Tuesday, June 09, 2009

There's Such A Thing As Too Much Mystery

With Moon Knight concluded (for now), I'm left wondering about this Toltec character.

What did they (since Toltec's gender is unrevealed) have against Alcantra, that would lead them to kill lots and lots of people with large bladed weapons? Were they like the Punisher, killing criminals because they're criminals? Are they doing because they worship a god who demands death, like Moon Knight? And what was the point of the Toltec being in the story? Were the Toltec and the Punisher meant to represent two different paths Spector/Lockley could (has?) walked, the man who kills evil because it's evil, and the man who kills because his god demands it? That could be, but I can't be sure, because I don't know the Toltec's motives. And if that was a correct analysis, then what do I make of Moon Knight's actions?

See, I can't quite figure out what's supposed to be going on in this story. Moon Knight faked his death to elude the Thunderbolts, and went to Mexico. Because he had to go somewhere, I suppose. By the end of the story, he's learned that Norman Osborn has even more power than before, and seems resolved to return to New York and do something about that.

But what? Kill Norman? Set aside the odds of Moon Knight making it past the Thunderbolts, the Dark Avengers, the Sentry and whatever else Norman would use to protect himself. Heck, set aside the likelihood that Moon Knight can kill Norman Osborn if he reaches him, what with Norman being the Green Goblin, and apparently having appropriated some armor Stark left behind to boot*. Let's say Moon Knight reaches and defeats Norman, and has the opportunity. Is he going to take it? Near as I can tell, he killed no one in this arc. Beat the stuffing out of lots of people, but killed nobody. The Punisher killed people. The Zapata Brothers killed people. The Toltec killed a whole bunch of people, but Moon Knight did not.

So what the heck does it mean? Did he deem the people he was facing not worth killing? Did he figure with all the other killers around, he didn't need to? Or is he rejecting all of it? That seemed to be the case, when he confronted Alcantra, then came face-to-face with Toltec, and rather than kill Alcantra himself, or defend him from the Toltec, Moon Knight simply walked out, seemingly washing his hands of the whole affair. That sounds like a guy through with killing, so what will attacking Norman Osborn accomplish?

* We've already seen Moon Knight against the Green Goblin once, in the Avengers Annual of 1987, and Moon Knight got his butt kicked. And since that was a Green Goblin that was dead, well that wasn't even Norman Osborn, but Bart Hamilton, a third-rate Green Goblin**.

** Yes, I'm sure it was meant to be Norman Osborn, since he was supposed to be dead at the time, and believe me, I wish they'd left him that way, I'm just having some fun. Either way, Moon Knight vs. Green Goblin = Moon Knight getting capped.

2 comments:

Seangreyson said...

I guess if the heroes keep pushing Norman he might eventually snap and go full Goblin in a way that can't be ignored (I'm thinking of something like his attack on the reporters in The Pulse, that sent him to jail most recently).

CalvinPitt said...

seangreyson: That could work. It'd have to happen in such a way he couldn't blame the underground heroes though, since people in the Marvel U. seem like they'd be willing to say "Yeah, it was all Luke Cage and his renegades fault Norman Osborn killed all those reporters!"