Champions No. 3 review: The heartbreaking decision of Miles Morales
By Alex Widen
Miles and Cho made a deal with the devil, and Sam’s past returns! Can Kamala’s team survive in Champions No. 3?
Champions No. 3
Writer: Jim Zub
Artist: Steven Cummings
Colorist: Marcio Menyz
Cover Artists: Kim Jacinto & Rain Beredo
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Ever since the end of the previous volume of Champions, Ms. Marvel and her friends have drastically expanded their team roster (again). Despite the ranks reaching a baker’s dozen, the focus is by and large on the “core four.” Kamala Khan, Miles Morales (Spider-Man), Amadeus Cho (Brawn), and Sam Alexander (formerly Nova). Viv Vision and Snowguard (Amka Aliyak) occasionally garner more panel time than some of the others, or even Nadia Pym (Wasp). Both Nadia and Riri Williams (Ironheart) sporadically get their own ongoing or mini-series, in fairness. The rest of the cast are there to fill the ranks and bolster their appearances. It gives Zub tons of material to work with.
Image by Marvel Comics
Despite his focus on Kamala, Miles, and Cho, Zub has arguably put the majority of his focus on Sam Alexander. A Jeph Loeb creation who used to co-star in Ultimate Spider-Man on Disney XD, his small screen time has long since faded and he’s a star without a book. Zub has especially attempted to do more with Sam’s persona and direction than Mark Waid did, who usually depicted Sam as a well-intended yet awkward jerk. Zub hasn’t forgotten Sam’s roots as a space hero, as a villain from his past as Nova liberates herself from an alien prison a galaxy away!
Image by Marvel Comics
“Training Accident” Is One of the Worst Phrases Ever!
Ignorant of the danger from a universe away, Sam Washington is focused on the crisis within. He’s gone from being one of the team’s founders to their glorified pilot or hanger-on. While he rightly resisted the Master’s attempts to empower him in Weirdworld, he’s been too embarrassed to ask his superhero friends for a quick fix (like armor). He’s done his best to stick around, but he feels outclassed during Ms. Marvel’s training classes with the newbies, and ignored by his pal, Miles.
Image by Marvel Comics
Kamala and Amka do their best to help train their new teammates. These include a mixture of novices like Locust (Fern Rodriguez), Patriot (Rayshaun Lucas), Falcon (Joaquin Torres) and Bombshell (Lana Baumgartner) with modestly experienced young heroes like Power Man (Victor Alvarez). And Sam does his best to hang out with them, as one of the team. Yet when he’s caught in one of Lana’s shock-waves and needs Kamala to save him, the gap between them becomes clear.
Image by Marvel Comics
Sam can’t figure out why Miles Morales, usually his best friend on the team, has become coldly distant. Given his own angst about his lack of super powers emasculating him, Sam simply sees it through that prism. Yet to the young Spider-Man, it has absolutely nothing to do with Sam. It has to do the literal deal with the devil (or a devil) that he and Amadeus Cho took a part in during their initial mission in Dubai, to undo the monster Zzzax successfully slaying Kamala and Viv Vision.
Image by Marvel Comics
All Deals with the Devil Have Their Price!
While Cho bore witness to the meeting, and offer, with the Hell-Lord Mephisto, it was Miles who actually agreed to the demon’s terms. He’d already experienced what losing friends and family members was like in the “Ultimate Universe” where he came from. The Molecule Man resurrected members of Miles’ cast when he joined the “main Marvel Universe” after the third Secret Wars as a reward for offering him a hamburger — seriously. Yet having experienced when it was to lose, then regain, loved ones before, it’s no surprise that Miles made the choice that he did.
Image by Marvel Comics
Yet now with time to ruminate about it, Miles is realizing the horror of his choice. Mephisto promised there’d be no “catches” or attempts to steal his soul. In fact, the demon even reappeared to Miles to offer a seeming ear for his angst. But Miles is quickly realizing that it is guilt which is consuming his soul, not a demon. When Mephisto turned back the clock and allowed he and Cho to save their friends, he’d neglected to rescue a civilian who he’d saved from death the first time.
Image by Marvel Comics
This is a secret Miles can’t admit to anyone, not even his best friends. Amadeus Cho, the only other Champion aware of the bargain, has been kept in the dark. Considering Cho’s also dealt with survivor’s guilt — his self-blame over his parents’ murder literally fueled his rage as the Hulk — it’s understandable that he would be able to accept the moral ambiguity. Yet not even Cho nor his advanced intelligence have realized that he and Spider-Man accidentally traded two lives for one.
Ashes to Ashes and Dust to Dust!
The only one of the new recruits who’d skipped Kamala’s training class is Pinpoint, a.k.a. Qureshi Gupta. The New Indian youth’s powers are strictly for teleporting, and he sees himself as a non-combatant. His role is similar to the one Gateway used to have with the X-Men and Manifold used to have with the Secret Warriors and Avengers. Miles capitalizes on that to convince the shy and awe-stricken kid to beam him back to Dubai, so he can confirm his own memories of the battle.
Image by Marvel Comics
Ms. Marvel is distracted by the woes of leadership and another crisis, in that order. Despite still feeling like a rookie compared to the Avengers, the rest of the newer Champions are too eager to impress her to focus on training cohesively. And then Viv Vision alerts Kamala and Amka of yet another anti-mutant protest which has the risk of turning violent. This time it is in front of Worthington Industries, the company run by founding X-Men and Champions member, Angel.
Image by Marvel Comics
For at least the third or fourth time, the X-Men are missing and presumed dead. This is causing anti-mutant bigots to mobilize in an attempt to “protest” against any who are left, or any mark of their legacy. The only one of them willing to defend Angel’s company from being ransacked is Sooraya Qadir, otherwise known as Dust. A Sunni Muslim mutant from Afghanistan, she was created by Grant Morrison and Ethan Van Sciver in 2002’s New X-Men No. 113.
Image by Marvel Comics
Will Dust Replace Cyclops on the Team?
Yet 17 years in real life is barely an eye blink to the rinse cycle of superhero comics, so Dust is still a little known rookie of the team. Angered at the crowd tarnishing the memories of her lost friends as well as becoming the target of their rage for various reasons, she unleashes her power. Able to summon a sandstorm within herself, Dust can capably suffocate or kill targets if she desires to. It is perhaps for this reason that Cho and the Champions step in to break it up.
Image by Marvel Comics
Unfortunately, while the Champions no longer have a well-known mutant among their ranks, their own diverse nature quickly wears out their welcome with the angry crowd. They see the wings of Amka or Falcon as too close to the “mutie” Worthington’s. Amadeus is Asian and the team are mostly teenage women. Viv’s attempts to reason with one particular bigot backfire, especially when she notes violence is still criminal. The team are quickly caught in the middle here!
Image by Marvel Comics
Sam Washington, as usual, is above them piloting the team’s flying headquarters. Unfortunately, not even that is safe as the aircraft is quickly breached by an intruder. It turns out to be Kaldera, a villain he knows quite well. Created by Zeb Wells in 2013’s Nova No. 8, she is a warrior enslaved to Proxima Midnight — one of Thanos’ minions. Being the minion of a minion is a cruel lot in life, and Kaldera was dispatched to kill Nova. Now she wants revenge, despite Sam not being Nova anymore.
Image by Marvel Comics
Right Where We Came In!
Things in Dubai don’t turn out much better. Miles returns to the site of Zzzax’s attack and sees a shrine set up to what appears to have been the monster’s only slain victim. It turns out to have been the teenage girl that Miles (or “the Second Spider” as he is called in Arabic) saved in their original mission, whose life was lost once he agreed to Mephisto’s deal to save his friends. It gets even worse when among the mourners are the girl’s mother, who still sees him as a hero.
Image by Marvel Comics
It becomes clear in no uncertain terms that Miles traded this girl’s life for those of Kamala and Viv. It is a choice that Spock from Star Trek might consider “logical” — the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. Yet it was not a choice made deliberately or knowingly, but out of emotion and ignorance. Like any Spider-Man, the themes of responsibility run strong within Morales, and the weight of guilt literally brings the wall-crawler to his knees. Can it get any worse for him?
Image by Marvel Comics
It’s a comic book and a fictional story, so of course it can. Ms. Marvel has sorted out why Pinpoint missed practice, and the poor kid was torn between ratting out one hero he respected versus being truthful to another. Even worse, Kamala demands to know what is up with Miles, and he’s forced to figure out how to tell her that he basically accepted a deal with a devil to trade her life for another. It would be a shocking moment…had the cover not made it clear from the start!
Image by Marvel Comics
“How Could You–?”
Jim Zub gets many things right here. While there were some questions revolving around his pitch and the opening issue of this volume, things are coming together well. The cast expansions and missions are there to keep up the obligations of a superhero team. His real focus is on a few of the characters, especially Kamala, Sam, and Miles. While creating a moral dilemma around a literal deal with the devil to make the team work right wasn’t expected, it has crafted some high drama.
Image by Marvel Comics
In fact the issue’s only demerit is one that many writers in comics do. Covers are often done months in advance and are based on the initial pitch for the issue. At worst they can depict a scene or even character who doesn’t appear within. Yet they can also have the paradoxical effect of establishing a scene which the interior story treats as a surprise or a shocker. The issue literally ends with the bit that all readers knew before they even bought the issue. It can feel like an anti-climax despite the obvious emotional weight within. But that’s more of a quibble than a fatal flaw.
Image by Marvel Comics
Perhaps more problematic is the expansion of the cast. While Zub unleashes his inner Chris Claremont or Kurt Busiek and relies heavily on narration to provide name tags and exposition, the more characters vying for panel time often means some will be neglected. It may be wise to lower focus on some characters with other books, like Nadia or Riri. Yet most of the rest simply seems there to fill out the numbers or make sure their Marvel Handbook biographies need to be updated. And it makes it tougher for newer characters like Amka or Qureshi to earn their stripes.
Image by Marvel Comics
Is This a Case of Some Genuine “Marvel Rising?”
Steve Cummings presents another strong issue on art; in fact this may be his best of the run yet. He is becoming more familiar with the cast and/or his schedule, and this issue comes together visually a pinch better than the last two. It isn’t easy covering all the superheroes as well as civilian characters, nor capturing all of the emotional turmoil behind a masked Spider-Man, yet Cummings does it spectacularly here. Marcio Menyz, much like with Luke Cage, is great on color work too.
Image by Marvel Comics
dark. Next. Miles and Cho Deal with Mephisto in No. 2!
It is a bit of a shame that Warren Worthington III’s role as founding the original Champions in 1975 (alongside fellow mutant Iceman with Hercules, Black Widow, and frigging Ghost Rider) wasn’t referenced here, especially since Kamala is a big “fangirl” who knows her heroes. But perhaps the better homage was the scene itself. While Zub seems to be focusing less on other dimensions and more on contemporary missions, he remains more committed to the interpersonal drama and moral dilemmas of teenage superheroes. This is a solid long term plan for this second volume.