Psylocke #6 // Review
There’s a young woman with golden hair in Minneapolis. She’s wearing a sexy outfit and carrying a sword the size of a small door. And she’s going hunting. The man she’s hunting is very dangerous. He kills people and livestreams the murders. What’s more: he kills mutants with superhuman powers. So the girl with the ridiculously large sword is in for a fight. She’s not alone, though. She’s fighting alongside the title character in Psylocke #6. Writer Alyssa Wong continues a fun runs with a powerful telepath in a story that is brought to page and panel by the art team of Vincenzo Carratu and Moises Hidalgo.
Psylocke isn’t going to have any problem with the hunter. The guy calls himself Orifice for chrissakes. Not exactly a very sharp guy. Psylocke even chastises her teammate for playing with their target. Nevertheless, there’s real danger in Minneapolis. The danger in question is not coming from Orifice, though. Psylocke is still being affected by phantoms in her own mind that just might prove to be very, very dangerous. Things are threatening to spin out of control. If Psylocke can keep it together, she might have a shot at real stability...but aren’t some phantoms better left in the past?
Wong’s crisp scripting keeps the action moving quite well through much of the issue. Having pushed through the dangers of prior issues, Psylocke is dealing with problems buried deeper in her past that are threatening to make things much worse for her on quite a few levels. Wong does a good job of balancing the physical action with a deeper look at more serious matters pertaining to the inner life of a psychic mutant who has a history that goes back a few decades now. It’s a delicate and intricate look at a very appealing hero.
Carratu and Hidalgo have some pretty deft work to try to achieve in the process of making everything click into place for a story that is as deep in the physical action as it is in emotional drama. There’s a sharp balance in page and panel as the action moves through some pretty well-tread terrain. Things jump around a lot. Minneapolis to Alaska to New Orleans. All of it ind of looks the same, though. That’s not exactly a bad thing, but ithe setting for each scene doesn’t feel nearly as distinct as it could. That being said, there’s plenty of resonance and radiance in the mood as it all moves froward from one moment to the next.
Psylocke’s story IS interesting as it fits in with all of the rest of the continuity with all of Marvel’s mutant books. The current state of things with the X-books isn’t quite as coherent as it had been in the past, though. There are issues with the larger picture that dampen Wong’s story a bit, but there’s plenty of action, drama and power coursing through her end of the narrative...and it all holds together quite well.
