Gifted with the uber-powerful XO Man-O-War armour, Visigoth barbarian Aric of Dacia takes his quest for revenge out against the evil spider aliens and their front, Orb Industries. Meanwhile, genetically engineered spider alien-human hybrid Lydia has plans of her own...
...Or not, since she's basically never seen again after this issue.
This story is nothing, just like the previous issue, and of course, par for the course for bad Valiant writing, Aric defeats and takes over Orb Industries in issue friggin' 2! Jesus, what is wrong with Valiant?! It either keeps villains around forever, or it rushes plot points so quickly they're resolved light years before they should have been!
There's still zero character to Aric. He's just an unlikeable brute who's got a nice set of spreads. There's no plot besides "Evil spider aliens! Must kill!", and so far, he hasn't even noticed that he's not in his own time anymore, let alone have we gotten the drama and character development that should entail! Not that there's any development to be had from that revelation, as we never even saw Aric in his own time.
The Visigoth is an idiot too, as when Ken is taken by an alien patrol, Aric immediately assumes he's is dead, despite it obvious he's just been captured, and Aric could easily fly over and rescue him. And there's this...
Our main character is lazy, dumb, unlikeable (it only gets worse from here on), and each page is covered in his narration! He will not shut the fuck up!
This story here is so rough that the start is plain confusing, as it just...starts. We have no idea where Aric is, or what's been happening in-between #1. It's just opens up with him...somewhere, in the middle of fighting...something.
The only positive to this issue besides the artwork (minus the still unappealing Ken) is that thankfully Aric only says 'Ho!' once, instead of saying it about ten times a freakin' issue, as is the norm.
The cover is good, although it completely spoils the ending! Plus, it gets the death of one of the main villains wrong.
Just with XO #1, I don't recommend this tedious dreck in the slightest...
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