Back during the “The White Event” event, we were introduced to Kevin Connor who became Starbrand, a protector of the planet and one of the most powerful cosmic players to appear in quite some time as shown during the “Builder War” and when “Time Runs Out.” The only problem is as his powers grew, he was losing his touch with his humanity. This puts us in a place where Connors might be dragged into the “Secret Empire” event but not have an apparent direction as to what to do about what Steve Rogers is doing to America or the world at large. Now, Magdalene Visaggio who is writing ‘Secret Empire: Brave New World‘ shares how Conners will play into the event and his state of mind.
In fact, Visaggio has a personal connection as to how Starbrand is being presented here which is quite fitting with how much the hero is starting to not feel connected to what is left of his humanity:
“So, the thing that really resonates with me about Kevin is his sense of disconnection; it’s sort of ambling through the universe as if it doesn’t concern him and he doesn’t entirely understand it. I’m autistic, so that’s basically how I roll on a day-to-day basis, anyway. It can get very hard to connect, to really inhabit the world and my body and my life, especially when things start to get heated or crazy or emotional. I sort of don’t understand human behavior or feelings a lot of the time, so the end result frequently turns out to be me standing in a room while everything happens around me, and I want to help, but mostly I’m in the way because I just can’t click with everybody else.
So in a real way, Kevin is grappling with all the craziness of SECRET EMPIRE the same way I would: by being totally overwhelmed but sincerely interested in lending a hand. And his process—look for the one thing nobody is doing and see if that works—is exactly how I operate.”
When we last left Starbrand this actually quite eerily resembled the track they had put the character on so I’m quite eager to see Starbrand evolve further down this path.
When we last had seen Starbrand he had been on the Alpha Flight Space Station to help test the new shield prior to Captain America blocking the heavy hitters from reentering Earth and that is where we find the character in this book:
“Kevin, at the start, is lost. He’s on the Alpha Flight Space Station, and everybody else seems to know what to do; Captain Marvel and Spectrum and Star-Lord are always working, strategizing, planning their next step. The people working on the station, the day-to-day crew, are keeping everything operational and providing support. And Kevin? Kevin is a living planetary defense system that can’t even get to his planet. He doesn’t know what purpose he’s even supposed to serve, and he’s so powerful he barely even knows what he brings to the table. Kevin’s whole [shtick] is that nothing in his life is clicking, nothing makes sense, and here he is in this giant mess, and he’s just in the way. So he wants to feel like he has a purpose up there.”
Starbrand is a cosmic level character who is pretty attached to Earth as he is its planetary defense system and yet the threats that occur in most comics are quite beneath his level of attention. He’s one of the supers that would best fit in a pure cosmic setting and yet now that he’s trapped in space is even more lost than before. It’ll be quite interesting to say the last as to what he brings to the table in “Secret Empire.”
Are you looking forward to the return of Starbrand? Do you feel that he will have a major role in the battles to come? What could his future look like once a bit of the old order is restored? Share your thoughts below True Believers!
‘Secret Empire: Brave New World’ #3 will be in comic shops everywhere on July 5th, 2017!>/strong>
Source: Marvel
Stuart Conover is an author, blogger, and all around geek. When not busy being a father and husband he tries to spend as much time as possible immersed in comic books, science fiction, and horror! Would you like to know more? Follow him on Twitter!
