Moon Knight by Lemire & Smallwood (Moon Knight by Lemire & Smallwood Hc)

Readers new to this character might be put off by another (admittedly positive) review which suggests you need to read other Moon Knight books to understand what's going on.Thankfully, I can confirm you don't need a PhD in MoonKnightology to enjoy this book (and enjoy it you will - it's a fun ride). If you've never come across the character before, the following is all you need:Moon Knight is, essentially, Marvel's Poundland Batman, a street-level superhero who hits the streets at night because the Ancient Egyptian moon god Khonshu (actually Khonsu, but what's a letter between friends?) has given him enhanced abilities when the sun goes down. His secret identity, Marc Spector, is a reformed mercenary, and his pal from those days, a Frenchman sensitively known as Frenchie, is his combined Alfred/Robin figure. He also runs two other secret identities, millionaire playboy (sound familiar?) Steven Grant and cabbie Jake Lockley. Lockley has two chums, a wino-informer called Crawley, and Gina, who owns a diner. MK's girlfriend Marlene is particularly fond of the Grant ID.There, saved you pounds and pounds in buying books you don't need to read in the first place. You might miss a few nuances, but nothing of any consequence. But I digress. Now we have to deal with a problem.Some years ago, someone - possibly MK creator Doug Moench - hit upon the bright idea that because MK is running three civilian IDs, he's as crazy as a bedbug, and lives out where the buses don't run, so to speak. There are three problems with this. First of all, from all we've seen of him in action, he's actually the least neurotic of all of Marvel's street-level heroes, impeccably calm and logical in comparison to such thin-skinned bundles of nerves as Matt Murdock or Peter Parker. Secondly, and more importantly, the average citizen of the Marvel Universe deals with unceasing craziness every minute of every day. Pretending to be a couple of other people, in a world where New York gets destroyed at least once a month, gods walk the earth and death is a less lasting inconvenience than a dose of flu, doesn't even begin to register on the crazyometer. And above all HE'S BEEN GIVEN HIS POWERS BY AN EGYPTIAN GOD AND THAT'S SOMEHOW LESS DISRUPTIVE TO MENTAL HEALTH THAN DOING UNDERCOVER WORK? Anyhoo, MK writers have been yakking on about this nonsensical - and frankly dull - iissue for decades now, and, well, I'm not saying it's connected, but MK series rarely last long before cancellation.Which brings us (about bleedin' time, you cry) to the present volume and our heartfelt thanks to Jeff Lemire for grabbing the wretched "Ooh, he's mad, him" nonsense by the scruff of the neck and putting it to bed once and for all. I bought the book on the strength of Lemire's track record (in particular the wonderful "Black Hammer" series, with artist Dean Ormston, every issue of which you need to read LONG before you get to this book) and was delighted to see that, essentially, he's managed to come up with a definitive explanation and hopefully lasting resolution of this tedious and silly story trope*. What's more, he's done it in a way that should satisfy not only readers like the present reviewer who never liked the idea in the first place, but also those with more patience who have bought into it. And which doesn't disrespect previous writers who, if nothing else, have put a lot of hours in at this particularly exhausted coal-face.One of Lemire's greatest gifts as a writer is clarity - the ability to convey complex stories with absolute lucidity. Which is why you don't need to know a lot about the character to be able to enjoy this story. It's utterly accessible from startin' to stoppin', and, setting aside only plot twists to keep you reading, it's as clear as Alpine spring-water. It breezes along, uses a rather smart gimmick (different artists to represent the viewpoints of MK's different IDs) and resolves the whole thing in a highly satisfying manner. It also achieves a balance between being a light, fun read and not trivialising the protagonist's problems, something of a miracle following decades where it seems you either have the unremitting flippancy of Deadpool on one hand and the relentless misery of many modern DC comics on the other.In brief, Lemire got me genuinely engaged with a topic I'd always been utterly dismissive of, and resolved said topic in an exciting, clever and eminently accessible story that's both fun and poignant.Why only four stars then? Ironically, this is also because of Lemire's gift for clarity. An artist himself, the stories he writes but doesn't draw are verbally economic, with ne'er a word wasted, and impeccably clear when it comes to visual storytelling. Whatever or however he conveys his plots to his artists, said artists invariably come up with instantly comprehensible visuals. Consequently, Lemire's comics are very quick reads. They're dense with information and story, but it's all conveyed with minimal verbiage and the lightest of visual touches. It's superb comics storytelling, but it does mean you get through his stories very, very quickly. I really enjoyed this book, but it felt like I got through the whole thing in about half an hour, and I wanted it to go on a lot longer. While that is actually quite a compliment, especially as it's a book based round a plot device I always hated, it does leave you wondering if the price of this (handsome) hardback edition is justified by the relatively brief time you spend reading it, however much fun it might be. But if only more books were good enough to have such a problem.* Of course the resolution won't last. This is comics, after all. Some desperate hack's probably undone all of Lemire's good work already.

My boyfriends loves this book!

Great edition for a mind blowing comic. Arrived in perfect conditions

“Moon Knight by Lemire & Smallwood” collects issues #1-14 of this series from (beginning in) 2014. It was previously collected in three paperback editions –Moon Knight – LunaticThis volume collects the first five issues of the new (post-Secret Wars) Moon Knight series. Yet another new writer for the series manages to capture the feel of the preceding series launched by Warren Ellis and maintained by Culled Bunn, and the artist from volume two of that series is back, again maintaining that feel; and they now manage to find yet another new direction within that now-established mood and setting.The story opens with Marc Spector in an asylum, where he is told that he has been all his adult life, and has been subject to delusions about being Moon Knight, who is a real-world character, whose activities are reported on the television there.SPOILERY BITThis is a comic book about Moon Knight, so we “know” that Marc Spector must be Moon Knight, but you do start wondering for a couple of pages, until you, and he, realise that asylums are not really allowed to be run like this anymore.UNSPOILERY AGAINThen it is a matter of finding out what is really going on, and even when we are told, we, and Marc, still feel a bit unsure about it all; and the presence of the entire supporting cast from the original stories (with a cameo by Scarlet on the TV) just adds to the unreality.We reach a revelation/resolution of sorts, which leaves a lot still to be understood and acted upon, but there is a volume 2 in a couple of months to take us onward.I found this to be a really unputdownable story, and the artwork reminded me of that by Bill Sienkiewicz, who introduced the ‘scribbly’ style to a mainstream audience back in the 1980s with Doug Moench on their classic Moon Knight series.Moon Knight – ReincarnationsThis collects issues #6-9 of the current series, along with issue #2 of the 1980 series, which addressed the current situation of Moon Knight in the vocabulary of the traditional comic-book of the day. Comic-book writing and comic book fans have come a long way in the intervening thirty-something years, and all for the better, writers actually got fired for writing stuff like this back then (though Jim Shooter fired people for all sorts of things).So – this story sees the various identities used by Marc Spector as his aliases having to be hunted down in their own realities and brought back into the single personality that has been fractured in the previous volumes; or so it appears to us. Wes till can’t tell what is ‘real’ and what isn’t, and so this is all purely subjective for the central character in the story.Whatever it is that is going on, this is definitely a really good comic, and this is a really good episode in the ongoing storyline. I could waffle on about the influences of 1970s comic-book writers or 1960s British TV, but I don’t feel like it.This is an excellent version of Moon Night, building on the previous short series, and on decades of history for the character.Don’t start here though, start with Warren Ellis’s opening volume,  Moon Knight Volume 1: From the Dead (Moon Knight (Numbered)) .Moon Knight – Birth and DeathThis collects the final issues of this series - #10-14, but you really have to read the preceding two volumes to appreciate it, and preferably the preceding three volumes before those, stating with Warren Ellis’s  Moon Knight Volume 1: From the Dead (Moon Knight (Numbered)) .The first three volumes were written by three different writers, Ellis, Wood and Bunn, while the second (current) three are all by Jeff Lemire, but you’d be hard put to find a break in continuity or style.This volume is the final piece of the jigsaw puzzle that has been assembling throughout the series, and is the secret origin of Marc Spector and all his aliases.I have been reading Moon Knight since his first appearance, and, as I often say, comics have grown up with us, their first audience to actually grow up with them, and this is the grown-up Moon Knight, actually growing up.Marc Spector: “is this real? All I know for sure is that the rain feels real as it hits our face. Real enough, anyway. And that’s good enough for us.”Me too.