Title: Guardians of the Galaxy: Gamora's Galactic Showdown
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Date: 2017
Writer: Brandon T. Snider
Artist: Pascale Qualano, Chris Sotomayor
Not a comic. This is a novel for young readers, part of the Mighty Marvel Chapter Books series. While it's a prose story, it is full of color illustrations from the team of Qualano and Sotomayor.
The story involves a mysterious box that belonged to Thanos, but which appears to be keyed so that only Gamora can open it. Gamora wants to find the box in the hopes of furthering her quest to make peace with her past. But her sister, Nebula, is also interested in the box, lured by the possibility of it containing an item of power, and possibly also just out of spite to keep it from her sister.
Gamora's quest brings her into contact with a whole array of Marvel's cosmic characters, from her friends in the Guardians of the Galaxy, to Pip the Troll, the Collector, Captain Marvel, and Adam Warlock. Unfortunately, the effort to cram the book full of cameos detracts a bit from the story. It would have worked perfectly well with just Gamora, Nebula, Warlock (who does have an important role here) and maybe one or two others thrown in as sidekicks.
The bloated cast takes the focus off of Gamora too much, which is unfortunate, because Gamora's inner struggle is actually really interesting. Her search to resolve the conflicting loyalties of her abusive family situation with Thanos and Nebula and her loving (if dysfunctional at times) chosen families of the Guardians and the Infinity Watch is the true conflict in the story. And when it is the focus, the story works really well.
The violence is kept to a toned-down PG level, and some of the emotional issues are a bit overexplained, but the central quest is handled well, and Gamora shines in the parts of the story where she's in the spotlight.
Rating: 7/10
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