Tag: Nova

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MCU ’22 Pitch 12: Warlock & The Infinity Watch

The Deal: I pitch movies set in the Marvel or DC cinematic universes. Also other things. This pitch follows on directly from Nova 2, which is a direct sequel to my Nova 1 pitch.

Warlock & The Infinity Watch: Taking place after Guardians 3. I’m assuming, for the moment, they won’t be decimated, and will co-anchor this movie with Warlock and Captain Marvel; even if they take casualties, whoever survives can be in this.

We start on Vormir. Red Skull is devastated. We think he’s talking to the embodiment of death. He’s upset that Steve Rogers is gone- he’ll never be able to kill him. That he could have been content to be a specter, so long as the possibility that he could one day torment Rogers existed. But now… he has to just let his hate die. And what is the Red Skull without his hate? The soul stone falls into his hand. He wasn’t speaking to death at all, but a Kang variant, who may need a universe with infinite stones, but doesn’t mind him using one in the interim (really, he’s expecting Red Skull to soften the universe up for him).

Adam Warlock, and I’m making educated guesses, here, but he’s largely a good guy. He shows up on Earth, shortly after the events of WandaVision. We see her studying the Darkhold, but when there’s a knock on the door, she comes to it in a wool shirt with a mug of cocoa. She doesn’t know Warlock, but his golden skin is striking. “Wanda Maximoff. I am known as Adam Warlock.”

“Oh, um… I don’t really train people in the mystic arts. But I probably have the number for Dr. Strange, if you’d like to come in.” (Yes, this scene is set before the events of Dr. Strange 2)

“I’m not here for that. I’m here with this.” He holds out one of the infinity stones, and she reaches for it. “Aren’t you concerned it could harm you?” He’s somewhat taken aback by her haste to seize its power. “Or that its great power might corrupt you?”

“It doesn’t seem to have harmed you, and my powers came from one of the stones. I always assumed I was immune to them.” Adam reads her aura.

“There is a darkness in you, Wanda Maximoff. You cannot aid in my quest, and I would beg you, to abandon your own, for it will rend your soul in half.”

“Could I use it?” She asks. “I see you, now. I know what you are. And I could no more take the stone from you than survive ripping loose the energy of the sun. But if I could hold it, for a moment. I could bring them back. I could give my boys life again, and make Vision… make my family whole again.”

“I’m sorry, Wanda. You are not whole, and while that remains true, you will be unfit to wield an infinite stone- and unfit to reclaim your family.”

“You bastard!” she unleashes a blast, but Warlock is already gone, flying at speed away from the Earth.

He makes it as far as the atmosphere before Captain Marvel collides with him, hitting him so hard he impacts on the surface of the Moon. They fight, briefly, before Warlock puts up his hands, realizing she isn’t a threat. “I mean you no harm, and, I believe, you mean but to protect your homeworld. There is no reason for violence between us.”

He explains that his cosmic senses allowed him to notice the reintroduction of the stones by Kang, and he means to protect them. However, he has a darkness in himself, one that cannot be tamed, and certainly cannot be trusted with the stones. So he needs others to safeguard them in his stead. She seems worthy, if she would stand by him. She accepts, if only so he’s not carrying two stones alone anymore.

She also mentions knowing a crew that might be able to help- people who have stood for the galaxy when others did not. “I would be eager to meet such heroes,” Warlock says.

“I… wouldn’t call them heroes, exactly…”

Needle drop, in a colorful corner of space. Drax and Groot are staring out the window at space. I’m going to assume by this point Groot is back to an adult floral colossus. “I do not understand, tree,” Drax says dryly.

“I am Groot.”

“I have never heard the contradiction of sentient life more poetically expressed.”

“He got that from a fortune cookie,” Rocket says, shoving between them.

“There were cookies?” Drax asks, walking towards the cabin.

“There were,” Nebula says, and pops the last one into her mouth whole.

“You’re eating the fortune,” Peter says.

“Why is there paper in my cookie?” she asks, pulling it out of her mouth.

“Mine wasn’t worth anything; let alone a fortune,” Rocket says. “Just some human gibbering.”

“The fortune’s, it’s a saying, something philosophical, or portentous,” Peter says.

“I saved you one,” Gamorra says, tossing it to Drax. He catches it, and crushes the cookie in his hand. He removes the paper, then crudely mashes the dust into his face.

“Thank you, assassin.” His fortune, which he drops but which we linger on, says, “Your daughter is alive.”

Drax takes one of the containers of food, and begins to shovel into his mouth with chop sticks. Suddenly the ship lurches.

“We hit something?” Gamorra asks.

“Hit, no,” Rocket says. “But if you want I can gun the engines.” Rocket points where Captain Marvel and Warlock are floating just on the other side of the ship’s windshield.

They walk through the forcefield in the rear of the ship. Warlock is less impressed, since he’s met the Guardians before, and expected… more. They get to talking, and it turns out they’re all headed to Knowhere. The Guardians are uneasy about assembling the stones. Isn’t that just making the job easier for the next Thanos? On the other hand, if the Infinity Watch train in the use of the stones, and coordinate, it’s likely the next Thanos wouldn’t be able to take them at all.

They fly to Knowhere, or what’s left of it after Thanos’ fight with the Collector. Oddly, the stone is back with his collection.

Next they travel on their ship to the wreckage of the realm of Asgard. I honestly kind of like the idea that the battle between Hela and Surtur continues in the background- a permanent Ragnarok on an increasingly small chunk of rock (alternately, as in my unrelated Thor 5 pitch, Hela could go to Hel and take over).

They find Beta Ray Bill, who found one of the remaining weapons from Odin’s vault (essentially the prototype for Mjolnir), which granted him Thor-like power, along with an infinite stone (unless of course either Hemsworth or Portman Thor want to guest- contacted by the Guardians- and then we’ll bring in Bill for the sequel/credits).

They go to Xandar. One of the stones is there. Red Skull finds the second stone, and begins to wreak havoc, using the two stones he possesses to transform the locals into his minions. As set up in the credits scene from Nova 2, The Nova Corps, led by Richard Rider and his brother Sam, are looking for the stone, too, leading a Nova contingent. They hold Skull off long enough for Warlock and the Guardians to arrive. He can hold back any one of them, even using the stones, hitting Peter Quill so hard he drops the stone he was holding, which is picked up by Richard Rider. The heroes without stones hold back the possessed Xandarians, while the four watchpersons, Warlock, Captain Marvel, Beta Ray Bill, and Nova, attack him as a team, essentially hitting him one after another in a round. Finally, they join hands, channeling the stones together, to stop Skull; during this, subtly, Magus tries to assert control of Warlock. Skull uses his teleporting stone to open a portal, and gets knocked into it, losing his stones.

We do an epilogue aboard the Milano, the heroes deciding to form the Infinity Watch, to take the stones to the opposite ends of the Universe.

Mid Credits Scene: Gamora and Peter are in an elevator. “I’m just saying, the last time we gave up an infinity stone, I lost you,” he says. “I don’t think I could survive that again.”

“It took a Thanos to kill me the first time- and he’s gone. And she died because the two of you trusted the Xandarians. I’m not just giving this stone to the most advanced power in the universe, but to its greatest warrior.” The elevator opens. We pan across the majestic Shiar throne room, before settling on Gladiator. Back to credits.

End Credits Scene: “I’ve already given up one infinity stone.” Strange says. We’re in his Sanctum Sanctorum.

“That’s why I trust you.” It’s Warlock, handing him one of the stones. “Because I don’t want you to keep it. If my other self…”

“Your other self?”

“The Magus. He knows what I do. He tried to assert control when we were fighting Red Skull. If he knows where the stone is, he’ll take it, first thing. And the Magus with two stones… he’d be harder to stop than Red Skull. Perhaps unstoppable.”

Strange takes the stone. “Have you thought about stepping down? Giving away both stones?”

“It’s my burden. At least for now. Unless you’re offering to take it on?”

Strange touches his third eye. “I’m not sure I’m the right man for the job. I’ve seen who Stephen Strange becomes with too much power. But I can make some inquiries.”

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MCU ’22 Pitch 11: Nova 2

The Deal: I pitch movies set in the Marvel or DC cinematic universes. Also other things. This pitch is a direct sequel to my Nova 1 pitch.

A very stubbly Richard flies, narrating a recap, “The Nova Corps., its ships, my armor, even its satellites like the Kiln, are powered by the Nova Force. I’ve never understood the physics of it- the science officer explained it lost me as quantum entanglement- but the man battery is on Xandar. It was built originally to power the fleet, and later, Nova Corps. armor. But with the destruction of the fleet fighting Ronan, and later the decimation of the armor Corps. fighting Thanos, the remaining Novas were supercharged. There weren’t many of us left, but we were stronger individually than ever before, and after the snap- there was no stopping us.” Quick flashback of Richard and Sam stopping in space, as Sam dusts in front of a terrified Richard. “But when I watched my little brother turn to dust, I snapped, too.”

Quick montage, Richard destroying the few remaining of Thanos’ forces, stopping when his helmet notifies him of the Infinity Gauntlet’s energy signature- and he blasts off. Richard lands hard, prepared to fight and likely die trying to tear the Infinity Gauntlet from Thanos… only to find the Mad Titan’s head laying next to his body on the floor. He lets out a primal scream as we zoom out, off-world, out of the solar system- out of systems into blackness.

We cut to Rich, in an alien bar, with his head on the bar. The bartender puts down a drink in front of him, and floating in the drink we see the words, “5 beers later.” As the beer disappears from the glass, so too does the word beer, and we can see “years” now through the empty glass. The alien who snarfled up the beer gets ushered out for stealing drinks again, while Rich, without lifting his head, orders another one. Another Nova arrives, and tells the bartender he’s had enough. This is Rhomann Dey’s widow, Karman-Kan, and she helps Richard off his stool, then lets him lean on her on the way out. She carries him home. She lives with him, though they’re not together, with her daughter; it’s a sense of obligation, for his work saving them, for his work saving the Corps., and a recognition of his trauma, including their shared loss of Rhomann. I’m not at all against her becoming a love interest, going forward, but right now Richard is utterly broken. Not merely traumatized, but so far from human that if she wasn’t keeping him alive, essentially as the sole way to keep some small part of her husband alive, he would wither and die. Her daughter is pretty brutal towards him, in the way only a mean tween (or maybe teen) girl can be; she didn’t see Rhomann’s affection for Richard because she was so young, or understand what he represents to her mother, and just sees him as this black hole of work and affection, and would rather see her mom move on and be happy. In part, I think Richard represents the part of her mother that doesn’t want to move on, because they both feel like moving on would be betraying the memory of those they’ve lost.

I’m not sure where this information goes, but it turns out the Nova suits were built harnessing the power of the infinity stone on Xandar. They built the suits to use genetic locks, so that enemies couldn’t use the tech against them. They keep the suits tied to families, so Rich’s helmet could only be given to someone genetically related to him (though how close a match necessary remains to be seen). After the loss of the power stone, they can no longer create more suits (or maybe not at the speed and volume). Karman-Kan actually wears Rhomann’s suit; they used their daughter’s genetics as the template, so it would accept either parent- this is also how Sam can make use of Richard’s helmet.

Mostly the corps keeps Rich around as a mascot; the timely repair of the battery in Nova 1 allowed the Corps to survive. Occasionally he dries up enough to go on missions. But he’s reckless, bordering on suicidal; it means he’s been a hero a few times even after Xandar, but only because Karman-Kan has hidden his screw ups from their superiors.

I think… after a brutal dressing down from Karman-Kan, that he finally admits to her that he’s not a drunk. He doesn’t drink. But if he hangs out in bars, people stopped ragging on him to get over it, to move on. They finally let him just be crippled by depression- not because he wants to be- but because it’s all he can do. Because if he tried to do anything else, he’d fly himself into the nearest sun. But he hasn’t even been able to fly to Earth to tell his mom what happened to Sam. That is what’s really kept him alive- because until he knows she knows, he can’t just… that he can’t face her and tell her Sam is gone is the only reason he isn’t, too.

They embrace, and she breaks down, too, but she smiles- not because she’s happy they’re sad, but because finally they aren’t alone in their grief. She convinces him that he needs closure, that she’ll be with him, every step of the way, but that he needs to let his family know what happened to Sam- and she’ll be there to help him through, whatever the fallout. The pair fly to Earth, and land at his family’s home. Rich still has his key, and opens the front door, only to find a different family living in the home. They speak excitedly at him in Spanish, at least until another member of the family starts speaking excitedly in a different language- they’re a family of refugees displaced from different parts of the world. (and Rich is trying to speak English- all while the helmet tries to translate everyone’s speech, so there’s six overlapping voices). It’s when Richard tears off his helmet that he feels a hand on his shoulder, and recognizes a voice that says, “He says they’ve been here five years, after the family that lived here disappeared.” His mouth drops open as he turns, and we see Sam, confused. “What’s going on?” Sam asks. “And why do you look and smell terrible. And who is the hot blue lady?”

Richard apologizes for him, and tells Karman-Kan he doesn’t know whether Kylorian puberty is anything like human puberty, but they’re just lucky he hasn’t drooled on her yet. She reacts largely with confusion, but also a little concern, and stammers something about if drooling is a sign of arousal in his species they have important boundaries to discuss. Just then, Sam’s mother with their little sister Ubers in front of the house, which we can see because the front door is still open. She tells them that they were at the police station filing a missing persons report about Sam, when suddenly the station was a zoo, with twice as many people inside, and half the officers were telling everyone else they disappeared five years ago. Their driver said the same thing and she just wants to know: has it really been five years? Sam wants to know the same thing. And at that climactic moment, the refugee family begin chattering excitedly again, and Richard suggests they go somewhere to grab something to eat. I think we go to Dairy Queen, the same one Richard worked at, though it’s since been rebuilt and remodeled- just the surrounding area should be the same.

To save some time and space, Sam’s mother basically nutshells it for us, “So if I understand right, the Avengers failed to stop an alien jerk from wiping out half of all life, then after five years managed to put things back together again- and you two work for an intergalactic alien police force that also failed to stop the alien jerk.”

Rich tells her she’s taking it all really well. “Yeah, way to go, mom,” Sam adds. She tells them she’s basically screaming internally because she’s pretty sure either she’s lost her mind or the world has and either way she’s not really equipped to handle what’s happening, and adding to it by yelling at her boys, now knowing that she narrowly avoided losing them, would be too much to stand.

Sam asks Rich why he feels different. “Puberty,” Rich says. Then Karman-Kan tells him it’s been a rough five years for the Nova Corps. With the destruction Thanos wrought, there have been no shortage of willing recruits, but with the chaos it also unleashed, the Corps’s numbers have continued to dwindle. That even presuming half the disappeared Novas returned, they’re each among the most powerful Novas to have ever lived- they’ve lost so many. Rich heads off to the bathroom, and Sam follows.

We linger, a moment, on the awkwardness of the mom and Karman-Kan. Mrs. Alexander asks how long she’s been seeing Rich, to which Karman-Kan replies, “I’ve been seeing him since he arrived on Xandar, some eight orbital rotations of your planet around your star.” Mrs. Alexander is… alarmed at that, and asks how that’s been going. “He is interesting to look at, I suppose.” She asks if the two of them have been physical, to which a confused Karman-Kan replies that they’ve come into contact. Mrs. Alexander says she supposes that means her species must have compatible genitals. “Not genital contact,” Karman-Kan gasps, before mumbling that she is “retreating to a waste-elimination chamber.” She pauses a moment, at the bathroom doors, looking at the symbol of a man on the one door, and a symbol of a woman on the other, hesitating, before going into the opposite one Rich and Sam used.

We cut back to the Nova battery on Xandar. It pulses, and the lights inside the room dim, when in walks Nova Prime. She asks one of the scientists about the readings she requested. He tells her that their figures are promising, that energy can’t be created or destroyed. When he leaves, the energy forms into the shape of a man, specifically, Saal, and she calls him by that name, and tells him they’re trying to figure out what happened to him. The prototype armor he was wearing seemed to trap his template in the World Mind connected to the Nova Force.

We hear battle chatter overlapping for an instant before we cut to what is basically the Nova D-Day. Novas are pouring onto a planet, and just as quickly being slaughtered. Depending which big bad you want to set up for Nova 3, it could be an incursion of a small section of the annihilation wave from the Negative Zone, or Phalanx, or something else, even. Subtly, with each Nova that falls, the energy field surrounding those that remain becomes a little more bright.

We cut back to the Nova battery on Xandar, where Nova scientists are monitoring it. Prime asks about the incursion, and her latest Denarian tells her it’s going about as expected- but that with each Nova who falls, their remaining forces receive a greater share of the Nova Force- which ensures that their troop strength remains about the same- it’s just that the enemy forces seem endless- an unending wave of destruction. There’s a surge of power, and the lights dim. The new Denarian checks his figures, and goes pale. Something has drained an inordinate amount of the Nova Force. Their troops are falling exponentially faster- and with each that falls the anomaly is swallowing up the new share- leaving the remaining force underpowered. Prime orders an all points- they need all of Nova’s forces to converge on the battle.

Inside the men’s room, Richard is splashing water on his face. Sam can tell he’s having a hard time, and pats his back, and tries to tell him it’s okay. That he’s been under a lot of pressure.

“I didn’t buckle under the pressure of a galaxy on my shoulders, or even a world. I couldn’t handle the pressure of my little brother on my shoulders. I crumpled under it.”

Sam is thoughtful, for a moment, before comically slapping him. Then he sticks his tongue out so close to Richard’s face that it nearly touches him and then raspberries him. “Gah,” Rich exclaims, wiping spittle from his face, and asks, “How did you get through my shield?”

“Family always does,” Sam says. “They’re the ones who can hurt you worst. And the ones who help you heal. And the ones whose loss you feel the most. I never got to tell you how scared I was, when I heard your distress call. I thought that was the last time I’d hear your voice. I was terrified, but I had to try to help you. And I knew you’d been okay when you sent the message… but for all I knew I was never coming back. But also,”

Sam slaps him again. “Dad left when I was still in diapers. I barely remember him, but I always had you. And I remember having a really hard time, I felt like I couldn’t get through… anything. You told me, ‘When you can’t get through the next hour, the next minute, get through the next breath. And then the next. And the next. Sometimes the world can just be so much… but if you can break it down to however much you can handle, you can make it through the next breath. And then the next. Until you’ve got improbable minutes. Impossible hours. Unfathomable days. An inconceivable lifetime.’”

“You know, you turned out all right. Almost makes me feel bad about telling mom to put you up for adoption.”

“You mean that about Kaelynn.”

“No. Her, I liked. Mostly. She was cute. You had a head like a sat-on potato.”

Sam shrugs. “Just means I know you love me for me.” They hug. A kid walks into the bathroom, then ducks halfway out, and we hear him complain that there are men hugging in the bathroom again. “We should maybe stop, or at least hug someplace less weird.”

Back on Xandar, the scientist from before interrupts, to tell Prime he checked on the anomaly, and it’s gone. The Denarian is confused, and the scientist affirms that Denarian Saal’s template is no longer housed within the World Mind.

Sam and Richard return to the table. “Your girlfriend seems… nice,” their mother says.

“Girl friend?” Sam asks. “I’ve missed a lot.”

“She’s not my, she was my partner’s partner,” Rich says.

“Aren’t you your partner’s partner?” Sam asks.

“I’m not doing a Who’s on First,” Rich complains. “His wife, I guess. They had a kid. Because of that, she kept me alive.”

“Alive?”

Rich takes her hand. “Losing Sam… it broke me, mom. I felt like… like he was the one person in the whole Universe I needed to protect most, and I failed. I couldn’t face you. I couldn’t face anything. She’s the only reason I’m still here.”

“She must be very special,” their mother says.

“She is, I,” Karman-Kan’s hand lights on his shoulder, and he looks up at her.

“We should go.” She’s all business.

“Wait,” he says. “I need to say this. You saved me. I know you did it for Rhomann, but…”

“Not just for Rhomann. You two saved my daughter. And me. You’re family.” It’s a moment… but right now we only get a moment of it, because she says, “But we need to go.”

“No. I’m tired of running from this- all of this. I need-” the all points finally reaches Rich’s helmet, then Sam’s. “Oh. We need to go.”

“I’m sorry for your loss,” Sam’s mom says as they get up to leave.

“Thank you. Rhomann was special; I’ve tried to carry on his spark.”

“Why did you get the alert so much sooner than us?” Sam asks.

“Technically, I outrank both of you.”

The three of them fly across the galaxy. We intercut with the battle, that continues to go poorly. Karman-Kan has them hold off, waiting in atmosphere. “You outrank me?” Rich asks.

“You spent five years pretending to be a drunk. And Rhomann’s helmet gave me an in to promotion. But more importantly, you feel that?”

“Feel what?”

“Nothing. I haven’t felt a surge since just before the distress call. Before that, every single Nova that fell returned their portion of the Nova Force to the rest of us. I’ve seen a dozen of us fall since we arrived, and our power levels remained static. It’s,” she stops, as she’s hit from space by a being made of pure energy.

He’s Nova Omega, and resembles someone wearing Nova power armor. The general idea that I’m leaning towards is that Saal has become the Nova Omega, that his prototype managed to fuse him with the Nova Force- it’s also an excuse to bring back Peter Serafinowicz- he’s got a great voice for this kind of CGI character.

Saal continues to attack the three of them. He thinks they’re the reason the Nova Force is ebbing, not realizing that he is the one absorbing all of the excess Nova Force from his fallen comrades. The three Novas manage to hold off Saal long enough to get him to understand that he’s the anomaly- that as their friends below die, he’s getting stronger, that he’s the one stealing the lifeblood from the Corps. “I have to stop this.”

Saal flies into the battle, directly into the heart of the enemy. “What are you waiting for?” Karman-Kan asks, and flies after him. They follow her.

Nova Omega is essentially the Nova Force incarnate, and single-handedly turns the tide. But even as he’s winning, he sees that the Corps is losing, that it’s going to be a Pyrrhic victory, that the casualties they suffer will render the Novas useless to protect the galaxy. Nova Omega decides to detonate himself- that doing so can temporarily seal the rift into the Negative Zone (or destroy some other McGuffin). The Novas protect him while he does so. When he goes, the remaining Novas are hypercharged, and mop up the remaining enemies with ease.

We wrap with a scene back on Xandar. Prime is basically holding a vigil for those lost, giving a speech both meant to honor the fallen, including Saal, while boosting morale and also making sure they’re aware of the continuing gravity of the threat. It’s a hard balance. We’re really lucky to have Glenn Close to strike it.

The last bits of the speech we pull back, and see Rich, Sam and Karman-Kan in the rear. Rich’s hand accidentally brushes Karman-Kan, and she reacts, first with confusion, but then, realizing their five year journey together, with warmth, and takes his hand. At first he’s confused, but then he’s touched. He and Sam make eye contact, Sam infinitely amused with Rich holding a girl’s hand, and Sam puts out his fist; with some hesitance, Rich bumps back. We’ll cut to credits (this moment can happen in the middle of Prime’s speech, with the audio overlayed).

Mid credits scene: Sam and Rich are on Xandar, talking to Nova Prime as an alarm goes off. “The Nova Force has been more stable since Saal’s death.”

“Then what’s the alarm-” Sam starts, before another round of it blaring shuts him up.

“Since Thanos destroyed the six infinity stones the World Mind has been scanning the known Universe for power sources that could create similar levels of devastation. It started this morning, with a single signature, on Vormir, but it’s multiplied. It’s found six so far, one here on Xandar. We want the two of you to lead the retrieval team on-world, while we scramble Novas to check out the other signatures.” This is going to lead directly into Warlock and the Infinity Watch.

End credits scene: There’s a very subtle beeping. “You hear that?” Sam’s mom asks Kaelynn, who crinkles her nose. She follows the noise, into Sam’s room. At the bottom of his hamper (she spends a lot of time being weirded out by his old dirty clothes as she digs, “Ew ew ew,” she finds a Nova helmet. “What the hell?” she picks it up, and the helmet comes to life and begins to glow. “Oh.”

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12 Days of Pitchmas 2019, Part 1: Nova

To make a long story short, these were written last December, rather than finish the NaNo I was working on; my assistant was having some health problems, and I didn’t realize until this week these never got published to the blog, so I’ll be putting them up on days that I’m not posting new Breed. It’s a silly project: the 12 Days of Pitchmas. For 12 Days, I pitch a ‘new’ Marvel movie. I’m staying away from any of the announced movies I know virtually any plot of (Blade right now is the only one announced I’m pitching). The names are mostly silly and punny rather than real, because we mustn’t get too grimdark with our silly productivity preventer.

Marvel Cinematic Universe Pitch: Nova

We’ll start with an easy one, one that’s had the groundwork laid, and is grounded in recent events, but is otherwise fresh and interesting. This one’s going to have shades of Flight of the Navigator and the Last Starfighter, with maybe a little bit of ET if we were led to believe the little brown squish had a full interior life.

Starts off with Thanos’ attack on the Nova Corps. to steal the Power Stone. Richard Ryder, the sole Terran inducted into the Corps., standing with John C. Reilly and Nova Prime (Glenn Close), holed up in the area where the Stone is guarded. Outside, we see the few new Nova ships failing to stop Thanos’ fleet. Reilly asks for permission from Prime to use the stone to repel the invaders, and is denied; the stone could wipe out all life on the planet if he can’t contain its power. Ryder asks for permission to deploy the new Nova Power Shell. Reilly barks that it’s still untested; he could kill all of them just as easily as the Power Stone. Thanos bursts through the doors, and Prime comes over comms, telling all Novas to activate their new weapons. Outside, we see hundreds of Nova Corpsmen launch into the sky, sheathed in yellow light, making a dent in Thanos’ ships (it’s a moment of joy- we forget for a moment we know how this story ends). Back inside, Ryder steps to Thanos and blasts him, giving him the full force of power in his suit in a blinding flash. Thanos is still standing, and backhands him through a wall, and we watch him falling until the last second, his shell flickering but failing to activate. Back inside, Reilly trades blows with Thanos, lasting several before falling. Nova Prime is last, and backs into the stone, grabbing it in her hand almost by accident. Thanos wraps his hand around hers and squeezes, shattering the bones in her hand until she drops the stone. Reilly is back, tackles Thanos through the wall, leaving Prime in the building. They fall together, with Reilly using all of his power to fly Thanos towards the ground. They impact, and Reilly lays dead on the ground, not having reserved any of his power to save himself from impact.

Ryder kneels over Reilly (Rhoman Dey), and gets a message. “Buddy, if you’re hearing this, then I’m gone. I know, you’ll want to blubber for a while, and I respect that, but I need something from you, first. Take care of my wife, and our daughter. You know I’d do the same for you- if you ever got a woman plastered enough to agree to marry you.” “Crap,” Ryder says, before launching into narration. “So that’s how I ended up stuck on this dirtball millions of miles from Earth. But how did I get here?”

A slightly younger Richard Ryder, wearing his Dairy Queen uniform, flees from one of Ego’s spores. “That’s a long story.” It sure is. So we’re going to montage this. “Weird alien shit happened.” In a dark room Ryder is interrogated by a Nova alien demanding he renounce his fealty to this Queen of Dairy and explain what happened. “The weird alien shit police- themselves also weird- picked me up for questioning. I think they questioned me too hard, because,” Ryder flops onto the floor, foaming at the mouth. “my brain fossilized for a bit. They took me back to Xandar and fixed my brain.” We see Xandar from his hospital bed as he sits up. “As an apology, they offered me an honorary title in the Nova Corps, which I refused,” (he demands to be a real Corpsmen). “I served for a few years with distinction, even got a promotion, before I made it back to Earth, to tell my mom and little brother, Sam, I was okay.” He says, “I’m going off to save the stars… kidding, I got an internship at a prestigious technical program- prestigious for Jersey, anyway.” He toussles Sam’s hair. “I also, kind of, left him something, my first helmet, as a keepsake. But I didn’t want him to have it, yet; it was for when he was old enough not to do something really stupid with it.”

Cut to Earth, where Sam is crawling through the family crawlspace, through cobwebs, before bonking his head on his brother’s old Nova helmet. “Hey, little bro, if you’ve found this, it’s because I’m in trouble. Nah, I’m screwing with you. It’s because you’re old enough I told you where I hid it. Or you’re a little clod going through my stuff, and I am so telling mom when I get home.” Sam grabs the helmet and runs out of the crawlspace. He puts it on, and we jump into his head as text displays across the visor asking for his name. “Sam Alexander” (daddy took off before he was born, so mom gave him her maiden name). The helmet scans his face, then projects an image of him in full Nova gear. “Cool,” he says. The helmet grows the suit around him, and he’s surprised and a little worried, running outdoors as he tries to get it to stop. He accidentally takes flight, scorching his mother’s front lawn.

Cut back to Ryder, walking along Xandar’s surface. The destruction wrought by Thanos’ army is near-total; he’s walking through a post-apocalyptic world. We hear his voice distorted as he tries to broadcast. “This is Nova 9176, to all points, please respond, Nova 9176.” Ryder finds a single home, relatively protected amongst the devastation. There are scorch marks in the yard, and the charred remains of the Nova who died defending the home. Ryder rushes into the home, to find Rhoman Dey’s wife and daughter, huddled inside. She’s shocked at his intrusion, but recognizes him almost immediately and embraces him. “Richard! Is Rhoman-” “I’m so sorry…” Pull back from the house, through the window in the front door, continuing to recede. We start to hear Ryder’s distress signal. “Nova 9176 to all points, May Day. Xandar has fallen. Remaining Nova forces are insufficient to effect an evacuation of the remaining populace. This is Nova- this is Richard Ryder, of Earth. Any Nova within the sound of my voice, please respond.”

We hear the last two sentences again, this time through Sam’s helmet as he’s flying through the air back on Earth. “Rich?” he asks, before the helmet automatically responds to the distress signal and launches him into space. He’s flailing as he breaks atmosphere, yammering that “I can’t survive in space, you’re going to kill me,” until he realizes, “wait, I am surviving in space. Cool. Lets go save my brother.” Sam flies off into space.

Rich leads Dey’s family towards a rally point elsewhere in the city, where other Novas would have gone to make their final stand. On the way they hear the sound of a wounded Nova, and plan to help her until they realize she’s being tortured for information by Proxima Midnight and Corvus Glaive, left behind to ensure that the Nova’s can’t rally to help fight Thanos. Richard asks for a threat assessment from his helmet; they are classed as threats that would each require a powered Nova to combat, and he does not have enough residual power to fight either, let alone both, and trying to save her would likely mean the discovery of all three of them. Ryder has the Deys hide in a nearby building, and collapses a building on Midnight, Glaive and the Nova.

Sam breaks atmosphere on Xandar, both impressed by being on an alien world and awed at the devastation. He’s not quite sure what he can do, but sends out a broadcast on all channels- one picked up by Midnight and Glaive, who Rich and the Deys are now following. They set a trap for Sam, which he nearly falls for, except it’s clearly an alien Nova and not Rich. Sam blasts the both of them frantically, buying enough space for Rich to step in. They have a reunion, and Rich splits Sam’s power between the two of them so they can fight. Rich tries to teach Sam the Nova capabilities on the job, with some hilarious and mixed results. At one point, the Novas are on the ropes, about to be killed, when Dey’s daughter starts throwing rocks, distracting them. Her mother joins suit, flinging rocks from the other side (for my money, they both should eventually join the Corps outright as Novas). The distraction is enough to get the Novas on their feet, and they’re able to detain Thanos’ henchpeople long enough for them to receive a message from Thanos about another stone located on Earth, and they depart.

The fight sapped most of their remaining power, and they’re not going to be able to make it off world as is. They are able to find and repair the Nova power source and communications arrays (damaged in Thanos’ assault), allowing them to power back up. 

End Credits scene: Sam and Rich are flying through space, with Rich in the lead. “Now what?” Sam asks from behind Rich. “Now we rally the remaining Novas, track down the Mad Titan and stop him from wiping out half of all life.” “No,” Sam says weakly, “I meant what’s happening to-” he stops as he turns to dust. 

Bonus pitch: Nova 2 takes place over 2 time periods, the five years Sam is gone during the Blip, with Rich spiraling after the loss of his brother, becoming somewhat of a drunk and derelict Nova (that he saved the Corps at the moment of its greatest vulnerability is the only reason they don’t bounce him- but I can see them attaching like a breathalyzer to his helmet so he has to hero responsibly), and his eventual reunion and redemption once Sam comes back and breaks him out of his funk. (Note: It ended up happening a little differently, but you can see the result in my pitch for Nova 2).