Writer: Brian Michael Bendis
Artist: Michael Gaydos
Colorist: Matt Hollingsworth
Letterer: VC’s Cory Petit
Cover Art: Mike Mayhew
Editor: Andy Schmidt
Publisher: J Jonah Jameson & Dan Buckley
Sometimes girls just have to talk, ya know? Just girl talk. Jessica Jones, over the last few months, has been through some hectic stuff. She’s had to deal with watching her boyfriend (also the father of her child) be kidnapped, beaten until near death, as well as witnessing one of the biggest prison breaks the world has ever seen.
Sometimes you just need to go to the local outdoor café and talk about the crazy world of motherhood. Especially when your life is surrounded by guys in masks and capes, who choose a career based on fighting other guys in masks and capes. So that’s what Carol Danvers gets Jessica to do.
STORY!
Jessica Jones has been invited to go have some lunch. In one of the best scenes that the book has seen in quite awhile, we are put into the heads of Marvel’s Moms. They sit and discuss the fears of being a superpowered mother and what it’s like when the baby is finally there. After long action arcs, and the myth that is ‘Secret Wars’, this is a nice respite.
The story is much more real, and much more laid in the groundwork that we know Bendis can handle. Jessica goes into labor, and then on the other side of the world, Ben Urich is trailing Daredevil…. or Wolverine… or..
Heh, the gag in the underlying story here, which I’m sure – of course – will turn out to be a much more interesting and substantial bit than a throwaway third tier character bit, is that it’s D-Man… the most horribly costumed character ever. So, Bendis gives him the rub that Speedball and every female Spider character has gotten from him. Although most of them have ended up dead.
This though is the classic Bendis we enjoyed from Alias… without all that pesky anal sex.
ART!
Danielle and I argued about the cover for awhile. She loves it. I thought it was a little too silly. The book is a lighter book, so I guess it works out. It most definitely is well drawn, even though I don’t like Wolverine’s ‘coochie coochie’ face. Anyway…
The art style of Gaydos, or Lark, is what this book has needed all along. Not Bagley. Now, I’m sure people could have a debate as to who does it better… but I really actually enjoy Lark’s more than Gaydos’. Gaydos just seems a bit repetitive comparatively. His art is strong, and is strong on this book (as I’ve come to expect), but it is not in fact as good as last arc’s work by Michael Lark.
OVERALL!
The beginning of this arc, if it is there to set the pace – is going to be excellent. This is going to be a story where Jessica finally has her little girl. Will it come out floating? Probably not. Although I will comment that the original point of THE PULSE (Jessica doing a newspaper piece.. then again, one could argue the Urich portion of the story will tie-in later) has been lost in the jumble of superheroics. I guess we can forgo that in lieu of her squirting out a kid, but it would be nice to know that it’s still around.
