Closer to answers, but still all alone.
Creative Staff:
Story: James Robinson
Art: Aaron Campbell
Colors: Salvatore Aila
Letterer: Simon Bowland
What They Say:
Tiger Tanaka and Felix were pursuing the terrorists responsible for the detonation of a new, mysterious biological weapon – when a follow-up incident at Tanaka’s organizational headquarters cost them the rest of their team and resources. Now they’ve made things PERSONAL! Felix and Tanaka must take down a North Korean operative with information on the bio-bomb inside his heavily-guarded compound…before anyone else comes to harm!
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Felix Leiter has really delighted me as a series as it works to get us to know the character more in this incarnation, working from events on the first series that ran last year. Putting Leiter into a situation previously with the lost arm and leg and coming up with in-series prosthetics that mostly makes him feel whole, Robinson has worked to show us the internal struggle of a man who is good at his job when he has the company behind him but struggles when he works alongside the giants within his field, such as Bond and Tanaka. Aaron Campbell has driven a lot of this home with some great pages and character visuals that brings that emotion out while setting the stage around him with some haunting trappings.
The push into the complex we saw in the previous issue set things up well with the stakes high and catching a glimpse of Alena with others on the ship reinforced the rightness of the decision. The book doesn’t give us a lot in the way of answers but when Felix finally does get his confrontation, not one he wanted though, it’s pretty intense as he tries to get answers out of Alena for her mingling with Russians and North Koreans that have made this attack on Japan that has killed as many as it has. She’s dismissive and you can feel how it weighs on him considering their past, but the fact that they don’t just shoot him outright and instead toss him over gives a glimmer of hope of what exists between them. That said, Campbell puts together some great final panels here with him trying to survive in the sea and being all alone, made more intense thanks to Aila’s color work.
Where most of the book focuses is on the action and it’s deliciously done. The infiltration of the target is one that lets Tiger take the lead as he and his group move silently and quickly, killing efficiently and without a lot of noise for most of it. This is an area that really makes Felix realize his own lack of skills in this regard and he admires what they do a great deal and tries to work it his own way the best as he can. It may be a quick read initially but a second and third pass through it with all the details of the art and the movement of the flow through the panels makes for a really great experience. It’s all very theatrical without all the problematic banter and jokes that others might put into it, allowing it to breathe as an act unto itself.
In Summary:
As we near the end of this run, Felix Leiter has a pretty thrilling action sequence installment. Robinson gives us a few morsels to work with in terms of story but he also digs into Felix as a character pretty well with what he’s experiencing while watching Tiger Tanaka. But it is for the most part an action installment and Aaron Campbell has great fun in delivering us some tight and intense deaths, lots of quiet movements that just leap off the page, and a whole lot of fun with the locations and how the team interacts with it. A very good installment that already has me looking forward to reading it as a part of the whole run.
Grade: B+
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: Dynamite Entertainment
Release Date: May 24th, 2017
MSRP: $3.99
