VERY FINE/NEAR MINT by Mike Bullock, Zeu & Silvestre Szilagyi
"Man O' War." From the Chronicles of the 13th Phantom! While returning to the United States with his wife, Jeannette, The Ghost Who Walks finds himself embroiled in a battle with sea faring slave traders. Will The Phantom be able to free the enslaved members of the Llongo tribe, or join them in chains? And how does this tie in to the life of the 21st Phantom? Find out here!
Date Available: 01/07/2009
BONUS REVIEW by GARY OWENS
Moonstone (published in Illinois) likes to take old heroes (Zorro, Doc Savage) and reintroduce them to new audiences. DC has had success with The Spirit, and The Phantom has great potential; he’s enigmatic, been around for centuries, and has a strange wardrobe. Who could ask for more? Writer Mike Bullock, in this issue, doesn’t; he offers a comfortable flashback story about a ship carrying slaves, with a lot of action but not much depth. Disappointing, since he writes and paces well (which is hard to get sometimes in comics), but this issue is too safe and vanilla. The backup story, Ghost Zero, suffers a different fate, rushing through a story that was too long for the space provided. I’m a fan of older heroes, but I would like to read them with an updated edge, and this issue didn’t do that for me.
