Trinity of Sin: Pandora 9
Ray Fawkes, Francis Portela
Spoiler alert! You have been warned!
Before we begin, can we all take a minute to truly appreciate the beautiful cover by Julian Totino Tedesco? Go ahead. Do it. Back? Okay. Good stuff. I think it’s safe to say that the artwork of Francis Portela really complements the script of Ray Fawkes in this series, which, now that Forever Evil: Blight is coming to an end, I kind of want to eat my own words about its inevitable cancellation. I sort of want this book to continue a little while longer. And, as advance solicitations state, I seem to be getting my wish retroactively. So huzzah for that. Fawkes continues right where he left off with his epic cliffhanger last week in the pages of Constantine.
Pandora and company are sort of in the middle of an impossible situation. Even though Constantine pretty much took care of Nick Necro last issue, they still have to take out Felix Faust and his reign of terror. Granted, the team is pretty much immediately back together and Pandora’s all angelic now, and speaking of angels, Zauriel just saved John, but Faust is still, well, totally evil and backstabbing everyone he can to ensure his goal succeeds. That’s where we learn a little something about good old Felix… He’s actually right. Or, at the very least, he believes he’s going to save the world. Granted, it’s to rule it, but still. And just when he’s about to reveal Pandora’s true secret origin, the shit really hits the fan and everything escalates out of control. (Conveniently.) So when everyone gets all superheroic and ready to take him down once and for all, he becomes all uber-evil and puts them all back into the machine. Everyone, that is, except for Constantine, who wants to save the world and reshape it in his own image. Did he kill Faust? Not entirely sure. The ending, as with every issue of this crossover, is way too cliffhangery to tell. It’s literally the only flaw in the entire issue.
Silly, John. You just really don’t want anyone to like you, do you? The stories by Fawkes and event-within-an-event co-writer and co-plotter J. M. DeMatteis seem to be two of the very few DC Comics writers post-New 52 who really “get” the character of John Constantine. He’s not a hero. He’s not really even an anti-hero. He’s an asshole who occasionally makes not terribly selfish decisions. In other words, he’s flawed to the point where he’s almost a bad guy, but when it counts, he’s still human. I have no idea how this is all going to wrap up nicely (spoiler from future readers: it’s probably not), but color me curious as to how things shake out. I cannot wait.
My Rating: 4.5/5
