Review: Civil War II #7
The war ends…
Marvel‘s 2016 event Civil War II begins to wrap up with just a few more issues to go and this issue raises a hell of a lot of questions as to what’s to come.
Civil War II #7 is an interesting issue in that I’m very mixed in my thoughts about it. As an issue that teases things to come, it’s one that fans will be going over and be examining for a while to come. As part of a story that’s supposed to be exploring precognition’s use to stop crime, it falls rather short.
The issue is broken up into two parts written by Brian Michael Bendis. Half of the issue deals with Ulysses and his freezing at the end of the last issue and now being in the future somewhat which is the most intriguing thing about the issue.
Artists Andrea Sorrentino and Marcelo Maiolo lend their hand for that as the issue is set in the future that is Old Man Logan where the future grizzled Wolverine gives rather cryptic statements to Ulysses about where things have gone wrong. Of course, that opens up questions like why Wolverine doesn’t recognize Ulysses and why he hasn’t spoken up to everyone to tell them the future and put an end to all of the silliness. A bit of a Catch-22 there. Still, the art is utterly fantastic and the teasing is intriguing.
The other half of the comic deals with Spider-Man on the steps of the Capitol which is actually presented in a pretty authentic way post upgrades. Though where’s the Capitol police in all of this? There’d be more than DC police involved. He’s trying to come to grips with what Ulysses saw and Captain America confronts him to discuss that. That too is interesting but as soon as we get somewhere to really discuss things, the fighting begins again diluting any actual philosophical debate to be had. And that’s my issue with the series. For as smart as it seemed to have been or presented it has mostly been about heroes punching each other and characters dying. The actual important discussion of using an algorithm to arrest people before they commit a crime isn’t explored enough in the main story. It’s a Michael Bay film on paper, all flash, little depth.
David Marquez‘s art is solid as usual. As I said his interpretation of the Capitol is solid and I felt like I was walking around it. His characters and framing of the scenes keeps you watching and entertained. It’s really good work and continues the art of the series being strong than the story itself.
The issue sets a lot of things up to come and you know what’s hinted at will be something bigger than presented. It also interestingly shifts the importance of Marvel’s “X” lines a bit as the events to come are presented from the view of Old Man Logan increasing his importance. But, like the six issues before, the concept is muddled with too much flash.
Story: Brian Michael Bendis Art: David Marquez, Andrea Sorrentino, Marcelo Maiolo
Story: 6.95 Art: 8.15 Overall: 7.05 Recommendation: Read
Marvel provided Graphic Policy with a FREE copy for review
Disappointing issue. Most painful is seeing how badly Tony and Carol are written. Carol is a fascist and Tony is insane, showing no indication that he learned anything from the first Civil War and the pointlessness of fisticuffs. The original Civil War ended with Captain America surrendering after seeing what the war was actually doing. It was a poignant moment. I would have thought Tony would bring some of that experience with him. But instead, we get more ridiculous pointless fighting that feels totally forced on the reader.
And the addition of Old Man Logan is not welcome at all. It only confuses the narrative and sidelines the interesting philosophical questions that attracted me to the series in the first place.
It is clear that this will not actually end next issue and be nothing but set up for yet another event of some sort. An incredible failure for a series that started off with so much potential.