The explosive finale! Everyone Bryan Hitch draws looks like they have gangly arms and legs and along torso, but at least it makes sense for Reed Richards. Jordi Tarragona pitches in on inks this month. In an area of the Negative Zone apparently populated by big crystal thingies, we find our villain…
The Ultimates being kept out of this so long is kind of silly, but that’s comics. 2 single splash pages of action follow this double-splash, no wonder they had to bring in a 2nd inker, there’s a million characters in this comic.
The aforementioned brains get to the control panel (Why does that not include Jessica? She’s at least as smart as Peter. I guess maybe she’s not had the chance to be as educated?), and Rick is freaking out over this turning out to be what he was made for. But after Captain Marvel, Ock and Spidey determine that Reed is messing with things none of them even understand, they opt for plan B, which is having Rick teleport them and the gear out of there. And Rick accidentally dumps them on his elementary school playground. Spider-Man realizes that this is why he was attacked. All the other targets were obvious, but it was Reed trying to eliminate anyone he knew smart enough to stop him. Doc Ock praises Peter’s intellect, which really annoys him, and then they wonder what’s happening back at the fight.
Big doin’ in the end! Can Doc Ock go straight? Will Sue & Ben last? Is Reed dead? All this and more will be answered… some day! This is honestly one of the strongest, if not the strongest big event thing Bendis ever did. No weak points, no weird, disappointing ending, just full tilt crazy the whole time with a great finish. Rafa Sandoval did a geat job front to back, even faced with an ever-expanding casts and all those locations. Just top notch work from everybody. It will be collected as Ultimate Doomsday, and will have ramifications right up to today. But that’s for later. Theoretically. If I ever make it. My once two and a half year lead on these posts has shrunk to 4 months. We’ll see!