Pyro’s Big Day: ‘Marauders’ #9 Reviewed
by Josh Davison
Mild Spoilers Ahead
Pyro comes back to Krakoa to a hero’s welcome or so he thinks. In reality, he’s seeing a projection crafted by Emma Frost. The Yellowjacket is still inside Pyro in a tiny submarine. She calls for Bishop’s help, who has an idea. It will require exact illusion from Emma and some precise strategizing from Bishop, but they may be able to extract Yellowjacket without killing Pyro. If they do, Homines Verendi have a lot to answer for from Krakoa and the Marauders.
Marauders #9 finds Emma and Bishop trying to repel the incursion from Homines Verendi and their mercenary, Yellowjacket. Thankfully, Bishop and Emma are a lot smarter than Yellowjacket and, incidentally, Pyro.
There are a lot of psychic illusions in this issue, but they aren’t difficult to navigate. There are a couple of extended red herrings and diversions. That said, the climax of this comic gets surprisingly brutal and gory.
Pyro really is the charming doofus of this team–it is worth restating that he had a skull tattooed over his face. He’s quite horny too, but it mostly seems fairly harmless.
We do get a good bit of catharsis in this issue too. The X-Men don’t particularly like getting screwed with and Emma in particular knows how to be vindictive.
The Kate Pryde issue is brought up, but there’s no apparent resolution yet.
Matteo Lolli does a hell of a job with this issue, giving the book a lot of impressive detailing. The gory scenes are especially gory and the moments of catharsis are especially cathartic. It’s a damn good-looking book and color artist Edgar Delgado ensures that with a popping palette.
Marauders #9 is another gripping issue for this X-Men title. Our heroes deal with the mole in their ranks in the most mind-bending and insane way possible before flicking him away like the flea he is (yeah, mixed my metaphors, whatever). It’s definitely worth a recommendation from yours truly. Feel free to give it a read.
Marauders #9 comes to us from writer Gerry Duggan, artist Matteo Lolli, color artist Edgar Delgado, letterer VC’s Joe Caramagna, cover artist Russell Dauterman with Matthew Wilson, and variant cover artist Marcos Martin.
Final Score: 8.5/10