By Brian Michael Bendis (writer), Alex Maleev (art), Matthew Wilson (colors), VC’s Cory Petit (letters)
The Story:Marc Spector continues to bring the crazy and the pain as he seeks out an Ultron smuggler hiding out in a strip club. Unfortunately, the crazy comes on a little too strong, as Spector’s one-man Avenger team act proves more hindrance than help.
What’s Good: While it seems that Maleev’s artwork k is somewhat controversial in the reviewing community, I fall firmly into the “love it” category. Not only do his gritty, almost wild-looking pencils mesh perfectly with the skewed nature of the character and the narrative, I simply find the pages beautiful to look at in their own right. I love his take on the Avengers members (only complaint: the width of Wolverine’s mask’s ‘ears’ seem extremely inconsonant), and Moon Knight himself looks incredible. The issue’s look is further enhanced by Wilson’s muted, moody coloring that lends a beautiful noir-ish feel to the pages, and complements Maleev’s pencils extremely well.
What’s Not So Good: Although I really love the concept of this issue—Moon Knight adapting the personality (and attempting the emulate the powers) of several Avengers, the execution…just doesn’t quite work. Moon Knight is not generally a humorous or lighthearted character, but taking a concept like Marc Spector dressing up like Spider Man and rigging an elaborate series of pulleys and ropes to simulate web-slinging, and trying to play it completely seriously, just doesn’t work. Moon Knight is supposed to be crazy and more than a little unhinged, but this approach to his character when coupled with his almost complete failure at achieving his objective, makes him more a subject of ridicule than the dangerous and insane enforcer he’s meant to be. (Had Bendis taken the humor approach the story itself would have worked better, although the failure of characterization would still present a problem for me.)
Conclusion: Well written a beautifully drawn, but I’m not a fan of how Bendis executed this (admittedly very creative) take on Spector’s multiple personalities. I have a feeling this is only a slight hiccup however (at least I hope that’s the case) and will be back on track shortly.
Grade: B-
-SoldierHawk
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