You Get What You Pay For
And at this point, I'm breathing a sigh of relief that I'm not charging. Sunday, I said! It's Wednesday again!
Well, at least it's Wednesday morning, so there's time yet to tell you...
WHAT'S OUT THIS WEEK?
WASP #4, that's what!
In which we bring the journey of the Wasps to an end, reveal a few secrets about the Pym Particle, and lay some ghosts to rest, all with the ever-amazing art of Kasia Nie to bring it to life. Hopefully various circles are squared in terms of the various Wasps' relationship with legacy - having made it clear she'd have been someone even without an established hero to partner with, we now circle back around to who she is, not who she might have been. (And Nadia, too, who isn't short of heroic moments this ish.)
But while this isn't the last we'll see of Jan, it is the last anniversary issue, so at this point we'll stop looking back and start facing forward. As such, we end on a cliffhanger of sorts - I'll wait for the official announcement about where that's leading, but I think what comes next is going to be interesting.
And speaking of what comes next... 1000 years worth of next...
It's SINS OF SINISTER: DOMINION! Being the end-piece of the Sinister Saga I helped craft - this capstone issue written by the master craftsman Kieron Gillen and drawn by Paco Medina and Lucas Wernack. What becomes of the Sinister future? Does one of the Sinisters get their wish for absolute power, or is there a spanner in the works? And what effect does all this have on the modern-day X-universe? 'Cause it's not nothing - this one reverberates.
It's been fun seeing what people liked and didn't like - some people got really into the "snapshots of eras" storytelling methods, others felt frustrated. Personally, it was one of my favorite things about the experience - spending twenty pages in a milieu that comes once and never again, on a climax the build-up for which we only allude to, and then moving 900 years forward from that in turn... it flexed a few muscles I haven't used since WE ONLY FIND THEM WHEN THEY'RE DEAD, as well as sparking my old team-up brain into life from the days of JUDGE DREDD: TRIFECTA. Hope you all enjoy the ride as much as we did.
MARVEL COMICS, PANEL BY PANEL
Just enough time for a quick ramble about this important piece of comics history...
Well, we made it. On-panel, for the first time ever, the Human Torch! And boy, he looks pleased to be here. As we'll find out, the grumpy expression is from unconsciousness rather than a sullen demeanor - the Torch has not yet woken. But he is alive, in an air-tight glass cage, which is pretty strange in itself. A cage made of glass, a living creature in an airless void - if I didn't know better, I'd say this was some kind of alchemical union of opposites - but let's stick a pin in that one for now, it's a deep hole for a Wednesday morning.
I've not much to say about the off-model appearance of the Torch here, either - that's how he is for the rest of this feature, blue-clad, red-haired and vaguely menacing, and to make hay about how he's eventually going to look completely different feels contrary to the spirit of this exercise. I could throw something in here about the synchronicity of a man in a blue jumpsuit with elongated arms ushering in a Marvel Era, but that's kind of a stretch even for me. (Ho ho.)
Anyway, it's been two weeks, but a panel ago, Horton called this dude a "monstrosity" who even he, his creator, feared. And in that context, the color choice is interesting. Giving the Torch a red jumpsuit would make him pop in the panel - green or purple, like the journalists are wearing, would do the same. If he's in blue here, I've got to assume there's a reason for it, and that reason is to draw similarities to Horton's blue suit. And take a look at that square jaw! Those angry eyebrows! Put a moustache on the Torch and he could be Horton's son - which, I guess, is the subtext. Earlier, I called Horton a Frankenstein analogue - now he's Gepetto. A Gepetto in fear of his Pinocchio - the monstrosity looking back at him with his own face.
What awful decision will Horton make next? Stay tuned, True Believer.
AND THAT'S IT
At some point I'll get these newsletters under control. Maybe there'll be a subscription model! Self-publishing! Puzzles! Prizes! But for now, this is still - just about - the place to find me. Love and strength to all those who need it, and I'll play us out with "PARTY FEARS TWO" by THE ASSOCIATES.
