MOSAIC#6
Writer: Geoffrey Thorne
Penciller: Bruno Oliveira
Colorist: Emilio Lopez
Letterers: VC’s Joe Sabino
Release Date: March 8, 2017
Rating: Rated T
Price: $3.99
Plot- Mosaic is introduced to the Inhuman family.
Story- After an amazing origin arc, Mosaic #6 picks back up immediately after Morris blew a gapig hole in Brand Corp.’s backside. Paramedics grab his body and he’s rationalizing about why it was okay to cause an explosion that can possibly endanger lives. His number one argument is “They are bad guys and Spidey was there!”
I like Sackett. I like him because he’s kind of selfish, but not in a way that makes him mustache twirling megalomaniac. Just in the way that makes him kind of a contemptuous bag of donkey dung… sometimes. Even as he’s inside the body of a Brand scientist, and trying to retrieve his own, he quickly dismisses even the idea of trying to save the others. I love it. Those are strong character traits, and characterization adds that extra octane to the fuel the drives these comics. But okay… I’ll stop fanboying over the most minuscule of character molding and continue on with what’s happening in the story.
As I said, he’s in the body of this scientist, and he’s with a team that seem to be extracting the cased bodies of the subjects that Brand was experimenting on, including him. We really don’t get a chance to see what happens here, because as he is wan to do when he sniffs out a NuHuman (New Inhuman) Lockjaw, the Inhuman teleporting dog (or inhuman in the shape of a dog) shows up! Of course, Sackett does what we all want him to do… yes… he possesses Lockjaw.
The trip that follows is pure fun. They teleport to Asgard, The Sanctorum Sanctum, The Blue Side of the Moon, and then to Ms. Marvel, who finally directs them to New Attilan where Sackett decides that dog minds are no fun at all. I love how Geoffrey encapsulates the idea of the dog’ thoughts.
There, he discovers that with aligning himself to the proper plain of existence, he can be seen by others, and in turn we get conversation with the Inhumans. Well that’s not true… he only really talks to Medusa who seems to have a one-on-one with ever NuHuman, which actual speaks to the extent of her regal leadership skills. A good queen knows her people. She actually ends up naming him Mosaic. Fun, but I have my issues with this, that’ll cover in a moment.
Anyways, we get a retelling of a story we kind of already know if we’ve been reading Uncanny Inhumans, when they use Mosaic as part of their plan to get back at Stark for stealing Ulysses during the events of Civil War II.
From here on, the pacing seems a little stretched, and it takes away from the issue for me. I understand why it needed to be done, but at the same time, we aren’t getting the development I thought we’d get with his thoughts towards the Inhumans and the royal famly. We only get a page with Medusa, and he doesn’t talk to anyone else other than Human Torch. It feels rushed, like it had to happen this issue.
The cliffhanger was something that happened several months ago in Uncanny Inhumans, so it doesn’t really offer avid readers any wonder about what to expect next. This doesn’t mean that the time frame is an issue (it’s clear that Mosaic happened well before most of the current Marvel timeline) but it does upset the story flow and deviates from what we got in the last five issues. It does do the job of tying together where he is in reference to the other books, though.
Art- The cover of Mosiac #6 is a culturally creative work of art. I mean diverse work is beautiful. How can I walk down the aisles of the comic book shop and not be drawn to that, even if it wasn’t already on my pull list? Melanin is beautiful. Then there’s use of the present-day smartphone to capture the essence of Mr. Sackett’s power. Each device depicts a different person, representative of the different people that he has pieces of, because he in essence, is no longer himself, but a mosaic of several dozens of people. This is an incredible work of art, without even mentioning the shadowing and lighting that highly the contours of his face or the many people’s fingers. Simply amazing.
Inside the cover, the art is something new. The lines aren’t quite as well defined as before, but we get this new sketch-esque feel to the book. It’s not bad, but I would be lying if I said I didn’t miss Khary Randolph. I like what he does with Mosaic’s characters. Bruno seems to give is some good close shots but in the distance, some of the human anatomy isn’t well rendered, at least for the kind of art this book requires. I feel that the art is a huge part of Mosaic, as the name even implies art in form, but I don’t think that Bruno captures that as well as Khary. That’s not to say that the art isn’t good, but I don’t like it for this book.
Verdict- It’s good to see the story pick up and tie together with the events in the other Marvel books, and it was fun to see Mosaic teleporting around with Lockjaw, but this issue simply didn’t work on the same wavelength as its predecessors. We got an introduction to Sackett meeting the Inhuman family, but at the same time we didn’t really get to feel it. It felt rushed and then the pacing took a sour turn. It felt kind of like a bridge to the next part of his story, but alone it wasn’t the strongest. I think the art hurt it in some of the later pages as well.
Star Rating- 3 out of 5 stars