What I Bought 4/4/2022 - Part 2

Wednesday was all about second issues, but today is for fourth issues. Including the end of one mini-series.

Impossible Jones #4, by Karl Kesel (writer/inker), David Hahn (penciler), Tony Avina (colorist), Comicraft (letterers) - The old ball n' chain isn't interested in a gold mine, just in making sure Impossible Jones gets the shaft. Eh, that's not a great merging of two lamentations upon the misery of marriage.

Fresh off her first outing as a "hero", Isabelle goes looking for Jimmy. She finds his apartment wrecked, and Fosca snooping around. Fosca's finally recognized Isabelle, and knows what's happened to her, though she doesn't seem to be responsible. She at least gives Isabelle a lead on where to find Jimmy, who's about to lose his arm since he can't get the device they stole off. Time for Impossible Jones' second super-villain battle, and it doesn't go much better than the first until Even Steven shows up. 

Though you can see Isabelle gaining more confidence in her abilities. Hahn draws her not only using multiple arms, but different types. Human arms with boxing gloves, tentacles, rocklike arms. She's not surprised at what she can do anymore, either, which is a nice way to show progression. Though when Homewrecker gets in a really good shot, Isabelle notes she feels a lot of somethings break, but she's still up and fighting a couple pages later. So it may be an unconscious thing, her expanding the limits of her powers without realizing it.

So, four issues to get us back to where the issue 1 started, Impossible Jones with a stolen necklace she retrieved from a villain. We got her origin, though there are still mysteries afoot about who did this to her, why, and what exactly they did. She doesn't know where Jimmy ended up thanks to the device, and there's an unscrupulous former fed turned scientist who knows the true identity of the city's newest hero. She seems to have found a way to make the hero thing pay, but I feel like word of that is going to get around.

I don't know. The notion seemed to be, thief gets superpowers, pretends to be hero while finding the one who set her up. But we didn't get to "finding the one who set her up," because while Fosca certainly set up Isabelle's betrayal, she isn't the one who threw her in the weird science machine that gave her these powers. And the question of who did do that doesn't seem to be on Isabelle's mind any longer, since it apparently doesn't merit mention in her internal monologue at the end of the issue. I'm not disappointed in the mini-series; I'd certainly be interested in Kesel and Hahn doing more with the character. More dissatisfied, I guess. A lot of tease, but not much payoff.

The Rush #4, by Si Spurrier (writer), Nathan Gooden (artist), Addison Duke (colorist), Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou (letterer) - First wilderness rule: No eye contact with a bloody-eyed child.

Nettie's ready to throw in the towel, and finally gives in to the polite Mountie's urging that she leave. She's not the only one, and the find once they get to the edge of Brokehoof that spring has arrived, just not in that blighted crater. And not everyone is allowed to leave, as the Pale arrives on its giant spider to inform them. Those who are far enough gone the gold is appearing beneath their skin, must stay. They belong to the ground. That includes M.P., who we see has begun digging at his arms at some point in a panel where Duke colors his arm noticeably red than his face and Gooden draws pointy bumps from under the skin. Otsmane-Elhaou adds in a "schlooorb" sound effect in a squiggly golden font that just looks unpleasant. 

At least a few object and try to fight it out with a man with a wormhole for a face and a giant spider for a steed. That goes as well as you'd expect. Nettie tries to retreat to town with M.P., but they're intercepted by the Pale and the spider. But they can't kill her, or they won't. The pale phrases it as the latter, but I kind of suspect it's the former. She's not her for greed or wealth, she's not tainted by whatever brought all this madness forth.

And it's getting worse, because even as we learn the Mountie used Nettie as bait, the weird winged creature shows up to attack the Pale. Then a giant golden salmon bursts from a frozen stream to speak to them. Then the giant, gold crying moose makes an appearance.

Is Nettie's presence what's causing all this? She has consistently shown no interest in the gold, only in finding Caleb. Even the Pale knows it, because it uses that to barter for its life, and then the "Carrion Kid" attacks. So these creatures aren't all on the same side, or there are rules they have to abide by, and the Pale was breaking one of them. I'd figure each of the monsters used to be a person, since Tsikamin (aka Bill) seems to know who the Pale used to be. But that would mean the moose used to be a person, too. Maybe. Bill said there's a legend about something that happens when there's a crime, or a man becomes "over-mighty", but what was the crime, and why does it manifest in people digging gold from under their skin?

All sorts of questions, and the only thing I feel reasonably sure of is Nettie won't enjoy the answers she gets about Caleb. The Pale said he's alive, he didn't say anything about what state he's in, or if he's still human. I think he might be the Carrion Kid now.