'The Eternals': A Tepid Throwback

THE ETERNALS

THE ETERNALS
Charles and Daniel Knauf & Daniel Acuna
(Monthly; issue No. 1 is on sale now)
Inspired by characters created in the 1970s by the fabled Jack Kirby — and building upon ideas established in Neil Gaiman's recent franchise reboot — The Eternals follows an ancient race of alien-engineered, super-powered beings as they attempt to revive their memory-wiped comrades and tussle over the fate of Earth itself. Usually, these colorfully clad Eternal dudes battle demonic baddies known as the Deviants. But as the series begins, they're warring among themselves over how to deal with the Horde: a swarm of ravenous mechanical/extraterrestrial insect thingies summoned by the Dreaming Celestial, a godlike alien who just stands there in San Francisco, watching the world. Creepy. A megalomaniacal, not-so-vaguely Russianish Eternal named Druig wants to awaken old Eternals, brainwash them, and take control of the world; the more heroic, libertarian Ikaris and Thena want their kind to make up their own minds as to what to do. FOR FANS OF... Cosmic comic sagas like The New Gods; Captain Marvel; and the much superior Kirby-homage series Gødland. DOES IT DELIVER? The book is certainly a throwback, all right — back to oldy-moldy clichés that should've been retired decades ago (Eastern European-ish bad guys, fire and brimstone preachers with carnal appetites). Still, what's really missing in this pretty generic gloss on Kirby's material is that sense of heady, boundary-pushing strangeness that suffused all of the late master's trippy '70s work. The Eternals may be beyond rehabbing — too idiosyncratic, too reminiscent of other like-minded sci-fi — but playing it safe and sane definitely isn't the way to go. C+ — Jeff Jensen

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