Michelinie wraps up the story with an all action issue. He splits it, after bringing everyone together a couple times, between the Nazis and Indy and Marion. They all discover this lost tribe of evil Atlantis descendants. It would seem the only reason the tribe is evil is to give Michelinie an excuse to keep killing them whenever a scene needs to progress. They’re really tall too; apparently Marion’s just as good as hand-to-hand combat as Indy.
Gammill and de la Rosa continue to do a good job on the art, but since it’s an action comic–with digressions–set in the jungle, there’s not much for them to draw.
There’s really nothing to this issue; Michelinie doesn’t even take the time for character moments. He rips off the end of Raiders, which you’d think Marion or Indy would comment on (they don’t).
It’s harmless and utterly pointless.
CREDITS
Africa Screams, Chapter Two: Crystal Death; writer, David Michelinie; pencillers, Kerry Gammill and Sam de la Rosa; inker, de la Rosa; colorist, Paul Becton; letterer, Janice Chiang; editor, Louise Jones; publisher, Marvel Comics.
Michelinie definitely seems to have a formula–apparently based on Raiders–Indy starts the issue on one artifact hunt, it leads to a second hunt, which somehow has Nazis involved. It’s only the seventh issue of Further Adventures and it feels like there’s not going to be much interesting outside the little character moments.
Something goes very wrong when Terry Austin inks Howard Chaykin. Austin takes away all of Chaykin’s hard jaws, for example. I only caught one the entire issue. So while Chaykin does try some dynamic composition for the story, the art never clicks. Especially not on people. It’s a little better on the action.
Michelinie finishes his first two-parter quite well. The issue has a frantic pace with an interlude or two, usually for humor (sometimes for romance). Frenz keeps it moving in the art too; there aren’t any gradual segues for most of the action scenes. Michelinie and Frenz race through a bunch of action, pause for a bit, race again. Maybe there are three pauses, not two.
I really hope David Michelinie is the new regular writer on this one. Like, really, really hope. I’ve never been a big Michelinie supporter before, but coming after O’Neil, he clearly gets Indiana Jones. Even with the expository stuff, Michelinie makes it seem like natural dialogue from an academic.
There’s not a single woman in this issue; it helps O’Neil’s writing immensely.
Denny O’Neil takes over scripting from Byrne, who sticks around to pencil, and adds xenophobia and misogyny. Not to mention Indy talking for the first half of the issue in expository paragraphs.
There are a lot of unexpected things in this first issue of The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones. For example, writer and penciller John Byrne doesn’t work at making Indiana Jones likable. He’s a bit of a jerk, really, and definitely irresponsible.
Adapting Raiders of the Lost Ark into a comic book ought to be a no-brainer, especially with a strong creative team. And Walt Simonson’s script does have occasional highlights–he tries hard to make the stunts seem reasonable, using a lot of interior monologue for the cast–but not as many as it should. More than anything else, actually, the comic shows how movie and comic action differs and why adapting one to the other isn’t simple.