New Mutants #6
It’s Boom Boom to the rescue… maybe in New Mutants #6, by writer Dc Brisson, artist Flaviano, colorist Carlos Lopez, and letterer Travis Lanham. This issue adds some interesting wrinkles into the lives of the Earthbound New Mutants team.
Boom Boom arrives and blows up some of the kidnappers, but is hit by one of their power dampening bombs. In Beak’s parents’ house, Glob confronts Maxime and Manon about their method of taking out the guards, telling them having them shoot each other was the wrong way to do it, as it will bring more guards down on them to investigate… which happens, and Glob takes them out quietly. As they escape the cellar, Beak is shot. Outside, some of the kidnappers prepare to take out Boom Boom and Armor. The ringleader goes into the house to check on things, only to find the rest of the mutants escaped and a Maxime and Manon controlled guard opens fire on him. Boom Boom shows them that her years of experience with black ops mutant teams means she doesn’t need her powers to take them down. Glob and company come outside, carrying the injured Beak. They decide to steal one of the gang’s vehicles to get him to a hospital, but as they do so, they hear a gunshot. The kidnapper’s leader comes out, having just shot Beak’s mother, holding Beak’s father hostage. During the standoff, he tells them that he works for Costa Perdita’s biggest drug cartel and that they won’t stop coming, especially once they find their men dead. He kills Beak’s father, then himself. Later, on Krakoa, Armor and Glob visit Beak and Angel and their children to give them their condolences about his parents… but Beak doesn’t remember anything about them being killed, instead remembering that they had died years earlier. They confront Maxime and Manon, who admit to doing it. They say they were only trying to help and can put their memories back to normal, but Armor says they shouldn’t, but that these things have a way of coming back to haunt people.
There’s a lot of exciting things going on in the background of this issue. For one, Armor and Glob having teachable moments with Maxime and Manon is very interesting and cool. They’re no longer the young kids getting taught- they’re doing the teaching. The whole thing with the cartel swearing revenge is also entertaining as well. As revealed in previous issues, Costa Perdita isn’t going to allow the Krakoan drugs into their country in any way that would help the common folk, but the cartel’s method is no better. It looks like Brisson is setting them up as an antagonist for the future, and it makes sense, especially since drug cartels are known for taking revenge against those who wrong them. They could be especially dangerous because they have weapons that can dampen mutant powers.
However, the biggest surprise of the issue is a single page showing the front page of a website called DOX. It looks like they are a website devoted to “doxing” mutants. They report on what happened on the Bohusk farm, but present a skewered and incomplete version of events- basically just blaming mutants for the dead humans found there. Is there more to this little thing than meets the eye? Is Brisson setting up a new threat, perhaps a shadowy group behind DOX? The only way to find out is to keep reading the book.
The art by Flaviano is okay. It has a very 90s feel to it and in that respect seems kind of cliche. The quality of linework dips in places. There’s nothing out and out bad about it, but there’s nothing special about it either.
New Mutants #6 throws a lot of interesting little tidbits for attentive readers. Brisson knows what he’s doing, and there’s a lot of shy little hints in this book. Take Boom Boom, for example. She brings up her lifetime of working on black ops teams in this book and that right there that one little line explains why she is the way she is in recent issues she can’t tolerate boredom because it reminds her of all the bad things she’s done. It’s subtle, but it explains so much more than what’s happening in the context it’s used. The art by Flaviano is serviceable, but nothing special. While the Shi’Ar team’s exploits are more entertaining, the adventures of the Earthbound team are pretty good.
Grade: B
