Moon Knight 2, Magneto 2

Moon Knight 2
Ellis (w) and Shalvey (a) and Bellaire (c)

A sniper is targeting individuals connected by their mutual past. Though each of them, with the exception of this sniper, works for banks and other large financial companies now, they were all formerly part of a special ops group. The sniper was abandoned at the end of an op and, in his mind, left to die while they all went on to make lots of money in other fields. His life apparently over, he's made his way back to kill each of them. He's reached eight by the time Moon Knight tracks him and the two battle on a rooftop and even into the office building of the ninth person. Moon Knight holds his own in the fight, dodging bullets and using his tech to keep up. He knocks the sniper down and the pair of them are surprised by the ninth member of the team appearing and shooting the sniper in the head before explaining to Moon Knight that they had all gone their separate ways and that he was just the tool. Where the gun had once had power, they'd all but him realized in the end that it was the banks that truly have power.

This is what a MOON KNIGHT story should be. It's dark to the point of graphic and it's unsettling to the point of chilling. The story is presented in neat eight panel grids to start, four rows of two panels as these seemingly random people go about their daily lives. Each page, including the first one, someone is shot. The next page is then laid out the same way but with an emptiness where the victim's panel was. Meanwhile, the sniper's story is told in some of those empty spaces, a clean black font on a pure white background. It's calm, it's collected, and, eerily enough, it's meant to sounds like it's Moon Knight's origin. He was a mercenary, he was left to die on an operation that went south in a foreign country, now he's taking revenge on the others who wronged him. It's all told in the third person and the sniper isn't shown until the first eight targets are dead and the story has been told. In fact, Moon Knight, who appears after all of that as well, appears first. It's a scarily well-written and well-presented story as Ellis and Shalvey force the audience to wonder if Moon Knight's snapped or, even when we learn that he hasn't (any more than usual), if he's capable of this sort of retribution. Really great story, magnificently presented in a way that seems so obvious now but that I couldn't have pictured before I read it. If you're not too disturbed by assassinated people and maybe a little bloodshed, it's worth flipping through this one. Really fast read, kind of stunning when you're at the end suddenly.

Magneto 2
Bunn (w) and Walta (a) and Bellaire (c)

Magneto pays a visit to the shantytown that the Omega Sentinel he destroyed pointed him towards while a SHIELD team pays a visit to the place where Magneto destroyed the Omega Sentinel. They learn nothing there but Magneto quickly realizes there's something wrong with Down Acres and interrogates one of the men there. He learns that people come regularly and take someone away; they used to offer "work" but none of the workers ever returned so people started to get suspicious. Now they're taken away while every other person tries to keep his or her head down. Magneto waits until night when the vans come and attacks the men, brutally killing them. He gets information from one of them before also killing him.

Another pretty brutal outing for Magneto as Bunn begins to characterize Magneto more as the Holocaust survivor with a purpose. We see a memory of Magneto's where he and a pair of friends went to steal bread for their families in the camps but one of his friends is captured and promised freedom and food for his family if he gave up the names of his conspirators. His friend gives up the name of his other friend but doesn't mention Max. Leaving Max out of it led Magneto to learn that brutality works and that he was meant for something bigger in life. It's a bit of a strange message for Magneto to have learned but the point is made and it seems particularly relevant here. There's nothing like humanizing one of Marvel's most human (well, mutant. You know, very specifically not human in his case) "villains." The SHIELD team following Magneto serves as a ticking clock sort of plot point, like the special SHIELD team out to find Punisher over in PUNISHER. You know that it'll come to a head at some point, it's all a matter of when. Not a bad story for Magneto and one that I think has the potential to grow.