{"id":167,"date":"2008-10-06T07:00:53","date_gmt":"2008-10-06T11:00:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/?p=167"},"modified":"2008-10-06T02:31:41","modified_gmt":"2008-10-06T06:31:41","slug":"guarding-the-marvel-universe-sentry-must-go","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/onceuponageek.com\/wordpress\/2008\/10\/06\/guarding-the-marvel-universe-sentry-must-go\/","title":{"rendered":"Guarding the Marvel Universe: Sentry Must Go"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"The<\/a>I try to be positive and encouraging in my blog, rather than negative and pessimistic.\u00a0 However, there are a few things that simply bother the heck out of me.\u00a0 One such thing is the Marvel Comics superhero named “The Sentry<\/a>“, the golden guardian of good with the power of one million exploding suns.\u00a0 Goodness gracious, why can’t this character die or simply fade away into obscurity?<\/p>\n

The Sentry was introduced in the year 2000 and is essentially the Superman equivalent in the Marvel Universe.\u00a0 I’m not going to cover his whole background here; you can read all of that over at Wikipedia<\/a>.\u00a0 The primary difference between Superman and the Sentry is that Superman has his act together.\u00a0 The Sentry is a psychological wreck.\u00a0 In general, I think that’s an interesting concept – What if Superman came to Earth but suffered from mental breakdowns?\u00a0 There are some fascinating stories that could come out of that idea with some really dense plots.\u00a0 However, the writing for the Sentry character so far has been so lackluster that most fans simply are waiting for him to go away.<\/p>\n

I never got to read the first Sentry mini-series, but I’ve heard it was decent.\u00a0 In the mini-series it’s revealed that the Sentry was one of the premier heroes of the Marvel Universe back in the day (along with the FF, the X-Men, Spider-Man, etc).\u00a0 Due to a series of circumstances, the memories of everyone in the world were altered to forget about the Sentry.\u00a0 So when he returned in 2000, it was quite confusing for him and the others that began to remember him.\u00a0 That’s actually an interesting plot.\u00a0 It seems very feasible to me that one of the kooky 1960’s stories featured planet-wide memory alteration.\u00a0 In fact, it was such an interesting concept that DC Comics did almost the exact same thing back in 1994 with a JLA character named Triumph<\/a> (six years before the first appearance of the Sentry).\u00a0 Considering how crappy Triumph turned out, you’d think Marvel wouldn’t have bothered to steal the idea.<\/p>\n

\"Age<\/a>After the first mini-series, the Sentry joined Brian Michael Bendis’ “New Avengers<\/a>“.\u00a0 As one of the most powerful individuals on the planet and a member of the foremost superteam, the Sentry managed to do just about nothing over the course of a couple years.\u00a0 Then came the second Sentry mini-series, which was one of the most painful comics to read… EVER.\u00a0 It was really, really bad.\u00a0 Next, for no apparent reason, the Sentry joined Brian Michael Bendis’ “Mighty Avengers<\/a>” and has continued to contribute very little.\u00a0 And finally, Marvel has recently started a new mini-series entitled, “The Age of the Sentry<\/a>“.\u00a0 While the new mini-series has a new writer and a retro feel to it (see picture right), I just can’t bring myself to read another Sentry comic.\u00a0 I’m voting with my dollars on this one and I hope many other fans will do the same.<\/p>\n

While the Sentry could have been the deciding factor and resolved many Marvel Universe stories (such as “Civil War”, “World War Hulk”, and “Secret Invasion”), he seems incapable of setting his mind to anything during times of extreme stress.\u00a0 When he does finally commit to being involved in these world-threatening events, he ultimately contributes very little.\u00a0 Personally, I think this is a writer’s crutch so that the Sentry doesn’t just sweep in and fix any problems the writer has created for the heroes.\u00a0 At first I could buy into the fact that the Sentry didn’t get involved for whatever reason of the day.\u00a0 Now that it’s happened a few times, I think it’s just ridiculous.\u00a0 The Sentry could actually be a cool character, but time and again he’s been reduced to a coward or an indecisive flake.\u00a0 The Sentry also has some subplots that could be interesting… the operative word being “could”.\u00a0 These subplots include: his mechanical assistant CLOC, his repetitively-resurrected wife, and The Void (Sentry’s dark half\/alter-ego).\u00a0 Again, less-than-stellar writing has made these subplots more bothersome than fascinating.<\/p>\n

Brian Michael Bendis seems keen on including the Sentry in his Avengers titles, so I gotta think he has a plan for the character.\u00a0 Since the “New Avengers” title began back in 2004, the Sentry has pretty much been surplus to requirements.\u00a0 So maybe Bendis is planning to shock the readers with some big revelation or action regarding the Sentry.\u00a0 For example, maybe the Sentry’s destiny is connected with the “Secret Invasion” storyline.\u00a0 When Bendis started the “New Avengers” title he had already begun to map out what would eventually become “Secret Invasion”.\u00a0 Perhaps one of the reasons Bendis has continued to carry the Sentry character is that he’s integral to the “Secret Invasion” series.\u00a0 Who knows?\u00a0 One can dream and hope.\u00a0 Wouldn’t it be nice if the Sentry was simply a Skrull or died in the penultimate battle with the Skrulls?\u00a0 That would be many kinds of awesome.<\/p>\n

Now it’s fair to say that I’m about a month behind on reading my comics.\u00a0 So if Sentry has done something interesting in that time, I’ve missed out.\u00a0 However, my Sentry-Sense hasn’t been tingling, so I seriously doubt they found anything worthwhile for him to do other than cry in the corner.<\/p>\n

If I had my druthers, Marvel Comics would either kill the Sentry or simply make him go away.\u00a0 Considering how little he’s added to the Marvel Universe, why does he continue to hang around?\u00a0 Can’t he indecisively meander off to the Avengers Has-Been Home?\u00a0 He could play checkers with Silverclaw and shuffleboard with D-Man.\u00a0 Wouldn’t that be nice for his golden years?\u00a0 (pun intended)<\/p>\n

I’m not the only one who feels such frustration about this character.\u00a0 The folks over at Old-Wizard.com<\/a> did a great piece on him in August entitled, “Worst Character Ever?”<\/a> The guys at iFanboy<\/a> did an article in June entitled, “The Sentry Problem: Void Where Prohibited<\/a>“.\u00a0 Both are definitely worth a read.\u00a0 And finally, I wish the owner of the URL http:\/\/www.killthesentry.com\/ would get that site up and running.\u00a0 I’d be a big supporter.<\/p>\n

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