Silk #4 // Review
Cindy Moon had a run-in with a 400-year-old Korean witch. She got the life sucked out of her. Now she’s a whole hell of a lot older than she is. Things had been complicated for her in the past. Now she’s got magically-generated old age in Silk #4. Writer Emily Kim wraps up the penultimate chapter of her five-part series with the aid of accomplished spider-artist Takeshi Miyazawa. Color comes to the page courtesy of Ian Herring. The big showdown with the witch is set up as Cindy stumbles through towards the final issue next month.
A fifth-floor walk-up sounded like a good idea to Cindy until she suddenly found herself in a body that’s functionally at least half a century older than she is. It doesn’t help that her own brother doesn’t recognize her. Her best friends do. They offer to help. It’s a nice gesture, but the advanced age is the work of a deadly dangerous ancient Korean witch that would give Dr. Strange a headache. Cindy’s on her own with this one, and her time may be running out. She’s going to need to get help from somewhere. She’s going to find it in a cigar-chomping editor with greying temples and a love for out-of-season peppermint bark.
Kim is telling a pleasantly off-center story. The build-up of action that would normally accompany the penultimate issue of a mini-series is given over to Cindy, struggling with the curse of advanced age. It’s going to be a tremendous challenge to face a being of great magic. Rather than enlist the aid of allies and work on some sort of exotic plan to stop her, Cindy has slowly haul herself around, hang out on J. Jonah Jameson’s fire escape, and generally have a very awkward time with herself before launching an old body in the direction of an ancient witch. It’s not dramatic so much as it is weird.
Saddling Cindy with a heavy curse before the final showdown is suitably dramatic. Giving the young hero the infirmity of the elderly doesn’t exactly lend itself to visually dynamic storytelling. To his credit, Miyazawa gives Cindy the posture and physical presence of someone of advanced age. He just hasn’t found a way to bring it to the visually appealing page. Herring does a really good job of lending the atmosphere to the muted moodiness of the action. Cindy’s world continues to feel immersive thanks to some beautiful background work by Miyazawa and Herring.
Cindy’s final confrontation with the witch should be interesting. Emily Kim’s unique perspective on the classic Marvel web-slinger serial has been a great deal of fun. It’s been enjoyably quirky and off-center, but Kim’s pacing has felt strange. At no point in the series thus far has the pacing felt stranger than this issue. However, Cindy Moon continues to be fun in Kim’s hands, and fun goes a long way.
