4 Elements: Thunderbolts 144
June 3rd, 2010 by david brothers | Tags: 4 elements, jeff parker, kev walker, luke cage, thunderboltsThunderbolts 144 was written by Jeff Parker, drawn by Kev Walker, colored by Frank Martin, and lettered by Albert Deschesne. It was an excellent read, and a good introduction to the new team and status quo. I thought about doing a full blown review, but how boring would that be? Instead, I’m trying something different. Maybe we can make this a regular thing. Here are four things the team behind Thunderbolts 144 got right.
Luke Cage knows people. Luke spent most of his almost forty years in the game toiling in obscurity. He had a long-running series that ended in the ’80s, a couple of less-than-good revivals in the ’90s, and spent the first five years of the 2000s playing street level crime games. A nice side effect of his middling career is that Cage built up a strong network of friends. The Fantastic Four, Spider-Man, Daredevil, and several other heroes have interacted with and befriended Cage over the years. He has a reputation and he’s got a deep Rolodex. While Spider-Man and Ben Grimm built their varied friendships off the back of Marvel Team-Up and Marvel Two-in-One, Luke’s time as a nobody ended up being an asset.
Cage went from penny-ante hood to grown man gone straight to framed for dealing heroin. He was technically a fugitive when he began his Hero for Hire business. He took on the trappings of superheroes to make a little cash. The only thing that kept him from being Black Booster Gold is that he was after money, rather than fame.
Despite his inauspicious beginnings, Cage ended up being a great hero. He hooked up with several street level heroes and started fighting crime to do good. He cleaned up his building and his neighborhood. Later in life, he joined the Avengers and soon found himself leading the team. He spearheaded a charge for the Avengers to do more than fighting world-class villains. When Captain America came back and found himself in charge of the superheroes in the United States, he had one choice for the guy to help rehabilitate the villains on the Raft: Luke Cage.
Think it through: the man who is the equivalent of Superman in the Marvel Universe, with all the prestige and respect that role entails, goes to Luke Cage to get the job done. Steve Rogers respects the hustle.
Steve Rogers gives speeches. Tony Stark is arrogant. Thor is stuffy and pompous. Spider-Man is obnoxious. Wolverine is gruff and borderline rude. Hank Pym is eager for approval. Songbird is judgmental. Luke, though? Luke’s a man of the people. He’s casual. To the point, sure, but Luke’s genuine. There’s no artifice, no trickery, and no drama. He’s not your average superhero. If there’s something to say, he just says it. No beating around the bush. Real talk, no gimmicks.
Luke is fearless. Scared money don’t make money.
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Kev Walker’s such a find for Marvel. The colouring, while perfectly nice, reduces the impact of his line-work quite a bit, unfortunately. Might need more of a Dave Stewart approach.
@James W: Yeah, I wish I’d said at least something about his art. I dug it, and I like the new Songbird design. The body language when Moonstone accepts being on the team was pretty good, too.
Nifty new format, this 4 Elements thing. Interested to see it more.
Also, Mach IV went Gundam?
As a Luke Cage fan and a guy who was midly disapoointed by Diggle’s T Bolts, I am back on this book.
anybody else laugh at the titania scene?
@PMMDJ: I think I’m going to do one a week, assuming I can find things worth talking about. And really, if you could go Gundam… wouldn’t you? I just wish he’d gone Tequila Gundam.
@Froggee: Yup. “I’m gonna lick his neck” was great.
I actually picked this up yesterday, the first single issue I’ve bought in months. And I really, really liked it. And what else has Kev Walker done, artwise? I liked the look of it.
@Strider
He did Marvel Zombies 3 & 4, and used to do art for Magic the Gathering
“Songbird is judgmental.”
Of who? Moonstone? She has every right to judge Moonstone, certainly more right than Luke. That scene where Luke compares Songbird’s profile with Moonstone’s made no sense. When Songbird was a villain she was manipulated into robbing banks. Moonstone is a sociopath who murdered her own mother and regularly killed her patients for entertainment. Big difference there.
“Songbird is judgmental.”
I strongly disagree about this. She knows Moonstone as good she know herself.
Also, I didn’t find Cage essential to this team. Both Songbird and Hawkeye are examples of redemption and know more about this than him.
The last paragraph does nothing but prove how Cap, Iron Man, Spider-Man, Wolverine, Thor, Hank Pym, and Songbird ar real characters with real personality traits. Luke Cage has always been a boring character who seems more like a useless civilian than anything.
@Jim: Opinions being what they are and all that, you are apparently TOTALLY MISSING THE POINT OF LUKE CAGE.
And no, I’m not going to explain it.
Okay, but since when is Steve a Romulan?
“Steve Rogers gives speeches. Tony Stark is arrogant. Thor is stuffy and pompous. Spider-Man is obnoxious. Wolverine is gruff and borderline rude. Hank Pym is eager for approval. Songbird is judgmental. Luke, though? Luke’s a man of the people. He’s casual. To the point, sure, but Luke’s genuine. There’s no artifice, no trickery, and no drama. He’s not your average superhero. If there’s something to say, he just says it. No beating around the bush. Real talk, no gimmicks.”
I take it you read “Enter the Heroic Age”, Parker/Walker did a great story where Steve flat out tells this to Luke
@Jake: also there are ads in the comic pimping a James Bond comic he apparently did
@david brothers: as a man whose mexican uncle drank himself to death, I approve this statement
Just give Songbird her long hair back and this issue would have been perfect; I haven’t liked Luke Cage much in New Avengers, but here (and New Avengers Finale) have convinced me of how good a character he can be, this series seems like it could be great
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