The Pull List: Captain America: Fear Him #4 Review

Well, that was ... interesting. I can't say that I hated it, but I also can't say that I loved it. Nomad (aka Ian Rogers, Steve Rogers' son from another dimension because ... Marvel) isn't really that interesting to me as a character in the same vein that pre-Mark Waid Daredevil didn't get my attention, and Sam Wilson's Captain America was basically a damsel in distress throughout the whole limited series, which was disappointing. Like I said in Monday's Pull List, Fear Him seemed to be more of a "Hey, guys, would you read an ongoing about Nomad? Just wondering. No reason. Get back to me, though. For reasons. Tata!"

Via Marvel Comics

To be honest, nothing about this series really stood out, except that the final two pages played out like the ending of an after-school special. That's not really a compliment. It was trite and simplistic, and while I'm not anti-message when it comes to comics, it seems rather amateur of Dennis Hopeless* to go full-on Aesop, where Sam recites the "moral of the story." Blah, whatever. I know I said that I was enjoying the series, but the final issue kind of undid any positive thoughts I may have had for Fear Him.

This issue seemed pretty rushed, as well, particularly toward the end, and Hopeless' writing really has not improved since Spider-Woman. I know that a lot of my issues with that series were focused on Greg Land, but I'm beginning to wonder if the real weakness wasn't the writing. Even here, the dialogue is clunky, and Hopeless doesn't seem to have a real grasp of any of the characters' voices. This does not bode well for my restarting the Spider-Woman series next month, but I'll withhold my judgment until then. And if I didn't like Hopeless, I sure as hell didn't like the art by Szymon Kudranski. It seemed incomplete, especially in fight scenes. Many of the poses just had no motion, despite the fact that the characters were supposed to be moving, and the backgrounds were often just big blocks of a solid color, occasionally with black streaks. I mean, at least Greg Land had dynamics in his art, and you know it's bad when I half-heartedly compliment that dude.

The biggest hit to Fear Him, though, is that I felt a little cheated that nobody really feared Captain America. I mean, that was kind of in the title, Marvel. Instead, we have Cap cowering at the sight of scary crows and Nomad talking about how he doesn't fear stuff. That's some false advertising if there ever was any.

* What kind of scares me is that Rick Remender apparently helped Dennis Hopeless with this, but I couldn't see his hand anywhere. Remender isn't my favorite writer ever - although he does pen Low, which is a giant plus in his column - but this does make me wonder how bad this was before he got involved.