What I Bought 2/12/2025

The snow we got this week was kind enough to fall on the day I had off. That's not sarcasm, I would rather it fall on a day I don't have to go anywhere. I can just sit and watch it, or take a leisurely stroll (or a brisk run, because I'm like that sometimes), rather than risk being on the road with people who don't know how to drive in crap weather.

Moon Knight: Fist of Khonshu #5, by Jed MacKay (writer), Devmalya Pramanik (artist), Rachelle Rosenberg (color artist), Cory Petit (letterer) - Are we letting Vermin be a fist of Khonshu now? Standards are dropping all over the place.

While Marc was fighting Vermins last issue, the rest of the cast were out trying to do the work. So he didn't send them away to run the risk of being caught, he was just being a sulky baby and they got tired of waiting for him to snap out of it.

Badr and Soldier tried to pay a visit to a woman with a sick kid, only for her husband to refuse the medicine because the news says they're bad guys. Tigra, Reese and 8-Ball were fighting a gang of Frankensteins that come around to cause trouble every year. Although it looks like the real fight is about to be between Tigra, who is ticked at Marc, and Reese, who can't stop putting her two cents' worth of psychoanalysis into everyone else's business. Kind of want to see Tigra haul off an bust her one in the chops.

By the time they get back to the underground lair, they find one Vermin (who looks like a white guy, did people forget Edward was black, or did that change at some point?) handcuffed to a pipe. Marc, meanwhile, is fighting the drug dealer. And it's interesting that, after he seemed at odds with Steven and Jake in the previous issue, they're all on board with this fight. Or maybe the other two just figure that if Marc's gonna do this, they want him to do it right.

Which he doesn't, because it turns out this Achilles dude is an Asgardian. And I guess Marc either doesn't get boosts in strength based on phases of the moon any longer, or that's not enough to cut the mustard here. Pramanik occasionally switches from basic rectangular panels to these arced panels that bend over or around one larger panel. I thought initially it was to signify a shift in the fight's momentum, like one style when Marc's got the upper hand, the other for Achilles, but I don't think that's the case.

It's more that it switches to curved panels when one of the voices in his head is putting in their two cents. So the perception of the fight is being filtered through their way of seeing it, maybe? The last time it gets used is when Khonshu's pointing out Marc hasn't paid enough attention, or done enough research on what he's fighting, and draws attention to the fact this big goon doesn't have any scars. I guess a gold tooth doesn't count.