REVIEW: Miss Fury #3

Miss Fury continues her romp through time and space as she’s thrown back and forth between past, present, and future, trying to stop pesky robotic Nazis. Even as she hunts down a laundry list of targets—all people who’ve been replaced by Nazi look-a-likes—she continues to doubt her sanity and her new reality. Will she find the men who did this to her or will she continue to slip further down the rabbit hole? More after the jump!

SUMMARY

Pros
Herbert and Nunes make a great artistic team.
Entertaining despite it’s flaws.
Cons
Marla Drake looks a bit mannish with no mask.
Time travel needs to be better fleshed out.

Rating:

READER RATING!

[ratings]

MISS FURY #3
Writer: Rob Williams
Artist: Jack Herbert
Inker: Simon Bowland
Letterer: Ivan Nunes
Editor: Joe Rybandt
Publisher: Dynamite Entertainment
Cover Price: $3.99

Previously in Miss Fury: Stuck bouncing back and forth through time and potentially loosing her grip on both reality and her sanity, Marla Drake found herself working for Mr. Harmon hunting down supposed Nazis that were using the time streams to wreak havoc in the year 2013 and beyond. Now fully immersed in stopping the supposed Nazi menace, Marla ended up assassinating James H. Polk, the U.S Speaker of the House. She was promptly attacked by Nazi Robocops.

CLOAKED HI-TECH NAZI TIME TRAVEL AGENTS

Flipping the not-too-subtle bird at the radical Right, Miss Fury continues to hunt her prey, following Mr. Harmon as he not only gives her targets to assassinate but attempts to help her fix her unusual time jumping situation. When she targets one Mel Pinkston, an industrialist millionaire who epitomizes the evil ultra capitalist Republican overlord model, she’s forced to do a proverbial spit-take as she finds out that the evil Nazi conspiracy may be a bit more farther spread than she realized.

The time travel in this book is kind of complex to follow and may require multiple readings. As it stands, Marla keeps hopping back and forth through time, primarily stopping in the 40s, 2013, and the future. The reader is only given visual cues in order to sense that any time travel may have happened. Otherwise, the reader is purely dependent on dialogue. Problem is, Marla’s reactions to each moment she jumps in time are very odd. Sometimes she’ll act calm and address it like a curiosity. Other times, she’s freak her date out by jumping over a balcony with him in tow. It’s very strange and sometimes it takes a few readings to really understand that she’s time jumping and not just being a wild-child, which she was said to be in the earlier books.

Then there are the Nazis and Mr. Harmon. First, why must everything come back to Nazis? Even cloaked hi-tech time traveling Nazi agents? One thing this series is really good at is putting a new spin on the different kinds of Nazis out there, apparently. Second, why does Marla trust Mr. Harmon so much? She recognized him from 1943 when he shot what looked to be a Nazi leprechaun, but, beyond that, all he’s done is told her that there are hi-tech Nazi time travel agents running around and has given her a list of said agents to go hunt down. He’s helping her with her time jumping issue, true, but the trust she’s putting in him doesn’t feel earned yet, especially not this third issue in.

However, despite all this, it is a really entertaining story and it should be noted that its commendable Williams is tackling the time traveling concept at all. Even on it’s best days, it’s a difficult plot device to work with and, once one works it out, Williams is doing an alright job. Williams is a good storyteller, as well, giving the reader a fun and fast-paced read with a likable, if not slightly over-trusting, main character.

SHADOWS, BLACK LEATHER, AND HIGH-SPEED CHASES

The art for this series has been fairly strong so far. The creative team of Jack Herbert and Ivan Nunes continues to regularly deliver a slightly-better-than-adequate book each issue.

When it comes to action sequences, Herbert really shines. The first eight pages are really gorgeous and vivid to look at with Miss Fury escaping a number of Nazi robots via high-speed chase. The panels all look very fluid and alive, flowing into the next seamlessly. With Nunes working colors, a lot of attention to paid to shading and ensuring that Miss Fury looks as good in her shiny black cat suit as humanly possible, giving her a lithe and stealthy quality each and every time. For the most part, Herbert and Nunes seem to be really in sync with each other and the art works for this title.

The one complaint is that, on occasion, Marla Drake has a very manly look to her visage. This is particularly evident during a flashback at a dinner party Marla Drake attends, one where she decides to play chicken with gravity and nearly gets her date killed. The penciling is very evident and super heavy. Coupled with the already thick shadowing, which usually works for the book, Marla has much more masculine features than she has had in previous books. However, this has been the only incident so far in the series and she remains visually feminine for the rest of the book, though that might just be because she has her mask on most of the time.

BOTTOMLINE: DID I MENTION THE CLOAKED HI-TECH NAZI TIME TRAVEL AGENTS?

This book is fairly dense in the time travel department. It’s also too quick to make Marla Drake trust people she barely knows. Plus, Nazis are an overused motif and, here, they’re found everywhere. Despite all this, this book is still a lot of fun and is an entertaining read. Not to mention, Herbert and Nunes make a great artistic team when they’re not drawing female faces. It’s what I wish Catwoman would be. Overall, Miss Fury earns 3 out of 5 stars.

Rating: