Captain Marvel #17
I wasn’t going to review this issue, but after reading it, I felt it was my duty to comic readers everywhere to talk about it. I’m really not sure what’s going on with Marvel writers right now, but after reading a few pages, I couldn’t believe the plot. I felt as if I were reading a spoof of a Marvel comic.
Look at the cover. It looks epic. Wolverine standing beside Captain Marvel ready to take on a major foe that requires both of their talents. Well, that’s not what we get at all, dear reader. Not even close. In fact, neither character even puts on their costume throughout the entire issue. Talk about some false advertising.
So, here’s the plot. It’s “Game Night,” and Jessica Drew, Logan, Monica Rambeaux, Carol Danvers, Hazmat, and Ms. Marvel (who’s in costume) get together for a little R&R. When Ms. Marvel arrives, they are all immersed in a game of poker – with Logan leading, of course. Ms. Marvel brings a whole stack of board games (which is probably something I would have done) and announces that she can’t play poker since it’s gambling and against the Muslim religion.
Logan declares that he will not be playing a board game, so they decide to compromise and go to an escape room. Yes, you heard it correctly folks, this issue is about a group of Avengers and X-men going to an escape room. Apparently, the writer, Kelly Thompson has never been to an escape room, because it doesn’t resemble a real experience in the least.
When they arrive, the owner (a creepy guy named, the Nexus) cancels all the other appointments and gives them a private show. Once they are locked in the room, it immediately begins filling with water. They aren’t given a scenario, a hint, or told where the cameras are, safety tips, etc. These are all things that are done in a normal escape room experience. Kelly could have taken one panel to at least give us the semblance of a real escape room, but alas, that’s apparently too much work.
Carol tries to be the leader and each one in turn attempts to use their powers to break out. In the end, they figure out that they have to use their powers together to escape. The real reason they couldn’t escape is because the Nexus has mental/hypnotic abilities. Their powers not working was all in their minds. Only when they used them all at once was he unable to fool them since he couldn’t hypnotize that many minds simultaneously (even though they all saw Wolverine’s claw bend. Oops).
Okay, so let me get this straight. They randomly chose this place. It was a place Ms. Marvel had only heard about. So, they just happen to choose the one escape room out of dozens that has a supervillain for an owner? That’s a huge stretch. And his motive for trying to kill them? He wanted to be famous. Yep, that’s the reason.
It was obvious that this was a filler issue with Empyre coming next month, but come on, how far at the bottom of the barrel did they have to go to get this one? I really hope this title gets better. The best issues so far have been the ones with Star. All of the others have been garbage. Sorry, Kelly, but I think it’s time Captain Marvel to get a new writer.
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