wktf
01-29-2009, 11:10 AM
Dawg's Reviews
First of all Joe, is absolutely right in designating his pick of the week to New Avengers #49 (see his reviews below) Unfortunately teaching my class ran long last night and I was only able to thoroughly read 1 book, but from skimming Avengers, I can tell you there are major fireworks coming...
X-Force #111
Marvel Comics
Written by: Craig Kyle/ Chris Yost
Drawn by: Clayton Crain / Alina Urusov
So what happens when Cyclops black ops/ wet work squad all come back together after a mission? Well, they find out that they have another one to go on. Last issue Warpath discovered that someone had desecrated his tribal burial grounds and was using old magic with the wrong sort of intentions. This person goes by the name of Eli Bard.
With a little help from Ghost Rider Warpath was able to discern this information as well as figure out Eli Bards’s history. Eli Bard was aligned with the purifiers that went round and round with the New X-Men as well as X-Force during their first mission.
It turns out however that Eli Bard has been around since Ancient Rome and has been trying his best to have his immortal Queen forgive him and love him. All of the evil ole Eli has been working on throughout the hundreds of years of his life has been all about winning back the favor of his love.
As luck would have it… Eli Bard’s great love is none other than Selene, whom everyone knows as the immortal and vampiric Black Queen of the Hellfire club.
It turns out that Eli is running around working on his newest scheme and that is dead mutant resurrection. Selene is after souls and Eli has decided to provide her with more than mere human souls… he will give her thousands of dead mutant souls that will make her not unlike a god when she absorbs their energies.
This issue is all about the fill-in / arc set up to what is coming next.
You could look at it two ways…
It’s a fill in issue with different art in the flash backs… bah!
It’s the first part of a new arc and while theirs different art for the flash backs, it seems pretty well done.
I choose to go with the latter and I really found the issue right up there with the other quality stories that both Yost and Kyle have given us. At some point we needed to learn who in the blue hell this Eli Bard cat was and now we do, while at the same time we bring out team a much needed moment of down time before their inevitable killing spree continues.
This continues to be a great book and in my opinion this book should continue to be lauded.
Wktf’s Reviews
This only rarely happens, but my pick of the week isn’t even a book I’m reviewing. Nope, that honor goes to New Avengers #49, despite my not being a big fan of Billy Tan’s artwork. Hat’s off both to Luke Cage and Clint Barton for giving readers the visceral raw emotion to just suck you right into this story. You can practically taste Luke’s desperation, fury and joy, and likewise with Clint’s pure, raw anger. Next month’s “fiftieth double-sized anniversary issue” promises to, indeed, be an “Avengers Battle Royale.”
Final Crisis #7
DC Comics
Written by: Grant Morrisn
Drawn by: Doug Mahnke
Cover by: JG Jones
I’m not sure I even should be writing this review, or why I’ve continued buying this series. I will say that this issue does have a big, epic feel to it. But if you were to ask me what happens, why or how it happens, I just wouldn’t know what to tell you. Nearly every page of this issue feels disjointed from the pages that came before it, just as nearly every issue feels so from the ones that come before or after. Also, if this issue proves nothing it proves that you really need to be up on the Final Crisis spin off titles, and Superman Beyond in particular, for this even to make a modicum of sense. There’s simply no way to make sense of Lois’ and Perry’s complete recoveries from near death or, for that matter, the last minute villain appearance without doing so.
And so many questions are just left sitting there. This is “Final” Crisis, how exactly? The final fate of the Monitors? The end of the Fourth World (is this a big deal, considering the Fifth World is being created?)? Arthur of Atlantis is back? How’d this happen? Yeah, we saw Barry Allen come back but how was this possible? Lois is going into an ice cube? And Batman? Don’t get me started. He sure seems like he is but I guess he really isn’t.
I thought reading comic books was supposed to be fun, not give you a headache or make you feel stupid. I’ve been reading the DCU since the early 1960s and I feel like I need a reference guide for all the characters that showed up in this issue and those that came before it. This story has been like one big academic or intellectual exercise instead of storytelling magic or enjoyment. Secret Invasion had tense moments, and even a high profile death, but it was fun overall to read. The tension, in fact, made it fun. Not so here. From beginning to end I’d rate this series an unmitigated disaster and an unfair exercise for DC’s readers to have to endure.
Captain America #46
Marvel Comics
Written by: Ed Brubaker
Drawn by: Steve Epting
Cover by: Steve Epting
Hell, yeah! Steve Epting returns to this book and his artwork is as powerful and cinematic as ever. Hot on the heels of the last story arc, Bucky…I mean Cap…has teamed up with none other than his former Invaders ally, Prince Namor the Sub-Mariner, on a trip to China to track down Professor Zhang Chin, the 12 year old super genius he rescued with the Invaders back in 1942 and whom he later once tried to kill as the Soviet puppet Winter Soldier in 1968. And it was during that failed operation as Winter Soldier, though, that Bucky committed a heinous crime against Chin that’s still wreaking havoc on his conscience. So much so that he’s keeping this part of his past secret from the new love in his life, the beauteous Black Widow.
But, as if that’s not enough, that’s not all that’s plaguing him. Chin, with the enigmatic and ethereal help of the Man With No Face, absconded the remains of Bucky’s other war time friend, The Original Human Torch. And why? To fashion the Torch into some kind of weapon. As Bucky tells us, “Old Friends Mattter.” I don’t know if this story is how Bru is going to bring back the Original Human Torch who last was truly active back in John Byrne’s West Coast Avengers, even though he’s been seen since then, but one can only hope. With Bru and Epting back together we’re given the same storytelling magic that’s made this book a top seller and earned this title and author the Eisner Award. Especially during Cap and Namor’s entering China we get some serious butt kicking and brutal shield slinging. Seriously, that final blow with Cap’s shield is just brutal.
Captain America, The Sub-Mariner and the Original Human Torch. Together again only not anywhere nearly like they were before. This was a fun story and it’s only the first of a three-parter! If not for New Avengers I’d have made this comic my pick of the week.
Daredevil #115
Marvel Comics
Written by: Ed Brubaker
Drawn by: Michael Lark
Cover by: Marko Djurdjevic
With this issue the Lady Bullseye story arc comes to an end. With his friends The Tarantula and White Tiger murdered and turned to The Hand by Lady Bullseye, his wife removed from a psychiatric hospital and now in her parents’ custody, and his extra-marital affair with Dakota North plaguing his conscience, he’s in no shape to take on the Hand minions who were waiting for him in his brownstone at the end of last issue. Fortunately Iron Fist and Master Izo, the centuries old blind sensei who apparently trained DD’s mentor, Stick, are on the case. Within moments of DD about to get his head handed to him these two come crashing through his window and some major kung-fu ninja action is on!
But Lady Bullseye, supposedly serving the Hand’s master Hirochi actually has designs of her own on Matt and those designs, designs in The Hand’s best interest and shocking indeed to long time DD readers, finally are made clear in this issue. Matt’s pretty stunned by them, too. So much so he actually has to stop fighting to take it all in. Of all the Daredevil stories of the last few decades this one may be the truest to Frank Miller’s Daredevil legacy. All the freakin’ ninjas certainly make it feel this way. Bru is completely on the ball with his Daredevil work, largely unsung and even overlooked in the shadow of his higher profile Cap and Criminal writing. But he and Lark make as awesome a team on this book as he does with Steve Epting on Cap. While this arc, and this new villain, may not be as intense as those he’s done before hand, it’s still top notch compared to most other comics out there and, for those who love the character, its vintage DD yet with all kinds of new twists. I especially like Lark’s artwork on DD. He brings the same gritty street feeling he did with Bru on Gotham Central. And, if you can’t get enough of traditional Miller DD villains, delivered with Bru’s special brand of storytelling, be sure to check out next month’s “Return of the King!” tale. I don’t know what this team has in store but it won’t be same old same old.
Sam Wilson’s Reviews
Unknown Soldier #4
DC/Vertigo
Written by: Joshua Dysart
Drawn by: Alberto Ponticelli
For the most part the character of the Unknown Soldier has been a mystery to me. Never read the Joe Kubert drawn series back in the day, I never really read anything about the character until the mid-1990’s when I picked up the Garth Ennis limited series Vertigo put out during Ennis’s “Preacher” heyday. I loved that series, absolutely brutal and Ennis’s style lent itself very well to the immoral soldier. When I heard about the new series, again being put out by Vertigo, I was interested. Would it be like the Ennis series? What would the take be? Brutal? Political? Comic book standard (fat chance with that, but you never know)? One thing I will say, this new take on the character is not for everyone. Most fanboys like their action, big titties and mindless entertainment that must remain in-continuity and not force you to think of any other adjective other than “awesome” or “sweet”. If you think “Civil House of Secret Invasion” or “Infinite Final Crisis on Several Earth’s” is where it’s at and you’ve never read a Vertigo Book before the new “Unknown Soldier” isn’t for you. If you were a big fan of books like “Preacher”, “Y the Last Man” and “The Losers” then “Unknown Soldier” won’t disappoint. Anyway, on to the specifics…
In the first issue we are introduced to our protagonist, Dr. Lwanga Moses. The Dr. Moses was born in Uganda to parents who relocated to the United States when he was seven years old. This happened in 1978; Idi Amin was just ousted from power and the country plunged into civil war and Uganda soon became one of the poorest nations in the world. Meanwhile, Lwanga Moses goes to Harvard medical school and returns to Uganda as an adult. It’s now Uganda 2002, with his wife Sera in tow Dr. Moses opens up a clinic in a refugee zone (Uganda has one of the highest populations of displaced people in the world) and soon finds himself in the !%&!%&!%&!%&. Rampant disease, children with war injuries, Dr. Moses is in a living nightmare. A pacifist, Moses believes the only way Uganda will ever solve its problems is if Ugandans work to solve them, not the UN, not celebrities, not the US, Ugandans. The good Doctor is taking the first step by jumping neck deep in the !%&!%&!%&!%& and trying to do him some good, but the stress may be getting to him. He finds himself having nightmares, about killing his wife in a most heinous manner. Soon enough he finds himself staring such violence in the face. A kid shows up at his clinic with a head wound saying armed rebels attacked him and took his sister. Without thinking Dr. Moses rushes out to the jungle and finds the child, but finds himself surrounded by armed children. Almost-teens who can’t read but know how to work an AK-47. A voice commands the Dr. to take out the children, killing all of them. It’s almost more than the Dr. can take, and the voice keeps talking to him, telling him he now has the combat skills to punish those who profit from human misery, the untouchables who make the world a horrible place. Dr. Moses snaps and cuts up his own face with a jagged rock he finds on the ground and collapses in a heap with the bodies of the children he just killed. Not the man he thought he was when he woke up in the morning, the good Dr’s transformation continues in the second issue.
Dr. Moses wakes up to find himself naked and in a missionary house. Some young refugees came upon his person and rolled him for all of his money and possessions and left him for dead. The scary voice telling him how to kill people has gone away, but Moses finds himself lying about who he is and in a state of shock. Meanwhile, the CIA have taken an interest in finding the missing Dr. and have enlisted a senior agent by the name of Jack Lee Howl. More Gary Busey than Jack Ryan, Howl finds himself reluctantly on board not so much because he is ordered to but because he is blackmailed into compliance. Meanwhile Dr. Moses and his newfound saviors soon find themselves under attack by more teenaged rebels. Moses looks for answers from god but all he gets is the voice, talking him through combat instilling him with a killing lust he has never had before in his life, which brings us to issue three. In the wake of the attack, Dr. Moses finds himself captured by the teenaged rebels and forced to meet their leader, who thinks Dr. Moses is a priest (the nuns dressed him like one) and seeks his approval to bless his war. More harsh Ugandan realities come to light that are flat out horrible, disgusting and highly disturbing but unfortunately reality in some places in the world and Dr. Moses is forced to deal with these realities most unlike a Dr, substituting a stethoscope for some land mines. Our story continues in issue four with CIA Agent Howl on Dr. Moses’s trail. Meanwhile, the rebels catch up with Dr. Moses, but not before the Ugandan military does and needless to say a massive gunfight ensues. All this and the voice in Dr. Moses’s head that is telling him how to fight may slowly be driving him mad as well…
Yes, I’m a big fan of this book. Only four issues in there are still a lot of questions to be asked, but I want to ask them and I want to know how this is going to play out. A lot of people will be turned off by the politics; this book is not a straight actioneer by any means and that’s a good thing (check out Josh Dysart’s “Brief History of Uganda” in the letter page of this issue). If you aren’t ready for that then pick up the latest issue of Batman RIP. If “DMZ” and “Scalped” are more your thing than this book is a welcome addition to your pull list. My pick of the week, hands down.
Punisher War Zone #6 (of 6)
Marvel Knights
Written by: Garth Ennis
Drawn by: Steve Dillon
Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon, to a legion of fans they are the peanut butter and chocolate of comic books. I first became a fan of theirs with their run on Vertigo’s “Hellblazer”, and of course I became a die-hard worshiper with their legendary title “Preacher”. Probably the smartest thing Marvel Comics ever did during the Bill Hemas reign, Axel Alonso, new editor at Marvel Knights, brought Garth and Steve in (as he did for Vertigo) to bring the Punisher back to his ‘80’s prominence, and bring him back they did with “Welcome Back Frank”, a mad storyline for the ages where Garth showed Frank Castle for who is us, an unrelenting stone cold killer who truly gives a flying rats fu$# about anything other than his war to punish the guilty. And punish the guilty he did, making a lifelong adversary of mob boss Ma Gnucci. Yeah, under Garth’s pen Frank made her a paraplegic and bald (hey, he did Herr Starr worse) and now she’s back for one last hurrah to pay Frank back for what he did to her. Somehow I don’t think that’s going to happen and Frank is going to fu$# her up even worse and kill a sh$#load of people doing it, but hey, with Garth and Steve running the show I’m in.
“War Zone” started in typical Ennis fashion, a low level goodfella is about to get whacked because he let the bosses son get his c$#k ripped off by an escaped monkey at the zoo and then eaten by a vulture (no, seriously). Frank Castle saves the poor sap from execution via shotgun to turn the guy into his personal inside man in La Costa Nostra. Frank isn’t happy because he has heard rumors of a Gnucci family resurgence; apparently they have an Italian side that wants to make their name in the US. Yes, last we saw Ma Gnucci Frank had killed all her men and allowed her to be rendered limbless by a giant grizzly and then burnt alive in her own house. Meanwhile, Lt. Von Richthoffen (superhot lesbian), previously assigned to bring in Frank Castle, finds herself unlucky in love and possibly loosing her mind. It only guess worse when her sometime lover, who has a boyfriend, finds all of her potential suitors being the victims of a viscous scorned-lover ass whuppin. Meanwhile, “the Elite” (vigilante crazy from the first Ennis Punisher series, whom Frank Killed) has a kid, and he dreams of killing Frank. As our story continues Frank Kills a sh$#load of mob guys at a cookout, Lt. Von Richthoffen (possibly one of my favorite Ennis characters ever) shows how much of a psychotic, possessive bad ass she is (the random scenes with her girlfriend and her boyfriend are priceless) and Ma Gnucci is probably a clone, made by that “Elite” guy who has a serious revenge issue with Frank that will probably be his undoing. As last issue came to a close Frank and Lt. Von Richthoffen found themselves holed up and surrounded by a sh$#-ton of mob guys and the Elite, getting ready to go down in total John Woo fashion. And yeah, holy sh#t, they do. Frank and his newfound warrior bi$h-queen (you really need to read the last issue to understand that comment) blow the fu$# out of a ton of people. Word.
Classic Ennis, and I’m damn happy with that. Quirky (and fairly twisted) supporting characters, extreme sadism and Frank freakin’ Castle with a big ass shotgun. What more could you possible want? I know, make the series weekly, which it is. Word. I’m in for the series, in for the eventual hardcover (just solicited in this months previews by the way), and down anytime Garth and Steve want to write the Punisher…
First of all Joe, is absolutely right in designating his pick of the week to New Avengers #49 (see his reviews below) Unfortunately teaching my class ran long last night and I was only able to thoroughly read 1 book, but from skimming Avengers, I can tell you there are major fireworks coming...
X-Force #111
Marvel Comics
Written by: Craig Kyle/ Chris Yost
Drawn by: Clayton Crain / Alina Urusov
So what happens when Cyclops black ops/ wet work squad all come back together after a mission? Well, they find out that they have another one to go on. Last issue Warpath discovered that someone had desecrated his tribal burial grounds and was using old magic with the wrong sort of intentions. This person goes by the name of Eli Bard.
With a little help from Ghost Rider Warpath was able to discern this information as well as figure out Eli Bards’s history. Eli Bard was aligned with the purifiers that went round and round with the New X-Men as well as X-Force during their first mission.
It turns out however that Eli Bard has been around since Ancient Rome and has been trying his best to have his immortal Queen forgive him and love him. All of the evil ole Eli has been working on throughout the hundreds of years of his life has been all about winning back the favor of his love.
As luck would have it… Eli Bard’s great love is none other than Selene, whom everyone knows as the immortal and vampiric Black Queen of the Hellfire club.
It turns out that Eli is running around working on his newest scheme and that is dead mutant resurrection. Selene is after souls and Eli has decided to provide her with more than mere human souls… he will give her thousands of dead mutant souls that will make her not unlike a god when she absorbs their energies.
This issue is all about the fill-in / arc set up to what is coming next.
You could look at it two ways…
It’s a fill in issue with different art in the flash backs… bah!
It’s the first part of a new arc and while theirs different art for the flash backs, it seems pretty well done.
I choose to go with the latter and I really found the issue right up there with the other quality stories that both Yost and Kyle have given us. At some point we needed to learn who in the blue hell this Eli Bard cat was and now we do, while at the same time we bring out team a much needed moment of down time before their inevitable killing spree continues.
This continues to be a great book and in my opinion this book should continue to be lauded.
Wktf’s Reviews
This only rarely happens, but my pick of the week isn’t even a book I’m reviewing. Nope, that honor goes to New Avengers #49, despite my not being a big fan of Billy Tan’s artwork. Hat’s off both to Luke Cage and Clint Barton for giving readers the visceral raw emotion to just suck you right into this story. You can practically taste Luke’s desperation, fury and joy, and likewise with Clint’s pure, raw anger. Next month’s “fiftieth double-sized anniversary issue” promises to, indeed, be an “Avengers Battle Royale.”
Final Crisis #7
DC Comics
Written by: Grant Morrisn
Drawn by: Doug Mahnke
Cover by: JG Jones
I’m not sure I even should be writing this review, or why I’ve continued buying this series. I will say that this issue does have a big, epic feel to it. But if you were to ask me what happens, why or how it happens, I just wouldn’t know what to tell you. Nearly every page of this issue feels disjointed from the pages that came before it, just as nearly every issue feels so from the ones that come before or after. Also, if this issue proves nothing it proves that you really need to be up on the Final Crisis spin off titles, and Superman Beyond in particular, for this even to make a modicum of sense. There’s simply no way to make sense of Lois’ and Perry’s complete recoveries from near death or, for that matter, the last minute villain appearance without doing so.
And so many questions are just left sitting there. This is “Final” Crisis, how exactly? The final fate of the Monitors? The end of the Fourth World (is this a big deal, considering the Fifth World is being created?)? Arthur of Atlantis is back? How’d this happen? Yeah, we saw Barry Allen come back but how was this possible? Lois is going into an ice cube? And Batman? Don’t get me started. He sure seems like he is but I guess he really isn’t.
I thought reading comic books was supposed to be fun, not give you a headache or make you feel stupid. I’ve been reading the DCU since the early 1960s and I feel like I need a reference guide for all the characters that showed up in this issue and those that came before it. This story has been like one big academic or intellectual exercise instead of storytelling magic or enjoyment. Secret Invasion had tense moments, and even a high profile death, but it was fun overall to read. The tension, in fact, made it fun. Not so here. From beginning to end I’d rate this series an unmitigated disaster and an unfair exercise for DC’s readers to have to endure.
Captain America #46
Marvel Comics
Written by: Ed Brubaker
Drawn by: Steve Epting
Cover by: Steve Epting
Hell, yeah! Steve Epting returns to this book and his artwork is as powerful and cinematic as ever. Hot on the heels of the last story arc, Bucky…I mean Cap…has teamed up with none other than his former Invaders ally, Prince Namor the Sub-Mariner, on a trip to China to track down Professor Zhang Chin, the 12 year old super genius he rescued with the Invaders back in 1942 and whom he later once tried to kill as the Soviet puppet Winter Soldier in 1968. And it was during that failed operation as Winter Soldier, though, that Bucky committed a heinous crime against Chin that’s still wreaking havoc on his conscience. So much so that he’s keeping this part of his past secret from the new love in his life, the beauteous Black Widow.
But, as if that’s not enough, that’s not all that’s plaguing him. Chin, with the enigmatic and ethereal help of the Man With No Face, absconded the remains of Bucky’s other war time friend, The Original Human Torch. And why? To fashion the Torch into some kind of weapon. As Bucky tells us, “Old Friends Mattter.” I don’t know if this story is how Bru is going to bring back the Original Human Torch who last was truly active back in John Byrne’s West Coast Avengers, even though he’s been seen since then, but one can only hope. With Bru and Epting back together we’re given the same storytelling magic that’s made this book a top seller and earned this title and author the Eisner Award. Especially during Cap and Namor’s entering China we get some serious butt kicking and brutal shield slinging. Seriously, that final blow with Cap’s shield is just brutal.
Captain America, The Sub-Mariner and the Original Human Torch. Together again only not anywhere nearly like they were before. This was a fun story and it’s only the first of a three-parter! If not for New Avengers I’d have made this comic my pick of the week.
Daredevil #115
Marvel Comics
Written by: Ed Brubaker
Drawn by: Michael Lark
Cover by: Marko Djurdjevic
With this issue the Lady Bullseye story arc comes to an end. With his friends The Tarantula and White Tiger murdered and turned to The Hand by Lady Bullseye, his wife removed from a psychiatric hospital and now in her parents’ custody, and his extra-marital affair with Dakota North plaguing his conscience, he’s in no shape to take on the Hand minions who were waiting for him in his brownstone at the end of last issue. Fortunately Iron Fist and Master Izo, the centuries old blind sensei who apparently trained DD’s mentor, Stick, are on the case. Within moments of DD about to get his head handed to him these two come crashing through his window and some major kung-fu ninja action is on!
But Lady Bullseye, supposedly serving the Hand’s master Hirochi actually has designs of her own on Matt and those designs, designs in The Hand’s best interest and shocking indeed to long time DD readers, finally are made clear in this issue. Matt’s pretty stunned by them, too. So much so he actually has to stop fighting to take it all in. Of all the Daredevil stories of the last few decades this one may be the truest to Frank Miller’s Daredevil legacy. All the freakin’ ninjas certainly make it feel this way. Bru is completely on the ball with his Daredevil work, largely unsung and even overlooked in the shadow of his higher profile Cap and Criminal writing. But he and Lark make as awesome a team on this book as he does with Steve Epting on Cap. While this arc, and this new villain, may not be as intense as those he’s done before hand, it’s still top notch compared to most other comics out there and, for those who love the character, its vintage DD yet with all kinds of new twists. I especially like Lark’s artwork on DD. He brings the same gritty street feeling he did with Bru on Gotham Central. And, if you can’t get enough of traditional Miller DD villains, delivered with Bru’s special brand of storytelling, be sure to check out next month’s “Return of the King!” tale. I don’t know what this team has in store but it won’t be same old same old.
Sam Wilson’s Reviews
Unknown Soldier #4
DC/Vertigo
Written by: Joshua Dysart
Drawn by: Alberto Ponticelli
For the most part the character of the Unknown Soldier has been a mystery to me. Never read the Joe Kubert drawn series back in the day, I never really read anything about the character until the mid-1990’s when I picked up the Garth Ennis limited series Vertigo put out during Ennis’s “Preacher” heyday. I loved that series, absolutely brutal and Ennis’s style lent itself very well to the immoral soldier. When I heard about the new series, again being put out by Vertigo, I was interested. Would it be like the Ennis series? What would the take be? Brutal? Political? Comic book standard (fat chance with that, but you never know)? One thing I will say, this new take on the character is not for everyone. Most fanboys like their action, big titties and mindless entertainment that must remain in-continuity and not force you to think of any other adjective other than “awesome” or “sweet”. If you think “Civil House of Secret Invasion” or “Infinite Final Crisis on Several Earth’s” is where it’s at and you’ve never read a Vertigo Book before the new “Unknown Soldier” isn’t for you. If you were a big fan of books like “Preacher”, “Y the Last Man” and “The Losers” then “Unknown Soldier” won’t disappoint. Anyway, on to the specifics…
In the first issue we are introduced to our protagonist, Dr. Lwanga Moses. The Dr. Moses was born in Uganda to parents who relocated to the United States when he was seven years old. This happened in 1978; Idi Amin was just ousted from power and the country plunged into civil war and Uganda soon became one of the poorest nations in the world. Meanwhile, Lwanga Moses goes to Harvard medical school and returns to Uganda as an adult. It’s now Uganda 2002, with his wife Sera in tow Dr. Moses opens up a clinic in a refugee zone (Uganda has one of the highest populations of displaced people in the world) and soon finds himself in the !%&!%&!%&!%&. Rampant disease, children with war injuries, Dr. Moses is in a living nightmare. A pacifist, Moses believes the only way Uganda will ever solve its problems is if Ugandans work to solve them, not the UN, not celebrities, not the US, Ugandans. The good Doctor is taking the first step by jumping neck deep in the !%&!%&!%&!%& and trying to do him some good, but the stress may be getting to him. He finds himself having nightmares, about killing his wife in a most heinous manner. Soon enough he finds himself staring such violence in the face. A kid shows up at his clinic with a head wound saying armed rebels attacked him and took his sister. Without thinking Dr. Moses rushes out to the jungle and finds the child, but finds himself surrounded by armed children. Almost-teens who can’t read but know how to work an AK-47. A voice commands the Dr. to take out the children, killing all of them. It’s almost more than the Dr. can take, and the voice keeps talking to him, telling him he now has the combat skills to punish those who profit from human misery, the untouchables who make the world a horrible place. Dr. Moses snaps and cuts up his own face with a jagged rock he finds on the ground and collapses in a heap with the bodies of the children he just killed. Not the man he thought he was when he woke up in the morning, the good Dr’s transformation continues in the second issue.
Dr. Moses wakes up to find himself naked and in a missionary house. Some young refugees came upon his person and rolled him for all of his money and possessions and left him for dead. The scary voice telling him how to kill people has gone away, but Moses finds himself lying about who he is and in a state of shock. Meanwhile, the CIA have taken an interest in finding the missing Dr. and have enlisted a senior agent by the name of Jack Lee Howl. More Gary Busey than Jack Ryan, Howl finds himself reluctantly on board not so much because he is ordered to but because he is blackmailed into compliance. Meanwhile Dr. Moses and his newfound saviors soon find themselves under attack by more teenaged rebels. Moses looks for answers from god but all he gets is the voice, talking him through combat instilling him with a killing lust he has never had before in his life, which brings us to issue three. In the wake of the attack, Dr. Moses finds himself captured by the teenaged rebels and forced to meet their leader, who thinks Dr. Moses is a priest (the nuns dressed him like one) and seeks his approval to bless his war. More harsh Ugandan realities come to light that are flat out horrible, disgusting and highly disturbing but unfortunately reality in some places in the world and Dr. Moses is forced to deal with these realities most unlike a Dr, substituting a stethoscope for some land mines. Our story continues in issue four with CIA Agent Howl on Dr. Moses’s trail. Meanwhile, the rebels catch up with Dr. Moses, but not before the Ugandan military does and needless to say a massive gunfight ensues. All this and the voice in Dr. Moses’s head that is telling him how to fight may slowly be driving him mad as well…
Yes, I’m a big fan of this book. Only four issues in there are still a lot of questions to be asked, but I want to ask them and I want to know how this is going to play out. A lot of people will be turned off by the politics; this book is not a straight actioneer by any means and that’s a good thing (check out Josh Dysart’s “Brief History of Uganda” in the letter page of this issue). If you aren’t ready for that then pick up the latest issue of Batman RIP. If “DMZ” and “Scalped” are more your thing than this book is a welcome addition to your pull list. My pick of the week, hands down.
Punisher War Zone #6 (of 6)
Marvel Knights
Written by: Garth Ennis
Drawn by: Steve Dillon
Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon, to a legion of fans they are the peanut butter and chocolate of comic books. I first became a fan of theirs with their run on Vertigo’s “Hellblazer”, and of course I became a die-hard worshiper with their legendary title “Preacher”. Probably the smartest thing Marvel Comics ever did during the Bill Hemas reign, Axel Alonso, new editor at Marvel Knights, brought Garth and Steve in (as he did for Vertigo) to bring the Punisher back to his ‘80’s prominence, and bring him back they did with “Welcome Back Frank”, a mad storyline for the ages where Garth showed Frank Castle for who is us, an unrelenting stone cold killer who truly gives a flying rats fu$# about anything other than his war to punish the guilty. And punish the guilty he did, making a lifelong adversary of mob boss Ma Gnucci. Yeah, under Garth’s pen Frank made her a paraplegic and bald (hey, he did Herr Starr worse) and now she’s back for one last hurrah to pay Frank back for what he did to her. Somehow I don’t think that’s going to happen and Frank is going to fu$# her up even worse and kill a sh$#load of people doing it, but hey, with Garth and Steve running the show I’m in.
“War Zone” started in typical Ennis fashion, a low level goodfella is about to get whacked because he let the bosses son get his c$#k ripped off by an escaped monkey at the zoo and then eaten by a vulture (no, seriously). Frank Castle saves the poor sap from execution via shotgun to turn the guy into his personal inside man in La Costa Nostra. Frank isn’t happy because he has heard rumors of a Gnucci family resurgence; apparently they have an Italian side that wants to make their name in the US. Yes, last we saw Ma Gnucci Frank had killed all her men and allowed her to be rendered limbless by a giant grizzly and then burnt alive in her own house. Meanwhile, Lt. Von Richthoffen (superhot lesbian), previously assigned to bring in Frank Castle, finds herself unlucky in love and possibly loosing her mind. It only guess worse when her sometime lover, who has a boyfriend, finds all of her potential suitors being the victims of a viscous scorned-lover ass whuppin. Meanwhile, “the Elite” (vigilante crazy from the first Ennis Punisher series, whom Frank Killed) has a kid, and he dreams of killing Frank. As our story continues Frank Kills a sh$#load of mob guys at a cookout, Lt. Von Richthoffen (possibly one of my favorite Ennis characters ever) shows how much of a psychotic, possessive bad ass she is (the random scenes with her girlfriend and her boyfriend are priceless) and Ma Gnucci is probably a clone, made by that “Elite” guy who has a serious revenge issue with Frank that will probably be his undoing. As last issue came to a close Frank and Lt. Von Richthoffen found themselves holed up and surrounded by a sh$#-ton of mob guys and the Elite, getting ready to go down in total John Woo fashion. And yeah, holy sh#t, they do. Frank and his newfound warrior bi$h-queen (you really need to read the last issue to understand that comment) blow the fu$# out of a ton of people. Word.
Classic Ennis, and I’m damn happy with that. Quirky (and fairly twisted) supporting characters, extreme sadism and Frank freakin’ Castle with a big ass shotgun. What more could you possible want? I know, make the series weekly, which it is. Word. I’m in for the series, in for the eventual hardcover (just solicited in this months previews by the way), and down anytime Garth and Steve want to write the Punisher…