Cover #5 Creates New Levels Of Extraordinary Story Art
Cover #5 Creates New Levels Of Extraordinary Story Art, with stories within stories full of sharp humor, wit, and magnificent art.
Make no mistake, this tale reaches epic heights in its penultimate chapter.
Rarely do entertainment, philosophy and art appear as elegantly and impactfully together as they do in Cover #5 from David Mack and Brian Michael Bendis (and Ivan Reis on the variant cover).
This article will have SPOILERS*** for Cover #1-Cover #5.
Last we saw Max, he was tied to a chair and being beaten to a bloody pulp by fellow comic book creator and rival spy Essad Sinns.
Like all of the issues of Cover, the story begins on a surprising note.
A Thanksgiving dinner shows Max’s tightknit family: friends, their spouses and children, and talk of comic book legends and the stories surrounded their geeking out when confronting their heroes.
The sequence only gets funnier as Max listens to the conversation from the toilet where he does some research reading comic books.
It is a hilarious and endearing sequence of the desire to be ‘cool’ in the eyes of the ‘cool guys.’
When all of them get an all expenses paid trip to Brazil for a highly lucrative gig at a convention, Max becomes suspicious and nervous.
As the plot turns, Max’s hit story Ninja Sword Odyssey emerges.
In a gorgeous sequence, he learns that ancient calligraphers changed their name and mark after a new art style was adopted.
An old skin, an old life is left behind, and a new one is embraced.
The boy draws birds, trees, cats, and his father, clear as day, though the visage is different every time, because of his wavering memories.
The land is in turmoil and the young traveling apprentice changes his name over and over again.
A giant set of scrolls depicting a fearsome tiger is unfurled at the new ruler’s and he, being the man to kill the apprentice’s father and banish the swordmaker is faced with the unexpected.
The apprentice leaps from the fourth scroll with his tanto sword brandished and ready to change everything or die.
The swordmaker’s apprentice is reborn for the last time.
It is truly a remarkable story and the watercolor artwork is stunning, full of feeling and depth.
In Brazil, Max meets Julia who informs him that all of his friends did indeed get paid and the convention is real.
It is just funded by the CIA for the sake of espionage and foreign relations.
For the first time in months, Essad Sins is appearing in public too.
And Julia thinks, with Max having called out the man for being a fan of Jack ‘King’ Kirby who would have punched Sins out for being in league with fascists that Max’s mind rattling quip can help turn him to their side.
But it is Max who must flip him . . .
POWKABAM Score For Cover #5 = 10/10
- Writing: 10
- Art: 10
- Dialogue: 10
- Innovation: 10
- Intrigue: 10