Surfer.

Not much here. The art is nothing to write home about. Seven pages are devoted to Maxam beating up non-powered goofballs, which seems excessive. And i don't think there's ever really a payoff to either the Maxam mystery or to why Eternity seems to be taking an unusually micro level of interest in Warlock's activities. It's also worthless as a Blood and Thunder chapter.

Quality Rating: D

Historical Significance Rating: 1

Chronological Placement Considerations: This is part three of Blood and Thunder. Part four is in Warlock and the Infinity Watch #23. As noted above, this jumps back in time relative to part two, so it basically takes place concurrently with Silver Surfer #86. In this story, Warlock seemingly has Pip go directly from the cowboy bar to the fight with Thor, and Silver Surfer #86 also shows Pip showing up in cowboy clothes. But Quasar #54, part two of the Starblast crossover, shows Warlock telling Pip that they have to decide whether or not to respond to Quasar's call or deal with Thor, and Pip is not wearing the cowboy outfit in that scene. That scene has to take place after Pip is at the bar but before they teleport to the Surfer's aid. So apparently Warlock first summons Pip somewhere, Pip takes off his clothes for a while, and then puts them back on before the end scene here and in SS #86.

References:

• Moondragon gives Maxam a summary of Drax's history (no footnotes): created by Kronos (spelled Chronos here) in the flashback in Iron Man #55, given brain damage by Moondragon in Avengers #220.
  
• In Warlock and the Infinity Watch #15, Eternity told Warlock that he would be facing five unique beings. The Goddess from Infinity Crusade was the "terrible good". Count Abyss from Warlock and the Infinity Watch #16 is the being in need of a soul. Warlock thinks Maxam is one of the other three, either the one "entangled in a web of past and future woes", the one who "would touch my heart", or the "one whose trust I would betray".
  
• Eternity says that he's witnessed Warlock endeavor to put beings of vast power, "such as the Silver Surfer" into his debt. That's a reference to Silver Surfer/Warlock: Resurrection.

Crossover: Blood and Thunder

Continuity Insert? N

My Reprint: N/A

Maxam's story does get a resolution in the final issues of Infinity Watch, for what it's worth.

The smirk in the panel shown above is probably the most explicit statement that I have seen so far that Warlock has this craving for having powerful beings in his debt.

Fnord's commentary in the References implies that Eternity (of all beings) nonetheless went through the trouble of noticing that trait and values it enough to actually make and voice plans that rely on it.

I find that interesting, because it seems to confirm my previous guess that much of Starlin's depiction of Warlock at this point in time is informed by a largely unstated yet very definite psychological makeup. Warlock has become a much more manipulative, even malicious character since the last chapter of Infinity Gauntlet, and I don't recall any clear explanation of why it is so. It seems to have come out of nowhere.

At first glance it may well appear that Warlock is collecting powerful allies for some unspecified goal or future crisis. But I think that there are many hints that it is not so, and that his motivations are actually very personal and psychological in nature.

It is easy to miss those hints, because Warlock is so often involved with cosmic affairs and has even been literally omniscient for a short while not long ago (when he held the Infinity Gauntlet). Since Starlin will leave Marvel for a good while in just a few months it is hard to tell for sure, but I suspect that what we are seeing is Warlock becoming more of a typical Starlin protagonist drenched in authority/parent conflict.

That issue showcases everything that's wrong with the crossover concept. This issue definitely doesn't "deserve" th label tie-in bc it has only one page connected to the Blood and Thunder story and the rest of the pages do nothing to get new readers interested in the otherwise mostly well written Infinity Watch related series. And the art.... ugh.