Cool cover! If nothing else, I think we can at least assume no one will be consumed in this issue, so we’re already doing better than last post. This month, we open on another area of USM and how it’s reacting to the crisis by visiting the Daily Bugle…
Get ready for this next bit… I feel bad about how little justice my photo will do it…
Instant career highlight for this art team. I mean, wow. People still talk about this splash. Look at it! The power, the scope, the little details, the crackling energy of Spider-Man swooping through the water, and the truck coming in behind him in the distance, JJJ visibly having a lifechanging experience even though we can’t see his face up close. Truly remarkable. It would be kind of a weird thing to make a poster of, and yet it would be an amazing poster. It also makes me think of how comics work, how a writer is sending off a script telling someone what to draw, not knowing what they’ll get back no matter how well they describe it… can you imagine being Bendis seeing this for the first time? I would have totally lost my mind. There’s doing a good job, and then there’s creating one of the single most breathtaking images I’ve ever seen in a comic book. I could keep rambling about this indefinitely. Absolute mastery. At any rate, having had a profound experience, JJJ is truly humbled, and apologizes to Robbie for not listening to him all this time, and feels compelled to write the story of what he saw, to try to make it right, immediately. And then we get back to…
Yet another insanely good view of the staggering scope of this experience. And Bendis giving you that raw realism that made this book so special. It really is a shame the main book is such a disaster (Uh, no pun intended) because these issues of USM are all-timers. Ultimatum is a big, dumb shock fest, but this is a riveting portrait of our beloved cast living through something unimaginable. They couldn’t be more different, even though they’re the same story. Comics are truly crazy sometimes. Yet another stunning 2-pager follows, as Spider-Man and Hulk stare at each other. You get Peter’s patented neurotic narration has he desperately tries to figure out something to do. He can’t fight because he can’t win, he can’t run and leave others in danger. He thinks maybe he can try to reason with Hulk. And then, Hulk says his name…
There’s this documentary about Jack Kirby, and I feel like I may even have referenced it before. All-star cast of comics professionals talk about Kirby for an hour and a half. It was on a special edition DVD set with the first Fantastic Four movie, it rules. Anyway, near the beginning, Barry Windsor-Smith is trying to express his admiration for Kirby’s art and the profound impact it had on him, and he’s struggling to find the words, and he’s got a favorite page of Kirby art in front of him, and he finally says, “Oh, I can’t even look at it” and puts it down. I was so charmed by that the first time I saw it. I totally get it. And I’m reminded of it seeing the creative team knocking it out of the park page by page here. Well, we get a great 2-page sequence of Spidey helping people out of a high window, and one of them falls only to be caught by Hulk. Nearby, there’s a train car stuck on top of a burning building. Hulk does his famous hand clap, gust of wind move and puts it out, impressing Spider-Man. Then he runs up the building to see if anyone’s alive in the train car. He maybe shouldn’t have.
Intense. Banner proceeds to completely freak out, assuming Hulk somehow did all this. Spidey tries to talk him down, but he’s way gone, and starts demanding Spider-Man kill him. And getting angry. And, well, you know…
Immonen was really the preeminent action artist of his time. And I only say it like that because he’s largely left mainstream comics, and comics in general, bar a surprise thing here and there (Like the enchanting, baffling webcomic he did with his wife Kathryn, Grass of Parnassus). I hope he’s happy doing whatever he’s doing, but I miss his stuff. But I don’t just mean like, he’s was great at drawing people fighting. I mean action. That building exploding. Spider-Man zipping through the air. Making pictures that move. Our man flees the rampaging Hulk, trying to figure out how to stop this, when he notes Dr. Strange’s house. And the taxi through the big window. And recalls being told that big window was to keep magical forces contained in the house.
I mean, do we have to go back to the main book? Who cares? USM is all that matters. The back of this issue contains a preview of the 3-issue Dark Reign: Fantastic Four which, despite being a tie-in mini, is the start to Jonathan Hickman’s stellar run on that title. We’ll get to see some of it on the blog eventually. Top 3 FF runs, no contest. 2009 was still a great time to be reading comics.