Star-Lord and Kitty Pryde #1
Marvel Comics
Writer: Sam Humphries
Artist: Alti Firmansyah
Previously, Reed Richards saves several heroes, including Peter Quill, from Doom’s grasp using a Cosmic life raft.
The issue begins with Star-Lord moonlighting at a nightclub, where he goes by the name Stevie Rogers. We first see Quill, or Rogers, singing “Part of Your World” from Disney’s The Little Mermaid. Due to the aftermath of Battleworld, Quill is stranded on this alternate world and is forced to lay low, in order to stay off Doom’s radar. Although this comic takes place on Battleworld, with the exception of the mention of God Doom, this series feels distant from main Secret Wars book.
Drax makes an appearance as Quill’s boss, and nightclub manager. This version of Drax is a far departure from the
original 616-universe interpretation. This version has an interesting Elvis-esque hairstyle and is very eccentric. Although he is still trying comprehend everything that is going on, Quill still remembers his original universe, with his original Drax and his fiance Kitty Pryde. This is where the first half of the issue focuses on; Quill’s inner struggle with keeping up with this facade after he has had everything he cared about stripped away from him.
This is not the same Kitty Pryde that was previously engaged to Quill. This alternate version of Kitty Pryde has Adamantium claws similar to X-23 and acts as an agent for Valeria Von Doom’s Foundation. From my understanding this version originates from the Age of Apocalypse series, but in that series she is killed by Colossus so who knows.
This version of Kitty Pryde walks into the club and takes a seat at a table next to Remy LeBeau, who goes by the name Gambit The Collector in this universe. The two meet up to exchange goods. Kitty appears to be interested in some sort of anomaly Gambit has to offer in exchange for these rare knives. Quill spots Kitty across the room, approaches her and kisses her but because this isn’t the same Kitty he fell in love with, she punches him in the mouth. Due to Quill’s interference in the deal between Kitty and Gambit, Gambit hesitates and escapes with both items. We get to see a bit of Gambit’s powers at this point. As he charges up a champagne bottle that he explodes to use as a diversion.
In the future, I’d like to see more of this rendition of Gambit. It is still undetermined if Gambit is this universes 
version of Taneleer Tivan, the original Collector. With that said, I’m not sure if I like this version, but I’m willing to see where they take his story. He seems to share plently of similar characteristics as the 616-Gambit with a few added touches like Tivan’s love for rare objects.
We also get to see Drax take out his signature knives. I was a little concerned seeing this version of Drax at first. He is primarily used as comic relief and as I was reading this, I couldn’t help but draw some sort of comparison between him and Genie from Aladdin. Even though Quill works for Drax, seeing him continue to act as his enforcer in this universe was a nice touch.
Quill’s blood lands on a device Kitty was carrying that is able to scan the DNA of any object. The device labels the blood as unknown and Kitty is excited as she believes she has discovered a living anomaly and handcuffs herself to Quill, with the intention of taking him to Doomgard, ending issue #1.
When Battleworld was formed, apparently Disney Films no longer existed so Quill takes advantage of this as he sings nothing but songs featured in Disney films. Interestingly enough, this entire issue felt like something taken out of the pages of a Disney movie, even straight down to the art style done by Firmansyah. This story is very at-ease with very brief conflict. For this approach, there is no other character from the Marvel Universe better suited for this run than Peter Quill, himself. Although, this wouldn’t be the first story I would pull from the many introduced during the Battleworld saga, It’s a refreshing, lighthearted departure from Secret Wars series such as the Civil War or Age of Apocalypse tie-ins.
This storyline could go either way, it is still very early into the story and the overall tone was rather slow for the most part. Despite the drawn-out story, Humphries does a great job at setting up the personalities of multiple characters
from this universe.
One of the larger selling points was seeing Star Lord and Kitty Pryde reunited. When they were originally brought together in 2014, the reaction from fans was overall positive, myself included. The pairing between the two was initially unexpected as you wouldn’t expect someone like Peter Quill settling down. It will be interesting to see where Quill’s story ends up in the long road. It was just months ago, in the final moments of the Black Vortex series where Quill proposed to his universes Kitty Pryde. Now we have a heartbroken Quill, who wants to continue where him and Kitty left off, and this version of Kitty has absolutely no idea who he is.
If you are a fan of either Kitty Pryde or Star-Lord, or looking for a break from the destruction going on in majority of other Secret Wars issues out, this is worth reading. At the same time, if you do decide to skip it, you wouldn’t be missing much.
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