Guardians of the Galaxy: Solo Classic Omnibus (2024)

I like the basic idea of an omnibus volume, but the reality can sometimes be too much of a good thing. The physical tomes tend to be a little too big and heavy to comfortably read. I find that setting up a folding table helps greatly. If they exist as ebooks at all, that would be a bit more convenient in some ways, but a long digital file just isn't as impressive to contemplate as a two ton actual book.

Also, if it weren't for the success of the Guardians of the Galaxy movies, this book wouldn't even exist. It's a series of complete reprints of the appearances of each member of the movie team: Groot, Rocket, Starlord, Gamora, Drax … None of them are in stories with each other. In Groot’s case--a single tale from back in Marvel’s pre-Fantastic Four monster days--it's pretty clear that he (?) was never intended to be a recurring character anyway.

What's missing is the origin of the name “Guardians of the Galaxy.” There's a brief reference to the original team in the reprinted essay that appeared in the Starlord Special Edition, but that's it. A bit more of a history--even a one page essay would have been fine--seems needed. Also missing is any action on the part of this version of the Guardians as a team, which may disappoint any movie fans who run across this book.

On the plus side, there's a lot of good stuff in here. The more I see of Jim Starlin’s work, the more impressed I get. I'm generally familiar with his run on Captain Marvel, but clearly I need to read his Warlock one of these days. I’m also impressed by Bill Mantlo’s imagination. And, while I have fond memories of the Rocket Racoon miniseries, it’s been ages since I read it, and it was a delight to encounter it again.

And I’d read Chris Claremont’s Starlord before, but this was my first exposure to Steve Englehart’s and Doug Moench’s stories of the character. Very nice!

In all, this was a fun book, but probably best appreciated by longtime comics fans.

3.75 stars. So I was reading this in conjunction with Death of Captain Marvel gallery edition and the Warlock Gallery edition. This book basically serves as a collection of all the Guardians of the Galaxy’s first appearances. You have Groot first showing up as some creature from Planet X attacking earth. A scientist cooked up some special termites that took him out. 😂 You have Gamora’s first appearance with Warlock. I would have liked to see her given more to do as her appearances were brief. You have Starlord’s first appearance and many of his first adventures in the Marvel Preview issues. Those were in black and white with superb art and those early stories were actually a lot of fun. Had a blast with those. Drax shows up off and on all throughout this book. Always trying to destroy somebody. Plus Rocket Raccoon’s first appearance and his first solo mini series. So apparently in his first appearance in Marvel Preview presents Satana, he had an English accent. That would explain him having that accent in that old GOTG cartoon I found on YouTube years ago. His first 4 issue mini series was wall to wall bonkers. If you haven’t read it, I recommend checking it out. So outside of the GOTG, we also get a nice chunk of Captain Marvel (Mar-Vell) issues that were also really good. Makes me want to get his omnibus next. The Warlock stuff was pretty cool also. We also get Thanos’ first appearance and first schemes against the universe trying to appease Death. So I figured this would be the perfect book to read before I read the Infinity Gauntlet, War and Crusade omnibuses.

$20 at Ollies... so yeah I picked it up. It contains a lot of material the Avengers vs Thanos paperback has, which I already read. It contains old runs of the Guardians players... a lot of old material on Groot, Drax, Starlord, Rocket, Warlock, OG Mar-vell plus first appearance of Thanos in Iron Man. If you want to explore the Guardians circa 70's and 80's then this is for you. Step outside your MCU safe space and read the old school stuff.

A decent idea for a book, glad I tried it, but basically "you know the Guardians Of The Galaxy? Well liked, established, have their own movie franchise? Here's the early adventures of each member"
Early adventures of a pre-established team often means a lot of cancelled or short lived titles. Which implies a certain lack of quality or at least success.

There are some exceptions, some good stuff, and some terrible stuff. The novelty of seeing the debuts of each member is there, but the overall result is mediocre.

Here's a quick breakdown

GROOT
The modern version: A quirky likable weird tree-like sidekick who only says "Groot"
The old version: A generic sci-fi horror villain with a forgettable plot to invade Earth with tree aliens, in Tales To Astonish #13. But at least he can talk a lot with lazy dialogue? He got to fight the Hulk later on, was just ok.
Score: 1/5

DRAX (THE DESTROYER)
The modern version: A strongman always looking for a fight and vengeance on Thanos or someone in his posse.
The old version: Honestly not that different in basic build. Because comic book art, a little more streamlined in the appearance (skinnier), and he's a little more cosmic with flying and such. But he was created to kill Thanos, so not that different.
The stories are less all over the place than so many of them and so repetitive. Wants to destroy Thanos for awhile, those stories were fine (mostly because of Captain Marvel and writer/artist Jim Starlin).
Then he wants to kill Captain Marvel, later teams with him in Marvel Premiere #1, then teams with Moondragon. All these storylines major drop-off. Absolutely no character depth and no variation in his gimmick.
All that complaint aside, some of the action is ok, if not great.
Score: A very lenient 3/5

GAMORA
Both versions are about the same. Daughter of Thanos, trained to kill, finding her humanity.
Basically the movies just use her more. Gamora gets no solo adventures here, and while still a likable and interesting sidekick to Adam Warlock's saga, it's a little disappointing.
But I like Adam Warlock's mix of cosmic and superhero across space and fighting Thanos and the Magus, etc. with art by Jim Starlin (READ IT)
Score: 4/5

STAR-LORD
The modern version: A humorous and spunky leader, slick talker and always with a crazy scheme, etc.
The old version: The biggest difference and the worst character. Double threat.
The Star-Lord is this cosmically powerful guy in a vaguely bird-like suit. His powers (including a gun that shoots the four elements) are not necessarily bad. But prosaic, long adventures that involve him visiting a planet and contemplating some sci-fi thing (or hooking up some alien girl he'll never meet again) are just over long and boring and prevent making this guy likable or interesting. And black and white art, which while not a deal breaker, is kind of meh.
Writing by Chris Claremont and Steve Englehart should be great, but they're trying to write sci-fi novels in comic book form instead of actual comic books. It turned out bad.
Score: 1/5

ROCKET RACCOON
Modern version: A talking raccoon. But also snarky and opportunistic, also a dark past and a mixed personality.
Old version: Not terrible, but bland. Basically, in a world of animal villains and heroes, he's a well meaning talking raccoon who's trying to save his crazy land and the crazy humans who live there.
Animals that can talk is an awesome concept (read some Captain Carrot if you doubt that), but here the action is repetitive, the stakes aren't built right, it's basically somewhat weird and saying "this world is weird, huh?"
Crossover with the Hulk is kind of unique, but the story itself is bland and wrapped up too quick.
Score: 2/5

In general, a lot of bland or boring stories that don't seem to know how to use these mix of characters. The highlights are any of the Thanos or Adam Warlock crossovers, which is a little disappointing as those are reprinted the most of the bunch.

I'd honestly say it'd be better to seek out modern adventures of the Galaxy. There were few and far between insights or new joys amongst reading the clunky early adventures of these characters. But some of the art is ok, and its unique I guess.

2/5

I can we review a book that has so much stuff more or less unrelated? Giving it an average score, that's the only way, since we can read here terrific stuff (4-5 stars), like all Captain Marvel/Warlock stuff, and terrible stuff (1-3) like Rocket Raccoon Mini-series or some earlier Star-Lord stuff.

Pretty fun to see these characters in their original form. The only one that seems relatively unchanged is Gamora. I can’t say that there weren’t some slower stories, but even then, the art more often than not made up for the shortfall.

There were also a lot of Warlock stories in this and I’m looking forward to his big screen debut.

The beautiful Alex Ross cover with all the characters in their original designs is all you need to know about this book: It’s a GotG comic in the sense that the characters you think of when you think GotG are in it…but this isn’t a GotG book.

I’d say this is specifically for people like me who are hardcore comic book geeks who love to delve deep into the history of the medium both on and off the page. If you really, REALLY love the Guardians of the Galaxy and want to know more, than sure, you can get something out of it for that reason, too. But casual readers probably aren’t going to enjoy this as much.

For starters, these comics stretch from 1960 to 1985 and NOT all in chronological order (which would’ve been impossible anyway but I’ll get to that in a moment). Not only are you dealing with a radical difference in general trends and presentations that would probably make a modern comic reader’s head spin if they’re not prepared for it, but you’re also dealing with work by 12 different writers and 17 different artists. And that is not counting inkers, letterers and colorists. So saying this is a disjointed read is a massive understatement. I’m even hesitant to call it an anthology as several stories are multi-issue arcs that are themselves somewhat disjointed from issue-to-issue at times.

Overall, I’d say this is a more fascinating read than enjoyable one. I loved reading one of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby’s pre-Fantastic Four sci-fi monster comics and several tales by writer Bill Mantlo. But at the same time Jim Starlin’s writing style doesn’t do it for me personally.

Easily the low point is the Starlord tales that were written and drawn in the pulp stylings of Golden Age of Science Fiction complete with all the women wearing bikinis and loincloths for…reasons…and aliens looking decidedly human…except when they don’t. Again for…reasons. A little research showed that these stories are not a part of the main continuity so this isn’t even the Starlord that’s been around since at least Annihilation and started off the Guardians in the first place. Makes a large chunk of the middle feel like a huge waste of time.

But as down as this review may sound, I don’t think it’s that bad. But I wouldn’t suggest it without a huge asterisk attached. It takes a lot longer to read a single issue comic from the periods this covers compared to now. And though all the writers were more wordy back then, some are more wordy than others (I’m looking at you Chris Claremont). And aside from the Jim Starlin stuff that’s here mainly because of Thanos, there’s not really a narrative through-line to hook you aside from your own interest in these characters or Marvel’s cosmic mythology.

As for me, I’ll be keeping this more as a reference than a recurring read. I might come back to the Hulk issues or the Rocket Raccoon mini, but I doubt I’ll ever read this all the way through in one go ever again.

This is a fun big book. All the current GUARDIANS are featured in some way in each story. Gamora, however, does not get much time on panel. She was a supporting character and barely appears in some of her (solo) stories.
Star Lord is seen in his original incarnation and not all the stories are good; I found a couple boring.
Drax The Destroyer had a different look in the 1970s and look different. He was also stubborn. You see, Drax was created by Thanos's father to destroy Thanos. Drax was upset that someone else killed Thanos, therefor, that person must die.
Groot appears in 2 stories. That is all you need to know.
Rocket Racoon's early appearances are unusual and later just kind of boring to me.
The Best Stuff: Drax in the Captain Marvel issues. Gamora in the Warlock stories. Not that Gamora did much, but the Warlock stuff is groovy.

A fun collection of comics from my youth and before. The various characters (Groot, Drax, Gamora, Rocket Raccoon, and Star Lord) had little in common in the comics, but make up the MCU team of Guardians of the Galaxy. It was neat to revisit these characters, many of who I enjoyed in these original adventures when they first came out.

i'm giving this 4 stars based solely on the Rocket Raccoon 4 issue miniseries alone. it was so weird and fun but also incredibly sad if viewed a certain way. it also features art from a pre-Hellboy Mike Mignola

A somewhat eclectic selection of stories dealing with some of the the best-known characters in the modern iteration of the Guardians of the Galaxy, namely Drax and Gamora, Rocket and Groot, as well as Star-Lord.
At more than a 1,100 pages this is a pretty hefty tome with stories ranging from mere curiosities to actual classics, more than a few of which have previously been reprinted or collected elsewhere.
As far as I can tell, the stories collected here contain the first appearances and/or origins of the characters, as well as multiple appearances and even longer storylines involving some of them.
Still, some of the choices made for this collection leave me wondering.
There is very little Groot, of course, basically because - even though he is the oldest of the characters in this book - not much had been done with him before he joined the Guardians and became a movie star in the real world.
There is a lot of Drax here, even if he is only incidental to most of the stories he guest-stars in, stories that deal mostly with other characters trying to deal with or stop Thanos. Actually a lot of the material here is Starlin's original Thanos storyline, ranging across multiple titles, including the classic two-part Annuals crossover that saw the end of (Adam) Warlock and Thanos.
Probably justified by Gamora being in a few panels.
(Don't get me wrong, that story is great! I just don't see its place here, unless Warlock himself had been one of the featured Guardians.)
Weirdly, Drax' few pages from the Death of Captain Marvel GN get reprinted (instead of the whole thing), as does his death in a two-part Avengers story (featuring Moondragon, who - like Warlock - also becomes a Guardian, but again, is not a featured character in this collection), but there is nothing following his later resurrection or how he changed from the very different iteration in this volume to the one actually known to a wider audience.
Similarly, Gamora has her appearances from first to death (and a bit after...) collected here, but nothing following her resurrection and all the years up to the Guardians.
I have a soft spot for the Star-Lord (hyphenated or not) stories, all of which I have read before. Especially the one by Chris Claremont and John Byrne (which to me is the perfect comic book).
Why all of these stories are in this book I don't know, though.
The Guardians' Peter Quill is a completely different character from the original iteration, which cannot be considered a character from the 616 in any way. (I absolutely prefer him to the fool the characters is today.)
And last but not least, this collection contains the first Rocket Raccoon stories by Bill Mantlo (all of which were also collected in a volume of their own), with his first black and white appearance as a side-character in the long-forgotten Prince Wayfinder/Sword in the Star series, to his appearance in the Hulk's book, and Rocket's eponymous 4-part miniseries which is mostly remarkable for the early Mike Mignola art it featured.
Despite some head-scratching and the fact that not all herein in gold, I had a lot of fun delving into the - in parts forgotten - past of the Marvel Universe, re-reading a lot of the stories, most of which held up pretty well, as well as reading some stuff for the first time, not yet retconned into unrecognizability or oblivion. Reading this book makes me wish many modern authors would remember they are writing their stories standing on the shoulders of giants, instead of simply crapping all over their heads...

A truly beautiful companion to the Infinity War Omnibus. Filled with some of Marvel's greatest 70's comic books. A real must-have for every real Marvel aficionado. Brush up on your Guardians' history and read some of the most entertaining comics ever crafted by Gods and man.