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| Cover Artist: Josh Hood |
Original Price: $1.99
Title: "A Kind Face"
Writer: Ivan Velez Jr.
Artist: Josh Hood
Inker: Derek Fisher
Letterers: Richard Starkings & Emerson Miranda
Colorist: Brian Buccellato
Editor: Tom Brevoort
Editor In Chief: Bob Harras
SYNOPSIS
A gang of Chinese slave traffickers make their way through Chinatown with a van full of young women. When their leader, Lau Tak Wah, stops for cigarettes he is confronted by the Ghost Rider, who has come to exact vengeance on the criminal. When the slavers open fire on Ghost Rider, one of their captives named Lian sees her opportunity to escape. She runs out of the van and into the subway, but she is seen by Lau. Ghost Rider chains up the gang, but before he can give them his Penance Stare the police arrive and open fire. Ghost Rider leaves, telling them to do no more evil, and the slavers are taken to jail. On a nearby rooftop, Ghost Rider transforms back into Danny Ketch.
Lian rides on the subway, remembering how she and her young brother bought passage on a ship from China to America. Her brother died from sickness during the voyage, and Lian was pressed into slavery. She is seen on the street by one of Lau's men, but she manages to hide from him in an alley. Later that night, a very ill Lian attempts to get food from Luz's bodega, but she is chased out of the store just as Danny enters. While Danny wonders where his brother has disappeared to, John Blaze and Jennifer Kale are on the road in search of Blaze's missing children. When Danny leaves the store he gives Lian an apple and walks away, just as two of Lau's men arrive in a van to take Lian captive. Danny transforms into Ghost Rider, and after the two men shoot at him he disables them with his Penance Stare. He turns to find Lian on the ground, having been hit by one of the bullets. Ghost Rider scoops her up to get her to a hospital, but is too late. She dies in his arms, realizing that the Rider's skull hides "a kind face". Later, in the morgue, Blackheart visits Lian's body and offers her a chance to live again, resurrecting her as Pao Fu, the Goddess of Vengeance.
ANNOTATIONS
Pao Fu returns as one of Blackheart's Spirits of Vengeance in Ghost Rider (1990) # 90, where she exacts her revenge on Lau Tak Wah.
Jennifer Kale agreed to help John Blaze find his missing kids in Ghost Rider (1990) # 86.
REVIEW
Ivan Velez turns in another stand-alone story that features some of the worst artwork I've ever seen on this series.
It's bad when an artist makes me long for Pop Mhan to return, but that's exactly how Josh Hood's work makes me feel. I fail to understand why Marvel insisted on using artists with this style on this character so often, and it makes Javier Saltares' return in the Minus 1 issue stand out even more as an oasis of quality in a sea of eyesores. Proportions are off, everything is over-rendered with lines everywhere, and the characters all look like children. The worst offense is the way Ghost Rider himself is drawn, he's the size of the Hulk and wearing so much padding that he looks like a fiery Michelin Man. I can't get over this, at least Pop Mhan had some qualities I enjoyed, but Hood just does not work on this series.
The story for this issue doesn't quite work either, and maybe that's because Velez doesn't really excel at the done-in-one style of writing. Before the last few issues, each issue of this series led into one another even when arcs were beginning and ending. It made things feel like one big epic storyline in the life of the characters, and a lot of the progression he was making has ground to a screeching halt. There is, of course, still the sense that this is all building to something, with Blackheart going around recruiting each of the new villains being introduced, but it's not enough to make this story in itself into anything interesting.
Lian's story is sad and hits all the right sympathetic notes, I like her recognition of Ghost Rider having "a kind face" as she dies, but the story surrounding her just feels so inconsequential. At least last issue's Wallow story felt like it belonged in this series, this one just feels out of place. Ghost Rider has never been a series with much of a social conscience, and throwing in an immigrant sex slave plot doesn't seem like a logical progression. Maybe I'm being too harsh on it, though, because now that I think about it all of Velez's new villains in this era have a dark, sociological aspect to them. Wallow as all about suicide, Pao Fu in this issue has the slavery angle, and Doghead next issue deals with the treatment of immigrants.
Still, combined with the inappropriate artwork, this comic just fails for me on every level. I welcome Javier Saltares coming back next issue, because no matter what the story is like at least the artwork will be fantastic.
Grade: D+
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