Soule wraps up the Captain America story rather nicely. The story doesn’t really belong in a She-Hulk comic, just because it doesn’t have anything to do with Jen (not the explanation of the past nor the current lawsuit, which is just a red herring) but it’s a good Marvel universe story. Soule manages to correct the story arc’s trajectory; it helps he’s sincere.
Even though trial scenes–along with the explanatory flashback–take up the majority of the issue, Soule gets in a rather good postscript (or two) to the courtroom stuff. It almost reads like Soule thanking the reader for enjoying the story with he and Pulido. It’s a good finish, even though it gets a little cute as far as the composition flourishes.
Unfortunately, the cliffhanger suggests Soule’s returning to his–and the series’s–least successful plot line. Who knows, maybe he’ll pull it off after all.
B
CREDITS
The Good Old Days, Conclusion; writer, Charles Soule; artist, Javier Pulido; colorist, Muntsa Vicente; letterer, Gus Pillsbury; editor, Jeanine Schaefer; publisher, Marvel Comics.
Soule goes a little nuts with his application of Murphy’s law this issue. There’s a great scene where the President’s former chief of staff–recovering, somewhat, from his attack–lays out the President’s options and there aren’t many (or any). Things are going from bad to worse for the First Lady too, not to mention the soldiers in Afghanistan and then the astronauts.
The trial of Steve Rogers continues and… Soule fumbles it. There’s no other word for how he handles She-Hulk defending Captain America in a civil suit against Daredevil. He fumbles it.
It's an okay issue. It's not a great one, probably not even a good one. Soule coasts on a lot of good will and a lot of promise of what's to come–misunderstandings with the aliens, possible American-backed terrorism, the First Lady stepping out for a vote–and he doesn't actually do much here.
Soule has a big cliffhanger at the end and a bunch of little ones throughout. He lets his subplots thread out even further and some of these threads practically establish them as their own plot lines. For instance, who would have thought the previous President ever would have been such a big character?
Soule pulls one over on the reader. It’s a beautiful job of it too, because he sets the reader up and then distracts him or her from the inevitable.
Soule and Letter bounce back big time with an outstanding issue, both for the President and the astronauts on the Clarke. It’s a rocky start, given Alburquerque’s goofy body armor designs. The President has loosed all the futuristic weaponry to get the troops out of the Middle East and Afghanistan; Alburquerque makes the armor look like golden suits of armor. Knight armor. It’s almost like an “SNL” skit set at a Medieval Times.
Joëlle Jones fills in on art this issue–a flashback to the early oughts when the long distance space shuttle program is getting started up. Her style resembles the regular art, but there’s something different about it. She draws all of her characters the same age; they all look like they’re in their early twenties.
Alburquerque definitely does better on the art this issue. There’s not much action; there’s some running, when the landing party returns to the spaceship, and they don’t look good but there’s no other action.
It’s the first issue with a lot of action, both on Earth and in space. Alburquerque doesn’t do well with either. His figures in motion don’t work. He gets so rushed, people become squatter from one panel to the next. It’s unfortunate, especially because the awkwardness affects the pace of the comic.