DCU Comic Book Reviews

MANHUNTER #22

Psychobabble, Part Three:  Ghost In The Machine

July 2006

Written by Marc Andreyko

Pencils by Javier Pina

Inks by Fernando Blanco

Cover by Javier Pina

Synopsis

Now, Kate Spencer (aka Manhunter) is in the middle of battling a giant five-headed robot hydra-thingie.  Hours earlier, Kate receives flowers from her client, Edgar Cizko (aka Dr. Psycho) which contains a telepathic message in the card.  On the school yard, Kate’s son beats up a bully.  Elsewhere, Cameron Chase is trying to leave Dylan’s apartment when she runs into Mark Shaw, who is having some sort of delusion.  Dylan slaps him out of it.  At the JSA headquarters, Pieter Cross (aka Dr. Mid-Nite) runs Kate’s DNA to confirm if Al Pratt (aka the original Atom) is her father.  Strangely, Dr. Mid-nite finds two matches in the JSA database. Later, Kate asks Dylan to examine the card to see if Dr. Psycho’s powers really are dampened or if he has been faking.  Suddenly, the room explodes to reveal the five-headed monster.  Elsewhere, Cameron Chase is investigating the latest victim of a serial killer, when she encounters Sweeny Todd.  Meanwhile, the five-head thingie reveals itself to be Kilg%re and it needs a host body, which it finds in Dylan. 

Review by Binkley (e-mail)

“Please.  You two are about as stealthy as Star Jones at a buffet table.”

This was one hell of a jam-packed issue and I enjoyed it.  There is a lot going on in this issue and all of it plays directly off the last issue.  Previously we had seen Dylan experience problems with this computer, which now comes to the fore with the emergence of the hydra thingie, which may have been set off by the psychic card sent to Kate from Dr. Psycho.  Now, how is that for a tie-in?  Whew.  Plus, we finally get to learn who has killed all of the women in previous issues.  In case you did not know, Sweeny Todd is actually a fictional character from English literature in the mid-19th century.  It is possible Todd was real, but at this point he would be dead (obviously).  I really hope that this guy thinks he is Sweeny Todd and is not supposedly the real thing. 

I thing I have always liked about the Manhunter book is that the supporting characters are weaved very nicely into all of the plots.  I liked the moment when Mark Shaw bumps into Cameron, setting the stage to continue into Mark’s strange metal battle with some unknown people while at the same time revealing for the first time to Mark that Cameron and Dylan were dating.  And the small moment of Kate’s son fighting the school yard bully seems to connect to Dr. Mid-Nite’s finding of two DNA matches.  Perhaps genetics has been past on to her son?  And Dr. Psycho is absent for this issue, except for the card with the hallucination (Kate as Wonder Woman?  This also ties into the Wonder Woman series) that leads to the hydra thingie.  I get a kick that everything is connected in some way or fashion.

It is a shame this book has been canceled.  The last book will be issue #25.  It is a shame that something so good is being read by some few people.  I have hopes that Kate will appear elsewhere, perhaps in the revamped JSA, but even if she dies, I will miss all of the supporting characters.

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