Captain America: Symbol of Truth #2: This issue is a mixed bag.
It's pretty clear that someone (presumably White Wolf, though maybe not) injected the super-soldier serum (or "Triple S," as Deadpool later make Sam call it) into Falcon's cousin and her fellow migrants. When Luísa is the "unidentified substance" that sets off an alarm at the lab where they're "housing" the migrants, Falcon wisely extricates her. Meanwhile, White Wolf has two agents pose as guards and assassinate the mercenary who survived his team's attack on the train.
Unfortunately, the Falcon sequence makes less sense. He arrives in Latveria in his hunt for the mastermind of the attack on the train, though we're never told how he followed the trail there. He finds Deadpool there, because Deadpool is hunting a white supremacist. I think the creative team wants us to believe that both the mastermind and white supremacist is White Wolf, though that isn't super clear. I think that White Wolf hired Deadpool to set up this situation (of Sam encountering him), though I don't know why he would do so. After all, he had the mercenary killed to make sure he wasn't leaving loose ends. Moreover, we border on pet peeve #3 here. As Doom says, Sam should know better than to think that Doom would let him just run an op in Latveria.
I think this issue's split focus might be a little too much for the creative team. If they're going to keep it going, I think they need to connect the dots a little better as we continue with the story.
Sins of the Black Flamingo #1: Come for the thirsty gayness, stay for the intriguing plot!
Sebastian Harlow is the Black Flamingo, a "gentleman thief" who "steal[s] magic artifacts from idiots and debutantes and [puts] them where they belong."
The issue begins when a Jewish man hires Sebastian to find a token (for lack of a better word) that his Holocaust-survivor grandfather kept with him his entire life. His grandfather was a gay mystic rabbi (love it) and was clearly building a golem of his former lover as the token contained his lover's soul. It became lost after his grandfather's death and eventually passed from collector to collector of Holocaust memorabilia. (That's as gross as that sounds.)
Sebastian tracks it down in a hidden room of Nazi memorabilia at the white-supremacist "Museum of American Heritage and Culture" in Key West. (It's like that great "Difficult People" episode!) While there, he discovers a diagram of some sort of magical collar that he finds too dangerous to leave in the Museum's hands and takes it with him. Returning to the grandson's house, Sebastian inserts the token into the golem, activating it to the grandson's surprise.
Later, Sebastian's friend/handler Ofelia examines the diagram and discovers that it's a collar to contain a demon or other spirit. Apparently, it was in possession of a Thorndike Scar at the time of the document's writing 200 years earlier. Ofelia just so happens to be going to Scar's descendant's party that evening, so Sebastian goes with her to case the joint with a plan to return later to liberate the collar. ("God knows what those idiots would do if they captured a demon. Elect him, probably.")
At the party, Scar recognizes Sebastian as the "fucker" who won't sell the Devil's Tooth, which we see in an aside panel is in fact in Sebastian's safe. Sebastian denies that he dabbles in "hocus pocus" but suddenly gets a vision. While he sees everyone else in some form of decay, Scar's blood shines. Sebastian senses something else, so he has Ofelia us her powers to create a distraction. (She casts a spell to make two people "open [their] mind's eye to the horrible futility of [their] existence" as well as "suggest" they act in a certain way.) As Ofelia makes a woman throw a couch and another one set a fire, Sebastian goes upstairs and breaks into a room to find a collared, scarred angel begging for death. (I'm guessing Scar isn't actually the descendant...)
As I said, this issue goes beyond the thirsty presentation to a great premise. I mean, a gay thief of supernatural artifacts with a day job as an antiquities dealer in Miami? You wonder how someone hasn't thought of it previously.
Star Wars: Darth Vader #24: The issue begins with ZED discovering that the governor isn't on her flagship: she's on a shuttle en route to an abandoned science colony. When Vader and Sabé arrive at the site, the governor sends for help from Crimson Dawn ("send for the Dawn") and orders an attack.
While Sabé goes to free the Tatooine refugees who the governor has conscripted into service, Vader takes on the governor, only for her to reveal that she's working on a weapon capable of stunning him. Ochi arrives in time to save Vader from the now-arrived Dawn agents and the governor's troops.
After the governor escapes, Sabé interviews a conscript who explains that the governor's weapon can drain power from living things, even entire plants. The conscript is devastated to learn that she used it on Karolia, a densely forested planet. As he grieves, Vader recalls Tarkin's destruction of Alderaan and his final moments with Padmé where he refused her entreaties to return to the light side. (I'll be honest that I didn't see the connection between the two memories.)
While Sabé stays to destroy the weapon, Vader leaves in hot pursuit of the governor, whose future is pretty short, clearly.
Star Wars: Han Solo and Chewbacca #3: This issue is a deep cut.
Han manages to exfiltrate himself, Greedo, and Ovan from Graves' apartment by playing the various security teams against each other. Before they leave, though, Han hacks into Graves' security system to learn that he sold the urn to someone on Antillion.
After ditching Greedo (since he's no longer necessary to find the urn), Chewie, Han, and Ovan arrive on Antillion only for us to discover that Graves sold the urn to the Archivist. Qi'ra arrives to spirt away the Archivist, as seen in "Star Wars: Crimson Dawn" #3. Ovan finds the urn in her back room, but, before they can flee, Krrsantan from "Star Wars: Doctor Aphra" arrives! I'm sure that'll turn out well.
The most interesting part of this story is that the Archivist clearly couldn't afford to pay Graves for the urn (given its value), which means she had something of similar value that she traded to him. I'm sure Han isn't going to forget that.
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