My review: The Autobiography of Mr Spock (2021) ►
◄ Windows enshittification in the year 2025
Part #4 is being solicited as the end of the first arc and it's confirmed it'll be collected in two volumes, so that seems like a reasonable way to split reviews, even if this part may come up a bit short. I covered #1 in a previous post back here plus a bit of history of the team. Spoilers!
Part 2
This issue is reassuring. DiDio continues to capture the feel of the original voice actors with his writing, and the art continues to be if not stellar then perfectly adequate. Rick Gordon spends some time with Flash and K'Shin at Kro-Tan's ice base, with Rick starting to piece things together but the characters are interacting fairly normally. Lothar and LJ return to Africa to investigate Kurt Walker's massacre of pirates, and get a relatively friendly reception from Jedda (although she's upset at her father). Mandrake and Kit Walker face down alleyway muggers after a magic show, and there's an interesting plot twist with the deposed Phantom seemingly having become a more literal Ghost Who Walks (but one who bleeds and can throw punches and knives). It's a quick read but dense enough to move things forward, again much like the TV show.
The way things are presented, it looks as if Kro-Tan has had vagrants abducted to work in the ice base city. Flash is apparently on top of things, vocally not trusting Kro-Tan further than as an unlikely ally and dealing with matters off-planet on Mongo, where different races are at odds in the power vacuum left by Ming. So there's probably some mind control in the mix, or that's what we're led to believe.
Phantom seeming to develop more supernatural powers is interesting. The DotE show invented the "strength of ten tigers" mantra and power boost, which wasn't present in the original Phantom comics in which he was a highly skilled but ultimately baseline human character. He claims to be dead, to Mandrake's apparent surprise, but since he can interact physically it seems to be more akin to Kitty Pryde's phasing mutant ability. It's still a mystery why he's been absent from Africa for so long and why he's allowed his relationship with Jedda to deteriorate so much, apparently by failing to back her inheriting his role. I can't find anything suggesting the "Council of Phantoms" referred to is a pre-existing concept in the Phantom mythology, but if it's adjudicating who gets the job I'm guessing it'll play a bigger part in the six issues to come. Preview artwork posted by Jim Calafiore suggests it's composed of previous or alternate Phantoms.
The in-issue ads for NECA figures make this feel like part of a bigger revival, which is nice.
Part 3
Flashback to Mandrake saving Phantom during the war against Ming, in what's probably some kind of inadvisable magical pact type way. It's revealed that he's bound to Mandrake and their location (Xanadu, Mandrake's mansion). Which has grown a door to the council of Phantoms, who are apparently past holders of the title. They basically command him to join them, and reiterate opposition to female offspring taking the role.
Kro-Tan's sister Castra is hiding Flash's phone and keeping Rick out in the cold, but the latter is suddenly contacted by Dynak-X whose signal is overriden by Octon and arriving ice robots that capture him. Octon seems to exist across many computer systems and ice robots., including those of Ice Station Earth. It's not clear if Zuffy has survived the blast, but let's give DiDio the benefit of the doubt for now on not going grimdark.
Like the second part the audience is being given what it wants, answers and progression, and an issue #4 cover that suggests Flash on the run with Rick. I presume Flash has been playing a long game rather than being thick as shit.
As well as the NECA ads, there's apparently a Phantom game coming to PS5 and Nintendo.
Part 4
Octon interrogates Rick, Zuffy trying to defend him until Flash cannons through the skyscraper apartment window. There's a rather on-the-nose fourth wall breaking reference to Rick having a copy of the Mad Cave Defenders of the Earth trade paperback signed by Stan Lee. They zoom off on a jet bike, pursued by one of Ming's old cruisers. It turns out Flash was alerted by Dynak X. They patch Mandrake onto the call before being interrupted by a giant projection of Kro-Tan who invites them to Ice Station Earth, but continue to Xanadu and Mandrake and Phantom. Dynak confirms that Kro-Tan is building an army, turning vagrants into ice soldiers. Flash alerts the President, who's already been 'got' by Kro-Tan and orders them to turn themselves in. Lothar is also on remote call, and offers the Seven Nations as a refuge. Mandrake whips Flash's classic era rocket ship out of storage, then packs his house away into a pocket. This part ends on the cliffhanger that Kro-Tan is working with Garax (leader of the ice robots) and has Dale Arden alive but suspended in a fluid tank.
Of course, it could be a clone or decoy. And if it is, I wouldn't be surprised if by the end of the series she's either dead again or Dynak X has been restored into the clone. Although having both active would be an interesting proposition, as would having both Phantom and his daughter active simultaneously as Phantoms in some sort of Buffy "every potential Slayer becomes a Slayer" fashion.
The President may or may not have been "conditioned" to be compliant, like Kro-Tan claims Flash has been. He seems to acknowledge that he's at the former's mercy, with 95% of the US and 75% of the world running on Kro-Tan's Barin Atomics tech. With the dialogue still faithfully capturing the tone of the animated series, this could be being played straight.
The conceit that Phantom is bound to Xanadu and Mandrake is side-stepped by the latter being able to dimensional fold the mansion and make it portable. So he could have done this before now and it still isn't clear why Mandrake is so keen for his friend to not be honest about being dead / having died.
Tie-in Media
Apart from repeating it's been a decent first arc and faithful to the source material, there isn't a lot else to say at the mid-point. So I had a look at the site for the Phantom game, which as a retro sideways scrolling game hand drawn to look like comics panels seems a decent enough concept. Apparently it's $20 on Steam, but without indicating the spec of PC required. Maybe I'll check it out if there aren't DRM hoops to jump through. The style of graphics shouldn't need anything fancy in terms of hardware, and I assume it's mainly because the PS4 and PS5 are current machines that they get the release. There are some fairly inexpensive incentive pre-order packs including prints by artists including Sy Barry (who took over The Phantom after Wilson McCoy died in 1961 and did it until retiring in 1995). You can find some nice recent interviews with him on YouTube. Other artists in this list have been involved, by the looks of it.
You get the definite impression the game is a labour of love thing. I looked it up on the Steam site, and it does specify dedicated graphics cards so I guess I'll probably just be watching a play-through at some point:
It also reminded me that Julian Gollup, author of the Spectrum classics Chaos and Lords of Chaos, has a modern Chaos Reborn version of those out. Maybe I should stop banking on making it to retirement and investigate gaming a bit more before that.
There seems to be a significant market for retro games, such as TMNT Shredder's Revenge and games that aren't retro per se, but look basically the same as stuff I was playing on PS1 and PS2 which is still readily available and can now be emulated on decade-old hardware. On which note, Wolf Among Us 2 is apparently still coming despite delays.
That got off-topic, didn't it? If the Phantom game does alright, I wonder if King Features would go for another Defenders of the Earth game. Even in the 1990 computer game the team were being billed as "the heroes of the past are here to save the future". It'd need to be something a bit more involving than a left-right scrolling platform affair, and the franchise doesn't have the same international cachet as Phantom as a solo character.
More on-topic, here's someone's comparison of the Galoob 80s toys vs the recent NECA ones.
A review of parts #5-8 can now be found here.
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