Reviewer: Paul Sebert
Story Title: Voodoo Economics: Part 1 of 3 – Hath No Fury
Written by: John Layman
Penciled by: Georges Jeanty
Inked by: Don Hillsman II
Colored by: Tom Chu
Editor: Mike Marts, Joe Q.
Publisher: Marvel Comics
The opening arc of Gambit’s ongoing series was a fairly pleasant little surprise in which the Rage’n Cajun Mutant returned to his thieving roots by planning an elaborate almost Lupin-esc heist. Things soon took a supernatural turn as various parties feuded over a cursed deck of Tarot Cards and everything was pretty neatly wrapped up in the final issue. Unfortunately for Remy LeBeau the police weren’t too terribly pleased to see all of the dead/maimed associates of our hero, and the “burned by a cursed card” defense seldom works outside of California.
This leads us to issue #7 with Gambit in police custody, the New Orleans police alas don’t really have any solid evidence connecting him to trail of mangled bodies that’s been left in his path. Lebeau finds himself freed by a police detective named Noreen Tanaka who seems to have a very obvious ulterior motive for helping Gambit. This is where things get silly as the plot spills over into some nonsense with Gambit attempting to halt a bank-robbery that winds up with the would-be super villain dead but well with a story named “Voodoo Economics” it’s pretty easy to guess what the cliffhanger of this issue is.
Goerges Janty’s artwork has a simple and clean look to it the feels equally appropriate in superhero power slugfest along with more supernatural scenes. Meanwhile Tom Chu’s colors are well done, but perhaps a tad too brightly hued for a book of this subject matter.
Gambit is still a rather well polished product, but alas this follow up arc is feeling kind of lame, and I’m honestly wondering if this project would have worked better as a mini-series.
