A reminder of what was.
Creative Staff:
Story: Jonathan Hickman
Art: Esad Ribic
What They Say:
Owen Reece died for our sins!
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
How can this book be doing as well as it seems to be doing?
Having read a wide range of events books over the years, both the mainline series and spinoffs going all the way back to the original Secret Wars event, installments like this and a good chunk of the previous issues has me wondering about comic book fans. Secret Wars in this current incarnation is part of something large that’s really attempting to reshape things in a lot of ways but also solidify events. Yet while I expect there to be a solid bit of dialogue and exposition, I also kind of expected some really big world shattering events to take place because that’s how things are done. Yet I get an installment like this where we once again have it made clear that Doctor Doom is the villain of the Marvel Universe. And coming into this after the awful Fantastic Four movie just makes me despise that film all the more. Because here we get the kind of layered, intriguing and at the same time utterly horrifying character that he is with how he plots and plans.
The loss of Stephen Strange is given something of a really strong bit of symbolism here as the ceremony itself is intriguing with all the Thors and we also get it so that Doom sets Franklin and his group to task for figuring out more of what’s going on with how it happened. That alone opens up a nice subplot as we see the kids of that group putting together an action plan in a way that a lot of adults are rarely capable of in the superhero world of before. I’ve liked The Foundation and what we’ve seen of them here and having it carrying forward what Hickman did prior to the event in a sense certainly works well. The kids side also gets a really, really well done sequence with Valeria talking to Doom about the loss of Stephen and her understanding of what he’s going through. Both come across in a way that’s hard to really pin down in a sense but it has that really strong loss of family about them that just adds weight to the moment.
Where the book really gets me though is the complete surprise it offered me as Doom heads down below the statue of Strange into a whited out area where Owen Reece of all people resides. Now, I haven’t read deeply of Marvel for the past two decades so forgive me if I’m not aware of what the character has done in the meantime. But with my last real experience of note with him is the original Secret Wars series, i loved seeing him here and the very serious conversation the two have, especially as it reveals that Reece’s role in the cataclysm that’s claimed all these existences is touched upon. It’s not revelatory as a whole but rather teases some fascinating ideas that I suspect won’t be explored too much. But giving us the reveal of how doom took control, a look at the Beyonders and the struggle that he, Doom and Strange faced is illuminating and has me hoping for a lot more detail yet to come. Just adding the scale to events that they do here with the Black Swans and Reece’s role across the multiverse feels so wickedly perverse and perfect.
In Summary:
With a lot of exposition here, some of which was likely covered in some of the lead-up material spread across other books prior to the event, this issue of Secret Wars is like a godsend for people like me that aren’t heavily involved in all of Marvel’s books. The detail and expansion on what’s going on is very interesting to have revealed and it adds some much needed context for me with what’s going on, as well as tying me back to the original event all those years ago. The end result is a book that for me reads very, very well and kept me eager to turn the page to find out more, especially as it got into the Molecule Man and what he represents. It does look like the book is getting ready to kick it into action mode for the next couple of issues though going by the end panels and that will definitely be welcome as it needs to start pulling things together for the reveal of what will be born from all of this.
Grade: A-
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: Marvel Comics via ComiXology
Release Date: August 12th, 2015
MSRP: $4,99
