This comic is difficult to believe. Not the content of the issue, where Gerber just goes wild with a look at American presidential candidacy, but its very existence. Marvel Comics published a comic about the American public rabidly anticipating the assassination of political candidates. They let Gerber get away with it, they even paid Gene Colan to draw it. It’s amazing in its existence.
As a comic, it’s pretty good. Gerber’s plotting is strange. The issue really just is a series of assassination attempts on Howard’s life. There’s barely any character development. Gerber is just moving Howard and Bev from one setup to another. It’s efficiently done too, which is cool. It feels like a race.
The art, from Colan and inker Steve Leialoha, is awesome as usual. But this issue gives Colan and Leialoha a lot of thriller sequences they also have to make somewhat amusing. They confidently succeed.
CREDITS
Open Season!; writers, David Anthony Kraft, Don McGregor and Steve Gerber; penciller, Gene Colan; inker, Steve Leialoha; colorist, Janice Cohen; letterer, Irving Watanabe; editor, Archie Goodwin; publisher, Marvel Comics.
What an awful comic book. It gets dumber as it goes along, with Jennifer’s dad joining forces with the guy who killed his wife in order to kill She-Hulk. The villain isn’t a regular mobster, he has a huge Bond villain subterranean fortress. It’s not too big, however, since She-Hulk is able to find everyone right after she breaks in.
Well, Kraft certainly doesn’t turn things around this issue. He might make them worse–nothing this issue gets a full breath. The big ending, which should be an exciting fight between She-Hulk and her first superpowered villain, flops because of the setting. A beach house isn’t the place for a visually dynamic brawl.
If only writer David Anthony Kraft had a better artist, his first issue of She-Hulk would've been a lot stronger.