Gamora

Gamora Guide – now available to the public!

April 28, 2023 by krisis

As we continue the countdown to the release of Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 3, I have another new character guide to share with all readers of CK. I had so much fun reading through every issue in this guide to understand how the most dangerous woman in the universe was introduced as a bounty hunter, turned out to be Thanos’s agent, abruptly died, became a long-term love interest to Adam Warlock and member of the Infinity Watch, and reached new heights of popularity as a Guardian of the Galaxy. You guessed it: it’s my Gamora Guide!

Gamora Guide

Want to learn more about that rich comics history and Gamora’s canonical relationship with Thanos? Check out my original launch essay from when I debuted the Gamora Guide to Patrons of CK.

Gamora’s comics history is tied closely to both Warlock and the birth of the modern Guardians. I think it’s worth reading Starlin’s Warlock material for just how wildly psychedelic it is, but Gamora really comes into her own as Warlock’s tough lady-friend slash bodyguard during Warlock & The Infinity Watch. That includes a fuller accounting of her origins, which you can read from two different perspectives in Warlock & The Infinity Watch (1992) #9 & 11 during the original Infinity War.

What Gamora still sorely lacks are present day solo adventures, aside from a pair of team-ups in Guardians Team-Up (2015) #4 (with She-Hulk) & 6 (with Nightcralwer). That’s in part because her starring turns in Gamora (2016) and Thanos (2019) we both told in flashback. However, it’s also because she is such a critical anchor of the Guardians team that allows Star-Lord, Drax, and Rocket to rotate in and out of the roster. For an especially strong story of Gamora as a member of the team, read the sequence of Gerry Duggan’s All-New Guardians of the Galaxy (2017) into Infinity Countdown (2018) and Infinity Wars (2018) – which form one mega-arc that develop’s Gamora’s character.

The Gamora Guide explains how to to read all of those issues, whether you are tracking down floppy comics to place in a perfect reading order, buying collected editions for your bookshelf, or reading online on Marvel Unlimited.

Gamora – Definitive Collecting Guide & Reading Order

New for Patrons: Guide to Gamora

March 16, 2023 by krisis

Even with plenty of drag and indie comics to focus on this month, I still found the time to squeeze in another new Marvel guide for all Patrons of CK. This guide follows a character who started off both dangerous and incredibly complex when she was introduced by Jim Starlin in 1975, and that’s never changed – although she has changed considerably in her nearly 50 years of comics. It’s time for a Guide to Gamora!

Guide to Gamora

If I was totally off-base about my ideas of about Star-Lord when I got to work on his guide, working on a Guide to Gamora confirmed my assumptions and just made me love the character even more.

In fact, I’d go so far as to say that out of all of the Guardians of the Galaxy, Gamora is both the one who is closest to her comic version in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. That’s despite the fact that she is missing a critical element of her first 30 years of comics in the MCU.

Guardians of the Galaxy – Collecting Guide & Reading Order

The definitive issue-by-issue comic book collecting guide and reading order for Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy, in omnibus, hardcover, trade paperback, and digital. Part of Crushing Krisis’s Crushing Comics. Last updated September 2024 with titles scheduled for release through January 2025.

In 2014 Marvel introduced the Guardians of the Galaxy franchise to the entire planet with their movie version of the team consisting of Starlord, Gamora, Drax, Rocket Raccoon, and Groot.

However, the Guardians have only existed in that configuration since 2008! The only similar team was the 1990s cosmic group The Infinity Watch, which included Gamora and Drax. Historically, Guardians of the Galaxy referred to a very different, specific group of characters from Marvel’s far flung future with little overlap to the 2008 version of the team.

What both groups have in common is that they are a set of space-faring heroes who stand against the forces of destruction in the universe. They are, in effect, the Cosmic Avengers.

With that mandate in mind, this guide looks at more than just the titles named “Guardians of the Galaxy.” It also follows all of the core members of the various incarnations of that team, most of whom have never maintained an ongoing title. It also covers prominent cosmic hero Adam Warlock, who lead the Infinity Watch.

If you are interested in the cinematic incarnation of the team, this is your path:

Rocket Raccoon & Groot: The Complete Collection has all of the significant appearances of this whimsical pair of characters prior to Annihilation.
Avengers vs. Thanos covers the origins of Gamora an Drax. (Optionally, pick up Death of Captain Marvel to complete this story.)
Star-Lord: Guardian of the Galaxy collects the earliest adventures of the title character, when he was a pulp sci-fi character with no ties to the Marvel Universe.
Jump to Annihilation: Conquest, below and proceed from there. Though Drax played a role in the prior Annihilation event, this is where the team really begins to form. Their first series spins out of this.