The Shade #3 – Review

By: James Robinson (writer), Cully Hamner (artist), Dave McCaig (colorist)

The Story: To beautiful Australia, Shade just wants to say a happy g’day, mates!

The Review: Shade’s transition from villain to something of an antihero has been a gradual, uneven process and even now his motivations are somewhat questionable.  He doesn’t exactly go out of his way to do good in the world; he tackles evil and crime only insofar as it interferes with or promotes his interests.

So when you see Shade arriving in Australia to take down the Idle Hands, a gang on rocket scooters, he doesn’t do it out of the goodness of his heart, but rather does it in exchange for further information on the Caldecotts, one of whom has apparently taken up residence Down Under.  Shortly afterwards, he seeks the advice of Diablo Blackshade, a magician he once confronted back in his high larceny days, who very brusquely makes it plain that he has not forgotten the incident: “I’m not your friend.”

Still, Diablo does offer some valuable insight into what Shade’s up against, and he reveals something even more important: “I see your soul, Shade.  Here, now, I see it growing.”  This will come as a bit of a surprise, as it’s been long assumed Shade ceased having anything of the kind a long time ago.  Obviously, his regained ability to love has something to do with this spiritual development, but it’ll evidently take something more to complete the process.

It’s encouraging to see that Shade doesn’t seem resistant to having his soul back.  In battling Mangar-kunder-kunja, a lizard god of the Australian Aborigines, Shade actually takes Diablo’s teachings to heart and channels his “eternal spirit-child,” in essence showing his true self, free of his usual flippancy and wit.  It’s a surprisingly vulnerable, even gentle act (“of faith,” he admits), one that leads Mangar to state, with some surprise, “Evil you are.  Good you are, too.”