Attilan Rising Podcast

Brandan Montclare, Natacha Bustos and Tamra Bonvillain’s ‘Girl-Moon’ story arc comes to its conclusion in this week’s twenty-second Moon G and Devil D.  It’s a rather quick wrapping up of the adventure that is a bit heavy on exposition, but is a lot of fun nonetheless; with some very neat metaphors and absolutely beautiful art.

After a short jaunt to another dimension where Lunnela and DD landed on a counter-earth and met different versions of themselves, Moon Girl has managed to pilot the Moon Mobile back to Illa The Living Moon.  Illa is both relived and angered to see the pair return.  The living moon has spent much of her existence in isolation and has come to expect abandonment from others.  She was furious that Moon Girl had left in the first place and now angrily suspects she will once more be rejected and left on her own.

Illa is able to control every molecule comprising her satellite form, which allows her to take on a more anthropomorphic shape… though these human-like shapes tend to mirror her ambivalent feelings of need and fear.  It makes for a rather neat visual trick of showing Illa as having one body but two heads, highlighting her mixed feelings.  Lunella literally has to push the two bodies together in order to get Illa to thinking clearly.  The unifying principle being that she does not want to be alone.

Lunella is finally able to get Illa to trust her and follow her to a place on the moon;’s surface suitable for Lunella’s plan.  Ill accompanies Lunella by manifesting her own dinosaur to ride on, this one a stegosaurus made up of the rocks and soil of her cosmic body.  It’s super cute.

Reaching a high point on the moon, Lunella sets up a contraption that utilizes the Omniwave Projector in order to project a holographic version of her and Devil D beyond the dark side of the moon and to the front of the host planet.  And there she comes face to ‘face’ with Illa’s father, Ego The Living Planet.

For those of you who only know Ego from the movie, Guardians of The Galaxy Vol. 2, Ego is not actually a Celestial.  Rather he is a randomly occurring space anomaly wherein a planet gained sentience.  He first appeared int he pages of The Mighty Thor (#132) during a time in which Stan Lee and Jack Kirby were really stretching the bounds of cosmic storytelling.  It was also one of the first instances where Kirby began to incorporate elements of collage into his illustration and Ego’s first appearance remains one of the most striking images from Kirby and Lee’s golden age of innovating the comic book medium.

Anyways, Ego is as boastful and proud as his name implies.  He finds Lunella’s appearance in front of his as an intrusion and demands she go away.  Lunella uses Ego’s cantankerousness to her advantage.  She goads at Ego until he tries to destroy her; which leads him to realize she is merely a holographic projection emanating from elsewhere.  Further angered, Ego uses his powers over gravity and whatnot to track the source of the transmission and bring it in front of him.  And this causes him to essentially grab his moon/daughter and turn its circumference around.

The reason Illa could never see her father and her father could never see her is that their orbits were fixed so that Illa’s face was on the part of the moon turned away from its host planet… her back was constantly turned to her father.  Ego’s actions in trying to catch Lunella caused a realignment of the orbit, thus allowing Ego and Illa to finally face one another.  And with we get to see the happy reunion between father and daughter.  Ill will be alone and isolated no more.

Their mission accomplished, Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur head back to their Moon Mobile so to return to earth.

Inter-spliced throughout the narrative is a subplot involving the android duplicates that Luella had created so that her trip to the cosmos might go unnoticed by her parents, teachers and fellow classmates.  One of these android duplicates, Lunella Bot Seven, has gained a degree of sentience of her own.  Having befriended the disconnected head of a DoomBot that Lunella has ill-advisedly kept in her laboratory, Lunella-Bot 7 has endeavored into something of an existential crisis and search for meaning.  How this will resolve is yet to be seen.  In the meantime, the android’s gaining sentience and her actions has caused an even further alienation between Lunella and her parents.

The parallels between Illa’s desperate desire for connectivity and dependency on her parent and Lunella’s own disconnect and independency from her own parents makes for a very interesting juxtaposition.  Lunella’s taking her mom and dad for granted, her emotional disconnection from them and how this has effected the family as a whole has been a plot point in the series that has percolated from the very start.  And I’m hoping that the actions of Lunella-Bot Seven will finally cause the matter to be more fully addressed int he narrative.

Like many extremely smart people, Lunella is much better at doling out advice and fixing other people’s problems than she is at taking on her own issues.  There’s a panel in today’s issue where Lunella is trying to explain to Illa the reasons why she and her father cannot see each other (due to the two astral bodies being in a fixed orbit).  It’s plot exposition, yet is also quite evocative of the psychological construct of object relations.

Object relations is a rather old, but still quite pertinent theory from developmental psychology.  The theory holds that through good parenting, the child comes to formulate an internalized object  or psychic image of the parental figure.  Having internalized a psychic presence of the parent within the self imbues the growing child with confidence and the ability to handle things on their own.  It facilitates independence by way allowing the child to feel that their parent is always with them on an emotional level even if they are separated on a physical level.

For example, a young child can go off to the first day of school and not be terrified over the prospect of being join their own and separated from their parent because a part of the parent has been taken in as an internalized object.  The child is not fully alone because they have the internal object to accompany them and offer support, guidance and containment.

Of course the process in which a child cultivates internalized objects is not seamless nor instantaneous.  It occurs gradually over time, with fits and starts, steps forward and steps backward.   The lack of good object relations tends to lead to significant difficulties with anxiety, as well as temper tantrums and splitting (seeing things as either all good or all bad).  We see each of these symptoms in Illa (with the splitting being depicted in a rather literal sense).  Illa’s father is actually right behind her, he has always been there; yet Illa cannot feel his presence because they were separated too soon.  There was not time for Illa to form an internalized object of her father and is thus overwhelmed by loneliness and anxiety.   Eventually, Illa should be able to function on her own, perhaps even leave her father’s orbit and venture out into the larger universe.  Yet she will need time to truly bond with her dad in order to formulate an internalized version of him, a psychic object that will provide confidence and security even when she is on her own.

A matter that is all too often overlooked in this whole theoretical construct is that good object relations go both ways.  To the same extent that the child needs to form a guiding internal object of the parent so to gain self confidence and independence, so too does the parent need to form an internal object of their child to deal with their own pains of separation and worry.

We see this with Lunella’s mom and dad who are both kind of falling apart because their daughter has individuated from them before either of them were ready for it.    Lunella points out to Illa the one constant in the ever expanding universe: ‘we’re all moving apart from each other.  It’s actually light-years but only feels like little bits.’

This is true in astrophysics and is also true in parent/child relations.  From the moment a child is born, they begin the slow and inevitable process of moving away from the parent, individuating and becoming separate.  The distance apart will eventually become akin to light-years, but it needs to seem just as little bits so to prepare both parties for the separation; to give time for internal objects to be formed.

Mr. and Mrs. Lafayette have been denied this time.  Their daughter is just too precocious, too quick to separate a try to sate her curiosity over the grander universe around her.  As a result, they do not have a healthy internal object of their daughter.  They have a false, unsatisfying object in the form of the robot duplicate Lunella has left behind.

As a consequence, Lunella’s parents are in as much pain and distress as Illa was.  And it makes for a cruel irony that Lunella would venture off into the distant cosmos to assist Illa and solve her suffering while her own parents are left behind with their own suffering unaddressed.  One would think that the smartest person on the planet would be aware of something so obvious…

Once again, for all of her incredible intellect, Lunella still lacks wisdom.  Extra-dimensional astrophysics is child’s play to her, yet the simple matter of interpersonal relations remains a source of ignorance and bafflement.

The next issue is a Legacy tie-in and looks to see Moon Girl meeting the original Moon Boy.  While Moon Girl is all brains, Moon Boy was all heart and hopefully the two meeting one another might teach Lunella something; and that the whole ordeal with Lunella-Bot Seven will facilitate a much needed reckoning between Lunella and her mom and dad.  We’ll see…

Similar to the issue where Moon Girl met Dr. Strange, the art team of Bustos and Bonvillain do not waste the opportunity to stretch their creative muscles.  Much of Moon Girl’s adventures have taken place in urban environments and the art has done an excellent job of illustrating the cityscape of the Lower West Side and whatnot.  With this story, however, Bustos and Bonvillain get to depict a more cosmic and far out atmosphere and it’s a terrific fit.  Bustos’ confident line and animated style, coupled with Bonvillain’s ultra-vibrant color pallet really makes the cosmic setting come to life, popping off the page with Kirby-style crackle.  As the series progresses, I hope that writer Brendan Montclare will tell more stories that enable the art to further showcase Bustos and Bonvillain’s great knack for depicting cool and new environments.

Once again, highly recommended.  Although the resolution of the story relies a bit too heavy on exposition, it was a satisfying conclusion nonetheless; with art that continues to get better and better with each new installment.
Three and a half out of five Lockjaws!

Writer, Christopher Priest, and artist, Phil Noto, join forces to bring us a tale from a critical stage of the Inhuman Royal Family.  The story and art match wonderfully, working in concert to bring forth an intriguing tale that (thus far) captures much of what is so wonderful not just about The Inhumans, but the comics medium in general.

The tale takes part in the Royal Family’s past.  The Inhuman society of Attilan is in crisis.  Its king and queen have perished in a tragic accident and their two sons are deemed too young and not quite ready to assume the throne.  In the interim, The Inhuman known as The Living Terrigen  has stepped in to fill the role of stewardship ruler of Attilan.  He will decide when the brothers are ready to lead and which one will ascend to be the king, whether it be the ingeniously clever Maximus or his older brother, the destructively powerful Blackgarr.

The story begins on the shores of Iceland, where the city of Attilan was first built upon an isolated island.  The Living Terrigen takes the brothers to view a monument that has been built in honor of their father, Agon the fallen king.  Neither brother seems particularly interested in the monument.  Maximus speaks about his crush on their cousin and peer, Medusa, while Blackgarr expresses concern over the welfare of the Inhumans’ slave caste, The Alpha Primitives.  Blacker cannot speak due to the nature of his powers, yet Maximus’ psychic abilities allows them a rapport that enables him to share his brother’s feelings with The Living Terrigen.  Blackgarr’s moral qualms over the Alpha Primitives are discarded by the steward king  He states the beings are not slaves, but merely a lower form of life who rightfully serve more advanced beings.

Before the matter can be further discussed, the party is suddenly attacked.  Each are struck with arrows that have attached to them repressor modules that have the effect of nullifying Inhuman powers.

It is The Alpha Primitive who are making this attack.  Led by large Alpha named Dkamas the slaves are looking to slay their abusive master, The Living Terrigen.  Maximus stays behind to defend his steward king while Blackgarr less hoping to outrun the range of the power dampeners.  Maximus fights valiantly but is hopelessly outmanned.  It looks as though he is about to fall when Blackgarr makes it to a cliffside beyond the range of the dampeners and hence regains his powers.  He yells ‘enough!’ and the resulting sonic blast disperses the marauding Alphas.

In its wake, the monument to King Agon has been destroyed, but Maximus and The Living Terrigen have been saved.  Someone (perhaps a guard, perhaps Maximus) has run Dkamas through with a spear, killing the leader of the revolt.

Blackgarr and Maximus have saved their stewardship king, yet it will soon become evident that they will pay dearly for the act.  The Living Terrigen is initially thankful for his rescue.  He doubts that this revolt could have been orchestrated by the simple minded Dkamas.  The use of the power-dampening arrows required a level of sophistication that he feels is beyond the Alphas.  Yet he is mistaken.  The whole ordeal has been witnessed by an Alpha known as Elisha.  There is something special about this Alpha, he possesses a wisdom and intellect not yet seen among those transformed into Alpha Primitives.  It was he who had arranged this attack, who sought to kill the slave master and free his people… a plan that was foiled by Blackgarr and Maximus.

Back on Attilan, The Living Terrigen restores his health by bathing in Terrigen.  Kadlec, The Inhuman known as The Seeker, stands by his king as the two discuss the revolt of the Alphas.  The Living Terrigen continues to doubt that The Alphas possess the wherewithal to engage in such an intricate attack.  Rather, he believes that the revolt must have been the work of an Inhuman, perhaps someone among the Royal Family.

Furthermore, the ordeal has afforded The Living Terrigen the opportunity to maintain the throne; and he aims to utilize this opportunity.  He has Kadlec summon Medusa… she will be his key to undermining the sons of Agon and securing the kingship for himself.

The scene switches to the residence of House Amaquelin where young Medusa argues with her mother, Ambur, over adhering to laws of Attilan.  Medusa is as wild and feisty as her prehensile hair.

She has been summoned by her king but has no interest in bowing before him.  She sees The Living Terrigen as the scheming opportunist that he is.  Yet her mother is having none of her daughter’s disobedience.  Her daughter will do as their king orders or else risk the safety of her whole family.  Reluctantly, Medusa agrees to her mother’s wishes; she will appear before the king.  Crystal makes a brief appearance in the background.

Elsewhere, Blackgarr and Maximus have traveled to the catacombs beneath the city where a group of Alpha Primitive sit in vigil of their brothers who had been killed during the failed coup.  By way of his psychic connection with Maximus Blackgarr expresses guilt and remorse over the deaths of these Alphas.  Maximus disagrees; as he sees it Blackgarr did the right thing in foiling the Alpha’s revolt.  Blackgarr killed no one and has no reason to feel remorse.  Blacker is unmoved by his brother’s objections and joins the Alphas, kneeling with the others in mourning those who had died.

The two brothers are pulled aside by Elisha.  He acknowledges that it was he who had orchestrated the attack on the Living Terrigen.  The inhibitor devices he had contracted gave the Alphas their one opportunity to kill a malevolent god, yet Blackgarr had interfered and now the brothers will pay for their folly.

Elisha explains further that there is no way that The Living Terrigen will stand for the embarrassment of having to be saved by Blackgarr and Maximus.  He is far too proud to let this matter stand.  Somehow, he will manipulate things so that Blackgarr and Maximus are held as responsible; he will utilize the whole ordeal to dispose of the sons of Agon and secure his rulership.

Elisha’s warning is further supported when The Living Terrigen appears to also sit in morning among The Alphas.  His doing so disavows any responsibility or ownership over the deaths of the Alphas, making it further evident that the whole matter is likely to be wrongfully pinned on the brothers.

Later, Medusa arrives for her audience before the king.  The Living Terrigen shows her the Slave Engine, a device left behind by their Kree ancestors as a means to secure the wellbeing of the Inhuman peoples.  The Slave Engine uses Xerogen Crystals to transform humans into devolved Alpha Primitives, creating a force of mindless laborers to serve the Inhumans.

Medusa appears to be just as disgusted by the Slave Engine as her cousin, Blackgarr, yet she wisely hides her contempt, saying to her king what he wants to hear: agreement and devotion (although she does manage to tip her true feelings a bit by referring to the slave engine as a ‘weapon’ rather than a device).

The Living Terrigen makes it known that he has chosen young Medusa to be his queen and then leaves her to process the matter with his servant, Kedlec.  She holds her tongue no longer and expresses to Kedlec that she has no interest in being the consort to this vile king.  Ever the schemer, Kedlec has plans of his own.  He reveals that he has had Medusa’s home bugged and possesses a recording of Medusa speaking in a treasonous fashion… a recording that can be used to frame Medusa as responsible for the Alpha’s revolt.  And yet Kedlec has desires of his own and offers to dispose of this recording were Medusa to choose him as her mate.    Kedlec punctuates his lecherous proposition by groping Medusa’s rear end.  It is an insult Medusa will not stand for.  Her hair snaps into action, ensnaring Kedlec and slamming him against a wall.

Medusa turns heel to walk out but Kedlec shouts after her, wording the guards to seize her and proclaiming her as among the conspirators who plotted against the king.  Medusa’s hair grabs the guards who have come to apprehend her, yet they are not guards, it’s actually Maximus and Blackgarr who have come to rescue her.

Elisha had warned them that The Living Terrigen would use Medusa as a means of framing them all for the attack and the brothers had come to her aide.  Understandably, Medusa is less than pleased to learn it was her cousins who had gotten her involved in this whole mess.  But there isn’t time to discuss it.  Elisha shows up, having brought Lockjaw with him.  And here it should be noted that seeing lockjaw as a puppy is just about the cutest thing ever.

Anyways, there isn’t time to get to the bottom of how it is that Elisha is so knowledgeable and worldly… why it is that he appears to wear clothes from the human world.  What matters is that they are in danger and must utilize Lockjaw’s teleporting abilities to escape.  The four of them hold hands around the puppy and are instantly transported away.  And the story comes to its cliffhanger conclusion as the young Royals and Elisha are teleported to the heart of Times Square in Manhattan.

Wow!  This is just about everything I could ask for in an Inhumans comic, harkening back to all of the weirdness and palace intrigue that first so bewitched me and made me such a fan of their bizarre characters.  It’s all such a wonderful combination of super heroes and science fiction, a bastard lovechild of Claremont’s X-Men and Frank Herbert’s Dune.

Christopher Priest follows in the path of past Inhuman writers, Paul Jenkins and Ann Nocenti, casting aside any attempt to make The Royals more traditional super heroes and embracing all of the strange and problematic weirdness that makes the Inhumans unique.  Yet he does so in a fashion that makes you care about these character despite their flaws.  It’s a rather remarkable feat, and is accomplished so seamlessly that it can be easy to not even notice it.

The addition of Elisha to the cast is both intriguing and welcome.  I’m very interested in learning more about him and how it is that he possesses such knowledge.  Yet more so I am happy to see The Alphas more fully incorporated into the Inhuman lore.  There being a specific Alpha as a main character in an Inhumans story has been long, long overdo and Christopher Priest is a writer I absolutely trust to handle the character properly.

All of this is all brought to vibrant life by Phil Noto’s fabulous art.  Noto’s skills at illustrating people and facial expressions has been a well established strength; yet here he also gets to show off his abilities for creating cool settings and dynamic action sequences.  It’s some of his best work and it would seem that Noto’s stint illustrating the Star Wars comic, Poe Dameron, has aptly prepared him for The Inhumans.

There are a couple of continuity matters that are likely only to bug hardcore fans like myself.  The first of which is that Royals #3 had the brothers’ parents dying when Maximus was nineteen and Blackgarr twenty.  The two are clearly younger than that in this story, but the matter can be chalked up to artistic license; a no-prize explanation can be that Maximus merely misremembers how old he was when his parents died.

The relationship between Medusa and Blackgarr also appears a bit altered in this telling.  Beforehand the story had been that Medusa would go visit Blackgarr when he was sequestered in his isolation chamber and that the blooming love between the two was pivotal to Black Bolt’s learning to master his destructive powers.  This story slightly reimagines the relationship, laying the foundation for more of a love triangle between Medusa, Blackgarr and Maximus.

The slave engine is in and of itself a retcon, an alteration of the inhumans lore that was born out of The Unspoken Story arc in the pages of Mighty Avengers.  Before this retcon, The Alpha Primitive had been created by the Inhuman scientist, Avadar, who used cro magnum DNA to create clones who were meant to be drone-like automatons.  It was only after several generations of new clones that the Alphas gained sentience.  By then Attilan had grown so reliant on the Alphas as laborers that they forced themselves to repress this knowledge and attempt to deny that they had become a slave state.  This repressed guilt was later channeled by Maximus in his creation of the android, Omega the Ultimate Alpha.  This whole story was altered in Mighty Avengers #27 with the introduction of the Kree Slave Engine and the idea that the Alphas are actually captured humans who had been mutated by way of exposure to Xerogen Crystals.

Finally, the tale once more has Blackgarr, Maximus and Medusa referring to each other as ‘cousins.’  According to the family trees of House Boltagon and House Amaquelin, Blackgarr and Medusa are not blood relatives.  It may be that the story is looking to rework that matter; cousins intermarrying is certainly not unheard of among royalty.  Or it may be that ‘cousin’ is more of a colloquial term on Attilan.  The population of Attilan is only about twenty-five hundred strong so they’re all pretty closely related to one another…

Once more these are all merely continuity blips that do not in any way detract from the story.  Firm continuity can be fun, but I’m all for giving authors leeway if it means telling the story they want to tell.

The short backup feature string Lockjaw and The Thing doesn’t bring a while lot to the table, but is a fun bonus nonetheless.  Ryan North is a hoot and his and Erica Henderson’s The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl is always one of the best reads month in and month out.  He and artist Gustavo Durante offer up a quick and fun Lockjaw story that’s a nice pallet-cleanser after the intensity of the main story.

I cannot recommend this book highly enough.  An emphatic five out of five Lockjaws!

Brandan Montclare, Natacha Bustos and Tamra Bonvillain bring us the latest installment of Moon G and Devil D’s first adventures into the cosmos.

The Girl Moon story-arc continues as a temper tantrum by Illa The Living Moon, coupled with a malfunction of the Omniwave Projector, sent Lunella and Double D to an alternate dimension  where they landed on an alternate earth and met a very alternate version of themselves.  Devil Girl and Moon Dinosaur may look a good deal like there other-dimensional counterparts, yet rather than being a pair of super heroes they are actually super villains.

Moon Girl and Devil Girl are not complete opposites of one another, but are dissimilar in some key ways.  The alternate version of Lunella doesn’t seem to have a sense of curiosity to her at all.  She doesn’t really care where this alternate version of herself has come from, she just wants her gone as quickly as possible.  The bickering between the two Lunella(s) quickly results in a destructive battle between Devil Dinosaur and Moon Dinosaur.  We don’t get to see how the two Dinos differ… other than the fact that Moon Dinosaur is purple as has feathered plumage (and yes the scientifically minded Lunella has in the past made reference to odd fact that Devil Dinosaur is cold blooded and lacks feathers despite the fact that most paleontologists concur that real dinosaurs were likely warm blooded and feathered).

Anyways, the fight between the two sets of alternates goes nowhere fast and the real Moon Girl opts to run off and try to find a quite place to regroup and think up her next move.  Such a respite is offered when she and Devil D run into the alternate versions of her classmates, Zoe and Eduardo.  These two also significantly differ than their other dimensional counterparts.  Eduardo is thoughtful and pensive rather than hyperactive and impulsive; and Zoe is self assured and unembarrassed as opposed to anxious and constantly mortified.

From Zoe and Eduardo, Lunella learns that Devil Girl used to be much different.  She was shy, nerdy and quiet, but then she found the magical Moon Dinosaur and now all she is interested is causing trouble.   Lunella decides that she must put an end to the threat posed by her alternate self, but when she declare her intentions both Eduard and Zoe object.  They explain that while Devil Girl is kind of a rotten kid they like her… she makes things interesting and in her own way has actually done a lot of good (such as when she scared off an alien invasion).

There is clearly a rhyme and rhythm to this alternate world and Lunella catches on quick that it would be fruitless to try and change it.  It is the way it is meant to be; the only thing out of place is her and Devil D and her best move, her only move, is to leave as soon as possible.

The overheated Omniwave Projector has cooled and regained functioning, thus allowing Moon G and Devil D to take off and hopefully return to their home dimension.  They say their goodbyes before leaving and Devil Girl, in her own gruff fashion, seems a bit disappointed by her alternate self’s sudden departure.  Our Lunella’s parting words of advice to her other self is to more open to accepting the friendships of others, that allowing herself to open up to the important people in her life will likely result in her not always feeling so rotten.  Who knows if this alternate version of Lunella will heed this advice or not… the matter is left a mystery as the Moon Mobil fires off into outer space.

The beleaguered Omniwave  Projector is fired up once again and through luck and skill Lunella is able to navigate her way back to her home dimension.  yet she doesn’t return to earth just yet.  There is still a matter that requires attended to.  Lunella had initially set out into the stars to help Illa and she’s going to give the matter another shot.  And the issue concludes with The Moon Mobile coming into orbit of a still anger Illa the Living Moon.

A subplot runs through the issue focusing on the various robotic duplicates that Lunella had created to cover for her absence while she was off on this mission to the stars.  In comics, creating robot doubles is almost never a good idea, it usually results in some sort of mayhem; and this looks likely to be the case with Lunella’s robot doubles as well.

Although the doubles appear quite obviously to be robots to the reader, they appear to be convincing enough to fool Lunella’s teachers and classmates, even her parents.  Yet the android double is especially cold to those around her, extremely curt with Lunella’s parents.  Conversing with the disembodied DoomBot head in Moon Girl’s secret lab, it would appear as though the artificial intelligence that controls these robot doubles is beginning to question the meaning of its own existence.  It is gaining sentience and you just know that this is going to make for some serious trouble in the not so distant future.

All and all another very fun installment of Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur.  The art by Bustos and Bonvillain is once more absolutely top notch.  Natasha Bustos’ lifework is so ultra-confident, the action so fluid and Bonvillain’s color work so well synched that reading this book has come to feel like watching a really well done cartoon.

The thematic of the story isn’t as strong in this particular issue as it has been in the past.  Lunella’s meeting her other-dimensional double offered a lot of opportunity for introspection and self-discovery, but instead hinged on our Lunella realizing that her alternate self has yet to learn the same lessons she has… the truth she discovered in the ‘World’s Smartest’ story-arc.  That truth being that mutuality is just as important as autonomy and that Lunella is much stronger, more capable and happier when she allows herself to let in and rely on others as opposed to feeling as though she has to do everything on her own.

Moon Girl and Devil Girl’s origins are entirely similar.  Both had been shy and nerdy types who gained powers and dinosaur sidekicks.  Which begs the question, what has it been that caused this alternate version of Lunella to become such a brat, to choose evil over being a hero?  The answer is obvious, but left unsaid… which leads me to the one aspect of Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur that has started to drive me a bit bonkers.

Lunella has really great parents.  It’s clear that they raised her right and this is why she has ultimately chosen to use her gifts and abilities to become a hero and help people.  And yet Lunella has really been treating her mom and dad in a lousy way of late.  The tensions between Lunella and her parents have been percolating for twenty-one issues now and I’m getting impatient waiting for it to boil over… I feel that a reckoning is long overdue.

Granted, my feeling this way may be a facet of my being an adult reading an all ages comic.  It is possible that younger readers aren’t at all interested in seeing a story where Lunella realizes she has been taking her parents for granted.

Lunella is nine-years-old… pretty much in the thick of what developmental psychologists refer to as the ‘latency phase’ … the phase where the individual is transferring between childhood to young adulthood.  It is in this phase that a child learns to act independently, to leave their parent or caregiver’s side and start to explore the world on their own.  It’s a phase of a child’s life that can be especially difficult on their parents.  It’s exciting to see one’s child grow and develop, but there can also a great sense of loss.  Some children enter into latency with apprehension, they’re not sure if they are ready to do things on their own.  Others, however, leap into it with the utmost of eagerness, excited to explore the world on their own.  Lunella definitely fits into this later category and it is clear that the process has been especially difficult for her mom and dad.  They seem to feel that their daughter has outgrown them and they feel left behind… as though they have lost their daughter.

Mr. and Mrs. Lafayette having supper with an android duplicate of their daughter makes for an apt metaphorical representation of this dynamic, but I’m growing impatient to see the matter more fully addressed.  The next issue looks to focus on Moon Girl helping out Illa the Girl Moon and her father, Ego The Living Planet, is set to feature in the issue.  Perhaps the thematic of parent child relations therein will cause Lunella to realize how much she has taken her own patents for granted.  We will see.

While there are some aspects of the issue that bugs me as a grown up and child psychologist, it is nonetheless once more a joy to read and definitely recommended.  Three and a half out of Five Lockjaws!

It’s the second installment of the timely and topical ‘mecca’ story-arc, from the creative team of G. Willow Wilson, Marco Falla and Ian Herring.

Last issue saw the mayorship and governance of Jersey City taken over by sinister forces, including Dr. Faustus’ former underling, Chuck Worthy, and his chief lieutenants, Lockup and Discord.  As Ms. Marvel, Kamala charged in headlong and unfortunately fell to the electrical powers of the mysterious villain, Discord (there’s something eerily familiar about this guy).

Meanwhile, the Worthy’s administration has instituted a zero tolerance policy against anyone with super human powers or abnormalities (a thinly veiled metaphorical stand-in for ultra-jingoistic white nationalism).  Kamala’s brother has been apprehended by Worthy’s goons, charged with having possessed super powers and not divulging his status to the authorities.  Aamir had only possessed such powers for a brief time following his exposure to a mysterious quasi-terrigenic gas by Ms. Marvel’s foe, Kamran.  These powers quickly wore off, but the mere fact that Aamir once possess powers is enough for the Worthy administration to identify him as a threat to public safety who should have his U.S. citizenship revoked and subsequently deported back to his birth country of Pakistan.

The issue begins with a harrowing scene where the detained Aamir is interrogated.  Aamir doesn’t quite understand the situation and he assumes that he has been arrested by the NSA or FBI.  He imagines that he has been detained under the assumption that he is an enemy combatant, an Islamic extremist plotting acts of terror against the United States.

In expounding on his innocence, Aamir delivers an extremely interesting speech about the types of people do and do not fall in with such extremism.  What he says is poignant, not devoid of compassion and, above all else is strikes me as absolutely correct.

And yet Aamir has not been arrested for suspected terrorist ties, his charge is that he possessed super powers and failed to register this with the city municipal government.  Befuddled, Aamir states that he only possessed these powers for a brief moment before they wore off; a statement that his interrogator interprets as an admission of guilt.  In a knife-twisting extra punchline   the interrogator also notes that Aamir was seen walking down the street carrying a pressure cooker (it was actually a slow cooker containing left overs that Aamire was bringing to his neighbors).

All the while, Aamir’s interrogation is being watched in an adjacent room by Lockdown and Dischord.  The interrogator excuses himself to speak with these two,  He states that Aamir is a small fish, no real threat and suggests they cut him loose.  Discord disagrees, he wants Aamir further detained.  Discord is ardent and zealous in his crusade to rid Jersey City of all of the freaks and super powered beings that has robbed the city of its normalcy.  The juxtaposition between Discord’s extremist zeal and what Aamir had said about what can lead one to becoming terrorists is rather overt, but a satisfying parallel.

Elsewhere, Ms. Marvel is waking up from being knocked unconscious in her battle with Discord.  Although bested, Discord chose not to detain her and left her where she was.  In the twilight of her regaining consciousness, Kamala hallucinates that her old friend Bruno is at her side.   The visage of Bruno voices a bit of exposition, noting that Kamala has a tough fight on her hands and is going to have to come to terms with the fact that not everyone is going to like her.  The world is not black and white, all good or all bad.  What is right and what is wrong is colored by opinion and she has to wake up to the fact that she will never be universally accepted for who she is.

Ms. Marvel shakes off the cobwebs and darts back to the heart of the city where she quickly comes across a political rally held by the new Mayor Chuck Worthy.  Worthy is whipping up the crowd with his promises of bringing back peace and economic prosperity by ridding the city of all of the costumed freaks and super powered beings.

It’s all a rather straightforward straw man argument wherein a minority population is identified and vilified, held responsible for all the woes that trouble a politician’s constituents.  It’s also a rather obvious analog to the type of fear mongering that the Trump administration utilized to win the American presidency.  Any doubt of this is wiped away when Worthy notes that the rumors of his affiliation with Hydra is merely alternative facts propagated by the fake news media.

Worthy has spotted Ms. Marvel among the crowd.  His goons, Lockdown and Discord attack.  A tremendous battle ensues and Ms. Marvel is forced to flee when Discord unleashes a mobil missile platform that fires off a bevy of explosive projectiles.

The narrative switches to the now abandoned offices of the former mayor, Stella Machesi.  The liberal minded wheelchair bound Machesi was elected mayor several issues back in a one-shot tale where Ms. Marvel and her allies were able to battle through the barriers of district gerrymandering and get out enough of the vote to defeat Chuck Worthy’s dastardly plans to win the election.  It was an idealistic story that as quite clearly written and illustrated before the November election that saw Trump earn the presidency by way of the electoral college despite losing the popular vote by a sizable margin.  And it would seem that Worthy has stolen the Mayorship by way of similar Byzantine back door politics.

Ms. Marvel, roughed up by her fight with Discord arrives at Machesi’s offices asking for her help.  Machesi has little to offer in the way of aide.  She notes that Worthy has seize power by tapping into the populace’s more baser instincts: their fear and greed.  Before the two can formulate a plan, they are interrupted by Discord who calls out for Ms. Marvel from the street below.
Discord demands Ms. Marvel’s surrender and has paraded out a group of his detainees so to motivate her giving herself up peacefully.  The individuals Discord had detained appear to be innocents, people who have been arrested simply because they are different, because they are Inhumans or Mutants and their physical appearance is deemed by the status quo as being abnormal.  They haven’t done anything wrong, but Discord and Lockdown have been given the authority to apprehend them nonetheless and Discord notes how easy it could be to misplace paperwork and keep them imprisoned without charge trial all but indefinitely.

Once more, Kamala cannot help to feel that there is something distinctively familiar about Discord.  He knows how to press her buttons almost too well.  It’s almost like he is a former friend who had gotten to know Kamala and now uses that intimate knowledge as a weapon.

As a final threat, Discord brings out Aamir who has also been detained without charge.  Discord aims his power gauntlet at Aamir, threatening to kill him.  Amir has been identified as an abnormal, something less than human and Discord could kill him with impunity… unless Ms. Marvel agrees to surrender.

And it is with this frightening cliffhanger that the issue ends with the promise of continuation.

Wow.  This issue pulls absolutely zero punches.

After the preview pages for this issue was released last week, I received a question from a fellow fan bemoaning the fact that Wilson and company was producing such a politically charged story in the pages of Ms. Marvel.  While I can understand the wish that comic books might remain pure escapism devoid of politics and social issues, I don’t blame Wilson for making the decision to go in the other direction.  Indeed it could be construed as irresponsible were she not to address these issues.

Ms. Marvel is the first Muslim-American character to headline a mainstream superhero comic.  Her religion and ethnicity is not her only character trait, but it is a facet of who she is; and to that extent it would be something of a dereliction of duty to sidestep the harsh realities that Muslim Americans have to contend with in real life.  People who are Muslim, people who may look as though their family lineage might herald from the Middle East, India or Pakistan are forced to live under the looming threat of being misidentified as enemy combatants, potential terrorists… some sort of threat to Western society.   They live with the fear that they could be disappeared by the government, detained and held indefinitely without trial or legal representation.  This is not just a plot point for the issue, this actually happens in real life.

There’s an interesting parallel process to Ms. Marvel’s sense of popularity both in the fictional world of the Marvel Universe and actual reality.  Ms. Marvel arrived with a splash and was an immediate darling of liberal minded comic fans.  It was cool that there should finally be a big name Muslim super hero, but it was the great quality of the writing and art that really made the comic a hit.  Kamala is such a well-rounded and fully developed character; she’s fun and relatable, lovable.   And yet times have changed and the shift in the political atmosphere has emboldened those with bigoted, intolerant views to be much more open and vocal in their feelings.  Quite suddenly there were comic book fans who were vocal and upfront over their dislike of the surge in liberal, multicultural characters in superhero comics.  Suddenly there were people out there expounding their hatred of Ms. Marvel, a hatred based on her being a girl, of her being Muslim, of her being the darling of the so-called liberal elite.
All this was likely quite jarring for Ms. Wilson and the other creators working on Ms. Marvel.  And to the same extent that Marvel itself has had to contend with the fact that not everyone likes Ms. Marvel, Kamala herself has had to cope with this matter.

Ultra-conservatives and Trump supporters are likely to be a touch alienated by this issue, by seeing the sinister Chuck Worthy as such a poorly disguised representation of the so-called Alt-Right.  Yet, the chances that people with such views are actually reading Ms. Marvel is likely pretty slim.  So screw’em…

The politically charged nature of the story might not be for everyone.  Some may prefer super hero tales that are a bit lighter, that avoid the unsettling truths of the real world.  As for me, I like it and I completely understand Ms. Wilson’s desire to take on these matters.  It helps that Kamala and I share political convictions.  I definitely recommend this issue, but am aware that there may be some who find the heavy socio-political nature of the story to be disquieting.  Three out of Five Lockjaws.

It’s judgement day as The Royals stand accused by Ronan,  From the creative team of Al Ewing, Thony Silas, Jim Charalampidis and José Villarrubia.

The following issue saw the Royal squad crash landing onto the scorched soils of dead planet, Hala.  Hala had been destroyed in the pages of the Black Vortex story event and Marvel Boy has led the Royals to this dead world with he promises of discovering the secrets of Terrigen.  Ronan The Accuser had been bestowed tremendous new powers by The Back Vortex and now stands sentry over his deadened world.  He was displeased by the prospect of visitors and attacked the Asterion, causing the ship to crash.

The Royals survived, only to be besieged by Ronan’s new powers.  This power entails a psychic attack where each of The Royals are transplanted to a psychic plain where they are forced to re-experience feeling of past regret, eliciting such intense sensations of guilt and sorrow as to leave them immobilized.  Each except for Crystal, who was spared Ronan’s attack.

Ronan and Crystal were once married.  It began as a political marriage meant to cement the bond between the Kree and Inhumans.  Although the marriage had been forced upon Crystal, she and Ronan ultimately fell very much in love and both were heartbroken when the politics between their peoples caused their union to be annulled.  Now Ronan sits before his former wife and proclaims that she stands accused of turning her back on true love and breaking his heart.

Ronan’s recollections of the Inhumans’ rule over The Kree and his marriage to Crystal all took place in the pages of Jonathan Hickman’s seminal run on Fantastic Four.  Although how exactly Ronan choose to recall these events appear to be skewed by his grief and anger.  He accuses the Inhuman Royals of abandoning The Kree when they had grown bored, that Crystal had turned his back on him.

In truth, Ronan had been intent on re-attaining Kree sovereignty and to this extent he engineered the creation of a new Supreme Intelligence to lead the Empire.  It was this new iteration of Supremor who forced the annulment of Ronan and Crystal’s marriage; and Crystal chose to leave him so to ensure the welfare of both their peoples.

Crystal and Ronan discuss this is and it is very refreshing to see Crys elevated from wall flower status in this book.  Crystal has grown; she has emotionally matured a good deal since the two were together.  She stands up for herself and does not bend to his unfair accusations.

Crystal’s refusal of Ronan’s accusations are sound and he knows it.  He realizes that his pain and bereavement has twisted his mind.  The hate has faded away, leaving behind the unbearable sorrow that his anger had acted to obscure.  It is too much for him and Ronan attempts to kill himslef, turning his weapon unto himself.  Crystal acts quickly, unwilling to allow her one-time love to go through with this desperate act.  She uses her elemental powers to restrain Ronan, preventing his attempt at self destruction.

Elsewhere, Marvel Boy struggles in the psychic plain of guilt where he is lambasted by his former girlfriend, Kate Bishop.  The two had become an item when they both served on The Young Avengers.  Noh-Varr did indeed break up with her, but it is quite a stretch to suggest that he had broke her heart.

She says things that Noh knows the real Kate Bishop would never say and it enables him to realize his predicament.  Ronan’s new psychic abilities are not altogether unlike his own pocket battlefield, a realm where the laws of psychics and reality can be manipulated.  Yet Noh has these powers himself and he uses his own pocket battlefield to escape.

Upon escaping, Noh encounters Maximus.  Max has escaped as well; escaped by way of his own quasi-psychopathy.  Ronan’s psychic powers are fueled by guilt and feeling guilt is not an emotion that has all that much of an effect on Maximus.  As such, he was able to escape it quite easily and quickly.

Medusa also escapes the guilt realm by fighting back against a manifestation of her former love, Black Bolt.  This vision of Black Bolt accuses Medusa of leaving him stranded in his prison, turning her back on their love.  Yet both have known the intense responsibility of leadership, of being the rulers of their people; love is a luxury and a ruler must choose duty over love.

Medusa, Maximus and Noh-Varr convene and it is here that Noh’s ulterior motives become clear.

For millennia, The Kree have been ruled by a Supreme Intelligence – a biological computer that becomes a repository of massive amounts of data, issuing forth commands based on raw logic.  Each version of the Supreme Intelligence begins with a seed and, when it dies, it leaves a new seed behind.

Noh leads them to the antechamber where this seed lays doormat.  He begins the process of its regeneration by adding to it the remnants of The Plex Intelligence.

Plex was a benevolent artificial intelligence who came with Noh-Varr to this reality when his inter dimensional ship crashed.  Plex was eventually killed, but Noh held onto its remains and now uses it to fertilize the seed and create something new.

Medusa expresses reservation, but Noh assures her she has no need to fear.  He heralds from a much more peaceful Kree Empire, an alternate version of The Kree that embraced the tenets of love and discovery over conquest and domination.  This new amalgam of the Plex and Supreme Intelligences will bring forth a new era of peace and prosperity to The Kree people…  This has been Noh-Varr’s intention all along.  And activated by the Supreme Intelligence seed, The Plex Intelligence can now illuminate them of the secrets of Terrigen.

Ronan continues to struggle against Crystal’s elemental powers, yet he is stilled when he hears a disembodied voice.  It is the voice of the new Supreme Intelligence.  It sates that ‘the love of Hala is infinite; that you must accept it and forgive yourself.’

Gorgon, Swain and Flint also hear this voice and it breaks them free from the psychic binds that had ensnared them.

The information The Royals have sought out is relayed to Noh-Var and he tells the others what he has learned.  Eons ago, the Kree ventured to distant planets searching out a means to restart their own stagnant evolution.  They traveled to earth, experimenting on primitive humans and creating the Inhumans; and conducted similar experiments on the alien races known as the Kymellians, The Badoon, The Centurions and countless others.  Each were bestowed with a catalyst that would bring about their actualization.  The Inhumans of Earth were given Terrigen, The Kymellians were given Antigen, The Badoons Amphogen.  Each of these catalysts were derived from Primagen, the ‘prima materia’ that created the Kree in the first place.

Yet who was it that created the Kree?  Who was it that bestowed this ancient race with the Primagen?  The knowledge is lost, but the answers can be found with the Sky Spears.

It is here that the narrative shifts some five thousand years into the future.  Maximus, the last Inhuman has sought out a Kree spacecraft that had crashed into the barren earth hundreds of years ago.  Within, Maximus wakes the Final Accuser, who is revealed to be an aged Noh-Varr.  Maximus has awoken Noh-Var The Accuser to warn him that ‘they’ are coming back… that the folly they committed so many years ago was once more returning to haunt them.
They aged Noh-Varr laments the idealism and naiveté of his younger self.

It was a mistake to search out those who engineered the Kree, the gods of their gods.  Doing so it would seem awoke a sleeping and destructive beast.  Those who had created the Kree are called The Progenitors and it would seem that they are not merciful gods.  Indeed it would seem that their younger selves efforts to seek out these Progenitors resulted in doom and death.  And there is nothing that the aged Maximus and Noh-Var can do but regret their past deeds and await The Progenitors return to finish them off.

Another wild and weird sci-fi romp from Ewing and company.  I got the privilege to speak with Mr. Ewing for an interview for the Attilan Rising Podcast (you can hear the interview here).  There in Mr. Ewing spoke of his love for Hickman’s run on Fantastic Four.  This is quite evident in this issue with Ewing picking up and expanding many of the way cool outré concepts Hickman had put forth on FF.  And this looks to continue in subsequent issues as The Royals are set to cross paths with the other members of the Universal Inhumans.

Tethering the whole matter to The Sky Spears is a very gratifying concept.  The Sky Spears were first introduced in Uncanny Inhumans #1 and the mystery of what exactly they are has been left unrevealed.  It would appear that the spears are connected to these Progenitors, a group of space gods that are rather formidable looking.  In the letters page of the issue, Ewing shares some of the concept art of The Progenitors produced by Javier Rodriguez.  They are extremely cool and are likely to become a welcome addition to Marvel’s pantheon of interstellar threats.

A central theme throughout the issue is one of regret and fortitude in the face of one’s duty.  Each of the characters, Crystal, Ronan, Medusa and Noh-Varr have been forged by their regrets and hardened by their individual senses of duty.  Who they each feel they should be has acted to shape who they are.  They have each made themselves, which makes it ironic that they should end up seeking out their creators.  Seems to me they have already found them; and based on the older Maximus’ words it would seem that searching out their true source of creation may prove a deadly mistake.

I was surprised to see Noh-Varr in the role of the final Accuser.  It made for an interesting twist, but beyond that his showing up five thousand years in the future takes him out of dead pool that Ewing has set up for the cast.  Ewing stated at the onset that a cast member would die before their mission’s end.  Maximus and now Noh-Varr have been removed from the possible candidates of who is to die, leaving Medusa, Gorgon, Crystal, Flint and Swain.  Gulp!

This issue is a bit thick, heavy on exposition and possibly difficult to penetrate for those who are unfamiliar with Hickman’;s Fantastic Four run.  Yet I very much enjoyed it and cannot wait until the next installment.  Definitely recommended, Three and a half out of five Lockjaws.

It’s the next installment of the Secret Warriors; from the creative team of Mathew Rosenberg, Javier Garrón and Israel Silva.

Hydra has taken over much of the United States and Daisy ‘Quake’ Johnson and her ragtag team of Inhumans are doing their best to defeat this fascist regime and makes things right.  Their plan centers on locating a mysterious Inhuman named ‘Leer’ whom Karnak seems certain is pivotal to uprooting Hydra.  Who Leer is and why Karnak appears so sure he or she is central to their plan remains unknown.

The Warriors had traveled to the Mutant occupied territory of Tian in search of Leer.  Following a brief skirmish with a group of former X-Men, they were told Leer had been taken by Hydra.  The Warriors headed back east and were quickly assaulted by a battalion of Hydra soldiers led by Daisy’s evil father, the super villain known as Mr. Hyde.

Hyde’s forces include The Vision and Scarlet Witch (both under some form of mind control forcing them to align with Hydra) as well as Deadpool and Taskmaster.  The Warriors are very much outmatched, but Daisy is unwilling to surrender to her dastardly father.   A battle breaks out and The Warriors fair quite poorly.

The Scarlet Witch makes short work of Ms. Marvel; likewise Inferno is quickly defeated by The Vision.  Karnak holds his own against Taskmaster, but is felled once The Scarlet Witch intervenes.  Moon Girl fairs much better against Deadpool, kicking the merc with a mouth right in the groin, distracting him long enough for Devil Dinosaur to gobble him up with his massive jaws.

Daisy and Hyde fight each other, yet their battle is interrupted when Hyde orders his soldiers to open fire on Devil Dinosaur.  Fearing for her friend’s life, Moon Girl quickly shouts that they all surrender.  Daisy is angered; she doesn’t wish to give up, she wants to go down fighting.  There’s a sad desperation to Daisy, as though she has lost hope and would rather die free than become a prisoner of Hydra and her father.  Moon Girl hasn’t lost this hope, there is still too many things dear to her that she is unwilling to risk.   The threat of Devil Dinosaur being killed is enough to get her to surrender.   Daisy begrudgingly concedes and is quickly taken out by Taskmaster and The Scarlet Witch.

The team is imprisoned aboard a Hydra Hellicarrier, heading back toward central command located at Washington, DC.  Daisy and her father continue their spiteful banter with one another.  Hyde knows what the Warriors have been up to, that they have been seeking out the Inhuman named Leer; and he knows that his daughter is unaware of who Leer is and what exactly he or she can do.  He suggests that Daisy is simply looking for a reason to fight, a target to focus on in her quasi-suicidal intention to go down fighting.

Hyde slaps his daughter across the face when she barks back that she has no idea what he’s going on about.  Slapping Daisy like that elicits a rage in her that manifests in the whole hellicarrier beginning to tremor and shake.  Hyde is puzzled by it all; he had mistakenly assumed that his daughter required her specialized gauntlets to use her powers.  He had these gauntlets removed and believed Daisy to be incapacitated.  For all of his alleged intellect, Hyde did not realize that his daughter uses the gauntlets simply to focus her powers; that she is far from debilitated without them.  A sinister grin cuts across Daisy’s mouth… perhaps she is as self-destructive as her father suggests fore she is clearly intent on using her defused powers to bring this craft down.

A Hydra goon comes racing in beaconing Hyde back to the bridge, yelling that the ship is quickly being shaken apart.   Hyde leaves his prisoners to attend to the matter.

Meanwhile, Moon Girl had utilized her magnetic boots to furtively pickpocket a canister of nitroglycerin from Deadpool’s utility belt.   She uses the nitro to free herself from her restraints and then goes about freeing Daisy and the others.  They all rush to find some means of escaping the doomed hellicarrier, yet Moon Girl falls back.  Devil Dinosaur is being held elsewhere on the craft and she’s not leaving without him.  Daisy argues that there’s no time, that they have to leave him behind, but Moon Girl refuses.  They get separated by the falling debris and Moon Girl heads off on her own in search of her friend.

Moon Girl eventually comes across Devil Dino, whose being kept in the hull near a communications console.  She knocks out a Hydra goon manning the console and then uses the radio to send out an all-points SOS, asking for help from anyone who may be listening.

Elsewhere, the Hydra agents have fled the crashing helicarier taking all of the life pods leaving none for The Warriors.  Daisy has no plan as to how to escape and seems resigned to her fate.  Just when it seems that all hope is lost, Archangel and Sunfire of the X-Men come swooping onto the scene.  They had heard Moon Girl’s distress call and have come to help.

Yet there are only the two of them and each can only carry two apiece to safety.  Daisy insists that wait for Moon Girl, yet there isn’t any time.  They have to leave now or go down with the ship.

Back int he hull, Moon Girl races to free Devil Dinosaur from his restraints.  A little boy with red hair comes walking up and tells Lunella that her efforts are pointless,  Lunella asks who this kid is and he introduces himself as Leer.  Hey, this is the guy they’ve been looking!  Moon Girl demands he use his powers to help, yet Leer replies that he doesn’t have any powers.  Moon Girl doesn’t have the time to be confused by it all and goes back to trying to free Devil D.

Just then a shadowy figure comes from behind Moon Girl and knocks her out.

The others have finally accepted Archangel and Sunfire’s aide and have flown safely down to the surface.  They can only look on in horror as the helicarrier crashes in a massive fireball and it appears as though Moon Girl has perished.  And it is with this cliffhanger that the issue comes to an end, with the promise of continuation in the next installment.

As has been the case with the previous issues of Secret Warriors, the story is inter-spliced with flashback scenes of the recent past, showing how each of the characters composing the team dealt with the Hydra take-over.  This issue focuses on Moon Girl.  The first wave of Hydra’s attack involved an army of super villains laying siege to Manhattan.  Lunella sneaks off from her family’s apartment to go get Devil Dinosaur and join the battle against these villains.  The duo manage to save a group of civilians from the villains, but are ultimately chased off.  Devil Dinosaur appears to possess some kind of sixth sense… he seems to realize that the entire island of Manhattan is about to be closed off in an impenetrable dome of DarkForce energy.  He races off with Moon Girl in tow and jumps into the Hudson Bay… just in time escape being trapped within the dome.  Shocked by the turn of events, Moon Girl has Devil D swim them over to Jersey, which explains how she ended up with Ms. marvel as entailed in the first issue.

The issue is another intense and wild ride and Rosenberg’s script continues to do a very neat job of interjecting moments of levity to balance out the very grim tenner of the narrative.  Daisy’s reaction to the return of  the f–ing X-Men was a laugh out loud moment.

While Moon Girl was in some ways the star of this latest issue, the series as a whole continues to be centered on Daisy with the rest of the cast acting as foils to her emotional journey of dealing with all that’s happened.  Last issue saw daisy and Ms. Marvel butting heads over bending one’s morals in the midst of war; whereas this issue saw a conflict between Daisy and Moon Girl regarding putting companionship over the needs of the mission.  On two occasions during the issue, Daisy showed relative dispassion over the welfare of Devil Dinosaur… a willingness to sacrifice him in order not to give up.  Perhaps Daisy sees Devil D as little more than an animal, Moon Girl’s pet whose life isn’t as important as the others.  It’s a good deal out of line with Daisy’s normal sense of character, yet it would seem that her anger and desperation has overwhelmed her and clouded her judgement.

Daisy has been very much traumatized by all that has happened.  Her world has been turned upside down and she saw her friends and teammates, people whose lives she was responsible for, die in front of her eyes.  It has left her myopic, fixed with a tunnel vision to fight back almost blindly.  Her father might be correct that there is a degree of self destructiveness to it all.  All is lost and she has become resigned to go down fighting.

The sense of hopelessness that Daisy seems to feel is contrasted by Moon Girl.  Lunella is extremely intelligent, yet she is still only a child and possesses a childlike naiveté that helps her resist seeing their situation as a lost cause.  The whole dire affair of the Secret Empire story will be resolved, but it will be resolved in the pages of the main Secret Empire book.  The Secret Warriors have never really had a chance to save the day.  They have just been blindly following Daisy’s lead because it offered them hope.  Daisy hasn’t shared in this hope, but has herself blindly followed Karnak’s suggestion that locating Leer might bring about some miraculous resolution.   She doesn’t have any real faith in Karnak’s plan, it is simply a better option than lying down and letting the villains win.

Despite the snappy patter and the comedic aspect of Garrón’s terrific illustration, there is a rather cold pessimism at the heart of this issue.  I’m guessing it will prove to be the nadir of the arc, the point where things are at their bleakest before hope reemerges.

I would feel disappointed that the other characters have been little more than window dressing to    Daisy’s development if not for that fact that Rosenberg is doing such a good job of it.  Daisy was left in something of a limbo after the conclusion of Hickman’s run on the first Secret Warriors.  She showed up here and there, but was mostly relegated to sidekick status.  Chloe Bennet’s terrific performance as Daisy on the Agents of Shield television show has further muddled who the 616 version of Daisy is… as parts of the MCU Daisy got superimposed onto her 616 analog.  This new iteration of Secret Warriors has been intent on bringing Daisy’s character back to the forefront, putting meat back on the bones and forging Daisy as a fully dimensional character in her own right, distinct from her MCU counterpart.

Another highly recommended installment.  Four out of Five Lockjaws.

It’s another wild and gorgeously rendered installment of Saladin Ahmed and Christian Ward’s Black Bolt.

Maximus’ trickery has left Black Bolt stranded in a strange cosmic prison nestled off in the corner of some far off galaxy.  The prison is lorded over by the immensely powerful Jailer and his chief lieutenant, The Spyder.  Black Bolt has made allies among his fellow inmates, specially Crusher ‘The Absorbing Man’ Creel, The Metal Master, a Skrull pirate named Raava and a telepathic alien child incarcerated simply due to poor circumstances named Blinky.

Black Bolt has agreed to participate in a break-out and no sooner than he agrees then the plan is engaged.  The Metal Master has somehow regained the use of his magnetic powers which he employs to tear open the cell holding BB and his new allies.  It’s a good first step, but only a first step and if they are to make it all the way to freedom they are going to need to regain the use of their own powers.  This is Black Bolt’s role in the scheme.  He has to take on The Spyder, defeat the villain and procure from him a box-like device that works the prison’s power dampeners.

Searching through the labyrinth of the prison, Black Bolt comes across the Spyder, who is in the process of paying the intergalactic bounty hunter, Death’s Head, for his delivery of a new inmate.      Death’s Head originates from marvel comics United Kingdom imprint; although he has only appeared in a handful of comics here in the States, the cyborg mercenary enjoyed a good deal popularity overseas.  He’s also a total badass and, without his powers, BB really has no chance against him.

The matter aside, Black Bolt leaps into action, attacking The Spyder and taking the box from him.  The Spyder orders Death’s Head to attack and a firefight ensues.

BB is outmatched, yet before Death’s Head can go in for the kill a slight signal goes off.  The signal indicates that the transfer of funds that Death’s Head has been paid for delivering new prisoner has successfully gone through.  The cyborg is only interested in fees for service and now that he has been paid his interest in the affairs of the prison is over.  He disengaged from Black Bolt and goes about his merry way; leaving the Spyder at Black Bolt’s mercy.

Having accomplished his task, Black Bolt rejoins the others.  Young Blinky embraces Black Bolt, so happy to see him.  It’s a neat scene that highlights artist Christian Ward’s skill for relating story and emotion in subtle facial features.   It’s quite clear that Blinky is very much in need of a parental figure; as is it clear that BB is quite uncomfortable fulfilling this role.  It looks quite likely that we are going to get to see a lot more of the father/daughter relationship developing between these two as the series progresses and I’m quite looking forward to seeing how it goes down.

Disabling the control box returns Black Bolt and the others their powers.  Which is fortunate fore as Black Bolt and his colleagues open a new corridor then come face to face with the giant creature known as Monstroso (the new inmate that Death’s Head had delivered to the prison).  Rather than fighting the behemoth, Blinky uses her psychic powers to communicate with it.  It turns out that the creature is little more than a child whose destructive acts were simply the results of his being scared and separated from his parents.

They leave the child-like Monstroso in peace.  Raava expresses her annoyance that they opted not to recruit the creature to their cause; The Metal Master retorts that using the creature to their bidding would make them no better than the sinister Jailer who has toyed with them all with such cruelty (though the explanation does little to assuage Raava’s bemusement).

As for Black Bolt, he in no longer interested in simply escaping.  This whole torture chamber of a prison is an effrontery to his sensibilities and he is now committed to destroying The Jailer and bringing an end to his sadistic ways.

Venturing deeper into the shifting labyrinth of the group come across what appears to be an enormous engine.  Creel (showing a bit more insight than one might expect from him) ascertains that the whole thing is a power cell, a dynamo through which The Jailer fuels himself, feeds, off the anguish and pain that he subjects to his inmates.  The Jailer is some sort of psychic energy vampire who gains sustenance from the pain brought about from killing and resurrecting his prisoners.

The Jailer himself arrives, still prattling on about penance and repentance.  The team attacks.  Black Bolt summons his willpower and control over molecular energy into a single punch, a move referred to as ‘the master blow.’  This tactic has fallen the likes of The Thing and the Incredible Hulk, yet The Jailer is able to endure it without falling.  Left with no option, Black Botl releases his ultimately weapon, his voice, uttering the word ‘die.’

The resulting sonic blast knocks the jailer through a wall, opening up into a large antechamber where The Jailer’s true being resides.  The Jailer’s body as we have seen it thus far appears to be little more than an automaton… a psychical vessel for his psychic powers.  The true Jailer is a series of organs, brains, eyes and hearts each contained within orbs of crackling psychic energy.  Somehow these disparate, dissected organ work in concert, wielding an awesome power.  The sight of it, the raw power created by this grotesque mechanism, strikes fear into Black Bolt’s heart.

Yet this fear will not stop him and Black Bolt rats forward, attacking the being head-on.  And it is with Black Bolt’s valiant thrust into action that the issue comes to a cliffhanger end, to be continued with the next installment.

Ahmed and Ward’s tale continues to be the kind of Inhumans book I have very much longed for.  It feels less like your typical Marvel Comic and more like a neat science fiction tale one might come across in an old issue of Métal Hurlant.  The ideas and visuals make for a bizarre feast for the mind and eyes.  Although Ahmed draws a lot of random characters from Marvel’s backlog, the story stands very much on its own.  It’s kind of like an Image Comic that’s been furtively snuck into Marvel.

Ahmed is still building upon and developing the characters who make up the ensemble cast.  At times this process ends up a little heavy on the dialogue, with a bit more spoken exposition than is necessary.   Yet I don’t mind it in that the characters themselves are rich and a lot of fun to get to know.  Whereas Crusher Creel kind of stole the show last issue, Raava takes over some of the spotlight in this issue.  She’s fascinating; I’m really digging her.

This is not to say that Black Bolt himself isn’t being offered further character development.  Unlike his newfound colleagues, BB’s development is handled with a good deal more subtly.  Ward’s style is a bit minimalistic when it comes to facial expression, yet he still manages to relay a great deal with the few lines he utilizes.  BB’s feelings are easy to read on his face.  He’s no longer a king, but that sense of responsibility and need for justice is still a significant part of who he is.  He is determined to end The Jailer not just for what the Jailer had done to him, but rather because he is a blight on the universe and BB feels it his duty to end this menace.

Yet, while fulfilling what he sees as his kingly duties comes naturally to Black Bolt, being close with others, the bond he has forged with Blinky and his colleagues seems to strike him as unfamiliar and difficult.  Creel’s playful banter, Raava’s flirtation and Blinky’s affection all seem to make BB bristle and he reacts in a clumsy fashion to it,  It feels like, though he is unaccustomed to such closeness, what is actually jarring about it all is that it is nice, that it’s something that he actually wants.  The action is all exciting and wonderfully, richly depicted… yet it is BB’s emotional, interpersonal journey that I find myself the most interested in seeing more of.

Some further notes:

1. Although a Skrull, Raava chooses not to utilize her powers for shapeshifting.  She had never leaned to cultivate this power and explains that it is because she likes how she looks and has no interest to altering it.  It’s not exactly a good decision on a tactical level, but has a nice body-positive feel to it.
2. Rather than shapeshifting, Raava possesses powers not usually seen in Scrulls, such as the ability to fly and generate energy swords.  Each of her swords are named after her dead son and daughter.
3. It was an interesting twist to hear that The Metal Master had once had a husband.  Some might roll their eyes over what they see as the progressively-mandated mindset of including a gay character into he cast.  Yet, keep in mind that The Metal Master heralds from an alien world and the idea that heterosexuality is the de facto norm on other worlds is a presumptive fallacy.
4. Monstroso is one of the lessor known entries of the bevy of monsters that Kirby, Ditko and Lee created in the early issues of Tales to Astonish.  Monstroso himself first appeared in a backstory to Tales to Astonish #18 written and illustrated by Steve Ditcko.  The creature also made a brief appearance in the much more recent Monsters Unleashed miniseries.  Although, given this version of Monstroso’s more child-like nature, it is possible that he is the offspring of the original Monstroso.
5. It remains unclear what exactly The Jailer is and how he came to be.  The dissected pieces that work in concert to generate his powers must have been built by someone or something; and I’m not sure if or when we will learn how he came to be.  The technology employed in the prison is of a higher order than anything we have seen from such peoples as the Kree or Shi’Ar.  The whole matter remains a mystery.
6. Fans of Death’s Head will appreciate that Ahmed’s dialogue is very much in tune with the signature cadence of how the character talks.
7. Blinky’s telepathic powers will allow her to continue to communicate with Black Bolt now that he has his powers back.
8. Ward illustrates Black Bolt in his own unique way.  His costume appears quite a bit different compared to his original outfit as well as the redesign he’s been sporting of late.  I quite like Ward’s take on BB’s look, although I’m not that into how he draws BB’s wing’s.  Rather than the accordion bat-like wings, Eard draws BB’s wings as being more like a slight filament that generates from his wrist to hip, appear and disappearing as needed.  It’s a neat looking effect, but personally I prefer the bat style wings.
9. Christian Ward sneaks in a neat homage to fellow artist, Steve McNiven, in the scene where BB first enters into the antechamber where the Jailer’s true form resides.  Black Bolt’s silhouette is reminiscent to the cover art McNiven provided for Uncanny Inhumans #0.

Another can’t miss issue.  Five out of five Lockjaws!

It’s the second issue of Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur’s new adventure off into the cosmos.  Brought to us by the creative team of  Brendan Montclare, Natacha Bustos and Tamra Bonvillain.

Last issue, Lunella happened upon an interstellar distress call from a mysterious girl named Illa.  Intent on saving this girl, Lunella built the Moon Mobil, an intergalactic spacecraft powered by the Omniwave Projector, and she and Devil Dinosaur rocketed off to another galaxy.  Tracing Illa’s signal brought them to a small and strange moon and it wasn’t long before they discovered that Illa wasn’t on this moon, she actually was this moon.

Illa is a living planetary entity.  She was born when an unknown comic force crashed into Ego The Living Planet like a comet and broke off a small piece that shaped into its own spherical proto-planet.  Ego and Illa, father ad daughter, only got to meet each other for a brief moment until the forces of orbital gravity whisked them away from one another and Illa has been alone and adrift ever since.

Determining the trajectory of Illa’s orbital rotation around her larger parent planet, Lunella determines that the problem is that the rotational revolution is fixed and situated in a fashion that Illa’s face is never directed inward.  In short, Illa’s back is always turned to her father and left her feeling desperately alone.

Lunella draws out her theorem on the soil of Illa’s surface.  Doing so tickles Illa; she can feel everything that happens on her moon-based body.  It makes Lunella wonder, are there other planets like Illa out there, planets that have sentience or that can feel everything that happens to them?  Is earth similar?  Does earth feel all of the various things we do to injury and help her?

Before Lunella can ponder the matter any further, she and Devil Dinosaur are besieged by a swarm of giant bug-like creatures.  These bugs are sort of like space fleas that live off of cosmic bodies like parasites; and Illa is infested.  Moon G and Devil D jump into action to defend themselves.

Devil Dinosaur really gets to let loose.  Despite his giant mouth being kept behind the faceplate of his adorable dinosaur-snapped spacesuit, Devil Dino is able to make short work of the marauding mites, ripping them apart with his claws, stomping them with his feet and squishing them with his swinging tail.  Hopelessly outmatched, the surviving fleas scurry off.

Lunella seems to have some ideas as to how to help Illa’s situation, but she needs to relocate to a safer, more stable location to work them out.  Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur board their Moon Mobil and blast off.  Illa mistakes their intentions as their attempt to abandon her.  She throws a temper tantrum, exerting gravitational forces that wreak havoc on the instruments of the Moon Mobile.  The Omniwave Projector, the ancient Kree device that powers the craft, has been acting hinky of late and Illa’s tantrum further compounds its disfunction.  Lunella tries her best, directs the craft toward home and simply hopes they can power through it.

At first, it appears that they have succeeded.  The Moon Mobile reenters earth’s solar system and Lunella pilots it back to earth, back to the lower east side of Manhattan.  Yet, when she arrives, it becomes quickly evident that they have not returned to the same earth from which they had departed.  Somehow, Illa’s tantrum and the malfunction of the Omniwave Projector has caused them to pass through a dimensional rift, leading them to an alternate reality.  This is a very different earth and, when Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur land, they are met by a very different version of themselves.  Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur meet Devil Girl and Moon Dinosaur… and the pair don’t appear to be very friendly.

And it is with this surprising twist that the issues comes to an end with the promise of continuation with the next installment.

The main story is interspersed with a pair of interludes where it is shown that Lunella has created robot versions of herself to take her place while she is off on her mission to help Illa.  It turns out that Lunella is quite skilled at creating android duplicates, but perhaps not as apt at it as she may think.  The android duplicate goes a bit haywire while playing dodgeball in gym class, decimating her classmates with dodgeball chucks that are a bit too precise and powerful.  Even Coach Hrbek gets pummeled by a dodgeball to the back of the head.

To make matters worse, the robotic Lunella duplicates have all been left in the care of the disembodied DoomBot head that Lunella has kept in her Laboratory.  The DoomBot may seem harmless, bodiless and fastened atop an old rocking horse, yet it still possesses a cognitive motherboard modeled after the ingenious and nefarious Victor Von Doom… and it appears as though it has plans to manipulate the android Lunella duplicates, to cultivate the androids’ burgeoning sense of self-interest…  All this is sure to lead to some serious trouble in the future.

This was another very fun issue.  The action is cool and the inventive, outré science of how a living moon might be born is extremely cool.  A lot of different themes and allegories are being set up, yet are left a touch half-baked.  The notion that our own planet may be just as sensitive and easily hurt as Illa is put out there, but not really hammered home.  Likewise, the parallel between Illa and Ego and Lunella and her own parents is intimated, yet kind of needed to be made more overt.

Illa is like earth’s moon, it orbits its parent planet but doesn’t rotate on its own, meaning there is always a side face earth and always a side that faces away.  Illa’s face is on the far side of her orbital axis, meaning she can never see her father; her back is always turned.  This is quite similar to Lunella’s relationship with her own parents.  Lunella’s back is also always turned, her attention is always to the future, to what’s out there and what’s to come.  While it is Illa who feels isolated and abandoned, with Lunella’s situation it is her parents who feel alone and left behind.  The mounting tensions between Lunella and her mom and dad has been percolating for so long now that I might be reading in metaphors that aren’t intended… future issues are likely to see Illa ultimately reunited with her father and I hope this will lead to Lunella coming to realize just how much she has been icing her own parents out.

It is very cool getting to see Bustos and Bonvillain stretch their artistic skills in creating the alien setting of the adventure.  Natasha Bustos is subtle in the ways in which she relays emotion in her character’s facial features, yet it works just wonderfully well.  This is especially true for Illa, whose face can re-manifest on any part of her surface.  Bustos draws Illa’s face with a fantastic sense of expressiveness; she’s lonely, innocent, but also kind of a brat.  The little gap between her two front teeth is adorable.

There have been a lot of anthropomorphic cosmic entities in the Marvel Universe (Ego The Living Planet, Master Order, Galactus, The Living Tribunal, et cetera).  These beings almost always have faces with distinctively european features, as though such features are some kind of cosmic norm.  Illa bucks that trend.  Her facial features are a bit more ethnically ambiguous… to me, she sort of looks like she’s Latina.  Whatever the case, I liked it because it lead me to reconsider just how accustomed I’ve become to imagining cosmic beings as having faces similar to a white person’s.

Tamra Bovillain uses a lot of purple and blue hues in coloring the landscape of Illa the Living Moon.  it makes for a neat juxtaposition in which Lunella, in her yellow and white togs, really stick out.  Bonvillan and Bustos work so well together, with seem to bring out the best in each other’s work.

Just a quick tidbit for the dinosaur lovers and junior paleontologists out there…  this issue finally makes a note of the fact that Devil Dinosaur being cold blooded and lacking feathered plumage is an anomaly, possibly a product of his originating from a different universe.

Definitely recommended.  Three and a half out of four Lockjaws!

Once more the issues starts off with a cryptic prologue set thousands of years in the future.  The last Inhuman (whom we now know to be Maximus) looks over a battered and altered world (which we now know to be Earth).  A sickly giant riding atop a mutant pterodactyl ferries Maximus toward an alien vessel.  The narration mysteriously indicates that the last Inhuman is on his way to meet ‘the accuser.’

The scene shifts to the present and the scorched, deadened world of Hala.  The former capital planet of the Kree Empire had been attacked and laid barren by The Slaughter Lords during the Black Vortex story-arc (a cross-over that ran through the pages of Captain Marvel, Nova, All New X-Men and Guardians of The Galaxy a while’s back). Ronan himself was greatly empowered by the celestial energies of The Black Vortex, yet he was ultimately helpless to prevent Planet Hala’s demise.

Alone and besieged by grief, Ronan now spends his days walking amidst the smoldering ruins of Hala.  His solemn task to roam the immolated world and recall the names of the countless dead.  His solitary vigil is interrupted as his heightened senses detects the approach of The Inhuman vessel, The Asterion.

Aboard the Asterion, Captain Swain is tasked with plotting a landing trajectory whilst also putting up with the near constant nattering and insults offered up by Maximus.   Swain has little choice but to keep Max in the cockpit with her, the nature of the two Inhumans’ powers act to cancel each other out, mitigating the threat posed by the treacherous Maximus.

Of course this is all much to the consternation of Gorgon, who would much prefer Max locked in the brig (or better yet jettisoned out an airlock).  Maximus is quite happy to offer Gorgon an acerbic retort, stating that their mission is a scientific one with little use for a muscle-brained enforcer with a bad back.

Their spiteful patter is interrupted by a proximity alarm and Swain’s announcement that the allegedly dead world of Hala has fired an attack.  Evasive maneuvers prove fruitless as Ronan comes hurdling into orbit and uses his hammer to tear through the starboard wing of the craft, causing catastrophic damage to the Asterion.

For a brief instant Swain mistakes Ronan’s hammer for that belonging to Thor, wondering allowed whatever it may have been that elicited the wraith of the god of thunder.

The damage to the ship has taken out the escape pods and the ship and its crew barrel toward the surface at what will surely be a terminal velocity.  Marvel Boy, Crystal and Flint dash into the control bay, yet there seems to be little anyone can do to save them.

Confident he has the solution, Marvel Boy utilizes an advanced tool derived from the alternate technology of his home reality.  It’s called the ‘pocket battlefield.’

This difficult-to-describe weapon first showed up in the pages of the original Marvel Boy miniseries; and then once more in the miniseries, Civil War: Young Avengers/Runaways.   Fastened into the circuitry of his wristband, the pocket battlefield allows Noh-Varr to extend a spherical field around him and anyone in his vicinity; within this sphere, Noh can control and manipulate the properties of time, gravity and inertia.  The effects only last a matter of moments, but it is long enough to enable The crew to survive the turbulent crash of the Asterion completely unscathed.

Armed with laser rifles, Medusa leads the squad from the wreckage of the ship, ready to take on whatever foe had fallen their ship.  They discover that this adversary is their one-time ally and the former husband of Princess Crystal, Ronan the Accuser.
Yet it is a very different version of Ronan.   His transformation via passage through the Black Vortex has remade him into a veritable giant, possessing a host of new, formidable and mysterious powers.

Ronan is displeased to see The Royals.  Not only are they trespassing on the sacred memorial of the dead planet Hala, but Ronan holds the Inhumans as in-part responsible for the fate that had befallen his home-world.

Following the War of Kings event, The Inhumans of Attilan had been granted lordship over the war torn remnants of the Kree Empire.  Black Bolt ultimately relinquished Inhuman dominion over the Kree as part of a pact with The Supreme Intelligence…
and yet The Supreme Intelligence is now dead and Ronan accuses The Inhumans of growing bored with their responsibilities to The Kree, abandoning them to their fate and just as guilty and culpable for Hala’s fate as those who had destroyed it.

Ronan’s claims are baseless, clearly warped by his anger and grief.  Crystal, his one time love and wife tries to reason with him, but it is of no avail.  Gorgon losses his patience and attacks, yet he is ill prepared for Ronan’s impressive new abilities.

Ronan strikes down his hammer and a mysterious energy exude by from it, seizing each of The Royals in their tracks.  The energy appears to place its victims in some sort of trance where they are engulfed by hallucinations centered on feeling of intense guilt over past actions and feelings… each drawn psychically from their memories and imaginations.

Gorgon’s hallucinogenic experience is shown first and foremost; it’s a scene that introduces readers to his beforehand-unknown wife, a horned Inhuman named Myrra.

Writer, Al Ewing had hinted that Gorgon was going to be revealed as a widower, but here it is confirmed, with the additional tidbit that she is the mother of both their children (both the older adolescent, Alecto, as well as her younger brother Petras).
This suggests that Myrra died sometime shortly before or right after Attilan’s relocation to the Blue Area of the moon; although the circumstances of her death are left unrevealed.
Within Gorgon trance, Myrra berates him for having forgotten about her, for finding comfort and distraction in his love for another.

The others experience similar hallucinogenic trances, each focused upon feelings of guilt, accusation and betrayal.

Swain sees Panacea, accusing her of wishing for a girlfriend more able to reciprocate her feelings of affection in a traditional fashion.  Flint sees his adoptive parents condemning him for his negligence over never saying that he loved them.  Maximus sees his parents accusing him of his various malicious schemes; stating that it was him not his brother whom they should have been worried over (Max seems utterly unfazed by the matter).  Noh-Varr sees Kate Bishop, haranguing him for having broken her heart.  And Medusa sees Black Bolt who accuses her of betraying him, sending him into the blackness and breaking his heart.

And finally there is Crystal.  She is not effected like the others.  She is left to speak more privately with Ronan.  He accuses her of leaving him, of turning her back on true love. And the issue ends with Ronan demanding to know how she pleads to this accusation.

A very fun issue and truly my only complaint is just how short it was.  Although granted the matter is likely influenced by my near-insatiable hunger to see more of where Ewing and company is going.  Understanding the full context of the story sort of requires one to be fairly well versed on events that occurred in both the Black Vortex cross-over as well as parts of J. Hickman’s run on Fantastic Four.  This was no problem for me, but I can imagine that other readers might have been a bit puzzled over who Ronan is, his connection to the Inhumans and how Hala was destroyed.

Al Ewing is clearly having a lot of fun writing Maximus and it shows.  Max gets all the fun and funniest pieces of dialogue.  This is great, but it does detract a bit from the continued character development of the other players.  I have been hoping that these chapters would more focus on Crystal, who has thus far been the least utilized member of the cast.  Bringing back Noh-Varr’s pocket battlefield was super cool, but there’s no reason why it couldn’t have been Crystal who stepped up and saved the others when The Astern was crashing.  The cover for next issue (wonderfully illustrated by Kris Anka) focuses on Marvel Boy and while it’s a great cover, it leaves me further worried that Crystal will continue to take a back seat int he narrative despite the fact that her past relationship with Ronan should place her front and center in the plot.  I suppose we will have to wait and see how it all pans out.

Silas and Charalampidis do terrific work on the art.  Silas particularly excels at larger scenes, such as Ronan standing before the Royals and his initial attack on The Asterian.  A touch less so in terms of facial expressions and I’m not a huge fan of the use of accentuated shadow covering much of the characters’ faces (particularly their eye-sockets.  My sense is that Ewing wrote this script with Jonboy Meyer’s art style very much in mind and Thony Silas as had to accommodate his own style to fit.  Yet this is totally speculation on my part.

some interesting side notes:

• How neat to see Gorgon’s wife.  His being a widower is a completely new wrinkle to his character.  Not necessarily a retcon, but an addition that reframes much of his past behaviors in a new context.  Many past tales have shown Gorgon as a hedonist, always on the look out for good time, lots to drink and sexual companionship.  Perhaps all of these behaviors were less about him just wanting to have fun and more about him desperately searching out distraction to keep him from dwelling on the pain and sorrow of having lost his wife.
• In that scene, Myrra accuses Gorgon of having fallen in love with another.  This is all just a hallucination, but to whom might Myrra be referring to here?  Is she talking about Gorgon’s affair with Mynxi (the two had a relationship in the pages of Inhumans: By Right of Birth) or is she referring to something else.  Of late, it seems that Gorgon has been quite dutiful and attentive of Medusa.  Is it possible he has fallen in love with his cousin’s former wife?
• The hallucinatory visage between Swain and Panacea is the first time where the two are officially connoted as girlfriends.  The matter has been rather obviously implied, but sometimes a fully unambiguous canonization is needed for naysayers.  Ash’s accusing Swain of wishing she could more conventionally express her feelings of love may rub some the wrong way.  It suggests that those in relationships with people who are neuroatypical may wish their partners could be more ‘normal.’  I don’t feel this is the intention.  I believe Swain truly loves Ash for who she is, but a certain degree of ambivalence is bound to exist in any relationship and I’m certain a part of Swain does long for Ash to be able to say ‘I love you’ in a more conventional fashion.
• It’s a bit of a stretch to say that Noh-Varr broke Kate Bishop’s heart.  I think she was saddened when he ended their relationship, but not really heart-broken.  Perhaps this is just how Noh sees it; or perhaps the thematic of a broken heart is being superimposed by Ronan.
• In the Black Vortex cross-over, Hala was destroyed at the behest of Mr. Knife, who was secretly J’son of Spartex (Peter Quill/Star Lord’s father).  J’son paid for this crime at the end of the story, but apparently Ronan’s thirst for vengeance is far from quenched, leaving him to add blame to The Royal Inhumans.
• Being the Captain Marvel fan-girl that she is, I’m kind of surprised that Swain didn’t recognize Ronan’s hammer right off the bat.
• The title of the chapter is ‘Dust and Roses.’  This is not the name of a David Bowie song but rather a lyric from Bowie’s ‘Big Brother’ from Demon Dogs.  It’s an interesting choice, more so in the context of the full stanza of the song…

“Don’t talk of dust and roses
Or should we powder our noses?
Don’t live for last year’s capers
Give me steel, give me steel,
Give me pulses unreal.”

• The ways in which the future-oriented prologues and the main story connect appears to be rapidly coming to ahead.  Yet the matter of how exactly they relate remains completely mysterious.

Definitely recommended.  Three out of Five Lockjaws.