New Warriors #2Issue(s): New Warriors #2 Review/plot: We do start with a fun training sequence (Nova deserves a thwack for that Confucius comment). But then Tai gives Night Thrasher a news report about some murdered police officers. And it turns out that the murderer is a former ally of Night Thrasher's, part of the first group that he worked with before recruiting the New Warriors. The other member of the group was the murderer's sister. Their names are Midnight's Fire and Silhouette. They went undercover to fight drug dealers, but came into conflict when Night Thrasher stopped Midnight's Fire attacking a cop that was about to shoot Silhouette. Midnight's Fire says he wasn't even going to kill the cop, just stop him. But obviously this altercation ends their partnership. Night Thrasher believes Silhouette to be dead, and Midnight's Fire is now running with a Vietnamese gang. It's surmised that Midnight's Fire is now killing police as a way to draw out Night Thrasher. Because Asian honor, that vaguely defined motivator for a thousand bad storylines featuring Asians (and also, as Namorita notes, Sub-Mariner stories). Night Thrasher is initially afraid to go after Midnight's Fire, so the rest of the New Warriors go with out him. Hopefully that's the last we'll see of the "Kid Nova" monicker. But then Night Thrasher shows up and the others back off. Midnight's Fire smashes Night Thrasher's skateboard. But Thrasher gets the upper hand and the Warriors worry that he's going to kill Midnight. Then Silhouette shows up. It turns out she survived the gunshot, although she's been crippled. Midnight's Fire's goons, armed with AIM weapons, then threaten to shoot at the neighborhood crowd if Night Thrasher doesn't release Midnight's Fire. These are the people that Midnight's Fire was supposedly protecting, and Night Thrasher points out the irony. So Midnight's Fire tells his goons to fire at the New Warriors instead, giving the team a little something to do. Speedball's rambling motormouth is funny. The tables turn during the fight and Midnight's Fire is about to defeat Night Thrasher, but then the neighborhood people turn on him, giving Night Thrasher an opportunity to get the upper hand again. It again looks like Night Thrasher might kill Midnight's Fire... ...but in the end he just slashes his face. Then the police show up to arrest Midnight's Fire. Silhouette disowns him as a brother. This almost feels like a misfire. If i didn't know these characters (Silhouette in particular) become important to the book in the long run, i'd say this was a really weird way to spend a second issue. Since he's a new character, Night Thrasher's inclusion on the team helps make it not just seem like a bunch of teen characters that have been floating in limbo and someone decided to throw them all together. And delving into his background is a logical thing to want to do (although this isn't an origin story). But you'd think you'd want to spend a few issues establishing the team as a team instead of having all the established characters stand on the sidelines while the resolution to a retroactive feud between the new characters is played out. A subplot building up for next issue shows the executives at Genetech watching footage of the New Warrior's fight with Terrax and deciding that the New Warriors are "usable". One of them was college roomates with the Mad Thinker(!), so they decide to reach out to him. Quality Rating: C+ Chronological Placement Considerations: N/A References:
Crossover: N/A Continuity Insert? N My Reprint: N/A Inbound References (3): showCharacters Appearing: Andrew Chord, Firestar, Harmon Furmintz, Justice, Midnight's Fire, Namorita, Night Thrasher, Nova (Rich Rider), Silhouette, Speedball, Tai (Dragon's Breadth), Walter Rosen CommentsWe've discussed earlier how weird it was for Egyptians to be colored grey. Silhouette and her brother are an even more bizarre example of comic book racial coloring. For Silhouette's first year and a half of appearances in New Warriors, I couldn't figure out if she was black, Asian or what. It wasn't until issue 20 that i finally got that she and her brother were half-black/half Asian. You'd never know it from the art. Sometimes Silhouette looks like a strange being that resembles no living human. Early '90s art/printing just wasn't suited for depicting half-black/half Asians. Posted by: Michael | June 17, 2015 8:49 PM Two things I hate: Night Thrasher and more stories about giri. My husband said he thought Fabian Nicieza might be my favorite writer. If only he was aware of this issue when he said that. Posted by: AF | March 11, 2016 11:05 AM Doesn't seem so illogical to focus on Night Thrasher's feud in second issue because I believe he said that this was the reason he recruited the team in the first place. Posted by: Mizark | July 21, 2016 1:52 PM Not quite- he says that after this Chord suggested that he get a team together to help him fight crime. Of course, we later find out that Chord's suggestion had nothing to do with what went down in the flashbacks... Posted by: Michael | July 21, 2016 11:51 PM Comments are now closed. |
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