Black Cloak #2: This series is, bar none, the best on the market and everyone should read it now!
We begin with Phaedra on a slab in the morgue. She isn't dead, though. Nida enters as Phaedra awakens and informs her that the assailant stabbed her with a dracona dagger and informs *us* that only draconas are likely to survive assaults from dracona daggers. Dun-dun-DUN! Phaedra mentions off-handedly that someone attacked her at the castle, and Nida interrupts her, shocked, since Phaedra hadn't told her about the attack yet. Phaedra dismisses the castle attack as "honor bullshit" but notes that the dracona attack was definitely not that.
To explain how she isn't dead, Phaedra recalls that the elves magically healed her after the castle attack, so they could argue the magic persisted and saved her. Nida points out the small pair of wings Phaedra grew suggests she tell everyone the truth. Phaedra refuses, saying people will kill her mother and possibly her father. Nida is enraged that Phaedra has to live her life in exile, fearing "honor killings and retribution at any moment," thus directly tying Phaedra's exile to her heritage. It sounds like she had to leave to keep the secret, but I wonder what the cover story for leaving was. Phaedra tells Nida that she likes her life, but Nida isn't buying it.
After Nida leaves, Phaedra realizes that she's next to Freyal's body. Upon inspection, she finds a scar in his tattoo, which the computer diagnoses as probably self-inflected. A tearful Phaedra asks his body why he would do that and laments that he's cold, noting that he always hated the cold.
In a flashback, Phaedra's mother recalls when the tattoos were a solemn rite, which she hated, because she felt bound by it. But she says all the kids think they're cool so they love them. Phaedra replies that she loves Freyal and the tattoo is just a bonus. She realizes though that her mother was saying that she didn't love her father, and her mother slyly tells her that she loved her father more than anything. Phaedra realizes that the stories don't align, but Freyal arrives in time to distract her. They have a lovely moment but, as they kiss, Phaedra feels an itch, not realizing that her nascent wings cause it.
Leaving the morgue, Phaedra encounters Pax as he reviews the "lookie-loos" he's had to interview (and accuses Phaedra of almost getting killed just to avoid the interviews.)
After interviewing a few lunatics together, they come to Romu and Iona, who I think are two of the hooligans who were at the Lookout last issue. Iona tells Phaedra that they're there because mermaids get a bad rap. Romu tells Phaedra and Pax that he and Iona stayed after the other two hooligans (Jessup and Tomig) left. Apparently if the wind is right you can hear the mermaids, which Romu describes as a test of wills. As they watched (Romu says they "do really cool stuff"), a figure in a "long, dark hooded cloak" floated to the beach carrying a body. Romu then saw a flash of light, and the body was gone and the figure was already at the wall leaving. Iona tells Phaedra that she saw the "big flash of gold light," but Romu had the spyglass so she can't confirm everything else other than that she saw a figure.
Suddenly, a noise signaling "ten ticks until the Brownout" happens, and Iona and Romu panic, telling the detectives that they have to get home before their parents get mad. After the kids leave, Pax notes that their figure didn't have wings so he assumes it used magic to float.
At home, Phaedra realizes that she isn't alone, and three very well dressed humans reveal themselves. The woman is surprised Phaedra senses them since they were "well cloaked." Phaedra tells them that she knows who they are: the woman is Elea Veris, and the men are Galal III of Veris and Aldric II of Solas. Phaedra describes them as the three most powerful humans in Kiros.
Galal is apparently the next in life for the throne now that Freyal is dead, which is an interesting political arrangement. Phaedra notes that it would shift power from the elves to humans for the first time. Galal tells Phaedra that they want their names cleared so they don't ascend the throne under a scandal, and Phaedra notes that the Queen is still alive and will outlive them all. Galal responds with a muted, "Of course," instantly putting our suspicion on them (particularly given that they're magic users).
When Phaedra asks what they want, Galal responds that they don't want anything from her: they want to give her a "nice juicy lead." Next, Phaedra is exiting her apartment and calling Pax to meet her at the Trees, where he apparently already is. She passes through a beautiful gate warning non-fliers to proceed with caution and takes a ferris wheel-like elevator into the Trees. Cryptically, the issue ends with Phaedra saying to the camera (if you will), "Let's see what you can tell me yourself, Freyal."
As I mentioned last issue, the world-building here is spectacular. Thompson has created a world so full of detail that it feels impossible that we'd ever come to grasp its full historical, political, and social realities, even in 100 issues. Moreover, we get most of this information not through expository monologuing but through character development. Moreover, McLaren's love of the story is clear in each line she draws and color she paints.
Again, I can't recommend it enough.
Dragon Age: The Missing #2: I don't particularly remember Solas as turning people to stone, but I might've glossed over that detail after learning that he was the elven god responsible for creating the Fade. But it's a relevant piece of data, since Varric and Harding arrive at Lady Crysanthus' estate in Vyrantium to discover her petrified (and the Antaam sieging Vyrantium). After shaking down Crysanthus' valet, Varric and Harding discover a secret room showing her efforts to help the Venatori make a strike against the Imperium. (I'm assuming she'd benefit from a Venatori-led Imperium.) She and the Venatori sought the Crucious Stone, some sort of elven magical artifact in the Arlathan forest, where only a few Dalish tribes reside. It seems clear now that the invitation we saw at the end of last issue is one Crysanthus sent the Venatori and Solas intercepted. To Arlathan we go!
Local Man #1: I picked up this series because I loved Seeley's work on "Grayson" and "Nightwing," and I'm thrilled I did. Like Seely, I was a 15 year old (well, 16 year old) kid when "Youngblood" hit the stands, and I couldn't have been more excited. I didn't totally understand it, and the focus on sex made me nervous. (Shaft made me feel...things second only to the way Spartan from "WildC.A.T.s" made me feel...things.) Like Seeley says here, it felt freeing to see Liefeld tell the story that he wanted to tell, one of the first times that comics seemed to depict superheroes the way that they'd likely exist in reality.
I'm thrilled to say Seeley and Fleecs capture that feeling in a bottle here. First, they ramps up my excitement when Jack's mother asks him if he's tried getting Brigade or Cyberforce to hire him. The authors doesn't just get the vibe of that Imageverse (which they totally get) but make it clear we're actually in that universe. I enjoyed Chad Bowers' reboot of "Youngblood," as it was filled with the same bold-faced narrative and brightly colored action as the original series were. But Seeley and Fleecs are taking the vibe of that era and infusing it with...well, a plot. The art drives home this point, as the issue's color palette is subdued when portraying Jack's present and bold when portraying Third Gen.
Getting to the basics, the aforementioned "Jack" is Jack Xaver, formerly Crossjack of Third Gen. Third Gen enterprises fired Jack for reasons that aren't clear. It *is* clear that he's a disgrace, something his mother actually calls him when he arrives home. (Also driving home that point is when a guy recognizes him sitting at the bus stop and yells out, "Fuck Crossjack.") Jack escapes home for a bar where a guy named Hodag busts past the bouncer. Jack thinks he wants to fight him and doesn't give Hodag a chance to reveal that he's there to tell him about a "place" he went.
After Jack gets thrown from the bar, his high-school sweetheart Inga takes him to her diner. You get the sense that Inga isn't as happy as her Facebook page implies she is, but their conversation is interrupted when Third Gen appears to serve Jack papers for using a shield in his fight, contrary to his agreement. Jack declines Inga's offer of a ride home (possibly because he knows something might develop) and is surprised to find to his parents' elderly dog, Pepper, in a field. Pepper is more than she appears: Jack swears she was 14 years old when he left home, and she evades the projectile he throws at her in the field despite his later insistence that he never misses.
But Pepper isn't the only mystery, as someone kills Hodag in his cell as he's yet again talking about how he's hoping to tell Jack about the place that can make the pain disappear.
All in all, it's a wonderful start. I'm here for where Seeley and Fleece are taking us.
Star Wars: Yoda #4: This series is taking the vignette approach of similar series, though the recent "Star Wars: Obi-Wan Kenobi" series felt more coherent than this one.
Starting off this arc, Yoda invites Count Dooku to spend time with the recent class of Padawans. Dooku becomes the confidante of a Wookiee Padawan who had a vision that the Trandoshians were going to massacre his people. It's notable because one of the Wookiee's friends is a Trandoshian, which Yoda sees as evidence of what Jedi training can achieve by removing Padawans from their people's prejudices. When the Wookiee tells Dooku about his vision, Dooku suggests the young Wookiee tell no one of his vision, alluding to the fate of Sifo-Dyas, his old yet seemingly estranged friend.
It's all fine, but it feels more like AI-generated fan-fiction right now than anything else. Like the first arc, I don't particularly feel like I've gotten any insight into Yoda himself. It's mostly Yoda being Yoda.
Undiscovered County #23: Snyder and Soule are vamping here, as we don't really learn anything new.
Future Chang and future Janet bring Present Chang and Present Janet to a movie theater to reveal the world's greatest secret, whatever it was that they saw in America that made them decide to kill Ace, Charlotte, and Daniel. However, Ace arrives with a souped up Buzz and ruins the party before we can learn more.
In the flashback (flash forward?), Future Chang and Future Janet reveal that they only need to stop Charlotte and Daniel from reaching the center of the Spiral (and not necessarily to prevent them from leaving America with the Sky cure). Future Ace has Future Valentina flee, which she does, but Future Valentina doesn't reveal why Future Chang and Future Janet let her live out her days in the Empire. She tells Present Ace that she doesn't know why they decided to act agains their colleagues, so I guess she wasn't a risk.
In the past, Charlotte and Valentina swipe Lavant's tablet, which controls time, and escape through a variety of timelines until Lavant attacks them at Gettysburg. I don't really get the physics here, to be honest. Lavant told Charlotte and Valentina that Aurora was able to create all these timelines, but he actually becomes Abraham Lincoln, implying a higher level of manipulation than I thought. I guess that makes sense, since the whole point of Zone History is to manipulate events to see how they create different outcomes.
This arc still remains intriguing, as it feels like the "greatest secret" will change what we understand about how Aurora works and where the team fits into her plans. But it's time to get there.
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