Hey, we're on to another month's adverts!  No Truth adverts this time round.  Aww.  I was really looking forward to a giant close-up of a girl with her nostrils stapled shut, too.

Anyhow.  Last time in Exiles, Tanaraq of the Great Beasts took over Sasquatch's body and took over the team.  In a rather odd piece of pacing, it took three issues to get to that point, most of which were devoted to messing around with the Kulan Gath stuff.  This issue, the whole storyline of Tanaraq bullying the Exiles is raced through and resolved in one issue. 

Bit backwards, isn't it?  I mean, this is actually a story about the Exiles!  It only gets one issue, when Kulan Gath gets three?

Then again, I'd been worried that we were just going to retread the Hyperion route, and it's nice to see that's not happening.  Tanaraq has a simple enough plan: complete the missions and, in the downtime before the next jump, find some criminal scientists to help him.  But, unlike some of the people we've had before, Tanaraq is thinking.  He doesn't want them to send him home - he wants them to trace the Timebroker by finding out where the Tallus is getting its signal from.  And then he's going to go and beat the crap out of the Timebroker.

Now, that actually makes a certain degree of sense, and presumably it leaves open the possibility that the Exiles might try something similar of their own accord.  The team are now openly questioning the premise of the book, so it looks like we're finally heading somewhere with that.  It's about the only direction that this book can have, so it's nice to see that it's being properly followed up.

As a single-issue story, this is entertaining enough - there's some good comedy as Tanaraq ropes in a bunch of the top supervillains, who naturally can't stand the idea of not being in charge and start slaughtering one another to get rid of the competition.  It also seems to leave Heather powerless, meaning that the Exiles are now lugging two minimally useful team members around with them.  That's something to work with.

Rating: B

back | continue