Sunday Splash Page #374

"Royal Succession Technique," in Murder Princess, vol. 1, ch. 2, by Sekihiko Inui

When the kingdom of Forland comes under attack from a disgruntled scientist and his two cyborgs, Princess Alita flees the castle, hoping to find her brother and his army to bring them back. Instead, she trips, falls off a cliff and knocks skulls with a bounty hunter named Falis.

When the two awaken, they find their souls have somehow switched bodies, though being in the body of a pampered princess does nothing to diminish Falis' strength or skill with a blade. Falis first agrees to defeat the scientist, and then, to run the country until a way can be found to put she and Alita back in their proper bodies. Alita, in Falis' body, takes the role of a servant and plays niece to the royal court's butler, Jodo.

I found the anime version of Murder Princess first, but as it was only 6 episodes, the conclusion felt incredibly rushed. So when I learned the anime was based on a manga, I went hunting for it. Except it's only two volumes (11 chapters total), and, if anything, has less of a conclusion. There's a great computer, hidden somewhere among the 4 kingdoms, that possesses all the knowledge of the world. It could tell how to reverse Falis and Alita's problem, or how to repeat the destruction of the world that preceded this one. And one of the 4 keys is in Alita's body.

In the anime, the computer is found and activated, but ultimately destroyed so its power can't be abused, but also preventing it from solving the main characters' problem. In the manga, they never get to that point. The computer is known about, and that there's a powerful witch, working for a never-seen, even more powerful master, who has 2 of the keys, and that's it. There's also a looming threat that the world and its people are gradually being corrupted because fate has gone off-course. Alita was supposed to die that night, and the soul transfer's mucking everything up as the corruption turns people into Resident Evil monsters.

That never gets resolved, either. It isn't as though Inui spends too much time on humor plots about how unfit the blunt, uncultured Falis is to be a political leader. Those jokes and gags are in there to be sure, but they're kept brief and within the flow of the plot. There's just too many things to introduce in too little time. We get Falis' origin, but not why she has two partners/subordinates, one a Frankenstein with the fashion sense of Bebop from the Ninja Turtles, and the other an actual Shinigami, a soul reaper. Seems like there would have been a story there, but oh well.

I reviewed volume 1 and volume 2 a month apart back in 2020. I strongly considered using that first image from the volume 1 post for this one, but figured I should pick something else.

Saturday Splash Page #176

"Never The End!", in Seven Soldiers of Victory #1, by Grant Morrison (writer), J.H. Williams III (artist/colorist), Dave Stewart (colorist), Todd Klein (letterer)

Bookending the seven mini-series we've looked at were a #0 and #1 issue. The first sort of puts things in motion, as the Vigilante tries to pull together a new Seven Soldiers to deal with an old threat. Unfortunately, one of his picks - Bulleteer - changes her mind at the last minute. So it's a team of 6, not 7, that travel to Miracle Mesa, and those six are mostly wiped out by Neh-Buh-Loh and an advance group of giant spiders. The Spyder survives, remade by the Sheeda to be their weapon. Too bad for them, someone else remade him first.

Williams alternates between pages where the panels are aligned like sigils or family crests, though I couldn't tell you what they mean, to very straightforward pages of short, wide panels stacked neatly atop each other when it looks like the Soldiers are winning. When it goes bad, the panels start to distort and warp. White panel borders become black, and it's all just images of death and terror scattered across the page. 

By issue 1, the Sheeda invasion is in full swing. Or as full swing as it can get with Neh-Buh-Loh dead and much of the Sheeda Queen's fleet destroyed by Frankenstein. Still, the Sheeda have turned a lot of people, and heroes are kind of thin on the ground, so it looks like it could go either way, but apparently the end's been preordained for over 40,000 years.

It's hard to really lay out how it all works. The New Gods apparently came to Earth long ago and did their own version of what the Celestials pulled over at Marvel, or the stone pillar in 2001. They created a combination of Neanderthal and God that became Aurakles (who Mister Miracle jailed in one of his Omega Sanction lives), who was given seven gifts to defend mankind. But this golden age sends a time machine into the future, where Melmoth finds it and the Sheeda reverse engineer it to come to the past and commit their first Harrowing. So in that sense, the past reached the future first, and it was via that gift the future turned back and reaped the past. And everything has built from that point.

(Williams draws that whole sequence in faux-Jack Kirby style, although the colors are somewhat less crisp. I don't know if that's because it's a story being viewed as a saga, and so some of the details are necessarily lost to the ages of time, or what.)

Except there's also the Seven Unknown Men of Slaughter Swamp. The Spyder was hired to kill them, except they actually hired him to get him there, so they could remake him and send him out with Vigilante's group. And though they're apparently panicked at the failure of Vigilante's group, they also perhaps planned for Spyder to strike at the Sheeda Queen from within, once Sir Justin destroyed the Cauldron of Rebirth?

The Sheeda themselves are apparently the creation of the Eighth of the Seven Unknown Men, the one known as Zor (who Zatanna defeated in the conclusion of her mini-series.) An idea or concept, that the renegade came up with. So, it's some thing within Morrison that wants to feed on past ideas to the extent of destroying them almost entirely? Some inner conflict he's trying to resolve in himself about his work?

But behind all that, seemingly taking place where no one's looking, is the struggle between Dark Side and Mister Miracle. Shilo Norman escaped the black hole, escaped the Omega Sanction, and now able to see the truth of Dark Side. Williams draws Dark Side's human self as such, but all around him is the visage of the true Darkseid, like a hologram of a stone carving. Dark Side is a figure of Kingpin-esque size and proportions, but he's a small piece of the panel, with Darkseid's head dominating the image. Mister Miracle bargains for Aurakles' freedom, betting he can escape any prison Dark Side can conjure.

So Dark Side shoots him in the head. Aurakles is free, so that the spear - named both "love" and "vengeance", and apparently is, or is represented by Bulleteer - he threw 40,000 years ago can finally strike down the Sheeda Queen. (In that she's hit by a car Bulleteer is driving. Or is that Bulleteer and Sally Sonic, who regains consciousness and starts a fight, which causes the car wreck that kills the Queen, represent the two sides together? Feels a little too Madonna/whore dichotomy, but maybe that's it.) 

But may not even matter. All this with the Sheeda is just an amusing distraction to Darkseid. The Sheeda might appear as gods to humans, or even superheroes, but Darkseid is the real deal. It does, looking back on it two decades later, give the whole thing the feel of just a warm-up. Countdown to Final Crisis, except written by Grant Morrison, as opposed to that miserable hodgepodge of a year-long, weekly series DC released.

Most of the Seven get some measure of hope or redemption. Justin (or Justina) survives, and learns from Ali Ka-Zoom she's likely to return to her time at some point to become a great ruler. Manhattan Guardian is the man on the street, the one the papers see rallying and protecting the people. He gets back together with his girlfriend. Zatanna is able to help her apprentice see that there are ways to stop the Sheeda Queen without becoming her. Mister Miracle freed Aurakles, and as for the bullet to the dome? Refer to the top of the page.

With the other three, it's harder to see. Bulleteer did her bit, with just about the least amount of active effort she could manage. Sally apparently died in the crash as well, but the brief glimpse we get of Bulleteer doesn't suggest she takes any solace from it. That panel, or some cop telling her she's free to go, and her reply, "Am I?", is a tiny one at the bottom of a page. The next panel, spread across two pages, of her and the Guardian staring at the flaming wreckage, is much larger. Even now, the life she wanted no part of gets more focus than the living she'll have to do after.

(Also, it just registered with me that her last name is "Harrower". The Sheeda refer to the pillages of the past as Harrowings, and she's the one who ultimately ends it.)

Klarion gets Misty's die away from her, giving him both of the six-sided probability engines, aka the Fatherbox. Or is only one of them that? I'm not clear what the 'Merlin sprite made of living language,' is, so maybe it's the other die. He takes the invasion ship (or commands Frankenstein, who is a Gurndy-Man after all) back to the future, which he seems quite pleased with. Not sure what happened to Frankenstein after that, though. Kind of gets lost in the shuffle.

Williams does a remarkable job shifting his art style to at least closely mimic the artists for each character's respective mini-series. Freddie Williams when drawing Mister Miracle's, Frazier Irving for Klarion, Sook for Zatanna, and so on. Enough so I had to stop and double-check those guys weren't actually listed in the credits. Curiously, Doug Mahnke's the one he struggles with the most. His Frankenstein just isn't the same imposing hulk, the lines are too thin and not nearly rough enough. 

I can't really think of anything else to say, so let's bring Seven Soldiers of Spring to a close.

What I Bought 5/5/2025 - Part 2

I've really been digging the NBA playoffs this year. Even the series that were over quickly had at least a couple of games with cool performances or huge comebacks. Overtime games, last-second shots, the Western Conference just being a Thunderdome of good teams beating the crap out of each other. Fun times.

Dark Pyramid #2, by Paul Tobin (writer), PJ Holden (artist), Sara Colella (color artist), Taylor Esposito (letterer) - I doubt she's going to be happy when she turns around.

With Shailene's help, Becca escapes the giant, bizarrely-speaking murder creature (which we'll learn is named Eve.) That gives Shailene time to explain a little more about the situation. Measurements of seismic shockwaves revealed a pyramid beneath Mt. Denali. Now the locals all look at you funny if you bring it up. Probably a violation of the "Never Mind All That, Then," ordinance.

Shailene explains a lot of Hooky's fans that showed up to help are staying in the big house of some rich lady Shailene used to date, and it might be a good place to rest and prepare. Unfortunately, Eve got there first. I laughed at the bit where Becca insists they should go in and help, and promptly gets herself and Shailene trampled by a panicked crowd. It's not funny for them, because now Becca's trying to carry an unconscious Shailene to safety, only to run into the military, who apparently work with or control Eve. But still, seeing the altruistic intentions backfire so spectacularly was kind of funny.

Tobin spends four pages on what was going on in the house before Eve showed up. It's mostly people getting drunk and talking about random crap. Holden doesn't draw anyone making preparations for a search-and-rescue mission, just people standing or sitting around, drinking and talking.  'I found a banjo but it doesn't have strings. I realize this is a problem,' is uttered at one point. One lady is just walking around topless. Very comfortable with her body, I suppose. Or she was, until Eve ripped her apart.

It feels at first glance like it's just establishing that no, these people were not going to be much help to Becca or Shailene. But the scene is focused mostly on this one guy, Hermann, who seems to like meeting people and learning stuff. Tarot, how to play the banjo, whatever. So I assume he's going to evade the military's attempt to round up whoever Eve doesn't slaughter and prove useful.

Past Time #1, by Joe Harris (writer), Russell Olson (artist), Carlos Mangual (letterer) - Who is throwing red paint all over the scoreboard? That's really inconsiderate. 

Harris uses a framing sequence set in Chicago in 1988, as the Cubs are about to finally have nighttime baseball games at Wrigley Field. One old guy who has a bite mark on his neck has tracked down a blind black man named Ronald Harris. Ronald doesn't have a reflection, but "Jack" wants to know about someone else, someone Ronald met in 1923.

Which is where most of this issue takes place, 1923 Nebraska. Horrifying. We see a little of a night game between a local team and a barnstorming group Ronald helped coach. Olson keeps the uniforms baggy and the players kind of crappy. Also, the umpire's wearing a top hat, which I can't recall being the fashion at the time, but what the heck. On the down side, when a player slides into what I think is second base, its drawn wrong. It looks like he slid coming from the outfield instead of second base, which I'm positive is not how baseball was played in the 1920s.

After the game's over, Ronald has a brief conversation with a man the sheriff may be looking for. The mystery man seems more concerned that someone he beat and left unconscious in the cornfield wasn't there, but when Ronald's getting beat up at some later point over money he owes, the mystery man rather violently saves his life.

So there's a few mysteries. Who Jack is, how Ronald ended up a vampire, what's up with Henry and the man he left in the cornfield. How Jack found Ronald in the first place, maybe? I'm curious to see how Harris doles out the answers, if we get them. And I'm curious how he and Olson weave the baseball into the story.

The Way of Coyote - Gavin van Horn

The book is about wildlife in urban areas. Van Horn starts with several short chapters discussing different types of wildlife he encountered since moving to Chicago, or at least encounters that felt significant to him. Spotting a coyote loping across a golf course near dusk, or learning peregrine falcons have turned skyscrapers into their own cliffside nesting sites.

The section second of the book is still focused on wildlife, but less about how wildlife have adapted to what humans built up for ourselves, and more about how the city has changed, in ways great and small, intended and otherwise, that have prompted some sort of response in wildlife. A robin nests near a school, and some teacher placed cones around the tree with a sign advising the children to not disturb the birds. The city improving its sewage treatment, so that waterways are less polluted and pelicans can use them as stops on migration, or night herons can pick their way through the reeds.

In the third and final section, he turns to things we can do that will make cities more compatible with wildlife, but also improve the cities for ourselves. Walking or biking trails also provide corridors that connect chunks of suitable habitat for many creatures. A woman is spearheading a neighborhood program (along with another program for backyard vegetable gardens and things like that) encouraging people to plant beds of pollinator species on the corners. It helps butterflies, but also beautifies the neighborhood and maybe promotes a sense of community.

Van Horn cites conservationist Aldo Leopold, philosopher Lao Tzu, and the Coyote of many myths as major influences in his thinking for this book, and starts sections of the book with short tales (which van Horn apparently came up with) of Coyote encountering the city and trying to find a way to make humans more aware of other life. The spiritual aspect doesn't always land with me. When he's citing the Tao Te Ching on the paradoxical weakness and strength of water in chapters about the waterways around Chicago, it feels like a bit of a put on, at the least a stretch. Trying to give the book an air of something more, enlightened or scholarly.

It may not be that; van Horn talks a lot about how seeing herons when he kayaks, or making eye contact with a bison at a restored prairie, makes him feel. His arguments in favor of remaking cities to be more collaborative with the earth and nature aren't strictly ecological, and certainly not economic. He believes allowing nature more room in cities, rather than trying to confine or eradicate it, helps connect people with the world, and that this is very important. Even if I wouldn't describe my reactions to being in nature or seeing wild things near to home in the same way as van Horn, I'd agree with him on that.

'So while restoration ecology involves diminishing human impact in particular places so that other beings can thrive or reestablish themselves, reconciliation ecology advances the position that humans can create and build novel systems that are suited to other species. In short, by understanding the behaviors of other species and what they require to meet their needs, we can deliberately create places of cohabitation.'

What I Bought 5/5/2025 - Part 1

I saw a list yesterday of alleged Millenial things that Gen Z find cringe. Based on the age range the article provided, I'm a Millenial, but there was not one thing on the list I do or was ever interested in. Taking pictures of my food? Harry Potter? The phrase "adulting"? The fuck outta here with that nonsense.

Anyway, here's two 5th issues to kick off our run through the remainder of April's books.

Dust to Dust #5, by JG Jones (writer/artist), Phil Bram (writer), Jackie Marzan (letterer) - I feel like the report really looks based on Cate Blanchett on the cover. Which is not necessarily true inside the book. Maybe it's just the eyes and brow ridge.

The sheriff visits the moonshiners to accuse them of killing that family. His evidence is that they have the family's mule. His attempt to collect the evidence gets him beat down, and he's only saved because the mysterious gas mask wearer (or a gas mask wearer, I suppose there could be more than one) blew up the still. Then kills the moonshiners and lugs the sheriff's unconscious body to the rainmaker's truck and leaves him there.

Meanwhile, the reporter agrees to take photos for the mayor's daughter's bridal shower (unlikely to happen since I suspect her ballplayer boyfriend is dead now), and in payment, she wants to do a feature on the town. Not on people abandoning it, oh no, on the resilience of the town under difficult circumstances. Whether that's bullshit or not, taking the photos gets her access to a darkroom, where she can develop the photos she took when out with the sheriff, confirming there was a gas can alongside the burned up car. Sure hope the sheriff is in any condition to make use of this information! 

Jones mostly only breaks the sepia tone for blood, or the fire of the still blowing up. The lone exception is the panel of Sarah in the darkroom, done entirely in shades of red. It's also the panel where she sees the sheriff was right about the gas can, which makes it significant in at least one sense.

It's hard to tell whether the sheriff's little dust-up and the reporter's chat with the mayor happened concurrently or not. I'm guessing they did, which would alibi him for the murders out at the still. Which seems to point the finger back around at his brother, the PTSD-afflicted veteran. I'm still wondering about the drugs the mayor gave his brother, though. Were they to help him sleep, or wind him up? The mayor's clearly still in image control mode.

Metamorpho the Element Man #5, by Al Ewing (writer), Steve Lieber (artist), Lee Loughridge (colorist), Ferran Delgado (letterer) - Nice of Metamorpho to let his guest stars have the more dynamic poses.

The (artificial) Thunderer helpfully explains that stars used to fight for dominance, but the eventual winner of their great contest decreed it was too dangerous to their worlds. So each star would have proxies who could fight in their stead. Of course, the losing star gets destroyed, so I'm not sure how that's an improvement, but the point is, the Orb of Ra is how Earth's Sun empowers its champions.

Metamorpho shows up about then, but even with Urania's help, he seems outclassed, so he retreats. To recruit Element Woman(?) and the dog that got Metamorpho powers in The Terrifics, and then his old enemy Algol shows up. Metamorpho's enemy I mean, not the dog's. Although maybe Muttamorpho's been having super-cool adventures all his own, and we just haven't seen them. It could happen! Of course, the first two aren't happy about being sidelined all this time - the gag about Element Woman not knowing how to turn into lead when the Justice League fought Red Kryptonite Man got a chuckle - but at least Algol understands what's going on. Apparently the instruction manual for being a Solar Champion got thrown out at some point.

Which is too bad, because it would have kept Metamorpho from goofing. Battles between proxies are 1-on-1, so the Thunderer can defeat any of them and claim victory. While this raises the question of why there can be more than one proxy at a time if only one can fight at a time, the important thing is the Thunderer disintegrates Algol's head. At least he didn't hurt the dog.

But now Rex will never have the chance to make things right with Sapphire! I mean, the Sun is doomed! Doomed to be overtaken by the leader of C.Y.C.L.O.P.S., Solaris, the Tyrant Sun. I'm not sure how it was running an evil organization when it needed the Sun to collapse to exist, but I guess intelligent, evil stars can multi-task more efficiently than humans.

Malaya (1949)

John Royer's (Jimmy Stewart) a reporter who made his way back to the U.S. after the start of WWII. Rather than write stories about the local rubber round-ups the kids are doing, he's got a plan to get rubber out of Malaya. Despite the fact it's under Japanese occupation, after they ran the British, Americans, Dutch, and Australians out of the region.

Now, to be accurate, Royer doesn't have a full plan. In fact, he may not even reach the Star-Lord minimum 12% of a plan, because basically all he can say is he needs the help of a particular man. A smuggler named Carnahan (Spencer Tracy), who is currently in prison. More crucially, he's in prison because Royer wrote an article exposing him as a smuggler because, quote, 'a man's gotta eat.'

The movie doesn't do much with that tension, beyond Carnahan punching Royer the first time he sees him. Instead, it quickly hustles them to Malaya, where Carnahan gets in touch with a local tavernkeeper, The Dutchman (Sydney Greenstreet), a local lounge singer of his acquaintance (Valentina Cortese), and a local gun-runner, Roman (Gilbert Roland.) It's matter of Royer and Carnahan negotiating with the three major rubber plantation guys about where they've stashed their rubber, then getting it to a cargo ship, all under the nose of Colonel Tomura (Richard Loo.)

One thing that surprised me was, Greenstreet and Tracy were roughly the same height, Greenstreet maybe even a bit shorter. It's probably just his girth, or maybe how often movies like The Maltese Falcon or Casablanca shot him from a low angle looking up, but I'd always pictured him being much taller. Whereas Tracy I'd figure for being fairly short (apparently he's 5'10"). Standing next to beanpole Jimmy Stewart doesn't help, obviously.

Stewart plays Royer with a surface-level cynicism, masking anger and regret. When he's approached by an FBI agent, or put before naval officials with questions about his "plan", it's all glib remarks and vague comments. But once the plan's actually in motion, he's the impatient and stubborn one, who refuses to abandon the final delivery because he thinks he's got a way around a trap. His younger brother died on Wake Island, and Royer was going to enlist in the Marines if the government didn't decide they liked his plan. So there's an element of guilt and revenge in his actions, which Stewart doesn't overplay. It shows in how he ignores things his instincts should be telling him. Like don't trust information from a guy who just admitted he sold you out.

Tracy gets a more multi-faceted character to play, or he gives Carnahan more facets. He's sometimes angry, sometimes a sweet-talker (mostly around Cortese). Sometimes he's distant (also usually around Cortese), and sometimes he's outright menacing. When they meet with a German rubber plantation owner, Tracy shifts from this quietly affable guy to this not-quite snarling menace. Just a bit of a lean forward, and lowering of the brows, and a harder edge to the voice. You can't miss it, but he's doesn't overplay that, either.

My dad felt they needed Marlene Dietrich for Cortese's role, but I think Dietrich's characters are too street-wise and cagey, at least for how Cortese played it. It's curious, because her character is world-wise and has seen a lot, but loses that around Carnahan. (In discussing it with my dad, I compared her to Lauren Bacall's character in To Have and Have Not.) I thought Cortese did alright with what she was given, but it's mostly to look pretty and swoon over Tracy. Maybe that was just how she played it, but it didn't feel like a meaty role.

The Counterattack Starts Now

Florida Man, accused of attempted cannibalism, says he, "Just wanted to see what all the fuss was about."

One Piece, volume 39. The government kill squad is taking Nico Robin to the judicial island of Ennies Lobby, where she will be found guilty and sent on to either torture and imprisonment, or torture and death. But, the rest of the crew now know she's doing that to try and protect them, so they're not going to let it stand. Sanji already snuck on the train and started causing havoc, and now he's got Franky and Usopp to back him. Well, Franky, maybe, as Usopp bowed out. Only for the mysterious "Sniper King" to turn up moments later. Hailing from Sniper Island (which is located within your heart, so you might want to get that looked at,) he was asked by Mr. Usopp to lend them a hand. This disguise fools absolutely no one. 

Fine, it fools absolutely no one except Luffy and Chopper. Whatever, the point is, a 3-person rescue squad is better than a 2-person rescue squad. While Sanji kicks the crap out of Wanze, a government agent who also fancies himself a cook, and Franky takes on Nero, junior member of CP9, Usopp circumvents all that and makes his way directly to Robin.

Oda doesn't drag either fight out too long, while also playing up the opponents' dangerous and idiotic natures. Wanze's nuts, but he can make essentially an exo-skeleton out of ramen, while also getting furious when Sanji kicks him in the face so hard it makes him look like a pretty boy manga protagonist. 

Meanwhile, Nero has some of the same techniques as Lucci and the others, but he's cocky and unprepared for an opponent who fights dirty. Right off the bat, Franky catches him with the, "What's that behind you?" trick, which sets the tone. Nero keeps thinking he's got the upper hand, and Franky goes along with it, busting out stuff like spitting nails, or the "Franky Centaur", that seem utterly pointless. Until Nero finds himself trapped and about to get clobbered with a big metal fist.

Unfortunately, the rescue attempt fails when the rescuee refuses to be rescued. Robin's trying to protect them from, a Buster Call, essentially an overwhelming bombardment by the Marines. It's what wiped out everyone, except her, on her home island, and she just doesn't see any fighting it. Worse, Franky ends up a prisoner again, so CP9 has the guy with the blueprints for the ancient battleship, and the lady that could find the real deal.

Still, the interesting part of the whole sequence is probably that Usopp, who wouldn't go along with Luffy's decision and left the crew, tells Robin to have faith in Luffy, even as she's walking away with CP9. It speaks to how it wasn't really Luffy's choice to save farewell to their ship that caused Usopp to leave, but his feeling of inadequacy. He was supposed to maintain the Going Merry (with no actual experience, just he was the one that tried), and couldn't. He couldn't protect the money they were going to use to repair Merry. He wasn't good enough, so he left before they could cast him aside. That's also the fate Robin's trying to avoid, albeit for different reasons.

While all that's happening, Luffy and the rest of the crew, plus Franky's gang and some of the shipwrights, are hot on their trail in a more experimental Sea Train. Zoro gets them through a couple of problems - including when two train cars Sanji detached are on the track and Luffy simply orders, "It's in the way. Cut it." - and they pick up Sanji and Us-sorry Sniper King along the way.

A plan is devised as they approach, but plans never survive first contact with Luffy, who promptly slingshots himself into Ennies Lobby and starts fighting everyone he sees. Meanwhile, Franky's gang and the shipwrights are still on the plan of opening the gates so the Straw Hats can charge in and through without wasting a lot of time fighting small fry, but they run into a small problem. Well, two large problems, actually.

Sunday Splash Page #373

"Monkey's Paw," in Munden's Bar Annual #2, by Kim Yale (writer), Hilary Barta (writer/artist/colorist), Willie Schubert (letterer)

Like a freak snowstorm in May, Grim Spring returns without warning!

We didn't talk about Munden's Bar much when discussing GrimJack three years ago, but it was a back-up story that ran most months. Typically, though far from always, more light-hearted than John Gaunt's adventures, and featuring a wide variety of guest artists, writers and stars. First Comics did two annuals, one in 1988 and the other in 1991, each a mixture of stories that ran previously in GrimJack and new stories.

Most Munden's Bar stories fall into two categories: Those that are about the bar and Gordon the bartender or the other regular customers; and those that are really just about having some notable guest-star from a different book show up. To the latter, this annual reprints the story from GrimJack #26 where the Ninja Turtles came to Munden's looking for a spaceship they could hitch a ride on back to Earth (if I remember the results of the annual poll First Comics ran, was the best-selling but least-popular Munden's Bar story that year), and end up first in a brawl, then in a dance contest. But the annual also includes Evan Dorkin having Milk & Cheese show up to wreak havoc, and Kate Worley and Reed Waller include a story where Omaha the Cat Dancer tries to escape a police raid by ducking into the bathroom and comes out in Munden's.

Those stories tend to feel weak, since they boil down to, "Hey, here's this character you might know from entirely different comics!" Not much else to them, and if you don't care about the character in question, the story hangs on nothing. Not always; the back-up in GrimJack #40 would probably fall under this category and I love it. But I tend to prefer the ones that are more about Munden's or Cynosure in general.

The first annual reprints a story - "Doppelgangster," drawn by Jerry Ordway - where a cop, heartbroken that his wife's been cheating on him with a sleazebag, sees said sleazebag murder him in the mirror over the bar. Except the mirror is actually a window to a parallel dimension. So the cop goes looking to avenge "his" murder. The story for the above image was a new one, although the drunk magician, Foody Magicker, is a character that had shown up and caused mayhem a couple of times previously. In this case, he's not even doing magic for free drinks ("tricky, drinky, drinky, tricky" as he puts it in one of those earlier stories.)

It's not included in the annuals, but I was always fond of "Closing Time" (written by John Ostrander and Del Close, drawn by Rich Burchett) from GrimJack #8, which is, as the title implies, what Gordon does to close down the bar every night. It ends with an amusing 4th-wall break that also gets neatly at how inured Gordon is to strange things, from living in this city and tending this particular bar.

Saturday Splash Page #175

"Frank Stein of Mars," in Seven Soldiers: Frankenstein #2, by Grant Morrison (writer), Dough Mahnke (artist), John Kalisz (colorist), Phil Balsman (letterer)

Seven Soldiers of Spring cannot die, but can words on an electronic screen be said to truly live?

Frankenstein starts in 1870, with the monster confronting Melmoth aboard a train. Which ultimately explodes and crashes into a valley. A town grows there, only to be hit by falling trains two more times, until finally, in 2005, Sheeda faeries spawn and latch on to a boy, letting him see into the thoughts of others, and eventually bend them to his will.

And in the midst of that, Frankenstein digs himself out of the ground and sets to killing. And he doesn't really stop killing for the remainder of the mini-series. Issue 2 takes him to Mars, and another confrontation with Melmoth (who is recovering from the thrashing he got from Klarion at the conclusion of his mini-series.) Mars is also where the his "Red Team", the promotion that awaits the kids Klarion briefly ran with, are promoted to. A life of slavery and toil digging through the ruins of some long-dead Martian civilization for the resources to help Melmoth defeat his one-time wife, the Sheeda-Queen.

(Mahnke draws one crumbled statue with a head that generally resembles J'onn J'onzz true form, but otherwise, there's not a lot that resembles what I've seen depicted of the Martians, green or white.)

After that, Frankenstein is roped into working with S.H.A.D.E. a shadowy government agency that deals with weird shit, and whose ranks include the Bride, now with a few additional arms and a wry sense of humor. An attempt to weaponize water (that seems to be Chemo, though never referred to as such), and then a confrontation with the Nebula Man, or Neh-buh-loh, the Huntsman, who Morrison seems to have turned into DC's version of the Cosmic Cube, as his "infant" form is a glowing cube. The adult form, as depicted by Mahnke, is a black shape full of tiny stars (or maybe they're galaxies.) The body has huge muscles, but ridiculously tiny hands, not sure why Mahnke went that route.

The vice of this mini-series would seem to be Wrath. Frankenstein is angry a lot, and unforgiving. He's out for vengeance. He allows Melmoth to escape the "red zombies", only to throw him to a hungry herd of the creature he's riding in the splash page. He knows it won't kill Melmoth (though he later tells the Queen Melmoth is dead) , but he'll still be alive, as dung. But the contrasting virtue is supposedly Patience (according to Wikipedia which attributes it to a couple of people, including Pope Gregory I, so take it or don't), and that's harder to see.

Maybe in the sense that Frankenstein doesn't go to confront the Sheeda Queen directly, but takes the time to sabotage six of her invasion ships first. He does hold off from killing Father Time, the leader of S.H.A.D.E., which would have resulted in being melted with hydrochloric acid darts, leaving him unable to assist in the coming conflict, and S.H.A.D.E. even more unprepared for the Sheeda. He, um, waited to get Melmoth until after the guy probably thought he was safe?

Maybe I'm thinking of it too much as Patience reining in or subsuming Wrath entirely, when it's really about not being controlled by the Wrath rather than eliminating it entirely. But even there, I'm not sure. Because a lot of what comes up in this mini-series seems to be about compromise, or shades of grey morality, and Frankenstein not having it. The kid in the first issue was being controlled by one of the Sheeda fairy, but Frankenstein chucked him through a window and decapitated both of them at the same time. Melmoth is cozying up with various rich asses by promising he can protect them and humanity from his ex-wife. We've already discussed Melmoth's fate, the rich bastards don't do any better.

Did Frankenstein compromise Earth's ability to defend itself? I don't have a lot of faith in Melmoth, let alone the rich shits, but I don't think it even factors momentarily in Frankenstein's thought process. These guys were looking to profit off slavery, so he killed them. End of discussion. He doesn't approve of S.H.A.D.E. trying to weaponize water, then nuking a city to cover up their fuck-up. Enough so he'd rather walk to Tibet and his confrontation with Neh-buh-loh than hitch a ride with them. Of course, the last time he hopped in one of their choppers he got shot in the head and woke up imprisoned, so maybe that's just good common sense.

Frankenstein's not dead, even if he's a bunch of stitched-together dead things, but he's also not exactly alive. He apparently came to be with some help from Melmoth, which makes him cousin to the "Grundy Men" Klarion's people use for labor. Not alive, but not dead. He's a sort of compromise himself, but isn't open to the notion.

The big reveal of the fourth issue, when Frankenstein follows the Sheeda back to their base, is that they're us. Rather, they're what humanity becomes in a billion years. They live on the burned out husk of an Earth that's been cooked by the sun, and then they leap back in time to plunder the resources of the Earth's past.

(Mahnke draws cities beneath the floating "harrower" ships the Sheeda will invade with. At first I thought they were just ruins, which was strange enough. Cities that look like they're from the mid-20th Century or older - brick chimneys and everything - would still exist on that Earth, but it looks like Sheeda still actually live in them. Which makes me wonder how many still live on that world.)

There's no sign the Sheeda ever considered working with their ancestors. That perhaps by preventing past societies from collapsing or ravaging the world, the Sheeda might have better circumstances in their own time. Probably not on Earth, I doubt there's much to do about the Sun growing hotter and larger, but it doesn't seem like humanity ever expanded beyond our birth world here. At least, there's never any mention of humans elsewhere in the galaxy. For the Sheeda it's "see it, take it, have it." Anything else is not even worth considering, and against a force like that, you can't compromise. So maybe that makes Frankenstein the perfect one to fight them.

Random Back Issues #151 - Namor the Sub-Mariner #19

Did some of Byrne's Sensational She-Hulk scripts get mixed in by accident?

We open on Byrne doing a version of racist WWII Namor comics. Weird place to start. Even stranger, it's Jacqueline Crichton (aka the former Invader Spitfire), reading the comics, which Namor apparently has sitting around his skyscraper apartment. No explanation for that is forthcoming. Jacqueline muses on the war before catching a glimpse of herself in the mirror. She got de-aged thanks to a blood transfusion from the original Human Torch, and recalls Namorita's been on her to update her look.

We get a page or her trying on some of Nita's clothes before she's called to deal with a problem in Namor's private office. Not more racist caricatures. Namor's friend Caleb Alexander went in there to confront Desmond Marrs, the corporate shitbag who hoodwinked Namor into giving him control of his company while Namor was away. Jacqueline finds Caleb bleeding and unconscious on the floor.

The news is relayed to Namor, Namorita, Caleb's daughter Carrie, and Desmond's sister. Phoebe insists Caleb must have attacked her brother, which just about gets her a knuckle sandwich (that she'd deserve) from Carrie. They're in the Savage Land, where Super-Skrull was posing as a resurrected Danny Rand and hypnotized Ka-Zar into giving Rand-Meachum rights to strip mine the Savage Land. Super Skrull's gone, but Ka-Zar and Joy Meachum are going forward with the plan.

Namor appoints Jacqueline head of Oracle and tells her to buy up Rand-Meachum. Shanna hitches a ride with Carrie and Phoebe to New York to get her husband, but Namor and Namorita need to stop in Atlantis. Namor's dead wife, Dorma, turned up alive, but mindless. Worse, her tomb is empty.

After a two-page interlude about a "Mr. Smith" buying a secluded house to begin his work of subjugating the animal kingdom (starting with the poor realtor he kills), we return to New York, where Desmond Marrs is running from. . .the Punisher?! Desmond tried to take over Stark Enterprises (I think that during Armor Wars II), and Stark flattened him. Marrs turned to drugs for raising cash, and we all know how Frank Castle feels about drug dealers.

Give Desmond credit, the guy shoots Frank three times in the chest. For some reason, Frank doesn't immediately kill him, instead letting Desmond, well, you can see. If I remember right, Desmond somehow isn't dead, which doesn't seem like the sort of trick you could pull on the Punisher, but oh well.

Back under the sea, Namor and Nita find the cave where Dorma was discovered. It's full of equipment Namor finds familiar, equipment that belongs to Vyrra the Banished. Vyrra actually made more than one clone of Dorma, but none have the woman's mind or personality (though one of them develops some sort of will by the time Jae Lee's drawing the book.) Vyrra was banished by Namor's grandfather for his work, but hoped by giving Namor his wife back, he might be allowed to be buried in Atlantis, as he could only extend his life so far.

Namor's only interested in Dorma's remains, which Vyrra explains have been reduced to several jars of mushy crunchberries. Perhaps reading the room and expecting Namor's about to snap his neck, Vyrra remarks he's glad to see his skills hadn't diminished in the decades since he last used them. Namorita doesn't get it, but when Namor tries to end the conversation, she demands to know. Yep, it's Byrne's, "Nita is a clone of her mother, because hybrids are sterile," explanation on us. Thanks, John.

{7th longbox, 135th comic. Namor the Sub-Mariner #19, by John Byrne (writer/artist/letterer), Glynis Oliver (colorist)}

A Futile Chase

Battle Chasers: Nightwar has the main cast of the comics traveling by airship, when they're attacked by sky pirates and crash land. In the course of finding each other, they figure out there's a) a lot of mana on this island, which is apparently in short supply in the rest of the world, and b) dangerous forces mining it as part of a larger scheme to unleash some terrible horror upon the world. They team up with a guy they meet along the way (hiding a dark backstory, naturally), to try and stop the ancient evil, you know the deal.

Confession: I didn't beat the game. I got to what I think is the penultimate boss, and I could not get past her. The last time I tried, I got her to ~17,000 hit points (she starts ~37,000), and she used some damage shield that also lets her steal your health to replenish hers. By the time my party was dead, she was back to 28,000 hit points. I said nuts to that, and here we are.

It's a turn-based RPG, your party on one side of the battlefield, enemies on the other. I appreciate that the game shows the order characters will perform their actions via a list along the left side of the screen. When you're trying to choose between one of your Skills, if there's a delay before it happens, the screen will show you how soon the Skill will go into effect. So if you're torn between two healing spells - say, an individual spell and a group spell - and one won't go off until after the enemy's next attack, you know that and can plan accordingly.

And it does seem like that sort of planning is necessary, which was not great news for me. I've never been a "min-max" guy. Rather, I'm "attack, attack, attack, attack, oh that guy's low on health, heal, more attacking". This game feels unforgiving to that approach, so I got stomped, a lot. Especially against bosses. Even once I adjusted to more buffing defenses, preemptive heals, and status effect attacks, I found I usually couldn't beat a boss unless my characters were a level or two higher. Which is the problem with the boss I couldn't beat. She's Level 32, but your characters max out at Level 30. 

When not in battle or roaming a dungeon, you traverse the island like it's a game board. The roads have little dots and those dots may contain places you can look for crafting supplies, or shrines that grant boons, or enemies to fight. Eventually you can unlock warp gate things that will let you jump instantly from one section of the island to another, but you have to reach a warp gate on foot first to activate it.

The central hub of the game is a town called Harm's Way. In a development I found extremely annoying, the game only lets you swap party members at the town inn. Characters not in your party gain no experience from battles you fight. Meaning, I'd pursue a lead to a dungeon, fight my way through, and by the time I got back to the inn, half the party were 4 levels stronger than the other half. If I wanted the weaker half to keep up, I'd have to go back through the previous area and level grind, or else risk adding them in as I journeyed to the next area, where they would be woefully outclassed by the new enemies. I'd essentially be fighting shorthanded. Around level 15, I settled on Calibretto/Gully/Monika (healing/defense/poison) as my squad and let the other 3 rot.

(The game's capped so, once you're a certain number of levels stronger than enemies, you no longer gain experience from defeating them, though they still provide crafting supplies. On the other hand, the game gives you the choice of whether you want to fight those "lesser" enemies, or bypass them, as they're presumably intimidated enough not to willingly pick fights.)

Harm's Way has all the various shops you find in these games. A blacksmith for armor and weapons, an enchanter, a guy that sells potions and will let you use his resources to make your own. I did a little crafting and enchanting. Making flasks of resurrection juice, mostly. But I didn't want to bother, so I generally didn't. Probably a bad idea. Gotta make a special armor that neutralizes all status effects or something, I'm sure.

There's also a creepy guy that will accept special coins you find to buy stuff from him, like books that offer perk points (which you use to improve stats like evasion or critical chance, or the amount of damage an attack does), and a lion-woman who will give you hints about special monsters to "hunt" for special rewards. The targets are sometimes silly-looking - the last one is a chatterbox, dapper gentleman skeleton - but were challenging. Completing the hunts doesn't alter the story, but at least gave me a sense of accomplishment. You can also fish at select spots, and there's a shark-man to sell the fish to, who sometimes gives you the coins the creepy guy wants. But then you have to keep getting better lures and rods or you won't catch anything. Sigh.

I sank about 40 hours into the game before deciding to call it. Was it time well spent? Eh, there were times it was enjoyable, but it's definitely not going to crack my list of favorite RPGs, or my list of favorite PS4 games.

Dead Standstill in Summer

July's solicits weren't the worst I've seen since starting this monthly feature. Heck, last July had a total of 3 measly books I ended up buying. But even then, there were 5 others I noted but didn't buy for various reasons (some just didn't show up.) I know my handwriting is small, but I shouldn't be able to fit everything on one line in a spiral notebook.

What's new? Cosmic Lion has two issues of something called Ghostman, who can walk through walls (sure) and conjure weapons at will (???) The new Fantastic Four volume is starting, still written by Ryan North, but drawn by, sigh, Humberto Ramos. Ramos' art has never grown on me, so unless it changed drastically from what I remember when he was drawing Amazing Spider-Man or Champions, that's going to make for some tough sledding.

Guess I can always hope he doesn't last any longer than most artists Marvel announces for new series.

There's another Jeff the Land Shark one-shot, but it's by Jason Loo, and I've sworn him off after Dazzler and Werewolf by Night were such duds.

What's ending? Past Time, and even though it was in last month's solicits, the last issue of Great British Bump-Off. Also, apparently the oversized anniversary issue of Deadpool in June was the end of that book, too. Replaced by Deadpools and Wolverines. Yeesh.

And the rest: Moon Knight: Fist of Khonshu is celebrating Moonie's 250th issue. Hopefully that doesn't mean a cancellation like with Deadpool. The Runaways mini-series will be on issue 2, The Thing on issue 3, Resurrection Man: Quantum Karma on issue 4, Dark Pyramid on issue 5. Sadly, nothing releasing its sixth issue I want, but Batgirl will be up to issue 9. That's like a 6, if you stand on your head!

And that's it. I checked Image's website, still nothing on Dust to Dust past last week's issue. Can't find anything on more Bronze Faces on Boom!'s site, either. No manga caught my eye. Guess I'll have to find something else to do in July. Good thing it's such a pleasant month, weather-wise.

Manhunter (1986)

Will Graham (William Petersen) is a retired FBI profiler, coaxed (or manipulated) out of retirement by a fed buddy (Dennis Farina) to help catch the "Tooth Fairy" killer. The longer the case goes, the more involved Graham becomes, setting himself (and a tabloid reporter) up as targets, and consulting with an old acquaintance, Hannibal Lecktor (Brian Cox.)

I did not realize going in this was an earlier adaptation of the same book as the Ed Norton/Ralph Fiennes Red Dragon. I guess it doesn't make much difference; I've never watched Red Dragon, and I've only seen scattered bits of Silence of the Lambs, so at least I'm not really comparing it to anything.

Cox seems fine as Lektor; there are places where he seems more relaxed, or maybe casual, than I envision Lektor. A part during his face-to-face with Graham where he's in bed with his feet up on the wall in particular, caught my attention. It's not bad, it simply didn't match my impression of the character. And later we get additional context where it makes more sense, that Lektor knows things Graham doesn't, that he's enjoying this for more reasons than we suspect initially.

Petersen's approach to his character, I don't get as much. The talking to himself as he wanders the crime scene, which usually turns to him cursing the unknown killer, calling him a son of a bitch, that I get. He's getting too invested. His promise to just examine evidence is falling to pieces. The part late, where he blows up at Farina for telling him to accept they won't be able to stop the next killing, that made perfect sense. Farina knew him well enough to know how to suck him in, got what he wanted, put Graham's family in danger, and now he's telling Graham to pull back?

What I was curious about was, after learning that Lektor has not only been in contact with this other killer, but has advised him to kill Graham, and hidden Graham's home address in a message run in the tabloid paper, Graham speaks with Lektor on the phone. And he's not angry. He's not even hostile or frustrated, and it just seemed bizarre. For a guy that seems to get so intense so easily, nothing towards Lektor? The guy is locked up, can only use a phone with no dial pad, and still got your address and passed it to a guy who specifically kills families. I'd be at least a little angry, call him a few names, maybe have all his books taken away and burned in front of him, just to be petty.

The movie (and I don't know if this is consistent with the book, or a choice director Michael Mann made) surprised me with how it handled that move by Lektor. It happened about halfway through the movie, and so I expected the second half was going to be Graham waiting at home for the killer to come to him. Instead, he gets his family moved to a secure location, and the movie continues with Graham trying to figure out the killer's mindset. The killer never makes a move towards Graham, we never even see that he considers it. Which was interesting, and frankly, appreciated.

The whole movie revolves around Graham trying to understand the thinking of the serial killer, about what he's doing to himself trying to anticipate the killer and stop him from hurting anyone else. If you make it so he knows the target already, you lose that element. Now Graham can just sit back and wait for the killer to come to him. So, kudos on not going that route.

Come On, Ride That Train

This fucking guy. A coward, a moron, but also a sadist with a massive ego and a huge sense of entitlement. Sure hope he's not going to be a major part of the next 7 volumes!

OK, recap going into One Piece, volume 38: The Straw Hats got their asses beat by government assassins. Robin's turned against them, Usopp (no longer on the crew) and the Going Merry were taken hostage by Franky. Franky, in turn, has been captured by the government assassins, who want the plans to ancient battleship he supposedly has.

The volume wraps up Franky's flashback, showing he somehow survived being run over by a train, and somehow rebuilt himself into a cyborg. When he returned to Water 7, Iceberg gave him the plans for the battleship and told him to change his name and scram. He did the first, but not the second, and now he's a prisoner. Worse, the guy commanding CP9 is the same dickhead that got Franky's mentor arrested in the first place.

Back at Galley-La HQ, Chopper gets himself, Nami, Iceberg and Paulie out of the burning building, and Iceberg explains that Robin is working with CP9 in exchange for the Straw Hats' safety. Leaving two of them to die in a burning building would suggest the promise isn't being kept, but at any rate, Robin's entirely willing to sacrifice herself (and possibly the rest of the world) for this little crew. This is great, because it means the Straw Hats can activate the Power of Friendship to go with the Power of Overcoming Odds! John Cena has nothing on shonen protagonists when it comes to overcoming odds!

But first they've got to find Luffy and Zoro, who were sent flying into the city by Rob Lucci, and do it before the Aqua Laguna inundates most of the city. Nami and Chopper manage it, barely, but the Sea Train's already departed to the Government judicial island, Ennies Lobby. So they've got to find another ship or train and pursue. A train that can't be stopped once it starts is perfect for Luffy.

But Robin has at least one friend aboard, as Sanji snuck aboard, and starts making his way to the front of the train. He finds Franky and Usopp, the latter of whom appears unwilling to help. But Usopp might just put in a call to the mysterious hero, the Sniper King, and see what he can do. . .

Sunday Splash Page #372

"Meltdown," in Ms. Marvel: Mutant Menace #4, by Iman Vellani and Sabir Pirzada (writers), Scott Godlewski (artist), Erick Arciniega (color artist), Joe Caramagna (letterer)

Released last year, but still during the stretch when Krakoa had fallen and the X-Men were back underground (literally, they're hanging out in the sewers like ninja turtles) trying to stop ORCHIS, Mutant Menace takes Kamala back to her Jersey City roots.

Except it's a Jersey City no longer so friendly to Ms. Marvel. Not because HYDRA's using her image to cover for gentrification and a hipster influx, but because she's a mutant. Which feels contrary to how the community was presented in G. Willow Wilson's second volume when the fascists did a takeover of the city and were rounding up anyone with an unusual appearance, but it's a different era. And since Bruno's the only one who knows Kamala a) is Ms. Marvel, and b) died and was resurrected, she has to deal with her other friends calling Ms. Marvel a traitor.

Granted, Nakia was already doing that back in the HYDRA gentrification scheme (and we never got any sort of resolution between her and Kamala over that, nor will we have any sort of revelation/conversation here), so maybe Nakia is just one of those folks who loves to judge others. Actually, I'm pretty sure she's definitely one of those folks. To be fair, it's fun to be judgemental.

So as Kamala tries to spend time with her friends and family, and protect a Jersey City that (mostly) hates and fears her, she's having weird seizures, which former Copperhead artist Scott Godlewski initially draws like someone is exploding her from the inside. Eventually it gets to the mess you see up there.

(The cure ultimately hinges on the fact Krakoa neglected a particular ingredient when they brought her back from the dead. Because they weren't big on working with others.)

The other, more external, problem is Dr. Nitika, still interested in Ms. Marvel for reasons that are finally revealed. She also got ORCHIS to ship her some X-Men corpses, which she reanimates and has attack Jersey City. This culminates in using Kamala's original body, but with the mutant (and MCU-compliant) powers activated, in addition to Kamala's abilities, to prove some point about how Kamala should let Nitika use the mutant ability to "help" people. Honestly, the goal and method of approach don't mesh at all, which Kamala points out, but it's still a weak point. And because people in the Marvel Universe are dumbasses, the Ms. Marvel in the X-Men outfit protecting them from the shambling undead in the classic outfit means no Ms. Marvel can be trusted.

Still and all, Vellani and Pirzada have the character down. Kamala wants to help people, to the point it frustrates her when the X-Men encourage her to go to school and not put herself at risk going on missions with them (Deadpool says they should let her fight, but he's Deadpool. Do not take child raising advice from him.) When she catches a mutant robbing a jewelry store, she first offers to help him hide from ORCHIS if he just returns the jewels, and when he gets targeted by the Hordeculture, she helps him escape, but puts herself at risk. That her friends and family unknowingly hate her, that people got hurt because a crazy scientist targeted her, it hurts her.

Godlewski draws issues 1, 3, and 4. His work is much smoother here than it was in Copperhead, but this is a much smoother, brighter book, even with the reanimated corpses and whatnot. I like his hodgepodge design for "The Planter", there's a nifty couple of pages when Kamala and the Red Dagger fight a trio of re-animated X-Men.

The one weak point is the second issue, where Kamala is abruptly pulled away from fighting the Hordeculture to hep Lila Cheney rescue some of her fans from some weird set-up Mojo's got running. Kamala gets to play distraction by letting Mojo put her in all sorts of commercials and goofy shit, and when it's over, she's back in Jersey City and hey! Red Dagger is here! I guess he caught a commercial flight? It really doesn't feel like it has anything to do with the other 3 issues, beyond the notion Kamala was briefly, superficially, popular while pretending to be something, while people seem to hate her the more she embraces all the parts of herself (i.e., not hiding her mutant heritage.)

Even allowing for that, it felt pointless and irritating (and I'm not even a person that necessarily hates Mojo, though most writers sand his edges off too much from Nocenti's more vicious conception) and just a page-filler until, I don't know, Godlewski could get enough lead time to finish the remaining two issues.

Saturday Splash Page #174

"Solid Brass," in Seven Soldiers: Bulleteer #1, by Grant Morrison (writer), Yanick Paquette (penciler), Michael Bair (inker), Alex Sinclair (colorist), Phil Balsman (letterer)

Seven Soldiers of Spring wants to know if you believe you can fly? No? That's OK, neither can the lead of this week's entry.

Alex Harrower taught autistic kids, while her husband was a scientist trying to perfect a super-hard alloy, a "smartskin" that would make a subject indestructible. More critical from his perspective, it would make that person a superhero, so they could hang out with other (hot) superheroes, and it would keep them young forever.

Alex didn't see the appeal, but in one of life's curious twists, Lance testing the alloy on himself kills him, but when he infects Alex, she comes out of it fine. At least, that's how Lance and everyone else sees it. Alex sees she lost her husband (and learns he was spending a lot of time on x-rated sites with "teen" superheroines), lost her job (the kids freaked out because they thought she was a robot), and is stuck with this skin that she can't take off, hide or be otherwise rid of, which prevents her from killing herself (her attempt ends with her saving a bunch of people from a trainwreck instead.)

After that, it's Alex trying to pay bills and find her footing within the strange world of superheroics. It's almost an isekai manga, the character from "our" world dying and landing in some fantasy world. Except a lot of those involve people who understand the rules of the fantasy world and can exploit their special gifts to break the game, so to speak. Alex is the person who gets dumped into a fictional world she knows nothing about.

She turns down an offer she sees in a paper to join a group of superheroes for a mission out west. This turns out to be Vigilante's attempt to recruit a team to finish what he and the 1940s Seven Soldiers started (meaning Alex gained her powers prior to Seven Soldiers of Victory #0.) Instead, in issue 2 Alex acts as muscle for an FBI agent investigating Saunders' subsequent death out there. Agent Helligan was also the one brought in to question Sir Justin in Shining Knight #3, after she surrendered to the cops. Helligan is dying from the bite she received from the Sheeda-Queen at that point, but has Alex carry her to her sister's wedding to stop it. Turns out the groom is a werewolf.

(Helligan mentioned in Shining Knight the wedding was 'tomorrow', so this takes place the day after, yet the world Paquette draws does not appear to have descended into chaos. I mean, there's traffic, but it's not, "oh my god, run from the monsters emerging from the flying castle" terrified traffic, so it must be before the final issue of Manhattan Guardian. Helligan also used something she lifted from a museum of superhero memorabilia in an interrogation, and mentions the stealing of a subterranean digging machine gave her cover to do it. The theft was by Klarion and the other "Deviants" in issue 3 of his mini-series.)

Issue 3 finds Alex at a convention, populated by z-list heroes (and Booster Gold), acting as bodyguard for a mermaid. There's a panel of women heroes that includes original Newsboy Army member Lil' Hollywood, who learns from one of the attendees about Vincenzo (Lil' Scarface's) death at the end of Shining Knight, so we're somewhere past issue 4 of that. Alex is targeted by the newest Spyder, who was also recruited by Vigilante (possibly to give the family name a chance at redemption after the 1940s version betrayed them in their battle with Nebulon?), but has apparently changed sides.

Except the guy misses. Some archer. Also, Paquette's version of Nebulon must have the least amount of stars of any version we see across these mini-series. He's mostly a big purple guy with curling goat horns and three ellipsoid red eyes, and a few stars peeking through in the shadows of his body. Not impressive, but if you took it as us seeing the footage through Alex's perspective, maybe she's not immersed deeply enough in superheroics to see the true nature of the beast, so to speak.

Alex also took in a young art student as a renter to help pay bills, but this turns out to be "Sally Sonic," teen superhero turned super-villain (by some vengeful British criminal) turned x-rated camera girl. She was the one carrying on a virtual affair with Lance, and didn't appreciate Alex trying to track her down. They fight, but Alex really wants no part of it. She doesn't want revenge, doesn't want to hear Sally's "sob story", doesn't want to have a knockdown, drag-out super-brawl like all the boys love to see two girls do. She never wanted in the costumed world, never wanted the "immortality" that seems to come with being a superhero like Lance did. She tried to make the best of the hand she was dealt. And now she wants out.

The vice pretty clearly seems to be Lust, though not strictly in the sense of wanting to fuck or whatever. Though there's plenty of that. Practically everyone in costume except Alex seems perpetually horny. Morrison has Mind-Grabber Kid (from this issue of Justice League of America) at the same convention as Alex in issue 3, hoping to win "Comeback Hero of the Year" (he loses to Aquaman, who shaved his beard.) Mind-Grabber Kid plays the helpful veteran to Alex, but he also seems pretty clearly to be trying to get with her, when he isn't encouraging her to open her bustier as fans swarm her or whining about how he could totally use his powers to make girls sleep with him, but doesn't.

But it seems to really be a lust for youth, or fear of mortality/aging. Alex is only 27, but Lance mentions she has lines on her face she didn't used to. He's frequenting sites of teen heroes, who will supposedly be young and hot forever. As it turns out, Sally Sonic is actually decades old, but her body stopped aging as a teen (in the superhero comic version of a teen, who looks like a supermodel.) So that's what everyone treated her as, and it seems she never learned not to trust people until it was too late. Falls in with an older guy pretending to be a hero, he encourages her to give him what he wants, when she balks, he uses 'Doctor Hyde's Evil Serum,' to get her personality more in line with his interests.

Paquette leans into the cheesecake. The very first page is Alex standing in front of a mirror is lacy underwear, positioned so we can see her chest and her ass simultaneously. She spends a lot of time walking around her apartment in a t-shirt that stops above the navel and underwear that rides high. Her shirt does not survive her saving people from the train. When she and Sally fight, it sure seems like their movements and the POV are set so butts are in the center of focus, and things are shaded or colored so that it might seem like they're wearing less than they really are.

I mean, without even getting into the phallic aspect of that helmet, there's no reason for Bulleteer to be up on her toes in the splash page, right? She's not actually wearing heels, but it shows her off. Here she is, perfect as polished steel. No blemishes, no defects, can't be harmed, scarred, altered from how she is. Untouched by aging forever more. It's what people want to be - the first issue mentions there are lots of cases of people admitted to hospitals after trying to give themselves powers, and the medical staff hate dealing with it - or want to have.

But not Alex. The bullet that didn't ask to be cast, and refuses to be fired. The opposing virtue to Lust is Chastity. As mentioned, Alex isn't interested in fucking anyone, but chastity can also mean purity in conduct and intention. Alex tries to help people, tries to understand. As the Spyder notes from his observations, she listens. She doesn't succumb to Mind-Grabber Kid's come-ons, but she'll encourage him to help her track down the woman her husband was talking to online. They can have a "team-up", a real one like superheroes do. She helps Agent Helligan keep her sister from marrying that werewolf, even though that probably wasn't what she was paid to do, and it pains her that Helligan dies after. The fact 'monster hunters' showed up to corral the groom-to-be hardly registers with her. It's the person who died that concerns her.

She doesn't want revenge on Sally, just to ask why she went after Lance, and once the fight is over, she calls the ambulances to get medical help for both of them. She's not acting out of revenge, or spite, or ego. She does certain work to pay the bills, but she tries to protect people when they're in danger. Which sounds like purity of conduct to me.

Random Back Issues #150 - Scout #8

Nobody likes a know-it-all chipmunk.

Scout, aka Emilio Santana, has killed the 4 spirits he was tasked to kill. Unfortunately, the last one was President of what passes for the United States. So he's spent the last six months laying low in the desert Southwest, accompanied by a gahn (a guiding spirit) in the form of a chipmunk. But Scout's tired of living on roots, sorrel and seeds, and healed up enough to hunt.

Gahn guarantees they'll find something today, though Scout's dubious they're going to locate any food scaling a mesa. Well, he finds two figures waiting for him, but I'm not sure you'd want to eat either of 'em. One he calls "The Clown," the other "The Godeh." The Godeh reminds Santana when he stoned the kitten of a little girl as a child. The girl's mother promised they'd get him some day. Certainly took their asses long enough.

But Scout's got guns, and that seems to be enough, although Gahn remarks they're only dead, 'if you want them to be, Santana.' Out of bullets, or at least needing time to reload, Scout's attacked by a sort of wolf creature that flings him around while speaking in riddles. It hates him, it loves him. It wouldn't be there if he didn't know what it was. It hurt him most when he couldn't see it, but when he can't see it, it won't be a danger to him any longer.

They seem to merge, it takes Santana's form, then vanishes. Gahn explains Scout needed to see the next monster he'll have to kill: the one inside himself. I don't think Scout has much luck with that, but maybe I'm remembering the plot wrong. Either, he'll have to handle it alone, as Gahn's job is now done. It departs, telling Santana he's a lousy cook but that there's a jackrabbit in the rocks below that'll make a good dinner. Also, he'll have company in the morning.

The company is Doody, a blind young man Santana met earlier in his quest. Doody has, in the span of 4 months, become a prophet, traveling and speaking the word of the good books. By which I mean the Lord of the Rings. Thanking Santana for sharing his breakfast and the location of a water source, Doody and his large horde of followers continue on their way.

There's also a couple of pages of a subplot where an Israeli special ambassador briefly meets with the newly-elected President Carver about Israel offering aid to the U.S. Carver's intrigued, but her vice-president (and religious wackjob who worked for the previous president, who Santana killed) Bill Loper is against it. The U.S. doesn't need any help! Certainly not in digging its own grave. Either way, Ambassador Glanzman isn't bothered by the tirade and says the offer still stands. He'll pop up a lot in later issues.

{9th longbox, 54th comic. Scout #8, by Tim Truman (writer/artist), Sam Parsons (painter), Tim Harkins (letterer)}