Ok, so I'm getting all caught up to the current issues of Valiant's most excellent titles.
Honestly, there isn't one I haven't liked, but some I like better than others.
I heard high praise of the 4001 series from last year, with Rai being the central hero.
Read the 4001 mini and the one-shots (Bloodshot, X-O, Shadowman), all solid.
Reading Rai and it's better than all of those at top level excellence.
I'm constantly amazed at the stories Valiant puts out, and I have to say that although everyone says "great jumping on point", that's really only half true.
I suppose you could jump on, but, it's a lot more satisfying having followed all the connections.
Valiant does a one page recap to catch you up and it's probably the best I've read.
Think James Cameron meets Jack Kirby and you'll get an idea of what this feels like.
Another thing I love about the Rai series is that they build on the current Valiant U, everything makes sense, and yet they build their own direction.
This is one of the best Valiant, and best storylines, I've ever read.
DC and Marvel's mainstream titles, with all their changes, aren't as compelling to me anymore. Valiant hasn't rebooted / all-new all-different or whatever. Granted, they haven't been around as long, but, they've done a heck of a job with what they have.
Marvel and DC rotate creators to prevent another Image situation, but Valiant gets their previous talent and they seem to produce their best here.
Small but mighty, they've been here 4 years now. I'm buying all their titles, which they've maintained at a manageable 8 titles/month.
In a nutshell, from Valiant's solicits for the 4001 A.D. mini (pics inserted by me) :
One hundred years from today, Father – the benevolent artificial intelligence that governs the island nation of Japan – will gain sentience. To defend its borders, Father will take drastic action by launching Japan into space…where its people can thrive in isolation, away from the overpopulated and resource-deprived planet below. Over the centuries, as New Japan orbits our increasingly unstable world, it will become a model society – one built on peace, prosperity…and Father’s control.
A thousand years from today, Father will create the first Rai, founding a lineage of technologically enhanced heroes engineered to defend New Japan and sworn to protect it from all enemies. For hundreds of years into the future, the Rai will single-handedly enforce New Japan’s justice well…and serve Father without question.
Now, at the dawn of 4001 A.D., the latest Rai is about to inherit the dark truth behind the origin of his kind…and discover the sinister secret at the heart of Father’s existence. For New Japan to live, Earth must die…and as Rai challenges his former master for the first time in more than a millennium, the lone guardian of New Japan will be cast out of his own Father’s kingdom…
Exiled from the only realm he’s ever known, Rai now walks the ravaged world of 4001 A.D. in search of forgotten heroes like himself…on a mission to collect the last surviving legends of a broken planet…and to forge a rebellion with the power to bring the most advanced civilization in history crashing back down to Earth.
Earth must rise. Father must fall. Rai! Eternal Warrior! X-O Manowar! Bloodshot! Geomancer! Armstrong! And more! The war for the ultimate fate of humanity begins in 4001 A.D.!
