I Reads You Review: INHUMAN #2

INHUMAN #2
MARVEL COMICS - @Marvel

WRITER: Charles Soule
ARTIST: Joe Madureira
COLORS: Marte Gracia
LETTERS: VC’s Clayton Cowles
COVER:  Joe Madureira and Marte Gracia
VARIANT COVER: Frank Cho with Jason Keith
28pp, Color, $3.99 U.S. (July 2014)

Rated T+

Party 2: The Queen in the Sky

The Inhumans are a race of superhumans that appear in Marvel Comics.  This race was created by Jack Kirby and Stan Lee and first appeared in Fantastic Four #45 (cover dated: December 1965).  They are a strain of humanity that began with genetic manipulation by visitors to Earth from an alien civilization (the Kree) long ago in human prehistory.

The last year has seen the Inhumans begin to have a more prominent place in the Marvel Universe.  There is a new Inhumans comic book series, entitled Inhuman, written by Charles Soule, drawn by Joe Madureira, colored by Marte Gracia, and lettered Clayton Cowles.  Recently, the re-launched The Amazing Spider-Man #1 (thankfully) reprinted the sold-out Inhuman #1 (Part 1: Genesis).

Inhuman #2 (“The Queen in the Sky”) opens in the remains of Attilan, the capital city of the Inhumans, now located in the Hudson River on the New York/New Jersey border.  Inside, the former human musician Dante is trying to understand what happened to him.  He was exposed to the Terrigan Cloud, a runaway dispersion of the Terrigan Mists.  Anyone with Inhuman DNA buried in their genetic code undergoes a stunning transformation when exposed to the Terrigan Mists.  Post exposure, Dante has a tendency to suddenly burst into flame, and now, he wants to be cured or else…

Meanwhile, Medusa, Queen of the Inhumans and wife of Black Bolt (the presumed dead King of the Inhumans), tries to hold Attilan together.  She must also reach out both to the new Inhumans created by the rogue Terrigan Cloud and to humanity at large.  Now, Captain America wants a word with her.

I am enjoying Inhuman as much as I enjoyed writer Paul Jenkins and artist Jae Lee’s 1999, twelve-issue miniseries, Inhumans.  To be honest, my initial interest in Inhuman had to do with the announcement that the series artist would be Joe Madureira, whom I have admired going back to his early work on Deadpool and Uncanny X-Men for Marvel in and around 1993-94.  With Inhuman, the combination of his compositions with Marte Gracia’s colors is producing Madureira’s most energetic art and most vigorous storytelling since his creator-owned series, Battle Chasers.

The driving force behind Inhuman, however, might be writer Charles Soule.  He juggles multiple conspiracies, subplots, groups of characters, motivations, and storylines like a maestro of must-watch, soap opera television.  Perhaps, it was fate that made Matt Fraction, the writer originally intended to helm Inhuman, depart the series because of “creative differences.”  Fate knew what Charles Soule could do with this title.

A

Reviewed by Leroy Douresseaux


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