Thunderbolts #145 – Review

By Jeff Parker (writer), Kev Walker (artist), Frank Martin (colorist)

The Story: Luke Cage and the all new Thunderbolts have been tasked with cleaning up the fallout from ‘Siege’, but they’ll have to survive their encounter with Baron Zemo before they get a chance to prove themselves.

The Good: Holy crap, it’s a rare thing when this happens but I actually enjoyed this issue more than the last one! Let’s get this out of the way right now: this is one hell of an amazing creative team. Parker, Walker, and Martin have, in a mere two issues, left an indelible impression on this book that I find to be unique and, more importantly, a whole lot of fun to read. Parker’s assembled a wonderful roster here that balances redemption and bastardry in a way that I think is going to create wonderful tension throughout the team. Of Parker and Martin, I can only say that I’ve found a complete art team that I genuinely look forward to seeing every month. Remember how last month I said I wasn’t totally sold on Walker’s version of Juggernaut? Yeah, well, there’s a particular shot of him flattening a forest that completely convinced me Walker knows what he’s doing with the character.

Oddly enough, one of the things I enjoyed most about this issue was the sense of disarray that nearly crippled the team throughout the issue. It makes sense when you think about it, that a team this raw would barely even trust each other, much less know how to work together efficiently. This is still a team very much willing to betray each other for the sake of self-preservation, and that’s exactly the kind of dynamic we need to be seeing on the Thunderbolts right now. And being introduced to The Warden was an especially poignant moment. I feel like he has turned a new page in his life and is no longer the hero we grew up loving and loathing in equal measure. My hope is that, in future issues, he will become a voice of reason and perhaps even the emotional anchor that will bring this team together.