What I Bought 5/8/2019 - Part 5

We're back with more comics, both from Boom, both 12-issue mini-series. One of them is almost to the end, while there other is almost to the midpoint. So they're both putting the pieces in place for a big moment.

Coda #11, by Simon Spurrier (writer), Matias Bergara (artist), Michael Doig (colorist assist), Jim Campbell (letterer) - That's a placid, yet ominous scene.

The Murkrone is prepared to make her move, with a magic-powered airship. Oh, those never end well. There's no place to go but down. Serka and the assorted remains of Ridgetown, Thundervale, and the Urken are trying to devise some sort of strategy, but don't seem to be getting very far. Hum agrees to be the chronicler who will preserve the Murkrone's version of history to save the little kid, but actually frees said child and sends her away on Nag. He forced to drink the same potion the Murkrone made for Serka. Which is not a poison so much as a mind-control drug. I guess that explains he being able to talk with Serka through the war-gibbon last issue. I assumed that was some unrelated magical long-range communication thing.

In a lot of ways, it feels like the preparation for the big showdown next issue. But I think it's also Hum's big moment. When he chose to get off his butt and act to try and do some good for others. To save the kid (and Nag). To at least try and keep his promise to that poor, tormented ylf by killing it and ending its suffering. The kind of thing he would have sneered at, or done only as it brought him closer to his goal of "helping" Serka, previously.

I'm not expecting him to play much of a role in what comes next, which seems fitting. Things are settling into familiar patterns of someone trying to bring the world to heel, and a few brave, desperate, or angry souls trying to stop them. It's not the sort of thing he would be involved in, and as it stands, it's unlikely he will be now. A bystander, or a meat shield the Murkrone tries to use to slow Serka down at best. After all, he always asserted it was Serka who could truly help make the world a better place, not him. He did a little bit of good, and maybe that's what he should have been trying all along.

A few random things I enjoyed on the art side this issue. The kid's confused look when she learns the magic words that will let her ride Nag. How, when Hum speaks the word that causes the combustion charm to ignite, it's not written as a word, but as a symbol in his mouth in the same green shade as the acker that powers his magic. The contrast between the Murkrone, sparkly and smiling, making her pitch, while right next to her is a grumpy looking Urken carving bloody pieces off an emaciated ylf to throw into a squat, ugly furnace. The way her speech balloon about how said ylf is not simply a 'tawdry treasure', carries the eye to the line of blood from the entrails, and then down to the screaming victim. The casual dismissal of him as anything other than a resource, because as she's said, all that matters is the story people believe, not what actually happened.

I do hope she dies painfully next issue.

Smooth Criminals #5, by Kurt Lustgarten, Kirsten Smith, Amy Roy (writers), Leisha Riddel (artist), Raven Warner (inker), Brittany Peer (colorist), Ed Dukeshire (letterer) - I hope Mia warned Brenda about landing properly. Otherwise you end up with a superhero landing, and that's hell on your knees.

Brenda and Mia take a break at an arcade, where we learn Brenda has a crush on someone she plays against online. Because Brenda can't focus, Mia drags her to an open mic night T-Bird is playing at so they can meet in person. This does not go well, and leads to an argument between them, but they want to make the heist work, so they put that aside. Problem(s): the feds were checking out the net of Indra exhibit, and catch a glimpse of Mia. And Mia's old rival found her training area and has designed his own to copy it. Which at least gives us a funny scene of him being thwarted by the Talky Bears, and chastised by his henchmen for referring to Mia and Brenda as "girls", rather than "women". It's disrespectful, you see.

Kind of a sad thing when your stoic henchmen are more well-mannered than you are. What kind of classy thief is he?

Raven Warner handles some of the inking this issue. The only thing I really noticed was that sometimes Mia and her rivals' faces got much rounder looking for one or two panels. Also that there would be a lot more shading around the nose. There was one page where it looked like Mia had stuck her snoot in a coal bucket, for no apparent reason. Weird.

I like Mia demonstrating that they do have a plan for the heist by jumping around all over the arcade, as a way to both show off a bit, but also to put Brenda at ease and not let her use it as an excuse to avoid meeting her crush. It doesn't really work, but it seems like the kind of approach Mia would take, as someone who gives the appearance of being self-assured and confident. Or maybe she's just one of those people who talks with her hands, a highly acrobatic thief version.