Friday, May 03, 2024

What I Bought 5/1/2024

My movie rewatch marathon reached the letter M last week. Some weeks I end up with a lot of movies in a series - I had the first 3 John Wicks followed by Jurassic Park 1-3 a couple weeks ago - but this has been a better week for variety. Mad Max: Fury Road, Magnificent Warriors, Magnum Force, Major League, The Maltese Falcon, Man of Tai Chi and The Mask. A bit of silly to break up the cynical. Visual spectacle intermixed with snappy dialogue. It's been fun.

Vengeance of the Moon Knight #5, by Jed MacKay (writer), Alessandro Cappuccio (artist), Rachelle Rosenberg (color artist), Cory Petit (letterer) - Tigra's tail looks really skinny where it's wrapped around Shroud's axe handle.

Tigra and Hunter's Moon continue their fight with Shroud, taking it to the streets when he throws them out with his Darkforce abilities. Cappuccio and Rosenberg go for some impressive visuals with Shroud's powers, making massive bat wings out of Darkforce, or what looks vaguely like a giant bird silhouette (which makes me wonder if Khonshu's not entirely displeased with having another, unofficial, fist.)

Shroud tries to justify his actions by saying that he can't put his life back together as the Shroud, but he can do it as Moon Knight, and honor his friend in the process. Yeah, Greer and Badr ain't buying that. this feels a little like Shroud doing Speedball-as-Penance, adopting another identity to escape past failure. Not a comparison I want to make (or am pleased to remember existed), but when has my brain ever cared about what I'd prefer to forget?

At the same time, it's 8-Ball's turn with Dr. Sterman. For him, Moon Knight was a figure he once admired in the way you do someone who terrifies you. But he figured out Marc had completely fucked his life up in the process of becoming that guy, which was not something to emulate. That Marc was trying to put a life back together anyway, after all that, was something to emulate. The difference being, 8-Ball is still trying to make something of himself with his own identity, rather than by stealing someone else's.

Tigra makes much the same point to Shroud, and the fight goes out of him. It's a little odd MacKay has her spit in Shroud's face in one panel, but two pages later, she's giving him a hug as he collapses. Hey, I'm fine with her wanting to help him - it certainly didn't seem like anyone was all that interested in that when Waid used him in his Daredevil run - it's just an awfully quick turning off for the hostility faucet.

Anyway, before proper help can be provided, Shroud's powers start acting up as Darkforce energy erupts out of him - and apparently people with similar powers across the world - which is how the sun gets blocked and all the vampires come out to play. At least MacKay gave me some sort of conclusion before the Blood Hunt stuff barged in like Kramer.

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