The conclusion of Condor arc is here but there is only a few good things out of this issue...
This run has been a complete rollercoaster, with great issues and some not as good as it should be. The fight between Frank and Olaf ends after 12 pages, it's brutal and pure brawl but the artwork of Matt Horak doesn't seem so consistent as previous issue specially in the last pages.
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| (W) Cloonan (A) Horak (C) Frank Martin (CA) Declan Shalvey & Jordie Bellaire |
In my opinion Cloonan did some mistakes in this issue with Frank. I mean, at the end of issue #11, Olaf challenged Frank to fight hand to hand on an iceberg when Frank was armed and with ground advantage to kill him off easily ( Frank was in the boat). But in issue #12, while fighting Olaf, Frank missed his guns. The big question is... why he let the guns sink with the boat? Why didn't he shoot Olaf when he had the weapons and ground advantage (Olaf was in the iceberg and Frank in the boat).
I can see that Cloonan is portraying a heroic and honorable Frank Castle by fighting Olaf hand to hand , but he doesn't play by the heroes rules, he's smarter than that.
The fight itself was good, it makes you feel hooked while you are reading it, The fight scenes were well built by Cloonan and Horak.
The artwork is solid but my grip was in the last pages when Frank is seen with a different face design. I can understand that the hair has grown, but the face looks a bit different specially the jaw. I really like Matt's artwork but didn't understood why the sudden change in Frank's face...
Aside from this, the action scenes were perfectly portrayed and choreographed in every panel.
Frank Martin did a great work specially in the day scenes where the fight between Frank and Olaf was placed.
Again great cover by Declan Shalvey and Jordie Bellaire, it's far from being my favorite cover but it's a great one too. I think it lacks a bit of color ( of course! It's a glacier theme,,,) and the characters lack a bit more of detail.
Conclusion: With the end of this arc, i think it took too long to end this Condor chapter. I'm more a fan of compressed stories and a 6 issues arc would be enough instead of 12. But it's far from being a bad run, not at all. It's been quite decent run with very good moments and with a Frank who is like a force of nature who doesn't compromise.
It was too bad that the main bad guys couldn't be punished, they will eventually, but i don't know if they can show something interesting to pull them back into the game and keep things interesting.
Pros:
Good fighting scenes with Frank and Olaf;
The Punisher is back in New York!
Cons:
The main villains were unpunished;
Significant changes in Frank's face.
OVERALL RATE: 7 / 10
Posted by @ivomgs
