Powers Book 7: Forever by Brian Michael Bendis and Michael Avon Oeming

Powers readers have long wondered about the origins of Detective Christian Walker's origins. We know he was a Superhero named Diamond, but we never know where he really came from or how he got his powers. Now, all will be revealed!

We are in the age of Neanderthals. Two ape-like humans fight over a woman in the tribe, White-Stripe and Red-Stripe. Red Stripe loses, but doesn't like it. After he manages to kill a lion with his bare hands, Red Stripe goes back and rapes the woman who likes White Stripe more. However, when White Stripe defends the woman from a vicious rape, Red-Stripe turns his powers on her, and melts her into black goo. This breaks up the tribe, and White Stripe strikes back, manifesting powers of his own. The two fight each other fruitlessly, and the fight finally ends when they are both exhausted. Each goes their own way into the desert.

Many thousands of years later, Gora the Champion rides into a small town, seeking to get away from his problems. He is followed by Princess Zanona, who wants to persuade Gora to become her husband and take the throne of her father after her father dies, but Gora doesn't want to be the figurehead.

Their conversation is interrupted by a red warrior, who challenges Gora to fight, and melts the princess into a puddle of goo. Gora and Haemon, the red warrior, fight each other to a standstill, and the Red Warrior leaves, exhausted, telling Gora to prepare for battle when they meet again.

A thousand years later, in China, a man comes to the Hoshu Mountain Temple, seeking answers for why he has the powers that he does, and what his fractured memories mean. The master of the temple welcomes him, for the other members of the temple all have powers like him. The master tells the man that he is as old as the world, and he cannot remember his childhood because it was too long ago. But he can live there with them, in a world with others of his kind. But when a foreign land invades China and kills people, the man and his friends decide to fight on the behalf of people as heroes. Others disagree, and stay behind, saying that the people will come to resent their saviors and kill them for it.

In 1936, in Chicago, a man has begun fighting corruption down on the docks. This same man goes to talk to Albert Einstein about his powers and missing memories. Einstein tells the man he cannot explain his powers, but that he should keep his identity secret, lest other people kill him for them in the name of God, country and science. The man goes home to find his wife killed. The killer says he knows the man, but when the man doesn't remember the name of the killer, the killer says he is ruining it, and fights him, beating him up a little and leaves.

50 years later, Christian Walker is the Diamond, superhero working in Chicago. One of his team members finds a way to turn off the powers of supervillains. Christian is both disturbed and delighted by the idea. He'd like to turn his own powers off and live like an ordinary human. This deeply disturbs his friend, but their argument stops when Power Girl shows up and warns them about Johnny Royalle, aka Johnny Stompinato is gathering the supervillains in his lair for some kind of meeting. He thinks the supervillains should team up to overcome the team of superheroes. Powergirl is all for stomping on the villains, and the other two agree.

During the fight with Johnny Stompinato, Christian is attacked by Wolfe, the man with the red aura who killed his wife. He takes off after the man and brings him to his friend's lab, where he turns on the device that takes away both their powers, and proceeds to beat the living daylights out of the other man. Their fight ends up with them smashing into the machine that generates the power-denying field, which explodes, bathing them both in radiation. When the fight is over, Christian wakes up in the hospital. His powers are gone, perhaps permanently. After he recovers, and a great deal of soul-searching, he decides to become a cop, and goes to a cop he helped before. The other man agrees to help him.

Now a cop, Christian Walker is summoned to the scene of his apartment. Wolfe has regained his powers and is using them to take out Christian's apartment. Christian goes up to the roof to confront Wolfe, who is bleeding and apparently dying. But he still has enough power to destroy a helicopter. He asks Christian Walker to forgive him, calling him "Gora", but Walker can't, and shoots Wolfe through the head. Wolfe says in that case, he hopes, with his dying breath, that he can take Walker with him. He then explodes quite messily, but without killing anyone, even Walker.

Walker is left to deal with his death, and the end of his longtime foe. The end.

This was an unusual graphic novel, beginning, as it did, so far back in time. It also showed the great enemy that was made because one ape was jealous over one female liking another ape rather than himself. It's implied that somehow Wolfe remembered all his life, while Walker continually forgot who he was and where he had come from, but the reason why is never discussed.

I did enjoy the graphic novel, even if the stories didn't share much of a thematic whole, sometimes. We do learn Walker's background, but it feels more like a scattered series of snapshots rather than a coherent whole. It's only towards the end of the book that we really get any sense of continuity. I feel that it is somewhat flawed as a story, but I don't regret spending money on the book.