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The Forged #7-9
The Forged Volume 3: The Abaddon Strike
The Eternal Empire’s war against the Phobes opens a new front in the Skull Nebula! Vic and company join Forged teams Rapier and Gladius to bring the fight into T-space—but things go sideways fast when Vic is declared KIA! Now, CrazyJo must lead Scimitar-3 alongside the other Forged teams on a mission that will spell genocide for the Phobes. And behind it all, politics on Throneworld become all the stranger as Davian enters an uneasy alliance with the leader of the breakaway cabal of Cassandras. But will their alliance reveal the Empress’s true agenda, or is it just part of a longer game?
Collects THE FORGED #7–9
Collects THE FORGED #7–9
144 pages, Paperback
Published October 8, 2024
6 people want to read
About the author
Greg Rucka
1,496 books1,926 followersGreg Rucka, is an American comic book writer and novelist, known for his work on such comics as Action Comics, Batwoman: Detective Comics, and the miniseries Superman: World of New Krypton for DC Comics, and for novels such as his Queen & Country series.
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
February 12, 2025
The oversize format of this series..serve it well.
Especially as the plot is becoming more clear and picking up.
Especially as the plot is becoming more clear and picking up.
March 20, 2025
I enjoyed our featured military squad butting heads with some other squads as they head out for a joint reconnaissance mission against the alien threat, but the court intrigue and plot machinations are starting to eclipse the action and grunt camaraderie.
I see that it has been quite a few months since issue #9 of the comic book series came out, and #10 has still not been given a release date. Is this going to be another Greg Rucka series that starts out well and then just disappears? I'm still waiting on conclusions for Lazarus, The Old Guard, and Black Magick.
FOR REFERENCE:
Contains material originally published in single magazine form as The Forged #7-9.
I see that it has been quite a few months since issue #9 of the comic book series came out, and #10 has still not been given a release date. Is this going to be another Greg Rucka series that starts out well and then just disappears? I'm still waiting on conclusions for Lazarus, The Old Guard, and Black Magick.
FOR REFERENCE:
Contains material originally published in single magazine form as The Forged #7-9.
April 19, 2025
As I hoped, after the calm character- and world-building of the second volume, this third volume brings the heat. Our Forged team are sent straight off to a spot in space where they can access T-space and figure out what the alien beings are up to.
The internecine battles take center stage until late in the book, when a fun (and not altogether surprising) twist is presented (). Lots to keep track of here: the Empress, the Cassandras, not to mention the various Forged teams. Still, the pace is relentless and the art is terrific. Looking forward to more!
The internecine battles take center stage until late in the book, when a fun (and not altogether surprising) twist is presented (). Lots to keep track of here: the Empress, the Cassandras, not to mention the various Forged teams. Still, the pace is relentless and the art is terrific. Looking forward to more!
October 1, 2025
3.5 stars overall, mostly for the art
Forged team Scimitar-3 find themselves thrust back into the action again, beside two other Forged teams. They are charged with taking a massive bomb into T-Space to destroy the Phobes (what the aliens are called now) once and for all.
Vic, thought lost in battle, actually finds herself rescued and saved by the Phobes, learning some important facts about their contact with the ever-living Empress, down the ages...
And just as the Empress forces the hand of her military back in the Eternal Empire, and Scimitar-3 find themselves branded as traitors, the story just stops --- as far as I can tell there are no further issues on the release horizon... disappointing.
Forged team Scimitar-3 find themselves thrust back into the action again, beside two other Forged teams. They are charged with taking a massive bomb into T-Space to destroy the Phobes (what the aliens are called now) once and for all.
Vic, thought lost in battle, actually finds herself rescued and saved by the Phobes, learning some important facts about their contact with the ever-living Empress, down the ages...
And just as the Empress forces the hand of her military back in the Eternal Empire, and Scimitar-3 find themselves branded as traitors, the story just stops --- as far as I can tell there are no further issues on the release horizon... disappointing.
December 12, 2024
Good, but coddled. Dependable, but unfortunate and unlucky. Respected, but dangerously self-sufficient and prone to acting on rogue proposals. Forged Team Scimitar-3 is a lot of things, and by the time readers cut their way through the fog of THE FORGED v3, they'll have plenty more descriptors to add to the list.
The book opens with a multipronged attack on a specific junction of outer space where suspected energy rumblings query whether the phobes, the squiggly, sentient space critters, have congregated. The assignment? Infiltrate, observe, and so forth. "Sniff the flowers," as it were. The assigned? Vic's FS-3, along with two more teams: Forged Team Rapier-9 (guided by an insanely tall woman, Scythe) and Forged Team Gladius-6 (guided by a maddeningly stoic woman, Viper). These three Forged teams must investigate a crossroads of T-space, not get turned into mush, and return with data and telemetry information for the war room back on Throneworld.
Sounds like a done deal. Except, FS-3, as readers know by now, has a reputation of earning success despite an array of catastrophic malfeasances unraveling the fabric of proximal clarity. That intersection of T-space giving off odd energy readings? It's bad news. The suspicious behavior of the arch general, Mitten-Yur, whose supposed tactical knowledge is increasingly (obviously) skewing toward sycophancy for Her Eternal Gory? Also bad news. General Davian's investigation into the missing Cassandras (and how these incidents correlate to the rise of phobes interactions)? The green-haired Cassandra, from Planet Gehenna-D-54-C, brushes off the wily old man as presumptuous, paranoid, and disloyal, but not before nudging him closer toward a future truth even she cannot yet see. So, yes, also bad news.
THE FORGED v3 assesses and scrutinizes the character dynamics of Vic's FS-3 by contextualizing the team's feats (or failures) under the lenses of other Forged teams, other military leaders, and other authorities in the empire writ large. The comic book keeps its promise of delivering strange and entertaining sci-fi action, but it also seeks to impress upon readers the value these characters deliver for themselves and one another. For example, Viper, the leader of FG-6, is a beast of a woman who repeatedly calls Vic soft to her face. Her teammates are all itching for a fight and regularly quote the field manual like lapdogs. The dynamic between FS-3 and FG-6 illuminates the diversity of personality that mixes, by necessity, under the aegis of intergalactic warmongering, and the result is never quite good. (On the plus side, the expanded cast calls for more character designs of super-buff, attractive ladies.)
A lot happens in this volume, and the story shifts readers' expectations for the book's key players. The green-haired Cassandra is devious, but she's also keen on testing the boundaries of allyship in a time of desperation and on the precipice of chaos: Are the phobes planning war, or are they trying to avoid one? Meanwhile, General Davian plainly doesn't trust anybody: Mitten-Yur is a fool, sure, but can Davian trust Admiral Adrianna, whose masked prudence hides a withering criticism? And then there's Her Eternal Glory, the empress herself. She's 10,000 years old. As such, readers are instructed to imagine how merciless, petulant, and wholly psychotic a being must be to nourish a grudge for 10,000 years. This could get messy.
The book opens with a multipronged attack on a specific junction of outer space where suspected energy rumblings query whether the phobes, the squiggly, sentient space critters, have congregated. The assignment? Infiltrate, observe, and so forth. "Sniff the flowers," as it were. The assigned? Vic's FS-3, along with two more teams: Forged Team Rapier-9 (guided by an insanely tall woman, Scythe) and Forged Team Gladius-6 (guided by a maddeningly stoic woman, Viper). These three Forged teams must investigate a crossroads of T-space, not get turned into mush, and return with data and telemetry information for the war room back on Throneworld.
Sounds like a done deal. Except, FS-3, as readers know by now, has a reputation of earning success despite an array of catastrophic malfeasances unraveling the fabric of proximal clarity. That intersection of T-space giving off odd energy readings? It's bad news. The suspicious behavior of the arch general, Mitten-Yur, whose supposed tactical knowledge is increasingly (obviously) skewing toward sycophancy for Her Eternal Gory? Also bad news. General Davian's investigation into the missing Cassandras (and how these incidents correlate to the rise of phobes interactions)? The green-haired Cassandra, from Planet Gehenna-D-54-C, brushes off the wily old man as presumptuous, paranoid, and disloyal, but not before nudging him closer toward a future truth even she cannot yet see. So, yes, also bad news.
THE FORGED v3 assesses and scrutinizes the character dynamics of Vic's FS-3 by contextualizing the team's feats (or failures) under the lenses of other Forged teams, other military leaders, and other authorities in the empire writ large. The comic book keeps its promise of delivering strange and entertaining sci-fi action, but it also seeks to impress upon readers the value these characters deliver for themselves and one another. For example, Viper, the leader of FG-6, is a beast of a woman who repeatedly calls Vic soft to her face. Her teammates are all itching for a fight and regularly quote the field manual like lapdogs. The dynamic between FS-3 and FG-6 illuminates the diversity of personality that mixes, by necessity, under the aegis of intergalactic warmongering, and the result is never quite good. (On the plus side, the expanded cast calls for more character designs of super-buff, attractive ladies.)
A lot happens in this volume, and the story shifts readers' expectations for the book's key players. The green-haired Cassandra is devious, but she's also keen on testing the boundaries of allyship in a time of desperation and on the precipice of chaos: Are the phobes planning war, or are they trying to avoid one? Meanwhile, General Davian plainly doesn't trust anybody: Mitten-Yur is a fool, sure, but can Davian trust Admiral Adrianna, whose masked prudence hides a withering criticism? And then there's Her Eternal Glory, the empress herself. She's 10,000 years old. As such, readers are instructed to imagine how merciless, petulant, and wholly psychotic a being must be to nourish a grudge for 10,000 years. This could get messy.
May 20, 2025
I felt like this one was a little hard to follow at points. I'm still enjoying the story and the artwork, but it was hard to follow the plan the Empress put into action. I did like the banter between the different pilots and the camaraderie of teamwork with our main characters. I'm hoping we get more of what's going on in the next book.
September 27, 2024
3.5 Stars
It's interesting that the odd issues seem to focus more on plot so far. I'm not 100% sure about how I feel about the twist here, but I'm still down. I want to know what the General knows and is doing! Still fun, can't wait for the next volume.
It's interesting that the odd issues seem to focus more on plot so far. I'm not 100% sure about how I feel about the twist here, but I'm still down. I want to know what the General knows and is doing! Still fun, can't wait for the next volume.
April 16, 2025
Still a good series with very strong art. But it's getting a bit too convoluted and the story is moving very slowly (as seems to be the case with a number of Rucka's current series. Black Magick, anyone?). Not sure the Empress is to be trusted...
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews