Demon Knights #6 – Review

By: Paul Cornell (writer), Diógenes Neves & Robson Rocha (artists), Oclair Albert (inker), Marcelo Maiolo (colorist)

The Story: It’s the ultimate showdown, featuring Amazon versus Triceratops!  Heck yeah.

The Review: Nothing quite like a battle against impossible odds to see what your characters are made of, huh?  These types of crises tend to accomplish two things: on the practical side, you get to see the limits of your heroes’ abilities, and often, on the deeper side, you also see the strength of their values tested.  Consequently, by the time the story’s over, you often have a very different set of characters than what you started out with, even if none of them perish.

But don’t expect the Demon Knights to have even that optimistic ending.  With the kind of dire peril they’re up against and a couple of them already halfway to death’s door, the chances of victory look pretty slim.  I suppose, though, in true fantasy fashion, that makes the glory of their fall all the greater.  Already you’ve seen some amazing action out of the Knights, and here they take it even further, using every trick and power at their disposal to hold off the Horde for just a moment longer.

Even more notable is how crucial a role the women play in making this possible.  I’m not just talking about Exoristos’ solo face-off with a dinosaur battalion, or Horsewoman attempting to charge past a flight of mechanical dragons, or even Xanadu’s quiet attempts to keep the team together.  Think about the person responsible for bringing this conflict in the first place: the Questing Queen.  And who’s her bitter rival?  Not Etrigan nor Al Jabr, but the female (probably) Shining Knight.  Whether Cornell intended it or not, he’s established a pretty lady-centric title here, all the more remarkable considering there are some big-name men in the mix, too.

It’s also the women who bear the tough decisions, as both Horsewoman and Xanadu have to grapple with making the necessary sacrifices to increase the village’s chances of survival.  What they end up choosing to do shows, I think, the kind of person we’ll be following from now on.  We tend to view Xanadu as a very means-ends type of actor, yet here she proves to be of sterner morals than we typically give her credit for, even when the rationale for the evil choice is actually on her side for once.  Horsewoman using the lives of her loyal animals as bait, on the other hand, is much more surprising, particularly since they’re essentially her means of living.

WCBR’s Top Picks

Dean’s Top Picks

Best From The Past Week: Amazing Spider-Man #679 – The entirety of the Dan Slott run on ASM has been pretty darn good, but when he is partnered with Humberto Ramos the quality goes to a new level and we get a comic that can win “issue of the week” much of the time.  Ramos just accentuates the FUN aspect of Slott’s Spidey writing better than any of the other artists in the regular Spidey rotation.  So, on top of the fact that this Spidey time-travel story was exciting and played up the importance of the Peter Parker side of Spidey, Ramos’ art made everything so bouncy and expressive that nothing else was really close this past week.

Most Anticipated: Severed #7 – It’s a crowded week, but I can’t wait to see how this one ends.  Severed has been creepy and touching and featured great art!  How is that little boy going to get away from the creepy old man with the big-ass teeth?  Will we see how he loses an arm?  Scott Snyder mentioned doing more comics in the Severed universe, so will some elements of the story be left open-ended?  Runner-up: Fearless Dawn: Secret of the Swamp One-Shot – Steve Mannion = Awesome!  Comics don’t come much more fun than Fearless Dawn, so anytime an issue pops up, it is a “must read”.  If you didn’t pre-order this, you’re probably out of luck on Wednesday, but you can probably find them on the Asylum Press website.

Other Picks: Northlanders #48, The Unwritten #34, Blue Estate #9, Thief of Thieves #1, Powers #8, Scarlet Spider #2, Wolverine and the X-Men #5, Cavewoman: Feeding Grounds #1

Alex’s Top Picks

Best From The Past Week: Fatale #2 – While not quite at the slam-bang awesome level of the first issue, this was a still a really great, moody slice of everything the Brubaker/Phillips combo do so well.  This is a really great series that everyone should be on board with, particularly those who read Brubaker’s Marvel work.

Most Anticipated: Powers #8 – Do my eyes deceive me?  It has been almost exactly ONE FULL YEAR since the last issue of Powers, which left us hanging in the middle of a story-arc.  Seriously, this issue was solicited, I believe, in August of 2010. Resentful as I may be, that doesn’t change the fact that Powers is Bendis and Oeming at their best.  Both are creators with very distinctive, idiosyncratic styles that don’t necessarily fit every book, but Powers really is their wheel-house, one that maximizes their strengths and, well, turns their weaknesses into strengths as well.  So grumpy though I may be about the delay, rest assured that I will still be buying this book.

Other Picks: Batwoman #6, Demon Knights #6, Frankenstein #6, Green Lantern #6, Captain America #8, Incredible Hulk #5, Journey into Mystery #634, Wolverine and the X-Men #5, PunisherMAX #22