I don't really have anything to discuss in the opening paragraph today, so let's just go to the last remaining book, which is either the end of a mini-series, or the end of an arc.
Jae and Mads escape with Jae's grandfather and the dragon. A little distilled rice wine restores the dragon - something to do with them being water elementals - and the dragon is able to revive the old man. Although he's initially kind of feral, Martinez coloring him in dark reds and oranges. And the panel of Jae kneeling and apologizing surrounded by that color like he's in the middle of a fire, is pretty effective.
That, however, leaves the fox with the corrupted pearl thing, and a giant troll as a bodyguard. This brings us to where the mini-series started, as the grandfather goes in alone to confront the troll. The fight is more colorful than the bit we saw in the first issue. Less heavy blacks obscuring everything, more blues and reds. The old man's eyes aren't hidden in shadows so much as they were then (although I can't really find a pattern to when Bocardo and Martinez use that or don't). It's more clear why he's fighting and what for, whereas before, for all we knew, he was just an old guy who went in the woods to kill mythological creatures for kicks.
The fight works as a distraction, and the dragon gets Mads and Jae close enough to both attack the fox and recover the pearl before it can escape to the other world. Jae is able to grab the pearl, following his grandfather's instructions to avoid getting messed up, and the fox sinks to the bottom to the lake.
Jae at one point is being dragged down by the fox and his grandfather swims in and lops her arm off. This seems to be so Jae can somehow have a vision of what actually happened with to his grandfather in Vietnam. This allows for a reconciliation between them, as Jae apologizes for thinking so poorly of his grandfather previously.
Which is nice, but reading the scene, I wondered where Mads was. She popped out of the water to help stab the fox, but then she doesn't help Jae go after the pearl, nor does she keep the fox occupied to keep it from the pearl. I guess she and Jae have their reconciliation (of sorts) earlier in the issue, reminiscing over old times. I can't quite forget that for Jae it's been years since they saw each other, that he's potentially old enough to be Mads' father, rather than the father of her child, but they seem to be moving past it quickly enough.
There's still the matter of Jae and Mads' abducted child, and the issue ends with the three of them preparing to pass through the gate to rescue the kid. So there may be more some day.
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