The preview pages of X-O Manowar #2 are pretty much everywhere.

They are pretty darn cool too. It shows Aric leading the rest of the Vine captives in an uprising to get free, and then a charge against their overpowering foes, in a call back to Aric’s charge against the Romans.

And of course we see the two panels that lead up to the moment we’ve been waiting for…

Dave Aric watches the monolith Shanhara open

“My God, It’s full of stars!”

The armor opens up for Aric, and I can only imagine that this is what he sees:

Clearly*, this X-O Manowar series is an homage to 2001: A Space Odyssey, with Aric in his X-O Armor playing the role of Dave Bowman as the Star Child.

*Replace “clearly” with “conjecture”