Fist of Khonshu

Vengeance of the Moon Knight #9 hits stores today – and Spider-Man is along for the ride. Preview blurbs have promised a shock ending – I haven’t read it yet, so no spoilers here!

Don’t forget to pick it up! Check out the first few pages below.

Moon Knight is back in the Avengers! Well, the Secret Avengers – which trumps his West Coast Avengers past any day.

Secret Avengers is written by Ed Brubaker with art by Mike Deodato – two of my favorite writers and artists in comics today. Overall, the first issue is a success – Brubaker wastes no time in setting up this team’s status quo in the Marvel Universe and in Avengers canon. The way he positions the characters reminds me of a damn good spy flick with each team member being given a specialist role.

So where does Moon Knight fit in? That, largely, remains to be seen. You do get to see him in action with Ant Man in a great infiltration scene. However, if the norm down the road becomes Moon Knight and Ant Man as a buddy cop duo, it may get old fast. I’m pretty confident Brubaker will pair up different team members as time goes on, but just pointing it out.

There’s also a nice albeit brief set up scene with Moon Knight where Steve Rogers asks him to join the team – and Moon Knight responds with a greatly ironic “Teams and me, we don’t work. Too many voices…”. It’s a cool scene and I hope we see more of Rogers and Moon Knight interacting directly.

In fact, on that note, I would really like to see (either in Secret Avengers or Moon Knight’s solo arc) someone address what transpired the last time Moon Knight and Steve Rogers had words in Charlie Huston’s solo Moon Knight arc during Civil War. For a recap, Rogers came to Moon Knight’s home to tell him that he didn’t like his style and to stay out of the Civil War – to which Moon Knight replied that he didn’t want to get involved with their egocentric battle of who had the biggest super power. While they didn’t see eye to eye there, Moon Knight definitely showed respect for Steve Rogers when he later ran into Tony Stark, telling Iron Man that Captain America looked like a hero and Stark just looked like a pussy. Well played Huston!

Revisiting that tension would be a nice touch to bring it all back full circle.

Also, I have to mention that Mike Deodato’s art has never looked better. I’ve always liked his attention to detail and the way he draws Moon Knight in this issue is excellent. The newer tricked out suit he wears doesn’t look as armor-clad as it has in his solo arc and strikes a nice balance between his older and newer look.

So… I dug it. And I’m looking forward to more! Moon Knight fans, go pick this up and relish in the fact that we’re now getting Moon Knight more than once a month.

Crescent Dart:

Most people go to Mexico and get sun, surf, sights and cerveza. Moon Knight gets luchadore assassins, double crossing drug lords, a flesh eating brute and the Punisher on his tail. This is soul searching in Moon Knight’s world though, and it’s never looked better.

Waxing:

• Jefte Palo and Lee Loughridge deliver the goods on the art
• Moon Knight is returning to his roots

Waning:

• What’s the real distinction between Spector and Lockley?

Full:

Jake Lockley may have left Marc Spector’s name, life and warrant behind, but he seems to be hell bent on making peace with his past. While the first two issues of the arc have set up a web for Moon Knight to get tangled up in, there’s still the constant theme of his desire for reconciliation with his past within these pages. Except he’s not doing it as Moon Knight (he has yet to suit up) or in the name of Khonshu. Lockley is atoning for his mercenary past by… um… essentially being a mercenary again. [singlepic id=30 w=250 h=375 float=right]

It’s working for him though; this notion of reconnecting with your past by reliving it and doing it the right way. Marc Spector was a prize fighter – Jake Lockley is making money in Mexico in some underground cage matches. Spector offered his services as a mercenary for hire – Lockley winds up doing the same down in Mexico. It will be interesting to see if any more parallels develop in this arc.

Lockley seems to have a more conscience driven approach in this return to his roots. While I’m not really sure that the inclusion of the Punisher in this arc is necessarily a good thing, it might be an interesting jolt to Moon Knight’s reality to have a link to his past pop up so unexpectedly.

That said, the one potentially negative observation I have so far is there doesn’t seem to be a distinct difference between Moon Knight’s Jake Lockley persona and Marc Spector. Whether this is to downplay the multiple personality disorder or give more credence to Khonshu’s involvement with his “condition” – it will be interesting to see how this plays out, if it does indeed play out.

Something else that I’m wondering is where in the timeline of current events in the larger Marvel Universe is Down South taking place. The previous arcs have all been on a time lag behind Marvel U events, but Down South could very well be almost running parallel with Dark Reign. I say almost because the Punisher is doing his own thing in Dark Reign so his presence wouldn‘t be known in Mexico if they were exactly concurrent. It would be great to see Moon Knight’s return to the larger Marvel U though, as he could definitely go a long way in cleaning house there.

Jefte Palo’s art is perfect for this world. He draws with a pulpy noir feel that fits the tone exactly. His backgrounds are sparse but in a way that really brings out the characters and enables you to focus on the action and dialogue. A large part of this is Lee Loughridge’s coloring which allows just the right features to pop out of the page. They’re a great team.

Get on board with this arc, you won’t be disappointed.

I was hoping Moon Knight would be included in Hasbro’s recently announced 3 3/4 inch figures Marvel line up, but when I was at NYCC I didn’t see sign of him in the line up at their booth. Well, I must have been distracted by the sheer hordes of spandex-gone-wrong-terribly-wrong folks around me, because I missed this:

Moon Knight Marvel Hasbro 3 3/4 Figure

How the hell did I miss that!!! Oh right, the distractingly fetid spandex all around me. The image is from IGN and you can click here to check out the original standing next to Union Jack.

The whole line up looks great… but without nitpicking too much, I hope they throw in a little silver on Moon Knight’s belt, cape, and accessories. And make those eyes either blue or a bit smaller. They look a bit strange right now, but these are prototypes.

This is part of Wave 4 and it comes out this year. I’m just glad to see Moon Knight get some early lovin’ in this latest figure line up.