Good news, everybody! I have for sure survived my bout with COVID-19. It’s been a terrible two weeks, but I’m down to just the smallest of head congestion symptoms now. Suffice to say, it was pretty crappy having COVID. And just my luck to get it long after the pandemic has settled down around the world.

Comic Book of the Week goes to Dark Spaces: Wildfire #3 for another excellent part of this creative heist tale.

Meanwhile, I’m on the verge of buying Temtem, the knock-off Pokemon game that finally had its full release this month. The game looks tempting, but the knock-off nature is a little unappealing. But then I’ve got no other games coming out until the end of October, and even then I’ll need to finally buy a Playstation 5. So I’m just not sure what to do!

Comic Reviews: Amazing Spider-Man #9, Dark Spaces: Wildfire #3, Godzilla vs. The Mighty Morphin Power Rangers #5 and Jurassic League #5.

Amazing Spider-Man #9
Writer: Zeb Wells
Artist: Patrick Gleason
Colorist: Marcio Menyz
Letterer: VC’s Joe Caramagna

At long last, we pick up on the cliffhanger of Spider-Man and Wolverine going to rescue Mary Jane after the Hellfire Gala. It was not worth the wait.

Picking up from the Hellfire Gala, where Moira MacTaggert kidnapped Mary Jane Watson, Spider-Man and Wolverine team up to go save Mary Jane. And they do. Greycrow follows MJ to get Moira’s location, then our heroes show up and save her, and Moira gets away. Spidey tries to talk to Mary Jane afterwards and she angrily storms off because of whatever is going on between them.

Comic Rating: 6/10 – Pretty Good.

Much like the rest of this current Spider-Man run, this issue wasn’t anything particularly special or memorable. Greycrow, a minor character in this issue, does all the work of tracking Mary Jane, and then Spidey and Wolverine just show up to fight a little bit and she’s saved. Moira has much more important things to do than actually be stopped in an issue of Amazing Spider-Man, so that story goes nowhere. The fighting isn’t particularly interesting, the characters are written fine and the issue kind of just happens.

The only thing this Amazing Spider-Man run has going for it at the moment is this big mystery of whatever Spider-Man did and how it tore him and Mary Jane apart. But the creative team just keeps teasing that mystery instead of providing anything compelling about it. So Peter and Mary Jane are at odds again? Who cares! It’s happened so much in the recent past that this time doesn’t feel special. It just feels annoying. I don’t care that they’re not together. I would prefer Peter get with Felicia anyway. Stop dragging out the mystery and just tell us already. It’s already gotten old.

TL;DR: Nothing very special happens to resolve a cliffhanger set up months ago.

Dark Spaces: Wildfire #3
Writer: Scott Snyder
Artist: Hayden Sherman
Colorist: Ronda Pattison
Letterer: Andworld Design

Good story continues to be good.

The girls have found a dead body in the house and they start freaking out about what to do and what this means. Ma tells the story of how her daughter died, and how it’s a reminder that the universe does not reward good people who follow the rules. Ma wants to see this through. But then a big fire erupts in the house, and the ladies quickly shift into firefighting mode to put it out. But then they realize that somebody set the fire…and it just gets worse from there.

Comic Rating: 8/10 – Very Good.

This is just a well-crafted, very interesting heist story that keeps adding new layers of intrigue with each issue. The art, also, takes a big step up with this issue for some very interesting pages. As the opening narration sets the scene and theme of the issue, we get some one-page flashbacks of all the main characters. I will admit that I’ve largely forgotten each of them specifically — except Ma — these were still very cool pages. A character glossary at the start of each issue might have been a good idea. But they’re all solid characters in a solidly interesting situation, and the art really does them wonders this issue.

TL;DR: Another very interesting issue kicks things up a notch at exactly the right time for this story to kick off.

Godzilla vs. The Mighty Morphin Power Rangers #5
Writer: Cullen Bunn
Artist: Freddie E. Williams II
Colorist: Andrew Dalhouse
Letterer: Johanna Nattalie

And so this comic ends exactly as it existed, by delivering exactly what it says on the cover.

The Green Ranger rejoins the fight and the Power Rangers transform into the Dragon-Megazord. Between that combo and Godzilla, they’re able to defeat Ghidorah. And then Godzilla turns his attention on the Xilien ship, causing enough damage to convince Rita to flee as well. And with all the bad guys gone, Zordon teleports the Rangers home. The day is saved.

Comic Rating: 5/10 – Alright.

Considering how much I love the Power Rangers comics from BOOM!, I’m rather disappointed at how this series turned out. I can’t say it didn’t deliver exactly what it said it will deliver, but I usually expect more depth or creativity. We didn’t even get to see the Dragonzord armor fly onto Godzilla! Nothing creative was done at all between the Rangers and Godzilla, or Rita and the other villains. Just all the typical Godzilla monsters show up and fight, with the Rangers and Godzilla either working together or working against each other at various parts of the story.

And this issue wraps everything up quickly. Sure enough, teaming up and combining Zords is the key to winning, and then it’s just done and everybody goes home. The writing is more like the TV show than the BOOM! comics, all surface-level platitudes and character development. And, of course, Godzilla doesn’t know the first thing about character development.

At least the art remains amazing.

TL;DR: This crossover mini-series ends without any real surprises or creativity. Everything happens exactly as you would expect it to happen if you didn’t expect anything deeper than simply what it says on the cover.

Jurassic League #5
Writers: Juan Gedeon and Daniel Warren Johnson
Artist: Gedeon
Colorist: Mike Spicer
Letterer: Ferran Delgado

This series should end strong, which will be a nice end for it.

Darkyloseid has been awoken and he heads straight for Trimyscira. Wonderdon tries to get Supersaur to help, but he’s focused on protecting his family. Batsaur almost comes to help, but he’s distracted by Jokerzard instead and chases the villain — only for Jokerzard to kidnap Cave Robin. So Wonderdon faces Darkyloseid alone in epic battle.

Meanwhile, Supersaur’s human dad brings him to the ship he arrived in and plays a message from his dinosaur dad. This inspires Supersaur to fly to Trimyscira and help in the battle, brining Aquaman, Green Lantern and Flash to help.

Double meanwhile, Jokerzard summons a bunch of dinosaurs to attack the human settlement and Batsaur shows up to save them.

Comic Rating: 7/10 – Good.

I don’t have much to say about this issue. All of it works in a rather nice, simple way. The art remains good, since Gedeon does all the artwork for this issue. The story remains very simple. The familiar bad guys do familiar bad guy things, and there are moments of crisis in this penultimate issue, where all hope seems lost. But then nope! The good guys rally and the fight will surely be on next issue. Darkyloseid is a pretty fun, gigantic bad guy. Wonderdon gets a cool scene where she dons Ares’ armor to fight back. And the panel where Supersaur joins the fight is pretty darn cool.

Not much fuss is made about getting the whole Jurassic League together, but then the Green Lantern and Flash characters have always felt like add-ons. No biggie. I don’t need some grand Jurassic League unification story. Lets just get all the heroes together to stop the bad guys! And I’m sure Batsaur will join as well in the end. He’s gotta finish off Jokerzard first, which is definitely a priority.

Once again, this is a comic that delivers on the premise established in the title. And when the art is as good as it is in this issue, the comic really sings.

TL;DR: A very nice penultimate issue has its own great scenes, setting everything up for a hopefully bombastic finale.

The comics I review in my Hench-Sized reviews are just the usual comics I grab from Comixology any given week, along with a few impulse buys I might try on a whim. So if there are any comics or series you’d like me to review each week, let me know in the comments.

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