The story begins in the past. Officer Marrow (the hero of the tale) arrives at a plantation style home with the subtitle of, "The childhood home of Matthew Anderson." You should ask yourself, like I did, who the hell is Matthew Anderson? Well it's Nemesis! If you can't figure it out based on the fact that everyone in the house is wearing all white then you probably don't understand why this book is horrible.
Nemesis' dad hangs himself and Marrow arrests the rest of the house. Apparently Anderson's family is super rich and hunts runaway girls for sport. Anderson's mother gets the electric chair, but not before telling Matty to kill Marrow. Anderson somehow became a gang leader in Asia and some other crap that made about as much sense.
After his David Copperfield moment is over, we find Nemesis sitting in his lair with his four horsemen. It appears that this origin story was not only being told to the reader, but also his goons. Nemesis then begins leaving the police random "riddles" and then performing equally random acts of crime.
Mark Millar (Ultimate Avengers 2) has managed to take away any mystery surrounding Nemesis' identity and flush it down the toilet. In the first issue no one knew who he was and that made the impending cat and mouse game interesting. With this issue not only does the read know his identity but so does everyone else in the world! After having no clue of Nemesis' identity Marrow, is able to figure it out in this issue.
The story is about Nemesis that's not under question. What is, is who the reader is supposed to root for. Is it Nemesis seeking revenge on the man who brought his murderous parents to justice? Or is it Marrow, who really doesn't seem to give a damn about people so much as always being right. The cat and mouse game between the two is sloppy, lazy and lacking of imagination. There's no sense of the chase or battle of wits just typical Millar: convenient story telling.
There's plenty more I could go in depth about. Like how giving some one the antidote before the poison doesn't necessarily mean their immune. Or the accuracy of shooting a rocket launcher in the air is next to zero. Or that landing in water with a speeding motorcycle (Akira rip-off) right behind you would more than likely mean that you'd be crushed by the bike and these are just the tip of the ice berg. I get that I must distain belief in order to read this story, hell I read comics books every day I'm great at it! What I can't do is forgive lazy and convenient writing or distain said belief when rules are presented in the story. Nemesis appears to be the only one not affected by the rest of the world because he's "super." The series is half way done, but I for one am calling it good with this issue.
Story – 3.5
Plot – 3.5
Art – 5.0
Ink – 4.0
Color – 4.0
Overall – 4.0
I'm not sure which is worse, this or Ultimate Avengers... sigh. Follow Dustin on Twitter and leave a comment telling him what you think of the issue.
