Issue Six of Darkstars was cover dated March 1993. According to Mike’s Amazing World of DC Comics, the issue was released on February 2, 1993, Groundhog’s Day. Michael Jan Friedman was the writer with Travis Charest pencilling, inked by Scott Hanna.  Bob Pinhaha was the lettered and Eric Kachelhofer was the colorist.  Finally kickin’ butt and making change was Brian Augustyn, leaving Ruben Diaz getting’ his butt kicked and changing stuff.

Colos and Mo Douglas are streaking to Flint’s location. Colos is swearing that if Pappas haven’t already taken Flint apart, then he will do it himself.  Mo calls Colos out on his bitterness, saying that he can do anything he wants.  Colos just laughs at this suggestion saying that all he is good for is a little razzle dazzle, in reality he is as useless as anybody else.  Colos admits that something bad happened.

Colos now goes into his backstory.  He became a Darkstar because he saw Zamba, his home world destroyed by Qinorri Raiders.  The Qinorri were strip miners and they were after a mineral under Zamba’s crust.  As a result of the Qinorri mining, the planet was destroyed by earthquakes, floods and volcanic eruptions.  The Zambians who were a non space faring and peaceful race had no defenses.  Colos was one of the very few survivors. Days after the Qinorri destruction, a stranger fell out of the sky.  His name was Radz and he offered Colos a way to strike back.  Radz was a Darkstar and Colos joined the organization.  He rose in the ranks and found his own personal healing in being a Darkstar.  Then came Jenuwyne.  It was a world like Zamba, peaceful and naïve and it was in Colos’s sector and therefore his responsibility.  Jenuwyne was attacked by raiders more savage than the Qinorri.  Colos failed to stop the raiders and Jenuwyne was destroyed, killing all the natives.  Colos ends his story to focus on the present.

In the present, Hawkgirl and Hawkman are still fighting the alien slavers.  Carter sees that the hatch to the ship is still open and flies strait to it.  He enters the ship just as the hatch closes leaving Hawkgirl outside the ship and Hawkman alone on the ship.

Hawkman recounts how they became involved with this slave ring.  Carter and Shiera (Hawkgirl) were enjoying a night listening to Shiera’s favorite nightclub singer.  But after the performance the singer was attacked by the alien slavers in her dressing room.  Carter and Shiera discovered the Immanites attacking the singer when they went back to meet her after her performance.  The two were able to beat the Immanites and rescued the girl.  The Immanites are well renowned slave traders and after Carter’s form of persuasion, they found the base in Dallas.  The two went into action as Hawkman and Hawkgirl.  Now Carter finds himself alone in a ship filled with captive humans and alien slavers that is taking off.

Colos and Mo arrive just as the ship crashes through the warehouse.  Colos recognizes the ship as a slaver.  Colos blasts his way into the ship and he and Mo enter.  Colos notices a problem, the section they busted into should have been guarded and it isn’t.  He soon finds the guards and they are fighting a Thanagarian (Hawkman).  Colos and Mo not understanding why a Thanagarian is involved move in to help Hawkman against their common enemy. Hawkman thanks the two but then streaks off saying that this is his fight and he will finish it.  In his fight, one of the slavers gets the drop on him and he is saved by Colos.

Back on Earth, Hawkgirl is in a fight of her own.  Flint sees that she is alone and he helps her by taking out the slavers.  Hawkgirl asks if Flint can make up his mind whose side he is on.  He tells her that he can’t make up his mind whose side Hawkgirl is on.  The two quickly dispatch the remaining slavers then turn their attention to each other.  Hawkgirl notices that Flint is a Darkstar and slaps him.  She and Hawkman are members of the Justice Society of America and they were looking for some missing friends but the Darkstar turned a neat and efficient search into a circus.  We see Pappas hiding in some rubble with an alien that reaches for a gun behind Hawkgirl.  Flint sees the threat and screams for her to watch out and tackles her.  Shiera recovers and shoots the alien with a crossbow and Flint blasts Pappas with is masers.  Flint wants to leave to preserve his identity but all Shiera is concerned about is Carter, not knowing that he is not alone but is with Colos and Mo.

Colos questions why Hawkman is fighting slavers when he thought that the Thanagerians were slavers themselves. Hawkman admits that he is not Thanagarian and he cannot stand slavery, it goes against his grain.  Mo sees more guards approaching and he raises the alarm giving Colos and him a chance to blast the new guards.  Colos finds that they are not far from the slave hold.  Now Mo inwardly questions why he is here now but decides that this is not a time for doubts but a time to give his best shot in helping people again.  The three bust into the hold. Carter tells Colos and Mo to keep the guards busy while he heads for the Bridge.

In one of the cells we see Carla now dressed in a grey jumpsuit.  She is seeing Colos fighting the guards and surmises that he is not dressed as the others and he is fighting for them.  She sees that Colos’s partner is human but she does not know who they are.  She suddenly realizes that they were the same people involved in the bust at Allen Pharmaceuticals and they were called Darkstar.  She decides to lend a hand in the fight for her freedom.  She jumps out of the cell after it goes down and rallies the other prisoners to help.  She grabs a gun from one of the downed guards and joins in the fight against the guards. The other prisoners join in the battle.

Colos realizes that the humans are giving him the opportunity to give Hawkman a hand and he and Mo head for the Bridge leaving Carla and the others fighting the guards.  The two arrive to find Hawkman in a hand to hand struggle with the Bridge crew of the ship.  Hawkman sees the Darkstars and just asks what took them so long. Colos retorts the same question, a couple of the crew was still left standing.  Hawkman reverses the ships course to earth leaving Colos to return to the slave hold.

Carla also was successful in her fight.  The humans are the only ones left standing, until Colos shows up.  One of the former prisoners sees him and raises his gun to shoot but Carla lowers it saying he helped them to freedom.  Colos looks into Carla’s eyes and she asks him if he is all right. Colos says he is fine but he is thinking that she is just like Mo and Flint.  She too wants to make things right.  He does not understand the qualities of humans but he has found three with the selfless abandon to help others.  Colos moves to free the other humans.  The ship should set down on Earth is less than an hour.

This is my favorite issue of this series so far.  It has everything I like:  action, character development, the Hawks, and strong female characters.

The action here is terrific.  We get Hawkman on the ship and Hawkgirl in the “hangar” both fighting the aliens with their new allies the Darkstars.   The action here was fluid and gripping as we saw multiple battles in multiple fronts.

We get the back story of Colos here.  We learn of his planet of origin, Zamba as well as what sent him off to become a Darkstar.  We also get a glimpse of his failure that eventually got him assigned to Earth’s sector.  We also see that Colos is beginning to believe that’s the humans are not as barbaric as he originally thought they were as he has seen three humans exhibit the qualities of a Darkstar. Perhaps Hal Jordan is not so unique after all.

Of course we get the Hawks.  I know that their continuity is confusing and I am not going to get into that here.  The Hawks here are not Thanagarian but are humans using Thanagarian weapons.  We do see the viciousness of their fighting style as they are prone to use Medieval weapons in their battle. We see a little bit of their relationship which is one of the draws I have to these characters.

Finally the strong female character.  Carla is not a sexualized damsel in distress as we are prone to see a lot of in comics.  She is attractive but she is smart and strong. She can rally the other prisoners including the male prisoners to join in the fight and she does not shrink from Colos but looks him in the eyes.  She is to be sold as a slave but the attire that the prisoners are forced to wear is also very modest and not overly sexualized.

I will give this issue a 5 out of 5 power rings.  It was terrific and recommend tracking this down as I have noticed that the Darkstars series is being released on Comixology.

Comments are closed.