Writer – Jack Kirby, David Schwartz
Artist – Jack Kirby, Michael Thibodeaux
Inker – D. Bruce Berry, Daerick Gross
Colours – Tom Luth, Daryl Isaacs
Letters – D. Bruce Berry, Palle Jensen

The final issue of Jack Kirby’s Silver Star is interesting to say the least, a description that can really be used to sum up the entire series as a whole. It is here where everything that Kirby had been planting comes to fruition as Darius Drumm becomes the Angel of Death, laying waste to the Earth wherever he flies with only Silver Star standing in his way. As it is, Star is no match for Drumm and there comes a moment where Drum nearly kills him, sucking the life away from him even though he be Homo Geneticus. Such as it is though, Silver Star survives and manages to mend himself while both warning his father and the government that there is nothing they can do to stop Drumm and doing that very thing himself. Kirby does a great job at stopping the threat of Drumm and does so in quite the novel way, a refreshing end to a villain other than the usual fisticuffs seen in most superhero books. Suffice it to say though, this is not the usual type of superhero book one will read as Kirby puts some of his loftiest ideas into this title. The man also weaves in quite a bit of the philosophical as well, with ideas on where mankind might take itself, what might happen if they do, thoughts on life and death, good and evil and so forth. It is an interesting and unusual book and for some, it may not be their cup of tea but being Kirby and being how original this work turned out to be, it is at least worth a gander and like anything, it could turn out to be somebody’s favourite. Also in this book is the final chapter of The Last of the Viking Heroes, at least in this particular title as this is the last issue. In the first chapter, the heroes discovered a plot against the king and as such, were jailed for it so that they would not be able to interfere. In this chapter, they turn to Jon, a wizard who pretends to know more than he does and relies on trickery for much of his magic, and lo and behold, the man has the answer as to how to get them out of their cell. They do just that and arrive to late to stop the king’s brother from murdering him but as it turns out, the king knew all along and the only murder done was upon a straw dummy. Both tales in this book, which would end up being two completely different types of stories, sported some incredible artwork, the first by Kirby of course and the second by Michael Thibodeaux. In the end, it would have been nice to see Kirby’s feature be less obtuse in its narrative, it sometimes being slightly confusing but overall it was a good read.

3 out of 5