What I Bought 11/20/2024

I caught a bit of Spider-Man: No Way Home while I was in a hotel last week. Pretty much just the part once all three Spider-Men were in the same place. I found their conversations endearingly silly. The comparing of villains ("let's go back to the part where you were in space") and the stuff about Maguire-Spidey's organic webs. I'm sure the movie as a whole is a big mess, but that part, at least, I enjoyed.

Avengers Assemble #3, by Steve Orlando (writer), Marcelo Ferreira (penciler), Roberto Poggi (inker), Sonia Oback (colorist), Cory Petit (letterer) - I think the Night Stalkers ought to have checked with the Army on what happens when you shoot at a Hulk.

Four Avengers travel to a town where a bunch of vampires live and are under attack by a new team of Nightstalkers. The quartet - She-Hulk, Wonder Man, Living Lightning and Lightspeed - scuffle a bit, but ultimately protect the town. The main thing I took from that, besides remembering someone made Wonder Man a pacifist at some point (and it apparently still holds, for a particular value), is there's no sense of teamwork between this group. Last issue, you could tell Captain America, Hercules and Hawkeye had a track record of working together. This group, everyone just kind of splits up and flails about, fighting individual battles.

Meanwhile, Shang-Chi's figured out someone's been using the crises the team has faced as cover for heists and encounters this Tiger Snake. Who is a good enough fighter to sucker Shang-Chi into getting poisoned, though Shang escapes to alert Captain America. But the Serpent Society's got another new member, a very big one. OK, so? This Avengers squad has Hercules and She-Hulk. They beat up big dudes all the time. This is why the Serpent Society is a bunch of second-raters. "Our secret weapon is a guy on Pym Particles, but we named him after an extinct giant snake!" *extremely sarcastic golf clap*

I guess it's going to be a different artist every issue, then. Ferreira's art is a bit looser than Eaton or Smith's. Maybe a good touch to have when Bloodscream is sporting a mouth that could swallow a watermelon and huge teeth, but some of faces that don't belong to weird vampire-like people look kind of strange. He also likes overlapping panels, and squeezing together a lot of panels that are unevenly shaped. A tilted horizontal rhombus, on top of two narrower panels, all crammed into a quarter of the page. I don't know what effect it's supposed to have when I read it, beyond the sense maybe the page space isn't being allocated well.

Also, why the heck do characters keep saying it as "AVENG.E.R.S." I know, it's an acronym now, in that stupid, Vril Dox, "R.E.B.E.L.S. has another acronym inside it," way, but you can't pronounce the periods. It's just "Avengers." That's what it sounds like they're saying, they are Avengers, so just write it like that.

Moon Knight: Fist of Khonshu #2, by Jed MacKay (writer), Alessandro Cappuccio (artist), Rachelle Rosenberg (color artist), Cory Petit (letterer) - I'm confident 8-Ball is not going to stick the landing.

Moon Knight asks Iron Man to look at this new drug, but Stark don't know shit about chemistry, so that's a bust. I was thinking this was a job for Hank Pym, and sure enough, that's who Stark mentions. Too bad he's dead. Or not, since that Avengers Inc. mini-series Al Ewing did established Hank's still alive, I guess. Something Marc knew even before his most recent death, but thus far neglected to mention to Tigra.

Well, I'm sure that's going to be a calm and reasonable conversation. Especially as the cops have decided to barge into the Midnight Mission, I presume being on this Fairchild guy's payroll, or under his thumb, or whatever.

Oh, and Moon Knight tried to hit one of Fairchild's shipments, but got punked by some old foe of his with perception-warping pheromones. Cubist has a nifty design, though it seems like one a lot of artists would get tired of drawing quickly. Rosenberg and Cappuccio have the background tilt to match whatever direction the action is going in a particular panel, so that the characters seem like they're always hemmed in by it. Nice touch.

Sunday Splash Page #349

 

"Sunrise Over the City," in Mary Jane and Black Cat: Beyond #1, by Jed MacKay (writer), C.F. Villa (artist), Erick Arciniega (color artist), Travis Lanham (letterer)

After Nick Spencer's stint as writer on Amazing Spider-Man, but before Zeb Wells', Marvel handed the book over to a small team of writers. Peter Parker was laid up after getting hit with a lot of radiation (courtesy of the U-Foes, I think), and so Ben Reilly stepped in as Spider-Man in the interim while Captain America and the Black Cat tried to help Peter recover. Except Ben was being sponsored by the Beyond Corporation, and they messed with his head, and it all ended badly.

In the midst that was this one-shot, where The Hood, sans his namesake piece of fashion (courtesy of a Hawkeye mini-series I didn't read because it was written by Matthew Rosenberg, and he's on my no-buy list since that crappy Multiple Man mini-series), finds out Felicia Hardy's been visiting this loser photographer in the hospital and uses Peter as leverage to make her retrieve his hood. Mary Jane happened to be there when Felicia arrives, so she claims MJ is part of the crew she needs for this job to get MJ clear. Then the two of them work to track down the hood in one night while Peter sleeps through the whole thing.

Much of the part where they try to track down the hood is kept light and kind of breezy. MacKay's working the whole thing around the idea everybody wants something. Robbins wants his hood; Felicia and MJ want Peter to be safe; each of the people they question wants something in exchange. Except Mr. Fear and the Shocker, who just get their asses kicked. And I know Shocker's treated as a total joke these, but MJ really shouldn't be able to do anything to him with a baseball bat. The whole point is the suit cushions impacts!

Ahem. The heist comes when the trail leads to someone who doesn't want anything from them, it's set up in such a way Mary Jane's talents as an actress can play a role. Villa has a lot of fun with the expressions, as neither lady is happy with this set-up. So there's a fair amount of frustration and sarcasm on both their parts, as well as times where each of them is in their element and moving with total assurance and confidence.

The story does require me to accept the idea that Parker Robbins is any actual threat to Peter Parker, which is hard to manage. Yes, Parker's nowhere near full strength, but we're talking about an ordinary guy with one gun. No special magic cloak, no super-powered henchmen, or any henchmen for that matter. Just loser-ass Parker Robbins. (If the concern was Peter blowing his secret identity, that's another matter, but that's not how MJ explains her demand Robbins not even point his gun at the sleeping Peter.)

The important thing is, the Hood winds up dead. The long nightmare is over! Then Benjamin Percy brought him back in Ghost Rider. Booooooooo!

What I bought 10/17/2024

Can't go a day without somebody wanting me to drive halfway across the state to help them with something. People have apparently decided I'm someone at my job who can be counted on to help solve their problems. It wasn't intentional, I swear.

Moon Knight: Fist of Khonshu #1, by Jed MacKay (writer), Alessandro Cappuccio (artist), Rachelle Rosenberg (color artist), Cory Petit (letterer) - Moon Knight: he'll hit you with sticks. Daredevil's gonna sue for trademark infringement.

Moon Knight (or Mr. Knight) is on the streets, trying to shut off the flow of a new drug, which may in fact be fairy dust. The path leads to some former boxer turned Mista Big named Achilles Fairchild, who also has a chief enforcer named Carver. Carver doesn't talk, just carries a big magic sword, but Achilles talks enough for both of them. The conversation doesn't produce results, but it's probably more of a pissing contest, I mean, marking territory, I mean, a friendly warning.

Cappuccio keeps Fairchild sitting for the first half of the conversation, which means it was a surprise when he stands up and he's got several inches on Moon Knight. He didn't look that big, but it plays well as the moment when shifts from cordial businessman to hard-nosed drug pusher.

MacKay intersperses bits of a conversation between old Moon Knight supporting cast member (former) Lt. Flint, and a new cop, a Detective Frazier. Frazier is the cop who Doesn't Want to Play Nice with Vigilantes, and is openly scornful of Moon Knight's crew, who will therefore have to learn the error of their ways. Or die, I'm good with dying. Especially since Frazier is, gasp, working for Fairchild! Because she's hooked on the drug. I don't know, a bent cop is a pretty farfetched notion to expect me to swallow in this comic about a guy who dresses all in white and beats to shit out of people for his Skeleton Bird God.

I'm not sure if it's Rosenberg or Cappuccio, but the characters are less sharply defined than they were in the previous book. The colors tend to smudge and blur a bit, softens them a little. Or makes them dirtier, I suppose. Although maybe MacKay's going to have Moon Knight ease up a bit after his most recent death. Try a little compassion. You know, not hit people where it causes permanent disfiguring. Only temporary disfiguring.

Avengers Assemble #2, by Steve Orlando (writer), Scot Eaton (penciler), Elisabetta D'Amico (inker), Sonia Oback (colorist), Cory Petit (letterer) - I know Red Ghost can turn intangible, but his positioning on that cover is awkward. It looks like he's punching Night Thrasher, or waiting for Thrasher to run into the back of his knuckles.

A Massachusetts town is being haunted by ape ghosts. Lots of ape ghosts. Is it Silver Age DC month at Marvel and no one told me? So it's Captain America, Hercules, Hawkeye and Night Thrasher to investigate. Herc's the only one able to actually hit ghosts, so it's just as well the apes don't seem to be trying to hurt people. The heroes eventually figure out the apes are smart enough to speak, and that they were the Red Ghost's early test subjects. No powers, save enough intelligence to speak and plead for their lives. Pleas that were ignored.

The Avengers locate Red Ghost's house, let the apes torment him until they're satisfied and then Herc uses his mace's ability to absorb energy(?) to draw in the radiation holding the ghosts in the realm of the living. Another crisis averted, although the Serpent Society stole some bone fragments soaked in magic moonshine, so that's. . .concerning. I guess? I'd say the vocal dissent of members of the Society is going to short-circuit that plot before too long.

Anyway, credit to Orlando for an interesting problem for the team to confront. The ghosts of unethical animal experimentation. I didn't quite understand why, if Hercules can apparently understand the ghosts courtesy of the "All-Speak", why he let Hawkeye keep trying to read their lips. Did Hercules just not think of trying to understand their spectral cries? But that wouldn't explain why he's still letting Hawkeye have first crack even after that. I guess he just thinks it's a good challenge for Clint.

Oback keeps the colors murky while the team is dealing with the apes, then brightens things up considerably once they find the Red Ghost. Maybe because, once the team has a sense of the cause, things aren't so dire. Eaton's ghost apes are suitably anguished and angry looking.

What I Bought 9/11/2024 - Part 2

I happened to catch an episode of Columbo over the weekend, and he was making a peanut butter and raisin sandwich. I started eating those periodically back in elementary school, and I can't recall ever seeing anyone else do it. Now I'm wondering if Columbo gave me the notion.

Fantastic Four #25, by Ryan North (writer), Carlos Gomez (artist), Jesus Arbutov (color artist), Joe Caramagna (letterer) - Uh-oh, a planet of floating islands. Those platforming levels are always tricky.

Dr. Doom's erected a magical dome over Latveria. Naturally, the FF try to poke it and end up on an unfamiliar world full of intelligent, friendly aliens. Gomez draws the aliens as having a bit of the "big head and eyes" grey aliens, but on a long stalk neck, with multiple little noodle limbs and red spines sticking out of their backs (the purpose of which I was not clear on.)

The locals agree to let Reed use some resources to build a rocketship to get home (which looks very old-timey, even moreso than the original rocket Kirby drew them taking into space to get bombarded by cosmic rays.) Meanwhile, Johnny's hit it off with the liason, named (or translated to) Angelica of the Shore.

Everything's proceeding well until the clouds clear enough Reed can calculate their position by the stars. Turns out, they're still on Earth, but an Earth that was never hit by another planetary body, causing the formation of the Moon. Turns out the FF aren't the only ones who poked the dome. Reed can make his rocketship into a time machine and stop Doom's magic trick from doing this, but that means Angelica and her people won't exist, which is not OK with Johnny.

North continues to come up with clever bits of science to use as a basis for stories, but this is undercut by how easily Reed seems to solve these problems. Sure, he can make his rocketship into a time machine, too. Confronted with the problem, Reed builds a thing to solve the problem in about two panels. He's continuing one spiel throughout, so it's not like there's a timejump.

I guess there wasn't supposed to be any doubt they'd figure something out, so the real conflict was Johnny fighting with the others about how they can't get rid of Angelica's world to save their own. Then hie and Angelica having to sacrifice their happiness to make the solution stick. The internal narration boxes for this issue are Angelica's, which probably helps to plant their connection in the foreground and make this more than just another doomed relationship for Johnny Storm.

Vengeance of the Moon Knight #9, by Jed MacKay (writer), Devmalya Premanik (artist), Rachelle Rosenberg (color artist), Cory Petit (letterer) - I bet moon-fire is cold.

Marc owes Khonshu a favor. Not for bringing him back to life, but for that time he got Marc and Tigra a shortcut so they could save Reese and Soldier from Zodiac. And the favor is to kill the false Moon Knight, the Shroud.

So he does, after a brief fight, albeit with a lot of panels as Premanik and Rosenberg have one page of 16 panels, slanted and staggered, showing the main stretch of the fight, against the backdrop of a, I thought it was a crescent moon, but it's actually two crescent moons, one matching the symbol Shroud Knight wore, the other matching Marc Knight's. One shatters, the other remaining whole. Premanik's Moon Knight feels like more of a physical presence than Cappuccio's. Bigger, body less obscured by the cape, a lot of focus on his fists or legs, his instruments of pain.

Marc's talking in a very stilted manner, calling Shroud "Moon Knight", reminding him he disrespected a god, impressing on him that this is a fight for his life. Didn't impress it on him enough, as Marc brings Shroud Knight's costume to the villain bar and pins it on the wall as a message. Or two messages: a) he's back, b) the other guy is dead. That said, I don't believe for a second the Rhino is scared of Moon Knight. Come on, tell me McKay didn't actually tell Premanik to put him in those pages. The Jester, the Shocker? Sure. The Spot? Guy probably wees himself around Moon Knight. The Rhino takes punches from the Hulk. Same with Piledriver, except replace "Hulk" with "Thor."

Anyway, Shroud's not dead. He was, but you know, Hunter's Moon is a doctor. Hearts stops, hearts restart. Easy-peasy, right? Khonshu's pissed, but Marc makes an argument it's a fitting symbolic sacrifice, and points out Khonshu can't strike at Reese or the others in retaliation, because he owes them for getting him out of Asgard Jail. And that's were the book ends. Khonshu's back, Marc's back, with an uneasy detente at best.

What I Bought 8/14/2024 - Part 2

Now that Blood Hunt's over, it's safe to return to a couple of books I steered clear of the last two months. One of them is getting canceled soon (only to be rebooted immediately, because Marvel), but oh well.

Fantastic Four #23, by Ryan North (writer), Carlos Gomez (artist), Jesus Arbutov (color artist), Joe Caramagna (letterer) - Hey, the FF found the world that produces the probe from Star Trek IV!

Sue and Johnny are taking Nikki and Jo on a shopping trip to New York. I guess Arizona doesn't have the right kind of salsa for their refined, East Coast palettes. Interrupting a fight between a couple of dudes and some vampires (who can all walk around in daylight now), the city comes under barrage by some invisible force.

It's happening across the world, as Reed figures out when it wrecks the device he was testing to see if it would detect magic once Doom inevitably starts throwing some around. The shape Gomez draws Reed's head when it gets hit is appropriately weird and goofy-looking. Since this issue is narrated by Johnny, he simplifies Reed's explanation to, "the Earth is being hit by subatomic particles moving incredibly fast, except they aren't harmlessly decaying on impact like normal."

The FF shrink to the "preonic" level, and find a black sphere. Someone's turned these particles into starships. Except, as it turns out, the aliens inside are all dying or dead. They do find one alive, and manage to translate that it wants to get off Earth. Yeah, you and every billionaire.

It's a decent little science mystery, the kind of thing the Fantastic Four are better suited for than the other superteams, so that's good. North is trying to incorporate the new status quo, because of course Reed would be concerned about Sorcerer Supreme Doom (and of course he'd be certain magic has to obey the laws of science as he knows them.)

Vengeance of the Moon Knight #8, by Jed MacKay (writer), Devmalya Pramanik (artist), Rachelle Rosenberg (color artist), Cory Petit (letterer) - See what happens when you let Khonshu loose? Giant Moon Knights, rampaging through the city.

The Midnight Mission has been sheltering people from vampires, and the vampires are ready to just blow the place up and be done with it. As Reese and Soldier make a last stand, the sun comes back, but it doesn't burn any vampires. Well, that's both cool and inconvenient for our heroes.

Oh, but Moon Knight's back, too. So they trounce a lot of vampires to spread the message to get lost, and Marc wants to continue his therapy sessions with Dr. Sterman, but first he's got to have a little chat with Khonshu, about what Old Bird Skull wants. And what Khonshu wants is the Shroud dead. 

Pramanik's art is a lot looser than Cappuccio's, tending to exaggerate hands or perspective to let one image or part of a character dominate a panel. So Moon Knight attacks a vampire, his legs are tiny things in one corner of the panel while his face and upper body command the rest. Pramanik's willingness to exaggerate sells the exhaustion of the characters. With Cappuccio, even when they're shocked or angry, the linework is stiff enough it feels restrained. Here, everything is looser, the emotions are bigger, Reese's hair is messier. She looks too tired to put any sort of calm facade.

Rosenberg's also keeping the colors less starkly defined. More blurring or mixing for the backgrounds. Especially when the sun comes out and the backgrounds are really just a mixture of overpowering yellows. Previously, even during daylight scenes, it felt as though light would be constrained to a narrow band of a specific shade, and that was it. Maybe all the characters are just too tired, or maybe it's a new day, where Marc doesn't feel like he's so constrained by his fears or the suspicions of others.

Random Back Issues #135 - Black Cat #4

He could dispense with the bib - is it long enough to be an apron? - if he just wore casual dress. Maybe it's a thief thing, having a quirk. Felicia apparently only drinks champagne, the Fox always dresses in suits.

Black Cat's breaking into the Fantastic Four's current digs, a brownstone on Yancy Street. More accurately, she hit Johnny Storm up about them having dinner at his place. Felicia's out to steal a book Reed Richards owns, a collection of notes on dimensional travel, written by one Phineas Randall.

The Black Fox wants to loot the vault holding all the loot the New York Thieves Guild take as tariff, but the vault is in another dimension. Hence the need for the book, to complete his final job. Of course, the Fox is actually after something else entirely, as we (and Felicia) learned when we looked at an issue from the next volume.

Still, there's a journal to be lifted, and while Felicia is very wary of crossing Susan Storm-Richards, Johnny's the only one home now, so no big deal. Johnny gives her a tour, lingering over the Fantasticar, which he insists he designed and built, not Reed. The plan is for Bruno and Doctor Korpse, her crew, to pretend to be sushi delivery guys and when they hand over the food, she slips the journal to them. In the meantime, Korpse is boring Bruno with his, "Johnny Storm's not my Human Torch," takes.

Enter Sonny Ocampo. He was head of security on a heist Felicia's crew pulled in the first issue, which got him shitcanned. So he took a job from Odessa Drake, current head of the NYC T'ieves Guild to hunt down Felicia. At a dead end, he's staking the Tinkerer's storefront when the fact the Black Cat knocked on the FF's door pops up on social media. He's only two blocks away, so he rushes there and starts banging on the door and yelling into the intercom. Johnny, naturally, doesn't listen to what the guy is saying and remotely opens the door, thinking it's the sushi guys, who are in fact chasing Ocampo. They neglected to bring the sushi, though.

At least it's enough of a distraction for Felicia to swipe the book. The alarm is not about the book. Nor is it about Bruno and the Doc brutalizing Ocampo in the hallway. Nope, someone is opening the Negative Zone gate from the other side. With their bare hands. Uh-oh. If it's the Negative Zone, it can only be one of two guys, and it's not the one Richard Rider pulled inside-out.

{2nd longbox, 128th comic. Black Cat (vol. 3) #4, by Jed MacKay (writer), Travel Foreman (artist), Brian Reber (color artist), Ferran Delgado (letterer)}

Random Back Issues #130 - Black Cat #5

Can I trade it in for Flagstaff, or maybe Santa Fe?

This is the opening chapter of "The Gilded City" arc, the big heist that MacKay's entire Black Cat run (spanning the previous volume) was building to. Felicia, her crew, and the Black Fox have gathered all the pieces they need to break into the vault where the New York Branch o' da T'ieves Guild sends all their stolen goods.

This issue largely boils down to Felicia and the Fox descending through a series of tunnels to the place where they'll use the "dimensional resonator" she broke into Stark's building to make, to help the Randall Gate - whose design she copied from the one in Iron Fist's place - open the doorway they need.

In the meantime, flashbacks! First, to the point when Felicia told Fox that she was going to head out on her own, and that her first heist would be to get her father out of prison. Also, that she was taking the name "Black Cat", a combination of Fox's title and her father's, Walter Hardy, aka "The Cat".

A different "The Cat" from the one that became Tigra. At least, I hope so. That would be weird. "Felicia, your dad appeared to die, but actually, he traveled back in time, became a costumed female crimefighter, then a werecat-woman who was written as extremely horny by Steve Engelhart, and later humiliated by Bendis' latest attempt to prop up a crime boss character."

Anyway, Black Fox reveals 2 critical pieces of information. First, the New York Thieves made a deal with a being called The Gilded Saint. 10% of their take in exchange for immortality. Second, he's dying. He tried to get a lot of different cures, but he either can't get them, or they don't work. Even tried asking Dracula to turn him, but Drac remembers when Fox cheated him in a card game (detailed in an issue of the first volume), then sicced Ulysses Bloodstone on Drac to cover his escape. Dracula would rather watch Fox wither and die than turn him and have the guy under his thumb for an eternity.

I guess at that age, you find your kicks where you can.

Felicia should be getting bad vibes by this point, but Fox is still spooling some line about wanting to go out committing a heist no one else can, so she tells the guys to fire up the Randall Gate. But instead of all that gold landing in their laps, a giant skeleton emerges from a tear in the air in front of Felicia and demands answers. The Fox wants the immortality of the Thieves Guild transferred to he and Felicia, and in exchange, he'll hand over Manhattan (the deed to which Felicia swiped from the Sanctum Sanctorum.)

{2nd longbox, 140th comic. Black Cat (vol. 4) #5, by Jed MacKay (writer), Michael Dowling (artist), Brian Reber (color artist), Ferran Delgado (letterer)}

What I Bought 5/1/2024

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

What I Bought 4/3/2024 - Part 1

My weather luck when I need to go into the field isn't terrible, but when it's bad, it decides to be bad in unique ways. Snow in April, 50 mph winds in December, what's supposed to be 1 hour of rain turns into 5 hours of intense thunderstorms.

Doctor Strange #14, by Jed MacKay (writer), Pasqual Ferry (artist), Heather Moore (color artist), Cory Petit (letterer) - Oh, don't give the Black Cat boob armor, Ross. She can't hide any tools in that!

Mordo's got the enchanted, living game book, so he's in charge. Strange draws the dragon away, seeing it as more than just something Mordo's using to destroy them. Which leaves the rest of his Secret Defenders to contend with Mordo. Hunter's Moon and Taskmaster are swept up in a scenario where they're leaders of opposing factions, who will ultimately fight to the death. It seems like a game with limited room for creativity, or maybe it just plays into their respective approaches.

Ferry lays out all the pages in curiously shaped panels that feel like they're meant to be symbols, but I have no idea of what. Circle atop three tall, narrow panels. Circle spilling off the left side of the page, on top of a wide panel with a little hill in the middle, on top of another circle spilling off the right side of the page.

But while Mordo's enjoying the show, he forgot about the thief. Felicia may not be into tabletop gaming, but she understands swiping the special book. So she does. Ferry drops the odd panel layouts, so I guess they were meant to reflect being in a game scenario, but it almost feels like the panels should be more rigid, because the game has set rules and only so many locales and creatures. 

Strange returns, having reached an accord with the book's intelligence. Mordo get punched out by Clea, Strange offers the book to I think an evil doppleganger of himself that is living in his house, and Mordo gets chucked in a crypt with the ghost dog and the snakes.

I am unclear if the dog and snakes wandered in by mistake and are now stuck - as Strange doesn't seem to know where they are - or if someone else (Clea, the general) chucked them in as part of a move against Strange, or if they have their own plans to harm Mordo. And then the last page is the start of the vampire event thing I'm going to try very hard to avoid the next few months.

Vengeance of the Moon Knight #4, by Jed MacKay (writer), Alessandro Cappuccio (artist), Rachelle Rosenberg (color artist), Cory Petit (letterer) - At least Hunter's Moon is a doctor. He surely knows a treatment for crescent-axe-in the pectoral.

It's Dr. Badr's turn on the sofa. He doesn't seem as bothered by Marc's death, as he is by the imposter. Well, that and the fact that with Khonshu sealed up, there won't be anymore Fists of Khonshu after the next time Badr dies. None except the imposter, and that's not OK with him. I think Cappuccio draws Badr as more physically expressive in his civilian duds than his costume.

I don't mean facial expression, since we can't see that under the mask, but his hands are more active in the conversation with the doctor. In costume, his arms are either at his sides, or in front of him, like he's guarding his heart. In civilian garb, he gestures a lot more. When describing how this fake Moon Knight fights, he moves his arms more than he does while actually fighting. Fidgets with his glasses, tents his fingers, puts his hand to his head. Maybe he's more relaxed around Sterman, or more controlled when on the job.

When not with Dr. Sterman, the rest of the issue is Tigra and Badr hitting the new guy where he lives. Which is where Marc died. Great strategy to keep anyone from looking for you, but not great in that it pisses off a tiger-woman once she's found you. And Badr has figured out some of the imposter's identity as a result of those past Khonshu Fist memories.

I like that, if MacKay's going to go the "long and storied" tradition route with Moon Knights, he picked something to differentiate it from other of the other, similar lineages. Iron Fists may have a book about them, but that's not the same as being able to relive their experiences.

Anyway, they unmask the guy, and hey, I was right, it's the Shroud. Sweet, I'm now 8-for-873 on predictions on this blog! Go me!

What I Bought 3/20/2024 - Part 2

So much time on the road last week. 300+ miles of driving on Tuesday, but it was a productive day. 400+ miles on Thursday, and it was a shitshow, as expected. 500 miles on Saturday, which was family-related, so it was, fine.

Fantastic Four #18, by Ryan North (writer), Carlos Gomez (artist), Jesus Arbutov (color artist), Joe Caramagna (letterer) - I really wanted to see Ben Grimm clobber a meteor with a telephone pole.

Couple of reveals in this issue. First, once a year, Franklin Richards unlocks those crazy powers of his to look at what might be coming in the year ahead. This year, it was a swarm of invisible meteors, which he foresees his family not being able to stop. If you ever wanted to see Reed Richards pierced by dozens of meteors, this is your comic. 

Franklin uses his powers to nudge the meteors on a different course (that will not aim them at anyone else, which is a nice touch.) Then his powers shut down and he goes to sleep, not remembering any of it (until next year.)

Two, Nicolas Scratch and his terrible costume are watching the FF, so he sees Franklin's little show and reverses. Death by invisible meteors is go! Things start the same, but Alicia comes up with the idea of using the light Johnny generates with his fire, manipulated by Sue's powers, to create a laser which Reed and Ben guide visually. Death by meteors averted! Booooooo.

On the other hand, Jo-Nah asks if Johnny and Sue are going to visit to Cyclops and gloat about their cool laser eye power, and I think they should absolutely do that. Rub Cyclops' nose in the futility of his existence!

Vengeance of the Moon Knight #3, by Jed MacKay (writer), Alessandro Cappuccio (artist), Rachelle Rosenberg (color artist), Cory Petit (letterer) - It'd be funny if he got the crescent blades tangled and whacked himself in the back of the head by accident.

It's Soldier's turn with the doctor, and he feels guilty. What a shock. He thinks he should have died instead of Marc, because that was his job, to die for his boss. Since it's a little late for that, he's taking his own approach to trying to stop the Shroud, I mean, this new Moon Knight. Which involves calling in a debt from the Chinatown vamps Marc helped out in the last year of his previous book.

I have a hunch Soldier's actually setting them up, too, since he had 8-Ball get him into the Bar with No Name to meet with someone Cappuccio keeps obscured. Could be wrong. Maybe he was setting up the 4 super-villains attacking the Midnight Mission because they think Moon Knight's there, to try and impress the seriousness of the situation, but that seems a little much. Soldier describes them as a "gang", and I can't see a gang encouraging someone coming onto their turf and unloading machine guns and flamethrowers. But I've not been in a gang, so what do I know?

Soldier also seems like he might be embracing his vampiric side. Reese knows the mist trick and whatnot, but she doesn't show her fangs as much as Soldier, who takes full advantage of the resilience and healing. He runs right into the gunfire, doesn't care if pieces of himself get blown off. Guess we'll see how far that attitude goes if he gets a crack at the new guy.

What I Bought 3/6/2024

We're at the part of the NBA season where everyone is agog at the Boston Celtics' regular season success and proclaiming them a nigh-unstoppable juggernaut rolling towards a title. Ignoring, of course, the fact they said the same thing the last two seasons, only to watch the Celtics bumble their way through multiple lengthy playoff series against allegedly inferior teams, before eventually NOT winning the title.

Just a couple of night ago they were outscored - the entire team - in the 4th quarter by Dean Wade, a guy best known for NBA writer Zach Lowe saying his name makes it sound like he's an accountant. 'Dean Wade, for your company's accounting needs. Dean Wade!' I'm supposed to take that bunch of bumblefucks seriously? Get the hell out.

Doctor Strange #13, by Jed MacKay (writer), Pasqual Ferry (artist), Heather Moore (color artist), Cory Petit (letterer) - Taskmaster out here like, "How about this? Good pose, right? Lifted it from the last Arkon flick. Piece of shit movie, but good visuals."

So there's a D&D style game that's actually real. Kids start playing it, and it begins to establish itself in their world, branching out and gaining a stronger grip on reality. To beat it, Strange says you have to play by its rules, so that means gathering a party. That's about half the issue, Strange making various pitches to the Black Cat, Hunter's Moon, and Taskmaster. Tasky's in it for money, Felicia so the Doc doesn't snitch to Spidey about nearly dooming Manhattan, Hunter's Moon because Moon Knight owed the Doc a favor.

Into the game they go, complete with new duds. Taskmaster and Hunter's Moon's outfits feel like they match their regular aesthetics pretty well, the Black Cat's not so much. Maybe it's all the lavender, or just the helm with the little cat ears. One montage of various perils defeated or circumvented later and they've found the kids. Unfortunately, Baron Mordo found the game book first, so now he's running this clown show. Next issue, dragon fight!

MacKay has some fun with the banter between Strange and his party, most of whom he doesn't seem very fond of (he admits that's why he picked Taskmaster as the meat shield), but I would have liked a little more of things not going the way the party expects, or the characters less used to this stuff being more confused by it. But Taskmaster just sees it as an excuse to chop things up, and it's probably not that weird for the others, so I guess I can see it.

Moore's colors help solidify Ferry's art more than I remember it looking in the past. It's been a while, but I remember when he was drawing Ultimate Fantastic Four, the colors made everything look like it was shot through a Vaseline-smeared lens. Kind of ephemeral. They save that here for when they find the bubble with the kids in it, playing what they think is just a game, while it rewrites reality around them.

Ms. Marvel: Mutant Menace #1, by Iman Vellani and Sabir Pirzada (writers), Scott Godlweski (artist), Erick Arciniega (color artist), Joe Caramagna (letterer) - All X-Men must do dramatic posing in a sewer, it's in the curriculum.

Kamala's back in Jersey City, but Jersey City's not so friendly to Ms. Marvel. Her list of problems is lengthy, and includes half the people who used to love her no being suspicious because of the affiliation with the X-Men, including Nakia and Zoe. In their defense, they've been made to forget Kamala was Ms. Marvel, but not that Ms. Marvel died, so they aren't sure this is the same person. Nobody loves clones!

Kamala can't bring herself to stop trying to help people, even when the X-Men encourage her to focus on living her life, which feels true to the character. She gets overwhelmed at times, but she always seems determined to try and do all she can. Unfortunately, her body is acting up when she uses her powers. Godlewski draws it almost like little explosions are going off inside her.

The Hordeculture, who show up trying to abduct some mutant kid crook with plant powers, claim to know what's going on, but didn't feel like sharing. Kamala does save the kid from capture and eventual dissection by the creepy grannies, which is really nice after he dissed her codename. Not a bad design, lots of room for different looks as he mimicks characteristics of different plants, and the sweatpants emphasize the cobbled together, low-budget crook he's meant to be.

At any rate, Lila Cheney shows up and teleports Kamala to one of her concerts. That's where the issue ends, which is a weird place to leave it. Lila's watching the fight from the shadows, and Godlewski keeps her in shadow when she announces her presence. Then Kamala's in the crowd at a concert and just starts cheering wildly once Lila walks up on stage and begins to play.

So, why the mystery of her identity? Or, conversely, why have Lila essentially abduct Kamala because she needs X-Men, but then not speak to her about it at all. It seems like the cliffhanger ought to be Kamala materializes in a strange place full of aliens, and then next issue figures out it was Lila who did it and why. Or, have Lila approach her and at least make some cryptic and suspenseful or misleading statement to close the issue on. Like, "Ms. Marvel, you're killing it," or "I need you to have my baby, Ms. Marvel." OK, those are shit examples, but you get what I mean.

What I Bought 2/14/2023 - Part 2

With the announcement of a possibly forthcoming Fantastic Four movie - third (fourth?) times the charm! - I was thinking about who would make a good Dr. Doom. Who has the bombast, the dramatic demeanor. Then I read some concerns about Pedro Pascal as Reed, because the person just sees Pascal as himself now, rather than whatever role he's playing. They mentioned Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent, and my brain said, "Nic Muthafuckin' Cage as Doom."

Then I woke up on the floor with blood pouring from my eyes and ears. Anyway, comics!

Fantastic Four #17, by Ryan North (writer), Carlos Gomez (artist), Jesus Arbutov (color artist), Joe Caramagna (letterer) - So it wasn't aliens that seeded Earth with life, but the Accursed Richards? Figures.

Sue's helping with an archaeological dig in Arizona (because North established or reiterated that's what she has a doctorate in) which has found peculiar skeleton. 20,000 years old, but with European skeletal features. Oh, and there are scraps on clothing made of unstable molecules on the body. Using invisibility to compare the remains to the FF's - Gomez's stretchy Reed skeleton is highly disturbing, but only present on a splash page, so I can't show it here - leads to the conclusion the body is Sue, somehow.

So then we get the somehow. Reed brought Sue back to a point when the earliest arrivals were passing by that point, as an anniversary gift. Sure, he's off by probably at least 100,000, if not 200,000 years, if The Indigenous Paleolithic of the Western Hemisphere is on the money, but it's the thought that counts. Anyway, Rama-Tut shows up to kill them, right after he promised to do so in 1963's FF #19. And he's going to cheat like crazy, as every time they thwart him, he jumps back to before that, until they're overrun with Rama-Tuts.

Reed and Sue retreat to their time (4 years after Sue finds the body) to concoct a plan. Which involves building a gun that does science stuff, but also 3-D printing facsimiles of themselves. Meaning Reed has a 3-D printer that creates human bone and tissue. That feels kind of creepy. Sure hope he doesn't hit the "Asgardian Thunder God" setting by accident (or "accident".) 

Anyway, when Rama-Tut uses time tricks to swipe the gun, after Reed spends 3 panels explaining exactly what it does, he unwittingly shoots the duplicates, kept invisible until then, instead of the real deal. North writes Rama-Tut as a big gloater. Bragging, talking shit, the whole nine yards. Gomez has draws several panels of Rama-Tut looking smug. 

There's some handwavey explanation for why Rama doesn't just try again when he eventually figures out it didn't take, but more critically, Future Sue invisibly communicates with Present Reed and Sue that there's nothing to worry about. Sue can apparently make Braille with her powers, which isn't that out of line for the level of power she's demonstrated.

Not sure what Present-Day Sue is going to tell the people who called her in for that dig.

Vengeance of the Moon Knight #2, by Jed Mackay (writer), Alessandro Cappuccio (artist), Rachelle Rosenberg (color artist), Joe Caramagna (letterer) - Dead Pigeon Thunderdome.

It's Tigra's turn with Dr. Sterman, as she relates what happened in the confrontation with the new Moon Knight - she and Hunter's Moon got their asses kicked - and why she's convinced the new guy isn't Marc Spector. The latter of which involves a stroll down memory lane through her past lovers. We don't see any flashbacks, just her talking. Eyes darting away from Sterman's, or looking at something only she can see (figuratively). Fiddling with her hair or flexing her fingers, showing off the claws. Little tics, stuff like that.

As for the fight, this new Moon Knight has at least one new trick. Namely, he can envelop someone in total darkness, which he likens to the new moon. Rosenberg kind of blends purple with black for taht effect. That's how - combined with some pepper powder to mess with her nostrils - he can take out Tigra. Seems like that shouldn't help with a cat's hearing, but oh well. Reese dares him to prove he's Moon Knight by taking over the Midnight Mission, but the building rejects him. I think the building lifts from its foundation before dropping in an attempt to squash him, but it's not really clear. Either way he leaves, telling them to stay out of his way. 

It's the Shroud, right? Got the shadow powers, knows martial artist, wouldn't need light to fight anyway because he's blind, kind of nuts. It's the Shroud. Can't decide yet if this is better or worse than Mark Waid writing him as a pathetic stalker loser in Daredevil. See how MacKay plays it.

What I Bought 1/6/2024

Well, the snowpocalypse didn't materialize. They went from forecasting 5 inches of snow on Wednesday to half an inch by Thursday evening. *sad trombone* It is, however, cold as a welldigger's bum outside, so hooray?

There were no new comics I wanted out last week, and I only found 1 of the 2 from the week before. As always, make do with what I got.

Vengeance of the Moon Knight #1, by Jed MacKay (writer), Alessandro Cappuccio (artist), Rachelle Rosenberg (color artist), Cory Petit (letterer) -  Feel like Moonie stole Deadpool's mask design.

MacKay writes the issue as a conversation between Reese the vampire, and Dr. Sterman the, er, doctor. This makes everything we see Reese describe a flashback. The cast sitting shiva (with some help from Ben Grimm, I like MacKay went back to that bit about Ben always sending Moon Knight a card at Hannukah) for Moon Knight, with other heroes filling in.

And then the cast goes back to the work of protecting travelers in the night. Which includes protecting them from weird demons from Mark Waid's Dr. Strange run. I like that Hunter's Moon is devout enough to Khonshu he can act as a priest, though it's undercut somewhat when Marc, whose relationship with Khonshu was much more contentious, can do some of the same tricks.. And Rosenberg smears or sort of "vaseline lens"es the colors to give him a glow during the exorcism, making him seem blessed or a conduit for something otherworldly.

Tigra's apparently tearing up the various henchfodder looking for Black Spectre (who is probably dead at Zodiac's hands). Not handling her grief well, blood on the claws, looking kind of feral. It'd be more effective if we'd had more than 5 panels of Tigra and Moon Knight actually dating and whatnot. I'm wondering how much MacKay plans to play up the hostility between her and Reese. They've not gotten along since it came out Tigra was watching Moonie on behalf of the Avengers, but it's been limited to snide comments by Reese up to this point.

At any rate, the big development from Reese's perspective is someone claiming to be Moon Knight kicked the bejeezus out of 8-Ball and told them to get out of the Midnight Mission, and that's basically where the issue leaves off. The costume design is, fine? I don't know the significance of the crescent moon on the chest being tilted so the ends point at the ground. Marc's was usually angled so the open face pointed to 2 o'clock, and Hunter's Moon has a full moon symbol. Must mean something.

What I Bought 12/15/2023

Owing to tagging along with Alex on the Quest for Archaic Turntables, I hit up the comic shop in the next town over again last week, and found both the comics I wanted. Was that worth the 5 hours in the car, dealing with every driver on Interstate 70 having lost their minds? Eh, hard to say.

Moon Knight #30, by Jed MacKay (writer), Alessandro Cappuccio (artist), Rachelle Rosenberg (color artist), Cory Petit (letterer) - Come on Marc, you get let a little thing like multiple bullet wounds stop you?

Plesko monologues about how he just really likes to study the horrible things people do to each other. He worked with Bushman after the guy appeared to kill Marc, then helped Moon Knight later on. But he's tired of being an observer, hence the plan to drive the entire city murderously insane. Although that feels like he's still an observer, especially since he flies off in a helicopter, but I guess it's a matter of how much control the average person will have over themselves and what they do when the plan goes live.

Either way, no one can get to Marc to help, and he's bleeding out. Rosenberg, who has mostly kept the colors starkly defined in this series, matching the sharp edges of Cappuccio and Sabbatini's art, does a lot more blurring here. Not just the bloodstains on Marc's costume, or the smudged look of Zodiac and Plesko's masks. There's a lovely couple of pages of Marc asking Khonshu for help as he tries to move. Where the bid-skeleton's mostly been rendered in sharp detail up to this point in the series, here he's swirls of light and dark taking the shape of a beak or talons. Moon Knight's cloak seems to get bigger and heavier, weighing him down. It's a lovely couple of pages of a self-destructive guy at the end of his rope.

But with Jake and Steven urging him on, Marc drags himself to the control panel and blows the whole thing up, and him with it. Right. Sure. I note here that in issue 28, we saw Eight-Ball crawling through ventilation ducts without an explained purpose, then never saw him again until the last page of this issue, when we see he and the rest of the cast are apparently keeping the Midnight Mission going.

As for Zodiac, he didn't realize there's no more resurrection for Moon Knight, and makes a deal with the Midnight Mission where it lets him leave. To hunt and torture Plesko to death, apparently. So he's still on the loose, which is, unsatisfying to say the least. I hope he's not going to start calling himself Moon Knight, that would be obnoxious, even if it feels fitting for such a wannabe edgelord character.

Blood Run #1, by Evan K. Pozios (writer), Stefano Cardoselli (artist), Lettersquids (letterer) - I would say parallel parking that thing would be a pain, but I imagine the driver just blows up cars until there's a line of open spots.

Blood Run is a car race between a bunch of weirdos and their souped-up, heavily armed machines. There's a near constant string of commentary by an unseen announcer, making a constant string of sly jokes (using the term loosely) and puns. So, about as annoying as your typical pro wrestling announcer.

The main character, to the extent there is one, is Avalon Red, a bubblegum popping redhead in a boxy muscle car, but Pozios and Cardoselli surround her with a bunch of other unusual vehicles, their drivers given some brief introduction. Ice cream man, sheriff, mortician, trashmen, genius daughter of a time-traveler and a horndog stock car racer. Wait, what?

There's not much to it beyond the announcer describing these characters and the action, while we alternate between overhead or profile views of the cards (which are mostly muddy-colored outlines) and close-ups of the drivers. For most of them, that means close-ups of their deaths, while for Red, it mostly means close-ups of her glaring or blowing a bubble. Cardoselli still has an exaggerated, selectively simple style. Meaning, when he wants to go into more detail, the design on Red's shirt, the specific number of teeth one of the trashmen has, he'll do it. But when he doesn't think he needs it, stuff can really become just vague shapes in one color.

There's a few pages near the end about a specific grudge Red has against the trashmen (and vice versa), but characterization and plot are thin on the ground. The last page offers a reason for that, and I don't know how I liked it. Taken on its own terms, it works with the comic, it's that my expectations going in didn't match what Pozios and Cardoselli were looking to do.

What I Bought 11/29/2023

I think I'm going to be lazy this weekend. It won't be easy, but if I dedicate myself fully to the task, I think I can pull it off.

Ms. Marvel: The New Mutant #4, by Iman Vellani and Sabir Pirzada (writers), Carlos Gomez and Adam Gorham (artists), Erick Arciniega (color artist), Joe Caramagna (letterer) - Look at this book, trying to tempt people to buy it with the promise of Dead Cyclops.

While Kamala fits the Stark Sentinel and protects Typical Marvel Morons from falling rubble, Bruno tries to get a few of the kids to help him to rig Michelle's plasma generator into a sort of fusion reactor that, when placed on the unibeam spot on the Sentinel, does. . .something that blows up the Sentinel. The battle also revealed the ORCHIS lab, and Kamala and the other students save the people trapped there. Then Kamala has to run because more Sentinels are showing up.

Aftermath: Kamala gets a repaired costumed that's still more X-person than Ms. Marvel, but she got the golden wrist thing she always wore back, at least. The ORCHIS scientist with the bots is now a former ORCHIS scientist in hiding, compiling info on Ms. Marvel for some future purpose. Because, as Emma Frost tells Kamala, while her movie synergy energy powers didn't manifest, there is now the possibility they will in the future. Maybe.

Oh, and Kitty Pryde won't high-five Kamala, because it is a character trait of hers to be on unfriendly terms with all the other teen girls Logan befriended at one point or the other. Though I don't get that expression she's making in the last panel. Like she's confused watching Kamala's hand pass through her, or thinks this is really awkward. What did she think was going to happen?

I'm surprised Vellani and Pirzada didn't bust out the movie powers, but not disappointed. It felt like a classic adventure for Kamala Khan: Save some people with size-changing and stretching powers, plus some science back-up from her friend. Choose to help a downed enemy rather than destroy them, even if it'll make her life harder. Go home to dinner with her family.

Granted that G. Willow Wilson did a few stories where Kamala's powers evolved or changed, so a mutation going active wouldn't have been out of place, but saving that for later, and letting this story focus on the character finding her footing after being alive is a nice touch. It reaffirms the essential core of the character, regardless of whatever new stuff they bolt onto her.

Moon Knight #29, by Jed MacKay (writer), Federico Sabbatini (artist), Rachelle Rosenberg (color artist), Cory Petit (letterer) - That's got to be a pretty good knife to go through that chestplate so easily.

Moon Knight fights Black Spectre and eventually beats him, revealing it to be the 2nd Black Spectre, who it can't be because he was in jail. Which is when the actual Black Spectre behind everything shoots Marc a bunch of times. Well, trusting Moon Knight to barge into a fight and stop watching his six is smart planning, at least.

Hunter's Moon found out how to stop the "use sound to kill everyone plan", and Soldier defused the mine Tigra's sitting on, and argues she's the only one who would have noticed it, so that kept Moon Knight from getting blown up. Great. Either way, none of them can reach Moon Knight because the real guy blew out the floors below.

In the most amusing development, Zodiac wearing a gold necklace with his name had a purpose beyond identifying him as a self-involved tool. It's his version of a cross, to defend himself against Reese. Because he's the only thing he has faith in. This does not, however, save him from the stupidity of going into the Midnight Mission after Reese, what with the mission being a sentient (and hungry) building. So hopefully that's the last we see of him.

The Black Spectre is revealed on the last page to be Plesko, Marc's psychiatrist friend we saw in one issue interviewing Zodiac. Then he was supposedly blown up (off-panel, which was really obviously significant) in the next issue. I figured something was up with that, which makes me 14 for 726 for accurate predictions on this blog.

I don't know what his reason would be for doing this. I could see him feeling like he needs to help Marc by destroying Moon Knight, but he acts as though he never intended for Moon Knight to be involved. That it was a mistake to pose as Black Spectre, because he knew it would bring Moon Knight after him. Which means he really wants to kill everyone in New York, which seems like an odd turn. But with Marc being shot up, I suppose Plesko will have lots of chances to monologue in the finale.