It’s the crew of the Disco Queen against the Biophagus, and the Biophagus against everyone. Will anyone make it out of here, or will they all be consumed? Find out in this Major Spoilers review of The Weatherman Vol. 2 #5 from Image Comics.
THE WEATHERMAN VOL. 2 #5
Writer: Jody LeHeup
Artist: Nathan Fox
Colorist: Moreno Dinisio
Letterer: Steve Wands
Editor: Josh Johns
Publisher: Image Comics, Inc.
Cover Price: $3.99
Release Date: November 20, 2019
Previously in The Weatherman: The crew of the Disco Queen are on Earth where they’ve learned the horrible truth. The terrorist plague that killed so many people on earth is an organism known as the Biophagus that flash-feeds on animal DNA and can mimic any creature it has consumed. They make their way to Dr. Nyseth’s office in the Arctic Circle and, thanks to Nathan’s shenanigans, immediately become separated. Amanda, the Marshal, White Light, and Pace get captured by Kestrel. She informs them that the Council has been dropping furnaces to the surface of the planet. These are enormous; they burn fossil fuels; and the point of this is to raise the temperature of the Earth enough to kill the Biophagus with no regard to the survivors.
QUITE DEFT IN THE CLIFFHANGER DEPARTMENT
The Weatherman Vol. 2 #5 opens right at the point the last issue ended, with a Biophagus construct that looks like Nathan. But this is just its present shape. It soon changes into Regi, he lab assistant, I believe. Now, if I have one problem with this book, it is that I’m having trouble keeping track of these side characters. Even the side characters are really interesting, but it’s hard to tell who might show up after a couple of issues and turn out to be important. The dialogue feels natural in part because people aren’t calling each other by name all the time, but there are moments when it would be nice. At any rate, the construct has reached Skyborough, and then we see Nathan sneak off the ship too.
Kestrel oversees the loading of the shuttle preparing to drop the next “meal” to the Biophagus, a meal which includes the rest of the crew of the Disco Queen. Nathan catches up with them…just after the shuttle leaves. But he catches sight of the Disco Queen.
Madam President and her staff see a news report about a suicide bomber attack. This is a distraction they set up for the media, and it’s working for now. She calls Zane, her agent who is trying to locate Jenner. Her interrogations have not yielded any more information. Desperate, the President changes her mind on those thermal drops on Earth and votes to continue them.
Aboard the Disco Queen, Nathan is having trouble flying it and suddenly gains some respect for White Light. He decides he’s either going to crash or push the big red button and then crash. Things aboard the ship start moving around. Aw, yeah. The ship turns into a mech! In great dramatic fashion, it lands on Earth right about where the rest of the crew happens to be. Nathan holds off the Biophagus long enough for them to come aboard and White Light to take the controls.
The young boy, Gian, blows up the other shuttle which he is on. This means that half of the Biophagus’ next meal is suddenly gone, and things change in a hurry. The Biophagus pulls itself together and grows, becoming big enough to reach Skyborough. Kestrel prepares to blow the place up. The Disco Queen rescues as many people as they can, including the scientist they met a few issues ago.
EXPOLOSIONS GALORE
The art is strong and energetic in The Weatherman Vol. 2 #5. There is a whole lot of destruction going on, so there is action, fire, clouds of dust, and sound effects galore. When the crew lands on Earth at the foot of the mountain of bones, you can practically hear the crunching underfoot. But then there is the contrast of Nathan, first desperate and determined, but then having the ship turn into a mech around him, which is so crazy and so joyful, and the mech is just cool. Later, after White Light is operating it (with insane glee), she takes out some constructs in and explosion of blood and guts. And then gets the mech to twerk, calling back to a previous issue. We need those moments of sheer goofiness because otherwise the tension would be too unrelenting.
The Biophagus is horrifying to begin with, but when it becomes enormous in a huge double splash, it is awe-inspiring. It is not exactly Cthulhu-esque, but the way it draws upon a multitude of familiar looking animal body parts and throwing them together in a way that doesn’t really fit like any known animal makes it all the more terrifying.
BOTTOM LINE: SO NOW WHAT ARE THEY GOING TO DO?
The Weatherman Vol. 2 #5 is indubitably exciting. Our little band of antiheroes is in a terrifically bad spot. The storytelling to get us here has been tight, but gosh is it hard on the main characters.
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The Weatherman #5
The search for the memory drives has been sidetracked into an attempt to escape from Earth with their lives.
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Writing9
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By day, she’s a mild-mannered bureaucrat and Ms. Know-It-All. By night, she’s a dance teacher and RPG player (although admittedly not on the same nights). On the weekends, she may be found judging Magic, playing Guild Wars 2 (badly), or following other creative pursuits. Holy Lack of Copious Free Time, Batman! While she’s always wished she had teleportation as her superpower, she suspects that super-speed would be much more practical because then she’d have time to finish up those steampunk costumes she’s also working on.