I was first exposed to OMAC in a Paul Pope short in his issue of the no defunct(but awesome) DC series SOLO. Its basically a retelling of the first issue of OMAC, which according to the new collection's intro by Mark Evanier, was an idea Mr. Kirby originally had for a Captain America set in the future.
OMAC's origin bears some similarity to Cap's. OMAC started out as Buddy Blank, a scrawny man who was picked by the mysterious Global Peace Agency to become their new One man army, who must prevent catastrophes of violence in a future world that cant afford it. Buddy is linked with Brother Eye, a seemingly all powerful giant robotic eye shaped satellite in space that transforms Buddy into the super strong OMAC, whose first target is the Build a friend factory, who is making robotic women to become friends with important world leaders and the like. Once they meet, Kaboom! the woman explodes and takes the target with them. Buddy is horrified to discover that his friend, Lila, has been one of these robots all along, but as OMAC, the crooks are torn asunder, and OMAC realizes, that "OMAC LIVES...SO THAT MAN MAY LIVE..."
Each chapter features awesome robotics designs, monsters and weapons that are all Kirby staples, and the art is pretty outstanding throughout.Issue one and issue eight stand out i think, because inker and letterer Mike Royer contributed to them, and I think he may have had a bit more of an understanding of Mr. Kirby's pencils or something, they look a bit better than the inks provided by D.Bruce Berry. Each issue has a few incredible splash pages I would love to have framed and hung upon my wall. The book is fun to read above all else, something i cant say about alot of Mainstream superhero books out today. Maybe OMAC should become required superhero comics reading from now on...
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