Marvel Pick Of The Week – August 24, 2016

Pick Of The Week goes to the book that Civil War II really should be at this point – good books can come out of bad crossovers.

Pick Of The Week: Captain Marvel #8, by Ruth Fletcher Gage, Christos Gage, and Kris Anka

Captain Marvel has gotten the short end of the stick this summer. The Civil War II crossover casts her as a woman too devoted to her mission to listen to the reasonable challenges that almost 100% of the tie-ins have offered. And when you try to set up your mission as Minority Report, it would behoove you to actually read or watch Minority Report. Spoiler, the predictive justice side is the losing team. So many summer books are getting to explore the complexity of profiling, but it’s been at Carol’s expense.

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Except for what the Gages are doing in Carol’s own book. They’re not trying to make her right – they’re trying to make her relatable. And they get this done beautifully, making this the pick of the week. So far, we’ve seen the immense personal pain she feels when she can’t save people. She mourns her boyfriend but will carry that pain to protect the world.

Most of the tie-in books have skipped to the part of the story where Carol is arresting people before they’ve done anything. They show her grim support for her stance even at Hawkeye’s murder trial. This book slows it down a little and shows how much Carol really understands about the complexity of the issue. She’s developing new techniques daily to improve the specificity and utility of Ulysses’s predictions. She’s taking what she knows about his power and trying to find a way to apply his visions to more than just the United States. And she even has a long conversation with Hawkeye about how very much she privately disagrees with what he did, despite her public acceptance. She’s still on the wrong side of this War, but we can understand her in ways no other book allows.

After the first Civil War, Iron Man was a broken character. He’d imprisoned his friends in the Negative Zone, he’d paid villains to work for him, and Captain America had died after Iron Man arrested him. The Gages are making sure that this won’t happen to Captain Marvel. I only wish they were writing the event itself, bringing this subtle touch to the rest of the Marvel Universe. Maybe next summer?

Honorable Mentions:

New Avengers #15

Warlock’s unique alien style can get pretty annoying, but his interpretation of Dirty Harry is super cute.

Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #11

Doreen doesn’t just defeat Nightmare. She turns his trap into a pleasant dream of flying and holds hands with him. Because she is awesome.

Patsy Walker AKA Hellcat #9

There is nowhere else in the Marvel Universe to see vampire Jubilee kicking Hellcat’s sexy ex-husband.

Extraordinary X-Men #13

Let’s give some credit to colorist Jay David Ramos for making this jump through dimensions into something spectacular.

Catch up on previous Marvel Picks of the Week here!