Best of Marvel: Week of March 11th, 2020

Best of this Week: The Immortal Hulk #32 (Legacy #749) – Al Ewing, Joe Bennett, Ruy José, Belardino Brabo, Paul Mounts, Javier Rodríguez, Álvaro López and Cory Petit

Xenmu hopes you enjoy the show.

Xenmu the Living Titan or Xenmu the Hulk is a super deep cut of a character that predated The Incredible Hulk by two years and has been plaguing Hulk and his allies for the last few issues of this series. Xenmu’s origins trace back to Marvel’s old days of Sci-Fi horror in the “Journey into Mystery” anthology series back in 1960. On top of having immense strength, not unlike Hulk himself, the Living Titan is capable of using psionic abilities and mass hypnosis – something that has already come to bite Hulk in the backside.

This book begins with an incredibly creepy scene, drawn and colored by Javier Rodríguez with inks by Álvaro López, in which a mass of CRT TVs are stacked on top of each other and all show Xenmu recreating iconic Marvel moments. He emulates Spider-Man crawling down a wall, Reed Richards using the Ultimate Nullifier to scare away Galactus and even Wonder Man when he stood behind David Letterman (Avengers #239, 1984) before ending with his creepy eyes.

Al Ewing and Rodríguez do an amazing job of conveying what it is that Xenmu wants – the hearts and minds of the citizens of the Earth, to counteract the love that they’ve been giving The Hulk and other heroes of the Marvel Universe. Rodríguez draws and colors the background in a dark and dusty way with lots of dangling wires and dilapidated surfaces as well as lots of browns and hazy blues.

In the following scenes, regular series artist, Joe Bennett takes over and he and Ewing do their best Bendis impression as we get about six panels of citizens each talking about their love for Xenmu and how he’s the greatest hero in the world! One of these panels even includes a not so subtle cameo of Simpsons characters Bart Simpson, Milhouse Van Houten, Nelson Muntz and Lisa Simpson in the background. We obviously know none of this to be true and see that Xenmu’s false memories have wormed their way into their minds.

Soon after, we cut to the office of Roxxon CEO, Dario Agger, as he and Xenmu look upon the fruits of their work and continue to plan for a world without the Hulk interfering with them. Agger is always looking for a way to make a good dollar, even if that means selling out the human race to Dark Elves (War of the Realms, 2019) or by siding with an intergalactic being of mass mind control. Bennett continues to make Agger’s Minotaur form a thing of horror with his hunch back and drooling maw.

Things continue to get even more horrifying as Xenmu complains that he is getting hungry and Agger callously sacrifices Travers, one of the last men on his security team, to the monster. Bennett, Ruy José, Belardino Brabo and Paul Mounts work in tandem to create one of the most unsettling double page spreads of biomechanical body horror as Xenmu bends into a crab form like he’s Kayako from The Grudge, unleashes fleshy tendrils, dripping with blood and coiled in gold and drags Travers into the opening in his stomach. Travers screams in horror as Agger simply drinks his whiskey.

José and Brabo’s inks make the lines look incredibly smooth and do well to accentuate Bennett’s hatched shading as well as the small detail of Xenmu’s eyes peering at the floor as he reflects on the shining floor. Mounts also colors the scene with such casual, late afternoon lighting, contrasting the abject terror that is taking place within the scene. In a series with heart pounding-ly scary pages, this is HIGH up there with the most disturbing.

Soon after, we get another single page from Rodríguez with the same television set up, but this time, the news portrays the scientist, Dr. Robert Banner and his alter ego, The Devil, as a dangerous villain. These reports allude to Banner’s origin story, the events of the World War Hulk (2007) and even acknowledge the fact that General Thunderbolt Ross couldn’t be reached for comment (He was killed during the first arc of Ta-Nehisi Coates’ Captain America.)

This page distinguishes itself from the other as the backgrounds are given an eerie green color, one of the CRTs has been cracked and seems to be leaking some sort of purple liquid. The images on screen are given a green and purple static effect and the rat that was on the lower right corner of the page runs away at the sight of Banner and the Devil versus when it was mesmerized by the images of Xenmu the Incredible Hulk.

Bennett returns and utilizes the six panel structure with people lambasting Banner as a cult leader, murderer and terrorist. Bruce’s best friend, Amadeus Cho aka Brawn, doesn’t even remember his old friend. Jackie McGee, still recovering from her injuries following an attack by Roxxon, has trouble remembering if Banner and The Hulk were the same person, especially after travelling with Banner for a number of weeks/months. We then get a final panel of “Robert” Banner repeatedly saying that “nothing is wrong.”

Bennett, José, Brabo and Mounts do an amazing job of pulling us into the fracturing mindset of “Robert” Bruce Banner as we transition to Shadow Base and see Savage Hulk in the mirror, trying to break out, as Banner repeats the statement. Bennett sells us on Bruce slowly breaking with various pulled in shots of his sweaty, unshaven and crazed faces. Mounts even makes use of small hints of green around Banner’s eyes alluding to any one of the Hulks trying to escape.

Bruce is acting noticeably different and the resurrected Rick Jones seems to acknowledge this just a small bit. He doesn’t seem to be affected, but that might have to do with the metaphysical nature of his resurrected powers and how he’s always on, unlike Bruce who is still just a human holding back his various forms. Bruce also keeps referring to himself as “Robert” his real first name and also what Xenmu News keeps calling him, this suggests that Bruce as a human is also susceptible to the same mind control as other people.

Dr. McGowan and Doc Samson discuss as much when McGowan presents Samson with some video footage of her talking to Rick and Betty Ross as Harpy. Much like most others, she remembers Xenmu, but also knows that she said Daredevil in the footage and Samson confirms it. He also seems to have no actual recollection of Xenmu much like Rick and McGowan suggests that his existence is acting as some sort of Mandela Effect (google it, cause it’s weird) with multiple people remembering something that no one actually experienced.

McGowan explains that her experience as a transwoman helps her to separate what parts of her really are her and what is not and that method of self examination helps her in realizing that Xenmu’s memories aren’t real and that he’s been re-writing the minds of everyone else who looks at him through the screen, including Bruce Banner, which shocks Samson and Bennett gives us his shocked face.

We actually get one more shot of the television sets, but this final one is shockingly different. Almost all of the TV sets are smashed and bleeding, except for one showing Xenmu’s hypnotic stare. Each of the sets are a dark purple color and the background is given a bright and vibrant hot pink coloring. The purple and pink color scheme extends to the disgusting tentacles emerging from the shadows, almost leeching into the minds of all of its viewers. Even the rat in the corner isn’t safe as one of the tentacles wraps itself around the creature while Xenmu proclaims, “I’m in your head.” It’s all genuinely terrifying.

Before the book ends, Banner punches the mirror to hold back the Savage Hulk, and we get a surprising return of a previously mentioned Hulk and I’m ultra excited for the next issue.

This issue of Immortal Hulk was absolutely fantastic. Al Ewing continues with his epic run with the character by introducing a dastardly and unreasonably scary villain in the returning Xenmu to act as a foil to the plotting and genius Devil Hulk. Javier Rodríguez and Álvaro López absolutely blew my mind with their pages with the TVs by conveying the scale of the psychic threat and Joe Bennett, Ruy José, Belardino Brabo and Paul Mounts continue to stun with scenes of body horror and general grossness.

This book gets the highest of recommends from me.

Best of Marvel Week of October 23rd, 2019

Best of this Week: The Immortal Hulk #25 (Legacy #742) – Al Ewing, Germán García, Chris O’Halloran, Joe Bennett, Ruy José and Paul Mounts

At the end of the Universe, there is only the Breaker of Worlds.

Many issues of Immortal Hulk have tackled the horror of what comes next, the existence of an apocalyptic Green Hell for those touched by Gamma radiation being the most terrifying. This issue, however, doesn’t focus on what comes AFTER life, but what is coming for the last flickers of it that will exist at the end of time.

Following an alien being of some sort, named Par%l, we join hir as they travel to the last known vestige of the Universe’s knowledge. A planet called O%los, a beautiful planet with chromatic seas, crystalline superstructures and a general feeling of happiness. Par%l hopes that by beating the Breaker-Apart to O%los, that they might be able to warn the nine billion souls that live there or save the knowledge stored therein. From what we learn of hir interaction with another being of her kind, every other planet in the Universe has been destroyed by a monster of some kind.

These pages are characterized by García’s use of otherworldly visuals and O’Halloran’s use of warm and pastel colors. Par%l and her companion Farys look almost microbial with extended “necks,” long, almost tube like bodies, capped with heads that contain crystals of some sort in them. It’s abstract in a way that signifies that humans have long since been annihilated and that the beings at the far end of the universe are pretty much all that’s left.

The pages before this have been characterized by bright and lively colors. Warm oranges and yellows have signified life and the hope that knowledge could be saved. The multi colors of O%los even brim with light and a feeling that everything will be all right. O’Halloran makes sure to set the mood of the unknown before ripping it away at the very last moment.

As Par%l arrives to the orbit of O%los, in the distance, they spy a green light.

In an instant, O%los is beset upon by the form of The Immortal Hulk. He floats through space, not speaking a single word, but saying everything he needed to with a clothesline.

He obliterates the planet.

Par%l observes his every movement. From his crashing through several moons and lifeless planets, winding up his fist, to the impact of the hit. The crystals of O%los are spread across the vastness of space, the planet is turned into a combination of glass, dust and death as nine billion beings are killed and all of life knowledge if destroyed. What was once a colorful environment is then replaced with a bright green and the darkest blacks as the destroyed remains of O%los float around hir.

Par%l doesn’t understand and gathers the words for all of the things they’re seeing. They have never seen hands or arms before, but she finds the words, she has never seen a face before and above all, she had never seen a smile until the Breaker-Apart looks upon her minuscule and insignificant form. Hulk is terrifying here as he has now become planet sized or larger, able to shift his size enough to crush stars and even suns. He doesn’t have regular eyes as they just glow with evil Green Door Energy.

When Par%l tries to communicate with him, simply asking “Why?” They are met with horrors unimaginable. I’d imagine García is a fan of Jeff Lemire and Andrea Sorrentino’s Gideon Falls because the next few pages are beautiful double page spreads of Eldritch terror in a similar style. It’s not fair to draw comparisons, but in my opinion they are absolutely prevalent.

The shots of thousands of people with their eyes blotted out, screaming in fear without any words or even sound as they’re coated in an evil green and black is more than mind numbingly scary. The next shot of The One Below All showing his fleshy, mucus-y visage under the guise of Hulk’s horribly distorted and ripped apart body with the background showing a city razed to the ground is terrifying. The red lettering by Cory Petit only stands to make the scene more scary as he’s able to convey what The One Below All says in a way that makes him seem out of this dimension.

He is powerful in a way that is incomprehensible. This is shown even more on the final spread where he is shown with tunnels where his eyes were as he’s surrounded by faces in the melted flesh of the Hulk’s body. He says that he has eaten all of the selves that were in the Hulk and that the mystery of his own existence frightens him, but he will kill all of life to be alone.

Par%l is unable to take it and hir shell cracks, forming a fly containing all of hir knowledge of the future. Somehow it travels through time into the hands of one of the Hulk’s oldest enemies.

To say this book had me terrified would be an understatement. As I turned each page, the horrors only became more visceral, more dreadful. The Hulk will destroy the world, not just one, but all of them. Of the many futures that Marvel presents, I believe this one. The One Below All is written as if they are the truth. They will kill everything and there is nothing any living being can do to stop it. Maybe Par%l landing in the hands of who it does will be the catalyst to avoiding that future, but like Thanos, The One Below All might just be inevitable.

Germán García’s art was phenomenal here, just beautiful to look at with a page turner everywhere. It had vast a detailed visuals when things seemed to have an upswing, but when the time came for Hulk to appear and collapse the entire idea, García hammered home just how hopeless things were. Chis O’Halloran colored this book like a champ and really sold the desolation that The Green Light brought with it. He’s able to easily elicit a feeling of fear with such a simple and common color through his use of a particular shade, kind of a toxic color accentuated by a whiteness in the center.

What’s most enjoyable about this is Al Ewing’s ability to weave a tale that goes beyond the initial premise of an unkillable Hulk, to one where an interdimensional God using the Hulk’s body sniffs out every last light in the universe. There’s so much story potential and it’s a wonder where he could possibly go to reach this point if it’s not stopped.

This book is absolutely fitting of the horror of October and is a definite Scary Recommend.

Best of Marvel: Week of October 2nd, 2019

Best of this Week: The Immortal Hulk #24 (Legacy #741) – Al Ewing, Joe Bennet, Ruy Jose, Belardino Brabo, Marc Deering, Roberto Poggi, Paul Mounts and Cory Petit

There are two people in every mirror.

The central theme of The Immortal Hulk has been the reconciliation between the two sides of oneself. For Bruce Banner, it’s himself and the many other personalities that reside inside his mind and body, most notably that of the Devil Hulk. Banner, knowing that because of The Hulk and his connection to the Green Door to Hell he’ll never be able to die or find true peace, has given himself all in to The Devil Hulk’s plan of ending the world as they know it. The Devil Hulk himself is a dark and menacing entity that has some kind of good intention, but a myriad of evil hidden under it.

With an unkillable Hulk and a massive ego, some people are trying to do whatever they can to bring Hulk down and save humanity. One such man is General Reg Fortean. Over the course of this series, Fortean has observed Hulk, taken measures to contain or defeat him time after time. His most recent effort of using Rick Jones’s body to resurrect that of Abomination seemed to work until Banner ripped Jones out of the Abomination shell, saving his old friend. Fortean, however, get s it back and transplants himself into the body of the villain.

This was his biggest mistake. There’s something about peering into The Green Door that corrupts the soul and Fortean cast himself into that rabbit hole with reckless abandon.

This book begins with an amazing shot of the end of all things, potentially the first. We see Galan of Taa, the future Galactus, bathed in the green glow of the Cosmos, the first sign that The Green Door has always been there and that at one point it was wide open. Soon after we cut to the accident that gave Bruce Banner his Hulk powers with the caption of there being two faces in the mirror, “the one you think you know…and the other one.”

Paul Mounts colors each of these of these pages with varying levels of green. The first of Galan with bright shots of green offset by other colors, most notably Galan’s signature purple, echoing back to his origin by Jack Kirby and Stan Lee. Banner’s accident, in the form of a double page spread, is drawn and coated in an overwhelming Green tint while the rest of the book keeps the sinister Green relegated to Hulk and several backgrounds. It gives off a dark feeling that the Hulk and the presence of the Green Door in general is always lurking about, Mounts does his best to sow that feeling of uncomfortability throughout the book with darkly vibrant colors.

Joe Bennett doesn’t let those colors go to waste as his pencils are as amazing as they have been for the entire run of this story. His art has been instrumental for the success of the story with its focus on body horror, general gore and the extreme sense of scale that makes you feel like intense weights are bearing down on you in every instance. Every shot of the Hulk talking with half of his face ripped off is terrifying as Cory Petit letter it perfectly, emphasizing that at the moment, Hulk has no lips to speak of. It’s fleshy and gross and made even worse as Hulk throws his removed face at another soldier and it sizzles, burning him.

Fortean also goes about using his Abomination bodies abilities to try and spit acid at Hulk. It splashes forth in all of its frothy, bright green goodness. Hulk dodges, it hits reinforcement soldiers and turns them into gross masses of boils, blood and bones as they scream, unable to stop what’s happening to them. Bennet makes you feel the pain and terror by drawing their mouths agape, teeth bared and eyes wide open in pain. Their blood is overpowered by the green of the acid spit and they just melt away.

By this point, Shadow Base’s second-in-command, Doctor Charlene Gowan reconciles with who she is and what she’s done in all of her efforts to contain The Hulk. she realizes that she’s enabled Fortean to become this monster and that she had many opportunities to stop him. She felt the need to serve under Fortean when her obligation to him was the fact that he got her out of prison, gave her a second chance, but that’s changed. His obsession had taken him over and he’s killed his own men and allowed himself to become the monster that he hates. She tells the other personnel to stand down, leaving only Fortean and Hulk to fight it out.

Fortean sort of manges to get the upper hand with a mean right cross and acid directly in the face, but Hulk plunges a finger into Fortean’s eye and ultimately his brain, killing him. They end up in the Below-Place, the realm of The One Below All and Fortean sees the error of his obsession. He sees the hellscape that his soul would be damned to every time he died and he panics. He is terrified, but there’s no time for him to correct what he’s done as Joe Fixit snaps his neck, killing his soul and any chance of him coming back to life.

It’s nihilistic. It’s dark. It’s a sign that once you cross that threshold, there’s nothing left for you but a hellish wasteland. Even at the end of all things, once everything has died and the new world is supposed to begin…there’s a flicker of green and a post credit sequence that spells doom for the future of the Marvel Universe, hell – every Marvel Universe, if The Green Door isn’t closed.

Al Ewing, Joe Bennett and the rest of this creative team have forged something evil. Something dark and twisted that Marvel hasn’t quite seen in years. I gleefully anticipate every issue of the Hulk to see just how dark things will get. There’s this cold certainty to every word that The Devil Hulk says and Banner’s father being the main demon of the Below-Place has this awful feeling of depraved destiny, that maybe the world was right to fear Hulk. Bruce Banner and his alter egos will end the world and it can’t be pretty. It will be violent, bloody and ultimately hopeless.

The other person in the mirror is the one you don’t want to see.

Best of Marvel: Week of June 12th, 2019

Runner Up: The Immortal Hulk #19 – Al Ewing, Joe Bennett, Ruy Jose, Paul Mounts, Rachelle Rosenberg and Cory Petit

I think I’m going to be sick. Sick with disgust, fear and absolute love for this amazing series and the levels it goes to push the envelope of horror storytelling in a superhero universe.

Beginning with an impressive analogy, foreshadowing the events of the book, a young Captain Fortean is trying to impress a young Betty Ross with the importance of spiders to the ecosystem as they watch a butterfly trapped in its web. He tells her that spiders keep the rest of the insect population in hand so that the world isn’t in chaos. As they drive away, the butterfly escapes from the web.

Continuing the events from the last issue, Hulk is in the middle of battle with RickBomination, who displays an ability to dissolve Hulk’s body parts with his acid. Truly it’s a gruesome display from the fluid splashing off of Hulk’s arms, to the acid dripping from both of Rick’s mouths, to the slop of flesh falling off of Hulk’s hand as it fails to regrow.

Elsewhere, a kill team utilized by Shadow Base is taking care of witnesses and kills one of the hotel staff. This act is witnessed by Jackie McGee, the reporter that’s been following the Hulk and his exploits for the entirety of the series and her new friend: a newly resurrected and terrifying Harpy, Betty Ross-Banner.

Betty’s new form is a thing of nightmares. In her original Harpy form, Betty was a green skinned beast, resembling a centaur/manticore like monster consisting of wings and feathered legs. She was also the Red She-Hulk, pretty much exactly what it sounds like. This new Red Harpy is…something else. With a jaw that seems very snake-ish, the talons of her hands and feet are razor sharp, capable of grappling, ripping and slicing through anything. Her display of violence against the kill team is brutal and horrific.

She rips off heads, tears bodies in half and just strikes fear into the hearts of the men. The expressions on their faces are not unlike any previously seen in the series, but they still carry with them the sheer terror of what they’re facing. Jackie tries her best to stop Betty’s rampage, but her voice is mousy, unheard as Betty goes absolutely mad.

Throughout the book, Betty narrates that everything about her is her own. Her rage, pain and violence is all hers. Her new Harpy form is hers and after years and years being defined by her relationship to Bruce, she has something all on her own again. She is not endlessly loving, she is not forgiving, she is no one’s friend or soulmate and that if she is seen as a monster, then this is the perfect world for her. The truly horrific bit is saved for the end and it is disgusting.

This issue had a big focus and did a great job of reintroducing Betty Ross-Banner in a meaningful way after her “death” at the hands of Bushwacker a few issues earlier. It also teases a release from her role as just Bruce Banner’s love interest and more into her own kind of beast, more ferocious than her Red She-Hulk past. I’m excited for what the future has in store for her and the rest of the Gamma Monsters.