Inhumans #2. The Kaptroids

Have you ever been grabbed the Kaptroids?

I have.

And I'm not the only one. So were the Inhumans, in issue #2 of their very own comic.

For those not in the know, the Kaptroids (or the Craptoids, as my dad called them) were giant robots built by the Kree to imprison the Inhumans who, as you know, were originally created by the Kree to fight for them in their war with the Skrulls. The robots had been left beneath the Inhumans' city of Attilan and had now been awakened by Kree agent Blastaar to fulfill their mission.

At the time it always seemed odd to me that an entire city of super-beings would be little more than Scoop 'n Go fodder for a handful of robots, and it still does.

The royal family aside, the Inhumans really are a strangely pathetic bunch here, putting up no fight worth mentioning in the face of their attackers.

There's also a sub-plot about an ugly Inhuman called Iridia made beautiful by the city's Terrigan mists. These days I'm not sure what to make of this sub-plot's theme. On the one hand, it seems to promote the message that looks are all that matters in life, then again, as Black Bolt knew, it's clearly cruel to force someone to be repulsive when they don't have to be.

The thing was written by Doug Moench and drawn by George Perez who, like John Byrne at his peak, had that knack of making every story feel like it was a good story regardless of whether it actually was.

In retrospect, although I loved it at the time and I still have a lot of fondness for it now, there's really nothing special about this tale and, sadly, the Inhumans' strip soon ran out of steam, as the ruling family set off into space to go all Star Trek on us.

The move didn't work. This was the Inhumans, after all, not The Guardians of the Galaxy and the title was cancelled after just a dozen issues.

Looking back on it, I think the reason I loved this tale so much was that, one, the Inhumans were cool and, two, I got it on a Sunday. For some reason, comics that entered my life on a Sunday always seemed that bit more special.