Comixology currently has over 75,000 comics and it is now my job to dig through them all and find the strangest, most outrageous, and most fun comics deep within the depths and bring them to you at great danger to my own personal sanity. This week, we follow a small group of elite soldiers called the Armorines, as they look to steal a nuclear core from a submarine. This seems like a pretty straight forward, simple mission, except for all of the mutated shark monsters and a whole lot of bad decisions.
We start our story on a helicopter that’s flying off the coast of Australia, where the crew is frantically screaming for the Armorines to respond. It is also interesting to note, that everyone on the helicopter looks exactly like they are all failed versions of Cyclops who were just not cool enough to be in the X-Men. And that’s saying a lot. If you have awesome eye visors and are still not cool enough to beat out Cyclops, then there’s a problem. (Side note: I’m not a huge fan of Cyclops.) Also, their computers show them nothing more than giant orange and yellow pixels which seems…very useless. But hey, it was the mid 90s, computers were still young and clearly not everyone understood how they worked.
We soon discover that the reason the Armorines are ignoring Cyclops’ siblings is because, they are busy fighting giant mutated sharks that look like they are decaying in the water. Apparently, they have been hanging out too close to the sunken underwater nuclear sub but, they shouldn’t be too much of a problem. The Armorines have a suit with giant glowing swords and ion cannons that shoot from their arms. They should be fine right? Right?
No. It won’t be alright because the Armorines for some reason brought down a group of divers who decided to put some foam on the top of some tupperware containers and smash it onto their face as a diving mask. They don’t have any useful weapons or protection either but, damn it if they aren’t brave to the point of stupidity. After the Armorines fight off a few sharks, the remainder start to feed on what’s left of the dead. This gives the Armorines and friends the perfect opportunity to enter into the safety of the sunken sub through a large hole in the side. With all of them finally in the ship, they do what any sane person would do in this situation. They leave the ship to go stab some more sharks. The problem is, our friend Tristan forgets his has no stabbing weapons but shows a lot of bravery by playing chicken with one of the mutated monsters.
The lesson here guys, is to never play chicken with a shark, especially one mutated by nuclear radiation. And if you do, bring more than bravery to the fight. It’s not as effective as you may have been told. This finally leads to everyone deciding to enter the submarine and stay in the submarine. Lessons are being learned. The team of Armorines quickly splits up, one to grab the nuclear core and another to plant explosives on the ship. Why? No idea. I guess there is other important information on there that they just don’t feel like carrying around and explosives seem like more fun. It’s not a terrible argument.
Before anything else happens, we get a quick cut away to the captain of the warship floating above the Armorines. He is getting word that his men are being eaten by sharks and vows to see reinforcements. He says its time to bring in the special rescue team. It seems like these are a very important unit, who only come when situations are extreme, so I assume these are some tough people. The problem is, the captain never actually sends any help. Or the special rescue team is actually nowhere near the coast of Australia, and they’re still on the flight over while the Armorines are working. This would have actually been a great time for the rescue team to come because, a giant Hammerhead has made this ship his home. And he does not like intruders.
He also has a very cute mutated stingray best friend which is nice to see. Even mutated creatures need friends. The shark quickly eats a scuba diver, again making me question why they were brought along without an armored suit. The shark then makes the mistake of attacking the Armorine who pokes out his eyes, instantly killing him. Incorrect fact of the week: All of a sharks vital organs are located in its eye and if poked the entire creature dies. A second hammerhead comes and is quickly stabbed. This leads to one of the Armorines deciding it is time to leave the ship even though they haven’t accomplished their mission yet. He quickly learns that there are consequences for slacking off at work when, what appears to be, Mother Brain from Metriod zaps him with a laser and kidnaps them.
No one really seems to notice this, as the very next page they are lifting the nuclear core into a transport helicopter above. Then, the most ridiculous thing in this comic, a comic that includes mutant sea creatures and a giant brain like alien ship with tentacles, happens. Four dolphins randomly appear wearing harness and ready to help the divers not quite qualified enough to be Armorines. These dolphins were apparently trained by the Navy for situations just like this. And, while this may seem strange to… well, anyone really, the divers are only shocked because they thought the Navy abandoned the dolphin project a long time ago. It’s never really address why there was a dolphin project in the first place but, I need to hear that story. Hopefully, whenever Hollywood gets a hold of the Armorines license they’ll add that in as a gritty flashback.
A few dolphins get needlessly sacrificed but, the divers eventually escape with the help of a few Armorines who have come back to murder a some more sharks before they decide to finally call it a day. Then, we get back to the Armorine that went off to set explosives in the submarine that I completely forgot about because, his job seemed pointless to start with. After seeing how he handles his escape, I’m not surprised they sent him off on a useless mission because he is not good at things. The Armorine leaves the ship but, not before being speared into the submarine by a shark that nuclear radiation has clearly given the skill set of Goldberg.
This destroys his propulsion system but, not his cannon, which he uses to blast the shark through the face, essentially disintegrating it. Now, I may not be a scientist, I may actually have a degree in history, (Yes, history. Leave me alone.) but, I think all of that heavy metal armor he is wearing should drag him to the bottom of the sea. Or, he has incredibly strong legs to overcome the force pulling down on him. It turns out to be the latter as he casually swims to the surface. He did accidentally hit the submarine with his cannon blast though, sending it over the edge of the cliff it was on. He seems pretty distraught about it too, even though it blows up 50 feet further down from where it was originally going to blow up but, I’m not an Armorine so maybe I am missing something. And so, I guess the day was saved? They captured the core, a large amount of innocent men and dolphins dies, and they blew something up. Alright, so they really didn’t save anything but they’ll need to do some saving here soon. Remember that guy captured by the Mother Brain ship? Yeah, here’s where he ended up…
In a room completely filled with corpses. Yup. Welcome to Indie Icons.
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