Month: April 2024

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Moon Knight Epic Collection: Shadows of the Moon

This is a review of Moon Knight Epic Collection : Shadows of the Moon. You can read my review of the first volume, here. Moon Knight resembles Batman, down to the millionaire alter-ego and the Batarang (Moonarang?), except he dresses in white and the symptoms of his mental illness are more in-your-face.

The moon has four cycles, and Moon Knight has four personalities. I will refer to Moon Knight as Marc Spector, because he is the original. But I do like the ambivalence – mysticism or mental illness? Even though this is an early 80’s comic series, and thus about as subtle as a sledgehammer, writer Doug Moench is surprisingly coy on that topic. The bulk of the art is done by Bill Sienkiewicz, who has a distinctive style that’s not always to my personal tastes. Most of the stories are one or two-parters.

The most interesting storyline in this volume features Moon Knight archenemy the Bushmaster, who destroys the statue of moon-god Khonshu (Spector is a follower of Khonshu). It’s a psychological attack, which scores a direct hit. Spector is devastated, and the only thing that allows him to function again is the fact that Marlene (his partner) made a copy of the statue, which is what the Bushmaster destroyed. Or maybe the Bushmaster destroyed the original, and this statue is the copy? Spector doesn’t want to know.

There’s more! We meet an assassin who dresses up as an enormous rat, and counts rodents as his best (only?) friends. And then we have Morpheus, who took an experimental drug that makes him unable to dream. This drug was administered by Marlene’s heretofore unknown brother. If I didn’t know better, I’d say the creators made him up for this storyline. Morpheus’ inability to dream lets him tap into primal dark energy, as often happens, and the ability to manipulate people’s dreams.

The penultimate storyline resembles a James Bond movie, including doomsday weapons, assassins, bizarre gadgets and deathtraps. It involves the Mossad, a plot to set Manhattan afire, and a super-terrorist named Arsenal & his bikini-clad bodyguards. Arsenal is an anarchist dedicated to the destruction of all governments. He kills a friend of Spector’s, which gets Moon Knight involved. Marlene goes undercover, becomes a member of Arsenal’s guard, and gets into a no-holds brawl with his two other bodyguards. All of them wear bikinis, because reasons.

A decent series that helped pave the way to more adult-oriented superhero comics, but might be an acquired taste.

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Hitman Volume Two: 10,000 Bullets

This is a review of Hitman Volume Two: 10,000 Bullets. You can read my review of the first volume, here. There’s a scene in this volume where Natt the Hat – Tommy Monaghan’s hitman friend from Detroit – stomps on a ninja’s crotch to get information. This isn’t unusual. The hero displaying his manhood by beating the crap out of a guy who can’t fight back is a staple of action movies, especially buddy cop movies. The person getting beaten up is always a bad guy, which in action movie logic makes it okay. The problem is, what if the person doing the beating is also a bad guy?

Because Natt the Hat is a bad guy, just like Tommy Monaghan is a bad guy. This isn’t an insult. They kill people for a living, and they know the score. Garth Ennis (the writer) makes them likable. He gives Monaghan an imaginary code, i.e. don’t kill the good guys. Except Tommy is the person who determines who’s a good guy. None of that changes the fact that normal people view him with revulsion, fear, and hatred.

To wit: after getting shot, Tommy and Natt hole up in his girlfriend Wendy’s apartment. Wendy doesn’t know Tommy’s a hired killer, and is shocked when he shows up on her doorway half-dead. She lets him bleed on her couch until he’s well enough to leave, and then tells him to get out. She isn’t nice about it, either. And just like that Wendy is Tommy’s ex-girlfriend.

Natt the Hat – who serves as a sort of a Hitman Everyman – asks Tommy what he was thinking. Because he knows that a girl like Wendy is way out of Monaghan’s league. Natt knows it, the reader knows it. The only person who doesn’t is Tommy, who has an adolescent streak a mile long when it comes to women. AWWW SHUCKS LOOK AT ME I’M DATING A GURL!!!!!!!!!

Natt might not be able to read minds, but he can read people better than Tommy (who can read minds). When Tommy introduces Natt as his new best friend at Noonan’s (dive bar), his old best friend Pat gets upset. Natt sees this, but Tommy doesn’t. Tommy didn’t even mean anything bad by it – maybe. When Hacken (another hitman) punches Pat and calls him a coward, Monaghan breaks it up but later tells Natt that he thinks Hacken is right. It’s a lack of respect, which pays off big time. When Pat is later tortured for information, Tommy’s words are what keeps him from blabbing. Monaghan’s reaction to all this is to go on a killing spree, but the self-hatred isn’t hard to see.

Anyway, I liked this graphic novel a lot. Be warned: this is a very violent comic (there’s a 20+ page shootout that’s awesome), but it is comic book violence and thus not realistic. Still: if violence upsets you, you might not want to read this. There are also a few slurs that people used in the 1990’s that are (rightfully) taboo today.   

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Marvel Masterworks: The Avengers Volume Three

This is a review of Marvel Masterworks Avengers Volume Three. If you read my reviews of the first two volumes, here and here, you will see that the Avengers got off to a rocky start and found its legs only after the powers-that-be revamped the team, getting rid of the heavy hitters in favor of Captain America and three ex-criminals. The Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver are former members of Magneto’s Brotherhood of Evil, and Hawkeye has tangled with Iron Man.

These stories have a formula: the Avengers bicker. The source of the tension is almost always Hawkeye, who has a king-sized chip on his shoulder. Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch are mutants, Homo Superior, and possess wondrous powers. Captain America has his shield and the super soldier serum. Hawkeye is an ex-carny with a quiver full of trick arrows, so it’s natural that he might overcompensate.

Anyway, after bickering one of the Avengers quits or stalks off. The rest go on a mission, which goes badly until they are rejoined by the wayward Avenger. Rinse and repeat. The other thing that helps this book is that most of the stories are now two-parters, which adds a little depth.

This graphic novel doesn’t have great writing, or great art. What it does have is attitude and lots of action. My favorite storyline: the Avengers bicker. Hawkeye stalks off to hit the nightclubs and go dancing. The Avengers – alerted by guest star the Wasp – fight underwater warlord Attuma, who is a cross between the Sub-Mariner and Conan the Barbarian. Attuma wants to flood the surface world with his tidal wave machine.

The Avengers get their heads handed to them. Hawkeye returns to Avengers HQ, but can’t recall the password to access their comm-link system. Maybe he’s hungover? In case you haven’t figured it out, Hawkeye is an idiot. But it works.

In the meantime, Attuma decides to defeat the Avengers a second time, just to show how tough he is. Quicksilver gets flushed out of the torpedo bay but is rescued by a returning Hawkeye, who has managed to recall the password, and together the reunited Avengers destroy Attuma’s tidal wave machine. Etc., etc., etc.

It’s not rocket science, but it’s fun.

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The Flash Silver Age Volume Two

This is a review of The Flash Silver Age Vol. 2. I’m not going to mention that I have a special place in my heart for the Flash, as I’m sure I’ve mentioned that in every Flash review I’ve ever written. Instead, I’ll talk about how DC’s Silver Age comics aren’t to my tastes – most of the ones I’ve read are written in a style I have trouble connecting with. True, comics of that day were written for kids, but many of them are just glorified science fiction tales with eye-rolling pseudoscience.

Luckily, this volume isn’t like that. True, the stories are formulaic and the ‘science’ is dopey, but that’s fine. The author usually manages to give them an interesting twist: witness Charm School Gorilla Grodd. Grodd is an evil super-intelligent, super-powered gorilla who wants to conquer the world. In this volume, the Great Ape uses his mental powers to make himself irresistible to everyone, including the Flash. We have the Elongated Man, whose stretching powers derive from drinking soda pop. And then there’s Kid Flash, the bowtie wearing teen who emulates his idol, the head square himself, Barry Allen (who is the Flash).

In this volume we meet Digger Harkness, aka Captain Boomerang. Digger covers for his crimes by getting a couple of geriatric criminals to pose as his dear old mother and father. Later, he creates a boomerang that can time travel – not bad for a guy who probably dropped out of school in the fifth grade – and unwittingly causes an alien invasion, as one does. Instead of shooting The Flash in the head, Captain Boomerang enjoys tying the Scarlet Speedster to enormous boomerangs which he blasts into outer space.

This volume also has Bill “Beefy” Lawson. Beefy is all his nickname implies. We meet him at a class reunion; unfortunately it’s only a single issue. DC really missed out by not giving good ole’ Beefy his own series – he could use the moves he learned on the football gridiron to take down evildoers. I’m firmly convinced the creators of Married With Children read this particular issue, because Beefy is a perfect stand-in for Al Bundy.

There are a number of team-ups in this volume. Flash teams with Kid Flash, the Elongated Man, Green Lantern, and Jay Garrick, the Flash of Earth 2. I am unsure if the writer came up with the alternate earth gimmick, but it’s sure turned out to be a cash cow for the comics industry.

Recommended!

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Marvel Masterworks: The Fantastic Four Volume Three

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This is a review of Marvel Masterworks: The Fantastic Four Volume Three. After reading Jack Kirby’s Kamandi, this volume felt like a letdown. Mr. Kirby’s art looks rushed in places here, there’s no meta story, and the issues have a ‘villain of the month’ quality. We have a single science fiction tale about a young godling, but the rest is mostly battles with the team’s growing rogue’s gallery – Doctor Doom, The Mole Man, The Red Ghost and his Super Apes, etc, etc., etc.

The highlight of this volume is the Thing’s battle with the Hulk. The not-so-jolly-green-giant invades Manhattan, because reasons. Most of the Fantastic Four is either sick or injured by the Hulk, so it falls to the Thing to fight the jade giant. And fight him he does, in a great battle sequence that lasts nearly an entire issue and ends with the Thing getting knocked on his ass. Never fear, the rest of the Fantastic Four and the Avengers join the fray in the next issue. It’s a great two-parter.

Other developments worth mentioning: the creators give Sue Storm the ability to cast invisible force fields, which gives them more to do with her character. Prince Namor arrives to propose to Sue, except his idea of proposing involves kidnapping and imprisoning her in an enormous bubble until she agrees to marry him. Reed Richards, feeling his manhood threatened, rushes to fight the Sub-Mariner, which is interesting because he’s usually written as a pretty mild guy. Afterwards, Sue puts Namor in the Friend Zone – actually he should be in the Don’t-Come-Within-Two-Hundred-Feet of my House Zone, but whatever.

This volume is a slight step back from the first two books, but the Hulk two-parter is a classic and worth the price of admission. Recommended.