Young Miracleman has retreated to the furthest reaches of the Himalayas to try and come to terms with life after 40 years dead. It’s… not working out the way he had hoped. Your Major Spoilers review of Miracleman: The Silver Age #5 from Marvel Comics awaits!
MIRACLEMAN: THE SILVER AGE #5
Writer: Neil Gaiman/Mark Buckingham
Artist: Mark Buckingham
Colorist: Jordie Bellaire
Letterer: Todd Klein
Editor: Nick Lowe
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Cover Price: $4.99
Release Date: May 10, 2023
Previously in Miracleman: The Silver Age: Miracleman continues his search for Dickie Dauntless, aka Young Miracleman. As we learn more about Miracleman’s forgotten past, we see that he could use all the help he can get. But will he accept it?
WHAT LIES BENEATH
After his meeting with Mister Master, Dickie Dauntless has realized that the past he knows is a falsehood. Leaving the Himalayas behind, he awkwardly catches a ride with Meta-Maid’s ex-boyfriend, returning to England more confused than ever. Fortunately, she stays with him as his guide to the strange new world of Miracleman’s creation, explaining the bizarre notions of a waitlist for disease or a life on a floating garbage island to the puzzled ’60s schoolboy. Between his haunting dreams and the bits and pieces of his past that Miracleman has let slip, Young Marvelman and MetaMaid sift through what clues they have to discover his true past. Things are complicated by the fact that Johnny Bates tried to destroy all the secrets of Project Zarathustra before murdering most of the city of London, but thanks to a hidden cache of microfiche, they find their way to a rotting orphanage.
Then, overcome by his memories, Dickie collapses.
LOST MEMORIES?
As with the last issue, we are also presented with a “fictional” tale of Young Miracleman, which is to say an actual reprint of Mick Anglo’s ’60s work, as Miracleman seeks his own answers. Last issue’s armor-piercing question about his true name seemed to light a fire under Young Miracleman, but he quickly returns to his uncertain self here. That forces Meta-Maid to be the driving force of the plot, but she’s still a cypher whose motives feel uncertain, and the push-pull of their personalities slows things down in a faintly frustrating way. Buckingham once again gives us beautiful art, including the most terrible things that the future has to offer, but the recurring dream effects have a bizarre coloring that makes them distracting, even as they start to answer the questions readers have been sitting on for 30 years.
BOTTOM LINE: ALMOST STALLS OUT
Even with those subjective weaknesses, Miracleman: The Silver Age #5 delivers more often than not, giving us some insight into how the hero known as Dickie Dauntless ended up in the clutches of Gargunza back in 1963 and successfully gives us the patented “man-out-of-his-own-time” story beats in a fresh way, earning 4.5 out of 5 stars overall.
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MIRACLEMAN: THE SILVER AGE #5
Dickie's search for himself gets literal, and the detective work feels somehow out of place, even as it's very satisfying.
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Writing9
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Art10
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Coloring10
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