What I Bought 5/31/2016 - Part 2

I can't think of a thing to open this post with. Maybe a wrench would work.

Ms. Marvel #7, by G. Willow Wilson (writer), Adrian Alphona (artist), Ian Herring (color art), Joe Caramagna (letterer) - Jeez, Kamala's not even officially into Civil War 2 tie-ins yet and she already turned scowly. Just wait kid, it's only gonna get worse.

It's a big Science fair, to hopefully impress people and get into good colleges without going broke! Yeah, good luck on that one, kids. Kamala's there on the Jersey team, and Miles Morales is on the New York team. One team for the entire state? There's snooping, and spying, and possibly some flim-flammery, and then Bruno tries to up the ante with a pocket-sized Mr. Fusion, which explodes, but remarkably, does not kill him or anyone else. And Ms. Marvel and Spider-Miles just happen to both be there, and let that awkward moment pass without comment.

So Kamala knows Miles' secret i.d., but not the other way around. I knew that was the case for her and Nova, but not also her and Spider-Man. It's a "Road to Civil War II" issue, so is this meant to pre-sage trust issues that will tear their Avengers squad apart? Or that super-special future vision NuHuman boy will threaten the ability of people to maintain secret identities? Or just a moment to step back and look at the other sorts of problems a high school kid has. Like getting into college, the pressures that creates, and the questionable decisions that arise from those pressures.

But what was the stuff the New York team was saying about their Re-aktron having a massive draw on the electrical grid? I thought it was supposed to just be "grabbing stray electricity out of the air"? is the whole thing a sham? Is Miles just a P.T. Barnum with super-powers? Eh, he's still behaving better than Peter Parker these days, sigh.

Adrian Alphona returns! This is always good. His art is well-suited for this kind of oddball science. He's draws strange things well, so that they look cool, but not too threatening. He draws the happiest shark I have ever seen, which is kind of terrifying. You know it's just a matter of time until Skyshark masters its floating membrane, and then it can travel anywhere it wants, attacking birds and small planes and hot air balloons. The identical vertical shading on Bruno and Kamala on page 13 was good. They're both, as Mike notes, taking it too seriously, and operating under a dark cloud. I don't know who gets credit for the fonts as each team introduced its inventions, either Alphona or Caramagna, but I really liked the work someone did there.

Wynonna Earp #4, by Beau Smith (writer), Lora Innes (artist), Jay Fotos (colorist), Robbie Robbins (letterer) - That's pretty much how I feel anytime I get out of the mall.

A scientist has developed a zombie plague he can spread by touch, while remaining unaffected himself. And he's infected a mall full of people to demonstrate it for potential buyers. The Black Badge team kills a bunch of undead, Wynonna and Valdez arguing almost constantly, as Earp refuses to kill a Boy Scout troop, believing there will be a way to reverse it. As it turns out, there is, once they're able to lure the scientist close and neutralize the contagion inside him. Also, Valdez broke his arms. And Earp receives a message from some mysterious sniper demanding she come home and face said sniper.

Innes plays up Valdez' size a little differently from Evenhuis. Innes definitely emphasizes Valdez' musculature more, where Evenhuis went with showing it by how she interacts. Taking a flying punch from Earp and being completely unfazed, or smashing a bar top with one punch. Innes does some of that here, Valdez is the only one killing any of the zombies hand-to-hand, opting for a Mayan sword, but still a little different. Innes' style probably works for the tone of this issue better. It's a zombie outbreak, which means gore and stacks of corpses, but it's treated lightly. There's never any sense the Black Badge division is going to fail to contain the problem, or even that they're in any imminent danger from the zombies, just a question of whether anyone can be saved in the process. So it's more, slapstick isn't the right word, cartoonish violence I guess, which lines up more with Innes' work.

I'm guessing with the mini-series shifting to an ongoing, the Del Ray cartel plot is going to become more of a long-running subplot. Which is fine. I like comics with a mix of immediate, shorter arcs, and longer background arcs that eventually come to fruition. I'm pretty excited for this book going forward.