Dark Origins takes a more entertaining turn with Captain Marvel #127. It plays with its premise better, the plot makes itself clearer, and the art continues to rock. This one gets a recommendation. Check it out. Read Full Review

Carol and her Zetas go up against the Ravagers, the eeeeevil mirror universe equivalents of the Guardians of the Galaxy. Swapping Groot for a giant walking carrot called Root is, sadly, this issue's high-water mark.

The fight goes sour because Carol loses her ability to take any of this nonsense seriously and goes into a giggle fit. Which is a pretty reasonable reaction, except for the fact that it's all being orchestrated by Margaret Stohl. It's dangerously close to her outright saying, "Can you believe Marvel pays me to write this crap? Why on earth do you pay to read it?"

With forensic care, you could piece together a rational plot buried under this issue's cringe-provoking attempts at comedy. It's clear that the Infinity Stone content was wedged in sideways, but Ms. Stohl didn't put a lot of overtime into the effort to smooth out the joints and make the finished product easy to read.

You know what this reminds me of? Carol's had plenty of sassy "Sex in the Super-City" conversations where she does funny banter with a pal like Spider-Woman or Jessica Jones. This arc would make a *perfect* crazy anecdote for Carol to tell in a situation like that: "He had a talking carrot named Root backing him, swear to God!" A few hundred words, tops, across two-three pages. It'd be perfect. Seeing it stretched across five issues by an author who doesn't really understand Carol or Marvel or comics or comedy is just bloody torture. more