Welcome, dear readers, to another week of comics and commentary at Comics! The Blog! We kick things off, as always, by handing out awards for the Best of the Week – beginning with two Award postings, followed closely by the past week’s Best.
One of the classic elements of the Marvel Universe is that almost everything of note takes place in New York City. It gives a reason for every character, hero or villain, to run into each other. Normally, this would make it natural for Jennifer Walters and Matt Murdock, the two resident superhero lawyers of the Marvel Universe, to commiserate about cases and advise each other. But Matt recently relocated to San Francisco after revealing his identity as Daredevil, and that makes it difficult – in some ways – to have the two chat about their unique professional problems.
I mean, let’s be honest: you could just do what Charles Soule and Javier Pulido do in She-Hulk #4, which is just have Jen hop a plane to the west coast, chat with Matt and head back. This isn’t an episode of 24, after all. There’s literally nothing keeping them from doing that in a medium where a change of venue doesn’t mean an increase in cost and a genre where technology means you can be on Mars on the next page, let alone in San Francisco. But what does keep that from being an everyday thing, in all likelihood, for She-Hulk, is the scope of the storytelling. She-Hulk is a book that, at least so far, is playing it pretty close to the slice-of-life. It is, in a way, a workplace comedy with robot punches involved (more on that later), and the series might be better off keeping Jen in New York for the most part, with excursions like Issue #4‘s a relative rarity. What makes it work in this issue is that Soule, Pulido, Muntsa Vicente and Clayton Cowles (as well as their editors) build it into the fabric of the comic and overall Marvel Universe in some really smart ways.
First, it gives visual variety. It’s a reason for Pulido and Vicente to have fun, contrasting the vivid reds of the Golden Gate Bridge with the blues and teals of the sky and showing off Matt’s acrobatics vs Jen’s unflappability regarding the heights. It makes what could be a regular conversation visually interesting, to boot.
Second, it serves as a hand-off of sorts. Matt was the last superhero lawyer with a series set in New York; Jen is the latest one. The first half of the issue, as a result, is a passing of the baton and signifier that Jen is getting the spotlight.
Finally, it both serves as a balance to the second half of the issue and gives a good excuse for it, too. After Matt more or less advises his colleague to take a big, dangerous shot if it’s worth it, she’s catching a flight back home; it’s a nifty little narrative trick to have her just say, “I might make a little detour first,” and end up in Latveria fighting robots. The scale of the issue is boosted in a way that operates as a natural function of the story the creators are telling, further sidestepping the initial risk I mentioned.
And man, that last half of the issue. After a quiet, sensible but still visually fun first half, the second takes She-Hulk to Latveria, where she punches one killer robot, shoots a bunch of others with an anti-aircraft gun, then goes face-t0-face with a GIANT robot being controlled by Doctor Doom while brokering a compromise between him and his son, set against Vicente‘s gloriously garish fuchsia skies. It’s practically the poster child for baller moves. She-Hulk gets to destroy stuff like a Hulk should, but Jennifer Walters gets to resolve the issue nonviolently. It makes her look badass, which gives the change of pace in the final set-up scene an extra bit of oomph.
In short? She-Hulk #4 is smart and exciting as all hell.