Comic Info
Comic Name: Ka-Zar (Volume 4)
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Writer: Mark Waide/Brian K. Vaughan
Artist: Andy Kubert/Walter McDaniel/Louis Small, Jr.
# of Issues: 8
Release Date: 2012
Ka-Zar (4) #9
Reprints Ka-Zar (4) #8-14 and Annual ’97 (December 1997-June 1998). Ka-Zar is out to stop his brother Parnival Plunder once and for all! When he learns that his brother is working for one of the most powerful beings in the universe, Ka-Zar finds himself in the fight of his life with Thanos with the Savage Land as the prize…and the battle could change Ka-Zar and his family’s life forever!
Written by Mark Waid (with additional writing by Brian K. Vaughan) and art by Andy Kubert (with additional art by Walter McDaniel, Louis Small, Jr., and Aaron Lopresti), Ka-Zar by Mark Waid & Andy Kubert—Volume 2 is the second and final volume of Mark Waid and Andy Kubert’s series of the late ’90s.
Ka-Zar was a launch series after the whole Onslaught storyline which “killed” a number of the Marvel Universe’s major characters and relaunched them in a pocket universe. Ka-Zar and Thunderbolts developed from this, but Ka-Zar struggled while Thunderbolts remained strong.
Ka-Zar’s struggles really aren’t necessarily from the writing or art, but from the character. Waid does a great job crafting a story for the character, but Ka-Zar just doesn’t have the mass appeal of bigger superheroes and with characters like Turok treading on similar ground at the time, he feels a little redundant.
Ka-Zar (4) #11
I love that Waid has Ka-Zar going up against Thanos who slaughter a majority of the Marvel Universe’s heavy hitters during The Infinity Gauntlet. Here you have a loincloth style hero taking on a cosmic being…and winning! It is a fun little twist on Thanos who at the time was still recovering from character burnout from overuse in the early ’90s.
Unfortunately, I think that Waid does hit the skids a bit in the second half of the book with the High Evolutionary and Shanna storyline flipping the scenarios from the beginning of the book. It is a bit clunky, rushed, and suffers from Kubert leaving first. These all combine to really bog down a solid book.
Ka-Zar by Mark Waid & Andy Kubert—Volume 2 does have the fun of Thanos, but lacks the cohesion of the first volume. Surprisingly the series did not just end with Waid’s leaving and continued on for another six issues with a couple of different writers and artist teams…it was a rather slow death to a series that started so strong.
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