“Yesterday’s” Comic> Solitaire #2

There’s going to be a lot of logo destroying in this crossover event, aren’t there?

Solitaire #2

Malibu Comics/Ultraverse (December, 1993)

“Moon Madness”

(I hope they coordinated on these titles. There are only so many puns you can make about the moon and people going crazy.)

WRITER: Gerald Jones

PENCILER: Jeff Johnson

INKER: Barbara Kaalberg

COLORING: Keith Conroy (designer) and Foodhammer!

LETTERER: Tim Eldred

EDITOR: Hank Kalanz

Learning of a moon cult boosted by the Break-Thru event calling people to the moon, Solitaire goes to trademark-safe Disneyland Clone to stop it. He battles through the cult, women using bows and arrows, and finally reaches the “Moon Man”, who thinks himself a priest higher than Jesus. Through flashbacks we learn that his father sought to own this park, and Solitaire suspects he is actually the one responsible for this nut getting an atomic bomb. Our hero manages to stop the bomb but Moon Man is killed by one of Solitaire’s dad’s assassins, protecting the source of the bomb, but this just confirms Solitaire’s suspicions.

What they got right: It has to be hard to work a story around a crossover event like Break-Thru, but Jones manages to craft a good story around the current insanity connected to the moon around the world, as not-Disneyland is near enough to ground zero for the event. There’s a lot of action and it does manage to flashback to a bit of Solitaire’s childhood, giving us some insight into the character like how he can’t seem to remember his mother clearly.

What they got wrong: And that’s all the story you get. The rest is just chasing with a break for fighting before going right back to chasing. It’s more action than story.

What I think overall: This could have been proof that this crossover is coming way too soon, especially with this only being the second issue in the series, but it does manage to pull out something enjoyable, if too brief due to the nature of the telling. So far we still know little about this character, but at least we’ve learned something more about his backstory. This wasn’t listed as essential to the crossover or the Ultraverse as a whole but still a good read.