Skids and Nautica's Infinite Playlist
(Spoiler free-ish)
Synopsis“We should’ve known. Being happy: always a sign that somebody was about to die.” —From Knight Quest: The Quest for the Knights, by SWERVE of Helex.
Uh ohHitting the 42nd issue, More Than Meets the Eye also reaches the conclusion of the first arc post game-changing Elegant Chaos, and the two heavy pauses in between - but beyond the puns involving murder on the dance floor and other Sophie Ellis Bextor lyrics, what horrors does the Vis Vitalis hold? Read on!
Killer movesJames Roberts's script takes some time in this issue to use a previously trodden ground and path to actually send us in a new direction, at least for some of the characters involved. If space thrills are part of the manifest plot, it's the latent threads that really shine through, with a series of twists that are more humorous than horrorous.
Hot damnNautica in particular gets some very nice development, and we're enabled to see her in action and in her own element even when facing the multiple, very different moments of clash with other characters (threating or not) in the issue. Nightbeat is another spotlighter, and one that reveals how MTMTE actually operates after all.
Look! A distraction!However, the issue does not feel as though it reaches the full throttle of what the arc could've done, despite what it does do. Not entirely sure what I was expecting, and this was definitely not it of course, and welcome though it may have been, *something* felt off. Perhaps the shortness of the arc? More below.
ArtVisually, the horror is palpable. Even with the opening dance scene, we are plunged back into the Alien-esque side of story; and forget the Sparkeater from early on in the series, the creatures that Alex Milne conjures up in this issue are the stuff of someone's twisted, shifting yet somehow strangely enticing nightmares - despite, or perhaps also because of, the barnacles.
Nightmares, I tell youIn fact, there is a wonderful echo of the recently cancelled Hannibal series, also due to the stunningly elaborate colour work by Joana Lafuente, giving all the hues of terror - and its complete opposite in the resolution of the plot-thread, as we enter the final act of the story.
Dem colour/lettersTom B. Long, as seen above, just keeps shining, too. Some of the highest peaks of tension in the story, and their consequences, just look great in the voices that he helps shape out with the lettering. And on the cover front, the main Milne/Josh Perez variant sets one tone, the vibrant Nick Roche/Josh Burcham Nautica (thumbnail) sets the other, Naoto Tsutshima and Yamaishi capture the atmosphere of the latter part of the issue, and we get SDCC exclusive Combiner Hunter Chromia, by Sara Pitre-Durocher.
ThoughtsSpoilerish aheadThe concluding issue to this post-Elegant Chaos arc undoubtedly has a lot of heart and charm (perhaps charisma, too?) in its doings, both from a character perspective, and pacing for invested readers, particularly in the concluding act. It does also, however, feel very quick, and perhaps pleasingly so - leaving a small blip of satisfaction in a wider comedown from the Ratchet issue (eventually, I know). I am still unsure as to what it is that did not convince me as much.
ItWhile things do happen, especially in the character-developing and relationship establishing sections, I cannot shake the feeling that this may have been the most 'filler' arc we have seen so far in the MTMTE series. However, there is just enough lightness and much needed self-undermining and humbling humour to create a dangerously uneasy feeling of content, as we subtly Swerve into the next arc...
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