What I Bought 9/13/2017 - Part 2

Decided to group the two books from last week that were wrapping up storylines, so here they are.

Ms. Marvel #22, by G. Willow Wilson (writer), Marco Failla (artist), Ian Herring (color artist), Joe Caramagna (letterer) - Oh that's adorable Marvel's putting ads for their Inhumans TV show that is apparently complete garbage. When will they learn?

Josh lets Kamala escape and may be realizing he's actually a bad guy. Congratulations Josh, you're only about three times slower on the uptake than Deadpool, a man whose brain has had to literally regrow holes punched in it by bullets, multiple times. While Tyesha and Nakia confront Lockdown's goons with the combined force of a court order and the cops, Lockjaw reappears (about damn time) and helps Kamala refuel for the big fight, which ends with Lockdown in cuffs and Josh. . . I'm not sure. Lockdown says he snuck away to avoid arrest, but in the last panel he's standing in the middle of the street, watching Kamala and Lockjaw walk away. Presumably someone will notice and arrest him? Hopefully? Pretty please.

That wasn't a bad ending. I doubt this is the end of HYDRA's efforts in Jersey City. They'll try again; Lockdown's too stupid to quit, and the people who blame Ms. Marvel for the stuff happening in town aren't going to get any less convinced of that. We'll see how that goes. Hopefully Lockjaw is going to stick around. He's wasted on all those Inhumans titles no one reads.

I'm not so sure about Josh's sorta face turn once he learns Kamala is Ms. Marvel. Like he goes from mocking her when he's hurting her to talking about how he's not gonna shoot the hero who never kills in the back? But once I thought about it, it's just the, 'I didn't care until it affected ME' attitude. I encounter it all the time, so I shouldn't be surprised.

Herring continues to use yellow to represent resistance, or things turning in favor of the heroes. There's almost no yellow in the first several pages, right up to the point Tyesha point outs the cops are on her side, not K.I.N.D.'s. But after that, it starts to pop up more and more. The Mayor comes rushing from her office, hustling to get down there, and she's emerging from a room colored bright yellow. When Lockjaw appears, he's backlit by yellow. Most of the moments of Lockdown and her schmoes get punched are set against solid yellow backgrounds. It's a nice visual cue that Herring uses. At the end, it's more of an orange, which is a little gentler, the fight is over for the moment.

The Unbelievable Gwenpool #20, by Christopher Hastings (writer), Gurihiru (artists), Clayton Cowles (letterer) - C'mon denizens of the Marvel Universe, a girl with a gun and a sword leaping from a void in the sky is hardly cause for alarm. At least it isn't the Hulk, or Iron Man on a bender.

Evil Future Gwen tries to teach Gwen how to use her powers, while realizing her own past is being retconned by the interference of the other time travelers. The time travelers gradually realize trying to kill Present Gwen is only making her more aligned with Future Gwen but then they get killed, by Future Gwen, as a point she's trying to make. That Gwen is no longer a tourist, she is a character in the Marvel Universe, and she's subject to some of its laws. One of which Future Gwen has interpreted as trying to push Gwen to be evil. So she went with it. Present Gwen decides that is Not Cool, and resolves to not break bad. Which will probably get her killed in the background of a throwaway panel in a Big Event in a year or two, but kudos, anyway.

Well, this explains those solicitations for the next few issues a little better. And it was an interesting story. It addressed the fact Gwen has been gleefully committing a lot of murders since she got here, and hopefully she'll cut back on that going ahead. Which ought to be enough to go hero. Wolverine didn't even cut down on the number of people he killed, and he got to be an Avenger (still one of only two characters I will not accept as an Avenger, and they were both put on there by Bendis). Hastings brought her brother into the picture, as someone for Gwen to try and seek out and it'll be interesting to see what steps he takes going forward. There's the question of whether Gwen could even get back to her universe if she wanted to at this point. The question of if, assuming there is an editorial force that shoves her in the direction of villainy, she can actually resist that? Or at least get it retconned away later as mind control so she can go back to being good?

I love the visual representation of editorial diktat. "Gwenpool Can't Kill Spider-Man," indeed. A cyclone is about right for Marvel Editorial. Some shit gets destroyed, some escapes unscathed. How is it determined which is which? Who the fuck knows. Also, Evil Gwen diving outside the panels to reappear at the bottom of the cliff to save Present Gwen. Gurihiru just did an excellent job with showing Gwen using this power to hop outside the pages. It was very enjoyable and it makes for a memorable visual. Hopefully future artists can do as well with it.

Kind of a strange arc, but not a bad one.