This volume immediately follows on from The Ghosts of Inverloch, which was pretty much set-up… and it feels a little like there’s a middle volume missing somewhere. In the first of the two-parter, Earth and Galaxity Central (the HQ of the time-travelling intergalactic agency for which Valerian and Laureline work) was under threat from something either in the distant past or the deep future. The head of Galaxity gathered together a group of disparate characters – human and alien – at Inverloch Castle in Scotland in the 1980s… and in The Wrath of Hypsis they follow a ghost ship from Earth to the mysterious world of Hypsis… where it all goes a bit silly. The Holy Trinity – although not as they’re typically depicted in various works of dubious historical accuracy – are residents of Hypsis and responsible for Earth, and they’ve come to the conclusion the “experiment” is not working. It’s all a bit random and unsupported, and probably felt a bit more cutting-edge and dangerous back in 1985. Thirty years later, it reads like an incomplete premise. A shame… because this really is a superior space opera series. I suspect splitting a story over two episodes was considered pushing it for a bande dessinée that averaged 48 pages in length, but this particular story could have done with more room. ( )

Rumtiden, engang
Selve chefen for rumtidstjenesten er dukket op og står i spidsen for en ekspedition til Baffinhavet. Undervejs sørger Shingouz'erne for lidt underholdning blandt andet ved at blive søsyge. De finder Hvexdet, et tremastet skoleskib som også kan springe i rumtiden, og følger det til Hypsis, hvor Faderen, Sønnen og den hellige treenighed i form af en enarmet tyveknægt venter dem.

Ganske opfindsom historie ( )