Moon Knight - Volume 2: Midnight Sun [ペーパーバック]

I believe I own every appearance of the Moon Knight character from his debut in Werewolf by Night to the new Charlie Houston series, so I think that makes me some-what of an expert on the character. Over the years Moon Knight has gone through numerous tweaks and changes, some good and some not so good. I have seen Moon Knight go from a low level powered superhero after being bitten by a Werewolf, to being a cheap imitation Batman, to being an Egyptian decked out minor hero. The new series has turned him into a psychotic schizophrenic vigilante- and finally made him into the character he is capable of being- interesting and with depth.

Make no mistake about it, this generation Moon Knight is NOT a hero. Oh, he will be listed in the Handbooks as a "good guy" but he's not. He's more akin to the Punisher (who makes a brief appearance in this book), the only thing separating them is, so far, Moon Knight isn't killing everyone. He is only torturing and dismembering them. The violence in this book is a little too much at times. Moon Knight is constantly disfiguring and torturing people and there is a lot of blood, but his interaction with the disfigured Bushman/Khonsu character is excellent.

The only negative, and the thing which keeps me from giving it five stars, is the rewriting of his continuity without explanation. Marc Spector (Moon Knight) went from being a mercenary presumably based around the Vietnam era, to a thirty-something former Iraq War veteran. It's a common problem as heroes age but Marc Spector hasn't aged proportionately to Spider-Man (who also appears briefly in this series). Spiderman, as a teenager, interacted with Moon Knight years ago, now Peter Parker is (in this continuity) knocking on thirty himself and Marc Spector has regressed in age. Marvel is on the verge of having to do a DC Universe Crisis type event to address these situations. I do think the re-writing of Moon Knight's history was a bit unnecessary as the character would work just as well as a mid-40's nearly over the hill, banged up, anti-hero.

This edition also contains the Moon Knight Annual 1 which, in my opinion, was an awful, simplistic, issue. I don't think it took away from the addition, but it didn't add anything either.

Finally, bringing Frenchie "out of the closet" as a homosexual was an interesting twist that finally brought some depth to the most two dimensional character of the Moon Knight family. His interaction with Marc Spector brings a fantastic sense of reality to the book and finally gave Frenchie a purpose other than being a glorified helicopter pilot.

Guest appearances in this edition: Spiderman (brief), The Punisher, Captain America (Brief, as Steve Rogers), Ironman (as Tony Stark)

In Midnight Sun, Charlie Huston continues his reinvention of Marc Spector, a.k.a. Moon Knight, as a broken, hateful, possibly insane and largely ineffectual hero.

With his ex-girlfriend wisely seeking love elsewhere and his former sidekick trying not to get involved, Spector attempts in this volume to build a new stable of supporting characters -- none of whom, so far, make much of an impression. So, perhaps in an effort to lure readers back to the book, Huston brings in a four-pack of solid and reliable guest heroes -- Spider-Man, Captain America, Iron Man and Punisher -- while skirting the issue of the Civil War, the concurrent "big event" in the Marvel arena.

But nothing changes the fact that it's really hard to like this new incarnation of a once popular, second-tier character. Neither truly helpful nor homicidal (Moon Knight won't kill, although maiming and disfiguring people is all in a day's work), he seems rather to exist in some sort of heroic gray area -- at this point, still struggling to justify his existence more than anything else.

Sadly, Moon Knight continues to be a boring, even distasteful read. And there's just no good excuse for that failure.

by Tom Knapp, Rambles.(net) editor

Hey, I've gotta give this a really really solid 5 stars.
I started out with this volume, having never read moon knight ever before and I think this reallly really kicks some serious @ss!!!

The character Moon knight has apparently been around for a long time.
People have always criticized the character as "Marvel's Batman".
I can see them getting away with that before this volume came out.
Not anymore though.
Moon Knight in this volume is a harder, grittier, crazier, character than I've yet to see in all of Marvel.
I think he could make batman cry and go hide in his cave, but we won't get into that debate.

Older fans seem to have been disappointed by the characters revamp, but it's a common problem for older fans to hate the changes and modernizations of their favorite old superheros.
Which I think is giving an unfair and skewed review of this very good book.
I can see Moon Knight's fan base exploding after all this. I don't think you could ask for a better revamp or a stronger, more interesting character. Modernization is something we all have to come to terms with.

The book's writing is severely enjoyable, complex, and well styled. The art is on par with any high end comic and just as superb as the writing.

This book deserves a solid 5 star overall rating for what it is, not what old people who can't deal with change expect it to be.

This second volume does drag its feet a bit compared to the first, but hey, that's character development for you. Artwork is still amazing and writing is still getting even gutsier.