The remaining books from August arrived yesterday, not that there were many. We're gonna start with the conclusion of one mini-series, and an issue I missed from July that I missed last month for another.
Screw Driver (or RANGER ONE) rescues Maple from La Tortuga. Takes about six pages, most of those involving him beating up La Tortuga's gang while Maple clings to him like a baby koala. Nahuel uses a bunch of panels in uneven four-side shapes for that fight, although the art for one page is oddly pixellated. Like they tried to increase the size too much.
Rescue complete, Screw Driver's still left with the issue that Maple's mother is dead, and he's got to care for a child in an automaton body. So he does what he can, singing songs from writers that haven't been born yet and trying to keep her from falling down wells and off barns. There's a whole page of him trying to keep her from dying.
But he didn't go unnoticed, and that's how Razorneck learns where he is, so he can show up in issue 4, demanding surrender. What I don't follow is that Razorneck doesn't seem confused that Screw Driver sings songs that haven't been written yet. He's also talking about a "Cowgod", which could either be ominous or hilarious. I don't know which.
Something that didn't come up in issue 4 is that the priest out to kill all the automatons has a man under his command who decided to tinker with some improved designs of Glorianna's he found at her place. For a stronger automaton, and most importantly from the priest's perspective, one he can control utterly. Well sure, if the moron working for him can build it according to the specs.
Having figured out the Egyptian gods are behind all the killing, and that Athena's working with them, Clay and the few survivors of the various pantheons try to get their shit together to bring it crashing down. Fortunately, Clay's still on good terms with Hephaestus (rocking a Hulkamania tank top), and he's able to melt one of those god-killing daggers into bullets. Six, to be exact. Better than nothing.
Hades has figured things out independently, so he joins in as they storm the tower. The Egyptians are trying to bring over the other members of their pantheon that didn't make it, because they believe the serpent that will end everything, that was the reason they descended to the mortal realm in the first place, is on its way and possibly killing those other gods. Not clear if there's proof beyond all these mythologies having something about a great serpent or dragon in them.
Clay stops Osiris, thanks to Osiris making the mistake of putting on his godly attire. Really pumped himself up, made the fall almost inevitable. Although I notice in the panel where he first aims the gun, the sound effect implies he cocked the hammer, but Ponciano draws it as uncocked. But rather than enter the afterlife to be with his family's that's been waiting thousands of years, he lets Hades talk him into coming back. Because Hades somehow didn't catch Athena. Then again, we've only seen snippets of Clay's life as a soldier in Ancient Greece, so it's hard to really full too much of a pull between him and his family.
Maybe the fourth issue, which I still don't have, would have explained it further, but the whole subplot about Loki and Apollo and their Ambrosia drug felt like it went nowhere. Kind of extraneous to the whole thing. Maybe it was just a hook Ringel used as a way for Clay to be reinserted into the gods' affairs after he was given the boot. Maybe it'll be relevant at some later point, because the bit with the FBI at the end implies the book might return at some point in the future. That, and Clay not staying dead because there's work to do. And his seemingly calling lightning as though he's got some of Zeus' juice.
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