Writer: Bryan Hill; Artist: German Peralta; Letterer: VC's Cory Petit; Colorist: Arthur Hesli; Editor: Will Moss; Editor in Chief: C.B. Cebulski; Cover Artist: Ken Lashley
At the haunted hospital in Chicago, Dan Ketch has a conversation with Tulip about Blade, pointing out that he could have stayed to try and kill her, but he didn't. Dan transforms into Ghost Rider, telling Tulip that they have a more pressing mission, and that Blade will have to wait until it is completed. Meanwhile, John Blaze and Victoria Montesi talk with the nurse they rescued, Julie, and explain that another reality is trying to invade through the hospital. Victoria convinces Julie to help by giving them her fears to use in a spell.
Deciding to trust them, Julie leads them to them incinerator room. Victoria instructs Julie to recall her greatest fear in vivid detail, which the invading entity will latch on to and manifest as her nightmare, allowing the Midnight Sons the opportunity to kill it. Julie recounts a story from a Halloween several years before when a college kid was killed in a fire and she imagined his corpse sitting up in the morgue. Montesi casts her spell and a grotesque creature comes to life inside the morgue. The Midnight Sons allow Julie to act as bait, and when the creature stalks toward her Blaze downs it with his hellfire shotgun. Victoria casts a banishment spell that turns the creature into maggots, which she then instructs Ghost Rider to cleanse with his hellfire chain. Recognizing that the hospital is now free from the evil spirits that had been haunting, the three Midnight Sons notice that Tulip has already left them, deciding to hunt down Blade alone.
Later, weeks after the defeat of Varnae, the vampire lord who had possessed Blade, Tulip tracks Blade down to a monastery in Thailand. Convinced that Blade is himself again, Tulip tells him that Ghost Rider, Blaze, and Montesi gave up on tracking him down and have gone their separate ways once again. When Tulip asks Blade if he really would have killed her, he can only reply that he wished he knew.
 |
| A perfectly legitimate question, Julie. |
THE ROADMAP
This series is a tie-in to the "Blood Hunt" crossover event, which saw Blade lead a vampire army to cover the planet in Darkforce energy and try to take over the world.
The Midnight Sons were a loose affiliation of supernatural heroes, whose membership indeed included Danny Ketch, Johnny Blaze, Victoria Montesi, and Blade among others. They first came together as an informal group in Ghost Rider (1990) # 31 to defeat Lilith. A more recent incarnation of the Midnight Sons were gathered in Doctor Strange: Damnation # 2 to fight Mephisto, and both Blaze and Blade were on that team as well.
Where this story takes place in terms of continuity is frankly impossible to determine. Johnny Blaze lost the power of Zarathos in Ghost Rider: Final Vengeance (2024) # 1 and he regained his hellfire shotgun in Ghost Rider: Final Vengeance (2024) # 5. He is reunited with Zarathos in Ghost Rider: Final Vengeance (2024) # 6 and the footnotes in this issue explicitly states that this story takes place between issues of Final Vengeance. However, there are no breaks in the Final Vengeance story where Johnny could take part in this story, so it's actually a major continuity error.
Sadly, the Midnight Sons reunion ends here and the characters split off to go their separate ways. Johnny Blaze returns to the aforementioned Ghost Rider: Final Vengeance (2024) mini-series, Danny Ketch appears next in Spirits of Vengeance (2024) # 3, and Blade appears in the Blade: Red Band (2024) mini-series.
CHAIN REACTION
This story had little to do with the wider story of "Blood Hunt" despite being billed as a major tie-in, but I don't care because it's amazing on just about every level.
My only complaint about this mini-series, outside of the bait-and-switch with the "Blood Hunt" related premise, is that it doesn't go on longer. The ending feels truncated, like there was a lot more story to tell and it only ended because they ran out of pages. That's the sign of a great comic series, that it exits the stage with me as a reader wanting more. The ending is not unsatisfying, the heroes accomplish their immediate objective, but SO MUCH is left hanging that I want this creative team to do a follow-up story immediately to tie up all the threads.
Because let's face it, the Midnight Sons reformed to kill Blade and after their shockingly brief encounter with him in the previous issue they don't even come close to fulfilling that objective. Both Blaze and Montesi make comments throughout that their side quest is actually crucial to their main vampire-killing mission, what with all the mystical dreams and portents that the characters experience, but it still feels like we get robbed of what should have been a much bigger part of "Blood Hunt". Now don't get me wrong, I am VERY glad that this issue doesn't end on a cliffhanger that reads "to see what happens you must read Blood Hunt # 5", because that would have put the conclusion to this story in the hands of a completely different creative team, and that would have been a damn shame given how great a job Hill and Peralta have done on this series. I just really want to see the Midnight Sons confront Blade, and the coda scene with Tulip post-crossover didn't give me the closure that I wanted.
Taking this issue and the mini-series for what it actually is, a reunion that allows the Midnight Sons to deal with a mystical threat, means that you have to ignore the wider crossover baggage and evaluate what's actually on the page. Bryan Hill really REALLY nails these characters, giving them each their own distinct personality and voice while also making each of them integral to the success of their missing (well, except for Tulip, who bails halfway through). It would be so easy to just make Ghost Rider the focal character who does the heavy lifting but Hill makes sure Blaze and Montesi both get their moments to shine. The story is also very creepy and unsettling, with the seemingly empty hospital setting and ghostly shenanigans happening around poor Nurse Julie. The book excels at atmosphere, playing out like a suspenseful horror film.
All of that is aided superbly by German Peralta's artwork. As I said in previous reviews, his relatively clean linework shouldn't fit the tone of the story, but in practice it's a perfect match for the story Hill is telling. The characters emote appropriately, the action scenes are dynamic, and his Ghost Rider looks like he stepped right out of the 1990s. The colors by Arthur Hesli have to be noted as well, because this comic is colored beautifully. The splash page at the beginning with Danny slowly transforming into Ghost Rider while talking to Tulip is amazingly illustrated, it gives me goosebumps.
I want this creative team on another Midnight Sons series, preferably an ongoing that allows them to pay off some of the things set up here. I've not been much of a fan of the Ghost Rider material released in the last few years, but this was easily the best thing to feature the character in ages. Absolutely recommended.
 |
| Clean up on aisle 9! |
No comments:
Post a Comment