And In The Wake Of Shadowland....

Now Shadowland has come to a conclusion, yet again the status quo in the Marvel universe has been upset. What has been a rather under-rated and nicely compacted Marvel event (for a change) has had quite a, well, progressive conclusion.

Of course, the Beast was defeated, in an final battle that if anything was a trifle anti-climatic, but then I don’t see that as the point of the mini-series. What really excited me is the immediate jump into the new situation.  We have Ghost Rider back in action, after his revamp into a far more impressive character over the course of the last few years he is now front and centre in the rest of the universe rather than his own little corner.

Equally satisfying, Daredevil may have vanished immediately after the final battle, but then we follow him for a few pages. No endless months of ‘Is he? Isn’t he?’ speculation when we all know that he very well is, but we dive immediately into a foretaste of Matt Murdock’s seeking redemption. Hmm.  That sounds more clichéd than I intended, as I found this particular redemptive quest (all two pages of it) quite enticing.  And there is one more twist to the tale that I won’t reveal here, except to say I rather think this is but the first chapter.

One of the sequel titles also made it’s debut this month, Heroes For Hire. Which rather seems like a Birds Of Prey for the M.U. but hey, it’s a winning formula, and my recommendation for the week. You don’t need to have read Shadowland to follow this title, but you won’t want to miss it. Once again an old, traditional villain is being used to his maximum potential (one I always thought was wasted anyhow) and it’s about time.

For a so-called Heroic Age, I like this new darker side to the Marvel stable. For too long espionage and ‘professionalism’ has been the domain of the mutants, now with this title, and Secret Avengers, it seems like the M.U. is finally growing up.