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hellzyeahwebwielingessays · 4 years

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The Not-So-Amazing Mary Jane Part 34: AMJ #6.1

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You know I considered ending this series after the initial arc. I may well discontinue it after awhile. But for now at least I am going to press on. Thus begins the second of what I and dead certain will be a shitty arc of AMJ. Pray for me.

Before we dive into the issue I want to quote for you the solicit for this issue:

WELCOME TO NY, MJ! After the CAN’T-MISS events of AMAZING MARY JANE #5, your favorite redhead is back home! First stop: Spider-Man! But has her relationship with Mysterio changed things with the love of her life? Next stop: a press tour! Complete with iconic New York guest-starring gigs, and OH NO WHAT’S THAT?!?

We spent over 10 years of seeing Peter and MJ separated in the 616 universe.

Thanks to Nick Spencer they blessedly got back together.

Across 25 issues we got to see Peter and MJ interact and 99% of the time it was awesome and helped some old and open wounds get a little better.

It wasn’t every issue, but that was good. Don’t want to get indulgent right?

Then this series came along and Peter/MJ interactions got limited again due to the nature of the story.

That was a shame but at least we were going to get a great MJ story right?

Except we didn’t. We got a story that paradoxically simultaneously celebrated MJ whilst also inadvertently character assassinating her and just being a disgusting fucking mess in general.

But here we have MJ back in New York where Spider-Man is. This issue is even promising us an interaction between them.

Sounds good right?

Let’s see if it will deliver.

As always here we get the recap.

And once more it gives us the full title of the movie in spite of the comic yet to have done that.

As for the ‘strength of his vision blah blah blah’, you know the drill by now. That’s all bullshit, Mary Jane would never connect to Beck over that or allow him to walk free because of that.

There is also a passage in the recap claiming that MJ connected to Beck over familiarity with his situation. The idea of this being their last chance to make it big. I’ve already talked about how that’s bullshit, see part 12.

Finally, the recap confirms that MJ has still failed to tell Peter the truth. Nice to know MJ will continue to be hardcore out of character moving forward into this new arc.

As the issue starts we see MJ introduced as a guest on some kind of chat show.

As has been the case throughout the series, the art is (stylistically at least) gorgeous.

Beyond that there is little to about this page. Except of course the fact that Mary Jane has thought captions.

Let me repeat that.

For the first time in six issues the readers are being given an insight into the thoughts of title character!

You know, if this were a brand new run, a re-launch or even say the beginning of an outright new era for a series maybe that’d be okay.

But it isn’t. It’s the same run, the same volume, the same story, merely the next arc. This is like if Nick Spencer hadn’t used thought captions throughout the first five issues of his ASM run but then randomly did for the Trivia Night storyline with Boomerang.

Thought captions are perhaps one of the single most potent weapons in the arsenal of a comic book writer. It allows for immense development of characters and enables writers to combine the strength of prose stories with those of more visual mediums.

Now, it’s not that it’s bad to simply not use them. But be consistent. Thought captions would’ve gone a long way in helping us understand Mary Jane better in the first arc along with elaborating upon her asinine decisions there.

Not to mention for a character so often written off as shallow or just eye candy wouldn’t an insight into her thoughts have helped dispel such accusations? Jed Mackay has been doing that pretty consistently since the first issue of his Black Cat run. There it has done wonders for Felicia and fleshed her out more.

It’s especially bad when we consider we got more of an insight into MJ’s thoughts and feelings in one issue of Nick Spencer’s ASM run than in the entire five prior issues of her solo title.

Anyway, as her interview with Reilly Redding begins there is some quips and verbal jousting going on. Reilly asks if the movie has wrapped but MJ explains that McKnight and the crew are still shooting in L.A. Reilly asks if MJ is sure about that.

This isn’t a positive, more a general observation. I’m not overly familiar with chat shows, let alone American ones, but to my eyes the host seems influenced by Ellen DeGeneres.

Anyway, let me dispense with the pettiest of gripes first. I hate Reilly’s hairstyle. I hate that hairstyle in general. To me it looks really stupid, like you went for a haircut but gave up halfway through. That’s not in anyway shape or form a fair criticism. I totally own that. It is just a tiny point that really bothers me personally.

On the more positive side, Williams continues her frustrating tendency to nail MJ’s personality traits within a problematic context. MJ’s social skills are one of her greatest powers and here her charisma and ability to play verbal tennis with Reilly is executed superlatively. When Williams does stuff like this she delivers some of the best Mary Jane writing in a long time. Which is why I hate saying and believing that she shouldn’t work on the character over all. She makes traits of MJ shine whilst nevertheless damaging the character over all.

Case in point, the movie is still filming right? And the Vulture (and probably the other members of the Savage Six) are still out there. Let’s be kind and presume they are in a new secret location. That means Vulture will still want to find out where they are, so all the people (and their families) from issue #4 are still going to be harassed by the Vulture’s paparazzi gang and potentially threatened by the six themselves.

Oh well, MJ still DGAF I guess.

Guess she doesn’t care that she’s appearing in public (in NYC of all places!) in spite of six villains now holding a very direct grudge against her.

Also, we FINALLY get the full name of the movie in the story itself, not the recap pages.

As the interview continues, MJ takes questions from the audience. One man asks what it’s like for her to play a real hero for the first time considering she’s played normal female roles before.

MJ responds that they are all heroes to her. She doesn’t really make the female role distinction quite the same way either. It’s more like she plays a hero who is also a woman.

The next question is about the weird press speculation about Cage McKnight’s conduct. The woman asking the question wants to know what he’s really like. MJ responds that he’s great, just dedicated to the craft and protective of his crew. She points out the paparazzi didn’t take kindly to him because he in turn didn’t take kindly to them hounding the movie.

Reilly then reveals McKnight is here for the interview.

Once more, Williams (with a huge help from Gomez’s art) conveys the charisma and social savvy of MJ here. Gomez’s body language demands particular praise. He conveys MJ’s beauty, flirtation, charm, etc. And he does it on multiple levels. The subtle genius of this page is how Gomez captures MJ putting on a performance for the public, to convince them she’s being utterly genuine and casual.

As for the dialogue, the best faith interpretation of the man’s question, he meant MJ has never played a super hero before, just normal non-powered women. He didn’t mean stereotypical female roles. That interpretation makes MJ’s response make more sense than if the former was the intent. So I’ll give Williams a pass and presume that was in fact her intent.

As for the second question it further highlights the unethical nature of allowing Mysterio to impersonate McKnight. The real McKnight has a lot of gossip and a new public image that was not of his own making. It wasn’t even an unfair fabrication by the press, it existed specifically because someone else was using his name, face and reputation for personal gain.

Also the audacity of Williams to directly reference issue #4 where Ken was harassed by the Vulture’s paparazzi squad but just ignore the fact that that should still be going on.

To MJ’s confusion Cage McKnight joins the interview. However, he doesn’t seem to know anything about the movie at all. He says the first he heard of the movie was when he was contacted for the interview. Meanwhile MJ frantically contacts Beck on her phone. Reilly notices and calls MJ out just before Beck confirms he’s still in L.A.

To MJ’s horror she realizes she’s sitting next to the real Cage McKnight who’s returned from his penguin expedition. Reilly asks why he came on the show if he doesn’t remember movie. Cage responds that just because he doesn’t remember making the movie doesn’t mean he didn’t. he explains that in the past he’s made movies in ‘artistic fugues’ and presumes this is just one such time.

*pinches bridge of nose*

Oh my Gooooooooood this is so dumb.

I get the desire to have humour in a story for the sake of levity. But the world of Spider-Man is not even remotely a borderline Deadpool or Harley Quinn or Lobo comic book. The humour doesn’t come from absurdity or a cartoonlike breaking of logic and reality.

And make no mistake, this is absurd. Scratch that, it’s contrived to the nth degree.

First of all I’m not that well read up on fugue states so I briefly consulted Wikipedia who had this to say:

Dissociative fugue, formerly fugue state or psychogenic fugue, is a dissociative disorder[1] and a rare psychiatric disorder characterized by reversible amnesia for personal identity, including the memories, personality, and other identifying characteristics of individuality. The state can last days, months or longer. Dissociative fugue usually involves unplanned travel or wandering and is sometimes accompanied by the establishment of a new identity. It is a facet of dissociative amnesia, according to the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5).

-Wikipedia

Basically a fugue state is a sort of similar condition to Dissociative Identity Disorder, more commonly known as having a split personality. Only instead of an individual’s psyche fracturing into different personalities that take dominance, it’s someone’s mind running away with itself and becoming someone else. The individual forgets aspects of who they are and becomes someone else.

A very good example within fiction can be found in the Doctor Who episode ‘The Next Doctor’. In it a man named Jackson Lake suffers a traumatic experience and in the midst of it (through a sci-fi gizmo) absorbs a lot of information on the character of the Doctor. His traumatized mind consequently decides to imitate what it regards as the Doctor.

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What I’m saying is McKnight’s dialogue about his fugues are very probably bullshit unless someone can cite evidence to the contrary.

Using the above description though McKnight has gotten this rare psychiatric disorder multiple times and specifically in conjunction with his job as a filmmaker. Yeah, no. Not buying it and neither should you.

Being a film director isn’t a muscle memory skill you can’t forget no matter what. People with amnesia or Alzheimer’s disease do not forget how to play the piano or how to drive. But directing a movie? There are so many moving pieces to that job that rely upon you knowing how equipment and more importantly individual people operate. You have to bear a shitton of theory in mind too. It is physically impossible to repeatedly have fugues and then maintain that job.

And even if it was, oh my lord, that is the single most contrived thing in this series yet. Are you SERIOUSLY telling me that Mary Jane and Beck and the entire production got this lucky. The guy who’s reputation is what the movie is riding on happens to be someone who repeatedly deals with this incredibly rare mental condition?

Holy shit. That’s Superior Spider-Man levels of contrived.

And yet if you still swallowed all of that it still wouldn’t make sense!

McKnight presumes he made this Mysterio movie in a fugue state right? But he wasn’t, so he would remember his life during that period of time. Meaning that there are lots of public records and personal accounts testifying that he was making the movie at the same time that he knows he was observing penguins.

If you suffer amnesia or blackouts or DID then there are obviously gaps in time you cannot account for. The overwhelming majority of people who deal with those conditions make a point of keeping track of those gaps, for practical reasons if nothing else. So McKnight would know that there isn’t a gap in time he can’t account for and certainly not for the time period the Mysterio movie has been going for.

Shit, the movie is still filming! How the Hell does he believe he is still making this movie in a fugue state if he’s consciously aware of lacking any knowledge about it?

Not to mention if he’s been in the Falkland Islands this whole time. A quick Google search informed me that by plane it’d take over 14 hours to travel between the islands and Los Angeles. How the fuck is anyone supposed to ever commute that distance, let alone regularly. And McKnight sincerely believes he was doing both at the same goddam time?

You couldn’t even argue that McKnight believes he made the Mysterio movie before his penguin expedition. Because the movie is still being made and all his other ‘artistic fugues’ would have a movie as proof of what he was doing during the fugues.

This is just mind-numbingly stupid and lazy writing. It smacks so hard of Williams trying to desperately paper over the holes in her initial story.

More importantly, how fucking stupid is Mary Jane or Beck to never considered this possibility? I don’t mean the fugue bullshit, I mean the idea of McKnight just coming back from his penguin adventure.

Was Mysterio honestly so incompetent as to have never accounted for that? He seriously never had anything in place to make sure McKnight wouldn’t just decide to cut his journey short? Jesus, and I was dumb enough to buy his line about McKnight spending a year with the penguins.

Even putting that aside, what the flying fuck was MJ and Beck’s plan for when he eventually came back in the first place? Say he really did spend a year with the penguins then came back to the USA. Suddenly he has a movie with his name attached to it and lots of controversy. Let’s say McKnight’s fugue bullshit added up, there is no indication MJ or beck knew about them. So how the Hell were they planning on getting away with the obvious questions he or his friends or family would have had?

And if they did know about the fugues, why didn’t Williams address that before? That was kind of a lingering question hanging over the story until now wasn’t it?

God I can’t believe I paid for this!

On the next page MJ spots a guy in an Oni Mask backstage. She presumes he’s there to scare her as part of the show. However, she notices that the P.A.s haven’t seen him. Meanwhile Reilly set up a stupid game for them to play.

I got nothing to say about this page beyond McKnight’s dialogue. Williams is clearly trying to frame the real McKnight in a less than sympathetic manner. There could be many reasons why. I suspect one of the reasons is to incline us more towards Beck’s version of McKnight and to make us not feel as bad about Beck (and MJ) exploiting his identity.

Because being vaguely and lightly sexist means you deserve to have your career, public image, sense of self and life violated and damaged I guess?????????????

As Reilly brings in people from the audience to compete against McKnight and MJ, the latter thinks that there is something weirdly familiar about the Oni-masked man.

I have little to say about this page too.

Reilly’s attitude and facial expressions make me dislike her, even beyond her stupid haircut.

And as for the Oni-Masked man (I’ll just call him Oni for now) my only guess is that he’s affiliated with Mister Negative somehow. He had his goons wear Oni masks at times. And MJ interacted with them and Mister Negative himself in the popular 2018 Spider-Man video game by Insomniac; and it’s adapted comic book City at War. As such perhaps Williams is trying to tie-in or capitalize upon audience familiarity with that.

As MJ plays the dumb game he ponders if Oni could be a lesser member of Peter’s rogue’s gallery. Observing him again she notices him murder a civilian.

The dumb game annoyed me, but that’s just me.

Beyond that all I can say is that MJ’s dialogue about Peter’s rogue’s gallery is interesting. It proves that MJ has at least a working knowledge of Peter’s major foes. Which just further proves she would have been familiar with Mysterio and his crimes, just in case anyone was still clinging to the idea that she wouldn’t.

Also, the art and especially that splash page were beautiful.

Unfortunately for MJ, Oni notices she witnessed his crime. MJ is nervous and backs away in fear, annoying McKnight when she bumps into him. Meanwhile Spider-Man swings across town yelling for to hold on as he is on the way.

Gomez draws a nice Spider-Man.

Anyway, more of Williams making us dislike McKnight, see above for more on that.

MJ backing away in fear has me apprehensive. I don’t know if that’s in character for her. I guess the shock and surprise could’ve thrown her for a loop. And if Oni doesn’t notice her then it gives her a better chance of raising the alarm and capturing him.

I must say, I do like MJ being on the backfoot here after issues #1-5 made her often overconfident and over capable at times (see her nonchalance over the Savage Six in issue #5).

Also, isn’t MJ going to give Oni the benefit of the doubt? Maybe he’s sorry for murdering that guy just now. Maybe he wants to make amends by creating a movie about his life. So why is MJ so scared?

Sure, he just murdered someone, but what is that next to the laundry list of Beck’s crimes?

As it turns out, Spidey wasn’t on his way to save MJ. He was in fact en route to a French restaurant to have dinner with her. He is actually before MJ for a change.

I know Gomez isn’t the only artist on this issue and this doesn’t look like his work. Who ever is drawing it though is doing a very bland depiction of Peter with a overly wrinkly forehead.

The joke about him arriving first for a change was funny though.

Back at the studio, the show wraps up. McKnight insults Reilly’s profession just in case you’ve not realised he is a jerk yet. MJ thinks about persuading everyone to evacuate and searches for her phone. She notices Oni leaving and decides to leave her phone behind.

I already know MJ is going to pursue Oni herself. The stupidity of that aside why the fuck wouldn’t you grab your phone before doing that? You could use it no matter where you wind up and it wasn’t so far away that he’d get that much of a head start.

In fact, if Oni knows MJ is a witness why did he bother hanging around in the first place.

And why didn’t MJ raise the alarm immediately, the worst that would happen is the guy would run away. He’s just stealthily murdered someone and is in a mask. He obviously isn’t going to take the audience hostage, so if her priority is protecting innocents then raising the alarm immediately (or in fact earlier would’ve been her best bet. Yes that’d probably mean he’d have escaped but unlike with say Peter’s origin, getting him the Hell out of there would’ve reduced the immediate threat to the civilians present.

And on top of that if she figures he’s targeting her because she was a witness to his crime then by alerting everyone to his actions she’d have removed his need (at least for the moment) of sticking around to eliminate her, thus getting him away from the audience.

If he’s leaving anyway, MJ could also just grab her phone and put a call in to Peter, her super hero chums or the police and get them on the case immediately. If she was really so determined to go after this guy herself she still could but would’ve had a back up just in case he escapes or kills her. If she fails then she’s insured someone will still pursue him.

And as I copiously detailed in parts 19-22, MJ is not a super hero (and she knows that). She has no idea what this guy’s skills, weapons or powers might be, nor does she know what resources or assistance will be nearby to enable her to survive or subdue him. This isn’t like an armed cop, a martial artist or a super powered person going after a regular crook. She really doesn’t know what she is in for. Even if he is just a normal man, he clearly has a height and weight advantage over her, is obviously willing and capable of chocking a man to death and is armed. MJ meanwhile has little self-defence training, no weapons and hasn’t got the weight or muscle capable of taking him on if she’s backed into a corner. And she’s pursuing him back stage where presumably there is a fair chance of encountering many corners!

I understand that she doesn’t want to endanger innocent people, but there is no point in risking her life there is a much more practical and likely to succeed option available to her. Live to fight another day and all that. Yes the guy might hurt people during or after his escape but that’s a lesser evil vs. going after him herself when she is very unlikely to subdue him, far more likely to die and then the guy will get away without her having passed on any valuable intel on him to someone more qualified to pursue him.

Also once she sees the guy leaving she could just tell everyone the situation and ask the audience to stay put.

Basically if raises the alarm right there on stage and/or calls Peter or the authorities she is over all putting less people in danger and increasing the chances of the guy being apprehended in the long run. But no, instead she is going to gamble on the far slimmer odds that she can capture the guy.

Not to mention, why would the guy even give a shit that MJ saw him? Why would MJ give a shit that she is a witness to his crime? He is wearing a mask! She couldn’t identify him even if she went to the police. It is literally part of the reason her goddam boyfriend wears a mask!

And by the way, are there no security cameras backstage? Wouldn’t MJ consider that or Oni himself?

McKnight apologises to Reilly (so not that much of a jerk I guess) as MJ pursues Oni (barefooted) backstage. As she does this she rehearses what she will say to Peter in her head. This entails telling him that she had to get away from the killer. As she is thinking about this the body of Oni’s victim is discovered. Backstage she comes face to face with Oni who refers to her by name.

Yay. MJ deliberately planning on lying to Peter again. It’s so awesome that Williams understands why this isn’t a really bad idea for the reasons I pointed out in part 17.

By the way, I suspect Oni knows MJ personally rather than just recognizing her work.

I’m actually going to leave it there for now as the next part of the story has a shitton to unpack.

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#Leah Williams #Amazing Mary Jane #Mysterio #Quentin beck #Spider-Man #mary jane watson #Mary Jane Watson Parker #mjwatsonedit #MJ Watson #peter parker #Doctor Who

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totesmccoats · 7 years

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Dark Days: The Casting #1

This issue continues The Forge’s storytelling maneuver of throwing DCU canon at the wall to see what sticks, but also helpfully starts putting a few pieces together to the story of Metal.

Carter Hall writes in his journal about his multiple lives’ quest to discover the secret of Nth Metal – the power-source of his wings and weapons, and has traced it back to the beginnings of the universe, a bat-shaped Destroyer, and the “birds” that fought him back. Batman too, quests to discover the secret of the metals, which Wonder Woman tells him was used to make divine weapons, is found in all of the DCU’s most powerful relics, and courses through the blood of Earth’s heroes, including Batman himself. Meanwhile, Hal and Duke try to interrogate Joker about what he knows about the Metal and Batman’s been hiding from them.

This is Snyder going for broke, giving the DCU its biggest event since Flashpoint with Morrison-esque levels of continuity play connecting everything in the DC canon together. I’m expecting this to get incredibly silly, and make absolutely no sense to anyone not already 100% invested. Because it’s Snyder, I am so game for this. There’s still a radical shift in quality when the art goes from Kubrick to Romita Jr, the latter of whose style just does not fit the story as well as it does something like the first arc of All-Star Batman.

Wonder Woman #26

Considering her previous work, I wasn’t expecting Fontana’s first issue on the series to completely gel with where Rucka left us, but the shift in tone is still something I’m getting used to, even within this one issue.

I like the opening scene, with Wonder Woman breaking up a fight in a refugee camp, although I’m honestly not sure what’s supposed to be happening. She punches out a guy harassing a woman and her kid, but then the whole camp is on fire and explodes for some reason? I’m not sure; but that leads directly to a flashback where Wonder Woman overhears her mother worry that she shouldn’t still be playing with dolls if she’s to become an Amazon – a plot-thread which doesn’t really go anywhere nor even plant seeds for the story to come. After that, Diana debriefs from what’s revealed to be her 43rd mission this year with the US military, and the General offers to be someone she can talk to with any problems regarding what she sees on the missions; there’s a check-up with a Doctor with a mysterious cough; and Diana goes to Etta Candy’s brother’s wedding where she helps a young girl find a missing shoe.

Now, I’m the first person to advocate for more superheroes helping out children in comics, but there’s a tonal inconsistency between that and the beginning of the book which implies Di might be going through some PTSD. And that tonal inconstancy also appears within individual scenes, like when right after the General offers to be someone she can talk to, he bumps his head on a low-hanging light fixture, and then the two are interrupted by a Mark Zuckerberg-looking fellow who invites them to a building-wide softball game. Also, the final page feels like a Batman ’66 type cliffhanger, which I kind of love, but which also feels out of step with the rest of the issue.

The Flash #26

Eobard shows Barry and Iris a vision of their future where their children, Don and Dawn, grow up to be supervillains because Barry wasn’t around to be a father to them. Deciding that Iris has had enough of his lying to her, and that there is only one way to prevent this bad future from playing out, Barry goes with Eobard to a place where he’d never hurt anyone ever again – the negative Speed Force.

Although it probably happens too quickly, I like how Eobard breaks Barry by mind-judo-ing him into thinking that being the Flash is somehow irresponsible and hurts people. It’s not the most original storyline, god knows it’s happened to Peter Parker too many times, but in this situation, it works. Like Pete, Barry has seen how much his being the Flash hurts those closest to him, so when Eobard offers a way to prevent further harm, he takes it.

Also, it gives the series a great excuse to focus on Iris, who has to come to terms with her best friend being a superhero while fighting off the Reverse-Flash on her own. Hopefully this story will also borrow the ending from Spider-Man 2 and have the girlfriend knock some sense into their “my power = my choice” mindset when it comes to relationships.

Spider-Men II #1

The cover asks the question “Who is the other Miles?” but, of course we don’t find out this issue – though we do see his face. Instead, we get a cold in medias res open of the two Spider-Men failing to catch a plane with, presumably the other Miles on it, before jumping a week into the past where Peter and Miles meet up at the warehouse where the first Spider-Men story kicked off to investigate another mysterious pink portal flinging stuff through Manhattan.

I stopped picking up Bendis books, including Spider-Man (Miles’ book) because I was getting tired of his style after Civil War II; but reading this issue reminds me of what I like about his writing. All of Bendis’ dialogue is snappy and witty, with everyone knowing exactly how to respond to the last thing said with their own little witticism. So, basically, he’s perfect for Spider-Man (men).

Bendis does tend to be verbose, but the boxes and bubbles are broken up nicely through the spreads, never getting too much in the way except in one moment in particularly where the wordiness is a punchline. And despite each character being recognizably Bendis, they are still recognizably distinct. Peter’s inner monologue and dialogue reads as someone trying – perhaps too hard – to be funny. He repeats words and phrases, doubles back on things he’s thinking/saying to provide his own commentary, and goes out of his way to be self-deprecating while taking others down with his esteem. We don’t get any of Mile’s inner monologue, but his dialogue represents him as more self-conscious, more laconic. He speaks mainly to respond to others, and lets Ganke – oh man did I miss Ganke – do much of the talking for him.

Pichelli’s art also does a lot to define each of the Spider-Men. Peter, like his dialogue, is more comedic. His poses are more exaggerated, with him spreading his limbs away from his body with wide kicks and flips, and leaning and looking down over other characters. Conversely, Miles moves more conservatively, keeping his libs tucked while swinging, and crouching where Peter would stand and lean.

Amazing Spider-Man #30

We open on Spider-Man organizing a retreat from a Mjolnir wielding Hyrdra-Cap, then go to Peter in Shanghai, trying to rally his employees and prepare them for an attack by Doctor Octopus, who is raiding Parker Industry labs. Pete meets with the employees who remain loyal, warning them that if it comes to it, they’re going to have to destroy their life’s work to keep it out of Hydra’s grasps. And then Otto attacks.

It’s really impressive how Slott manages to weave his ongoing stories with event books without skipping a beat. Even without all the Secret Empire stuff, this arc is just another chapter in the Spider-Man/Doc Ock rivalry he’s set up since his Ends of the Earth storyline in 2012. Otto sees allying with Hydra as a means to the end of claiming all of Peter’s work as the fruits of his labor, and destroying Peter’s legacy as he takes it back.

And what’s scary is that, despite becoming a better CEO and doing his best to prepare for Ock, Peter is still a few steps behind. He still, unknowingly let Otto into his company, giving him the chance to sabotage everything right under his nose. In a way, Parker Industry is just as much Otto’s as it is Pete’s, and Otto’s taking advantage of that while Peter is failing to really comprehend it.

Black Panther and The Crew #4

In Mississippi in 1964, Ezra and Frank take the Crew to take care of some KKK members who can’t be touched by the law. In the present, Luke Cage escapes the firebombing of his apartment building by Hydra, then joins up with Misty Knight to investigate why he was targeted, and what that might have to do with Ezra’s assassination.

The cold open in Mississippi is one of the strongest scenes in comic books regarding racial violence printed in the Big 2’s comics yet. Not only does it clearly and concisely explain how white people can (and still) get away with murdering black people, but also demonstrates exactly why groups like the Crew, or the real life Black Panthers, were and are necessary in those times and places. It’s its own complete story and statement of purpose in four pages. And it’s echoed through the rest of the comic, as Misty and Luke eventually talk to the CEO of the company behind the Americops, who still gets away with targeting black people with impunity because that’s what benefits the powerful.

It’s weird how the same company that’s publishing Nick Spencer’s half-assed sanitized metaphor for fascism can also publish such clear-eyed commentary on race in America. And that also applies to David F. Walker’s too-short run on Nighthawk, which you should totally pick up.

Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #22

Doreen and Nancy win a programming contest and an all-expenses paid vacation to the Savage Land! Expect jokes involving: computer programming pun titles for classic literature, how insane Wikipedia articles in the Marvel universe must be, colonial era nomenclature, Jurassic Park, paleontology, Latveria, and more.

Reading this issue, it’s hard not to feel like North has wanted to write a Jurassic Park episode for Squirrel Girl for a while now, and he taps into the seemingly universal human love of dinosaurs. Henderson continues to deliver on art, with some of the best and funniest faces in comics, my favorite of which this issue is Doreen’s reaction to realizing Nancy has a crush on one of the other contest winners.

Kill or Be Killed #10

The cops, including detective Lily Sharpe find the Russian hitman’s burned-up corpse in the back of the van after learning about Dylan dropping off Rex at the hospital, and begin to postulate why their murderer tried to spare one victim while brutalizing the other. Meanwhile, Dylan, devastated by Rex’s death, move back home with his mom where he gets high, plays video games, and swears off killing, resigned to let the demon kill him. But then the demon reminds him that the Russians are after him, and might target the people he cares about, which complicates things a tad.

For a bit it seemed like Dylan was getting used to his new life, but this issue shows him in a downward spiral stemming from Rex’s death, as it’s the first one that’s actually personal for him. It’s his Uncle Ben moment, and that’s not the only part of this issue reminiscent of Spider-Man. When Dylan goes back to the city, it’s mainly to break up with Daisy and shut out Kira, who just happens to tell him about her feelings for him, just as he’s decided he’s too dangerous and messed up to afford to return her feelings.

This issue doesn’t really feel like the ending to an arc, but somewhere closer to the beginning of one. Continuing the comparison, this is Dylan’s “Spider-Man no more!” moment, which means that the stage is pretty much set for his comeback, whatever that may look like. It certainly won’t be as heroic as Spidey’s; but I wouldn’t rule out the inclusion of a criminal kingpin.

Comic Reviews for 7/12/17 Dark Days: The Casting #1 This issue continues The Forge's storytelling maneuver of throwing DCU canon at the wall to see what sticks, but also helpfully starts putting a few pieces together to the story of Metal.

#batman #black panther #dark days #dc comics #kill or be killed #luke cage #metal #miles morales #peter parker #spider-man #spider-men #squirrel girl #the casting #the crew #the flash #wonder woman

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totesmccoats · 7 years

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Dark Days: The Casting #1

This issue continues The Forge’s storytelling maneuver of throwing DCU canon at the wall to see what sticks, but also helpfully starts putting a few pieces together to the story of Metal.

Wonder Woman #26

The Flash #26

Spider-Men II #1

Amazing Spider-Man #30

Black Panther and The Crew #4

Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #22

Kill or Be Killed #10

#batman #black panther #dark days #dc comics #kill or be killed #luke cage #metal #miles morales #peter parker #spider-man #spider-men #squirrel girl #the casting #the crew #the flash #wonder woman

0 notes