Chronic Review: Black Panther Man Without Fear # 513!

Black Panther: Man Without Fear # 513

Marvel Comics

Script:      David Liss

Pencils:    Francesco Francavilla

23 pages for $ 2.99

This is a difficult book for me to review, because it simultaneously exhibits a host of attractive and repulsive qualities.  Almost in equal measure.  Let's start from the beginning, and be prepared for some spoilery wool, although I won't give away the whole sheep.

T'Challa is taking over as protector of Hell's Kitchen.  He's recently been getting into it with Doc Doom, and although he beat the Latverian prick, it cost him his nation's Vibranium stores and his mantle as the Black Panther.  So his country is broke, and pissed.  His daughter is now the Black Panther, and he's looking for some alone time to sort his future.  Fine.  The whole "finding himself" thing feels a little pussy for the Panther...but fine.  Whatever.

Matt Murdock gets on the phone and reaches out to T'Challa to pinch hit for him while he also goes on a completely pussified vision quest to discover the Real Matt again. I'm paraphrasing by the way, but it does read (to jaded me) with that New Agey bull excrement dripping off it.  I just want to find my totem animal in my inner sanctum and set fire to its face when I read that shit...but fine.  T'Challa agrees, and gets Foggy to set him up with a new identity as Mr. Okonkwo, humble diner manager by way of Congo.

So Black Panther fills the hero void, but there's a villainous vacuum as well, what with the Hand, and The Kingpin, and The Hood all MIA.  The Panther's main foil turns out to be a Romanian up-and-comer named Vlad, who recognizes the open power position and makes his move.  Naturally Vlad's activities and the Panthers collide, with the typical incendiary results.  Or maybe not so typical.

David Liss is obviously a smart cat with some chops, and I appreciate his ability to diagnose some cliched elements of the action/crime genre and side step them.  T'Challa doesn't go about business exactly as you'd expect, and Vlad certainly doesn't behave like his predecessors.  Everything about this new iteration of the Black Panther is a little more subtle, a little more nuanced, and a little more real, and a little smarter than most comic books.  In that way, this is a very appropriate extension of Daredevil's history for the past decade.

On the whole, I like Black Panther: The Man Without Fear.  There is clearly something there.  But I can't give it my unreserved adoration yet, either, because pieces of it feel clunky and awkward to me.  Let me give you three internal objections I felt while reading this issue, before I get to the stuff that seems like it will redeem those issues.

Why Would Matt Pick T'Challa?

This is just not a natural fit to me.  I guess if it follows that if Matt burned bridges with all of his close friends during Shadowland, then he would have to turn elsewhere to find a replacement.  And finding a replacement does make emotional sense to me.

I just...when would these guys ever cross paths?  I sort of understand T'Challa looking for a new start, but what's transpired that would ever make Matt Murdock think "Oh, yeah.  I'll just bring the Black Panther in."  Maybe they had more of a relationship during the Knights days than I remember?

If you're going to play the story as real as Liss wants to, the motivations really have to make sense, I think.  This is not a fluffy punch-out book where you check your brain at the door and just roll with the carnage and cleavage.  He's trying to do something a little meatier, which I applaud, but if you're going to do that, than the premise has to follow naturally or the suspension of disbelief falls apart. 

T'Challa Would Not Leave His Wife Behind

There's no Storm in this book, and by all indications, there will be no Storm in this book, and it makes no sense to me.  Now granted, I'm hardly the expert on healthy human relationships.  But it seems to me that if you're married to somebody, and it's working, than you don't ever go it alone.

That's the whole point of conjoining, isn't it?  No matter how deep it gets, now you're a team.  As one.  I mean, if the thing is on the rocks, maybe you separate to do the "finding yourselves" thing, although I would seriously question the efficacy of that strategy.  This just doesn't follow for me.

I'm Deep Undercover....Running Around Town In My Black Panther Suit?
OK.  You've kissed your old life good bye, you told your wife she can't enter your city limits, you're carving out a new niche for yourself, you've forsaken the name of the Black Panther....and you're running around town in your Black Panther suit?

This boggles my mind.  And its counter productive, because that suit is globally known, and it really shouldn't take a forensic detective to start piecing things together.  If Black Panther is punching faces in Hell's Kitchen and T'Challa isn't around, then he's undercover, and then that dude from the Congo who showed up the same time as the Black Panther is going to start raising eyebrows, I would think.  Unless there's a lot of African transplants popping up all over Hell's Kitchen.  I don't know how they do things there, I guess.

That's the stuff that was bugging me as I paged through the book, but that hardly tells the whole story.  When I got done with the issue, I really felt like I got a lot of story packed in there.  I recounted the pages just to be sure it wasn't extra-sized, because it took me much longer to digest BPTMWF

It's rare these days that we are introduced to new characters that matter, and clearly Vlad matters.  This is not a cipher, twiddling his moustache and spouting aggro nonsense.  This guy has a back story, an intriguing back story, it's tied into actual history in a way that makes sense, and clearly Liss has big plans that should be highly entertaining to watch.  Vlad is a worthy opponent, and his story is at least as interesting as T'Challas, and that's just good comics.

I'm trying to figure out how much I can punish this book for its awkward origins, or at least awkward as I perceive it.  If I could just set aside how we got here, I could fully embrace the book in a vacuum.  Maybe I should just let the other stuff go, and not worry about why Daredevil would bring Black Panther to Hell's Kitchen, or whether it actually makes sense that T'Challa would tell his loving wife to stay away while he works out his own personal issues, or whether he would leave Wakanda at all when clearly there are problems that need addressing back home.

In that sense, the book is in kind of a catch-22.  I might not care so much if this was a mindless battle book, but in that case I wouldn't be interested, either.  The care and subtlety that I enjoy so much in this comic also make the flaws in character/motivation I perceive hurt more than they probably ought. My feelings right now are that the good probably outweighs the bad.  There's something underneath this Black Panther that deserves a chance, I think, so I'm going to give it an arc and see what happens.


- Ryan

Chronic Review: Daredevil # 507!

Daredevil # 507
Marvel Comics
Script: Andy Diggle & Antony Johnston
Pencils: Marco Checchetto
22 pages for $2.99

The first comic I ever purchased was Uncanny X-Men # 163, but the first character I really fell for was Daredevil, beginning with issue # 198. What's funny is that I started with Denny O'Neill, not Frank Miller.

I had no clue that Frank existed until I hit Daredevil # 227, and that was like swallowing a Morpheus red pill. A whole new world. So then I backtracked and got hold of Miller's first run on Daredevil and the lights went on. "Ohhhhhh, so THIS is what I was sensing behind the page!"

Listen, Denny O'Neill has serious chops and his run has nothing to be ashamed of. But the juice was laid down by Frank Miller before he showed up. What I was enjoying at first was a good steward, and now here was the architect. But I digest.

I have always loved Daredevil, and I can't articulate rationally why that character is so special to me above all others. I always seem to find my way back "home" again. Hence Daredevil # 507.

What's extra weird is that for no reason I can discern, I've been interested in returning to the old D.G. Chichester run. You remember "Fall From Grace" with Scott McDaniel art, where he started wearing that armor? Diggle is returning to that piece of the canon, although I don't expect the suit to come back. It's just a weird piece of synchronicity that just as I randomly started considering Daredevil again, and randomly got interested in Fall From Grace, those things should dovetail.

So does it pay off? Well, it's hard to say. The difficulty for me is that I'm jumping aboard at the end of a very complex cycle, and that's just never a good idea. I've got the basic gist of what's going on. Matt Murdock is now the leader of The Hand, which he took over as a "devil you know" tactic to defend Hell's Kitchen from Norman Osborn.


He's in pretty tight with White Tiger, but she's a double agent. She doesn't appear to have any real animosity toward Matt, but she really doesn't seem to have his best interests at heart, either. While Matt is recognized as the boss to his face, it's pretty obvious that he's got major problems of a Machiavellian nature to contend with there.

As for the exact plot twists and ramifications of individual actions, I must admit that I am a bit lost. Again, jumping in at the end, this is more my fault than Andy Diggle's fault. While I was mainly pleased with the tone and direction of the writing, it is Marco Checchetto who really stole the show for me.

What's extra weird is that I got to that opening fight sequence and thought to myself; "WOW. Where have they been hiding this kid?" So the instant I finished the issue I went to research some of his previous work, and then remembered being wowed by his depiction of Invisible Woman in Spider-Man's "American Son" arc. I just have a really poor memory. I will remember Mr. Checchetto forever more, though, I can promise you that.

These pencils are gorgeous. The mood, the snow, the kinetic action, the choices he makes with perspective, it's all so....GORGEOUS. I have always turned my nose up at people who say things like "I don't care who's writing that book, as long as "X" is drawing that character, I'm on board!" I now understand that sentiment.

The good news is that Andy Diggle and Antony Johnston are doing solid work here, near as I can tell. The stakes are high, there is legitimate tension in the book. I found myself worrying about Matt getting in too deep, getting too confident in his position when there are so many snakes lying about. There was more ninja fighting in this issue than I'm ordinarily comfortable with, but again - the Checchetto factor made that most welcome.

Shadowland is a workable concept, it seems to be part of a master plan that Daredevil is being manipulated into, and the mystery is tantalizing enough to tempt me into the mini-series. I think that Diggle could make that pay off.

I'm a teeny bit concerned because the writing craft is not measuring up exactly. The concept is fine, and the execution is serviceable, but not....special. Let me give you an example of a little scene that just felt flat to me.

Daredevil stumbles upon a little cadre of dead ninjas that White Tiger dispatched to make it look like they all committed suicide. And he appears to buy it. The first thing I wondered is whether the dude that Bendis was writing in say..."Decalogue" could be duped by such a thing. But fine. The story sort of demands that he get led around right now, and maybe he's playing possum?

But it feels a little weak. And then he asks his highest underlings if they respect him, which seemed too blunt a question, but fine. And here are their responses:


Now, there's nothing wrong with any of that. But those replies are flat, derivative, kinda boring. There's nothing especially flavorful, cultural, fresh in there. You can bet your ass Gail Simone wouldn't have wasted that opportunity to throw in something unexpected, dripping with subtext, and probably cutting in its deference. That's just...flat.

So, to recap. Diggle and Johnston have a really nice setup. It's rich, complex, very workable. Marco Checchetto is displaying the full awesometude of his excellenticity. If Diggle can throw that kind of zest into characterization and dialogue, this might actually be worth the goddamned $3.99 I know they're going to charge for the Shadowland issues.

- Ryan