Absolute Carnage: Lethal Protectors #1 - Marvel Comics

ABSOLUTE CARNAGE: LETHAL PROTECTORS No. 1, October 2019

Considering that this comic clearly warned its audience that “the events of this story take place after Absolute Carnage #1 & #2”, Frank Tieri’s script for Issue One of “Absolute Carnage: Lethal Protectors” was probably something of a conundrum for those within its 43,029 strong readership who were blissfully unaware of Cletus Kasady’s “grand return to New York in a blistering triple-sized story”. For whilst the twenty-page periodical at least contains something akin to a summary of past events within its opening blurb, as well as a very evident immediate threat to Misty Knight’s life courtesy of a flashback to an old copy of “Web Of Venom: Cult Of Carnage”, the actual explanation as to just how Mercedes has become a one-armed prisoner of the Apostle of Knull at the Ravencroft Institute For The Criminally Insane is decidedly lacking.

In fact, the Brooklyn-born author’s opening appears to be so heavily-reliant upon the comic’s “Venomaniacs” comprehensively knowing precisely what has preceded his nauseatingly blood-drenched narrative, that it debatably makes a complete mockery of “Marvel Worldwide” even selling this particular publication as some sort of stand-alone mini-series; “Gee. Let me take a wild guess. Creepy cultists. Pentagram drawn in blood. And me as the human sacrifice. You’re bringing back something from the dead.”

Mercifully however, once John Jameson comes to collect his “plus-one” and the private investigator begrudgingly removes her bionic arm as a “token of my fidelity”, the rationale behind why Misty is stood before the “amorphous extra-terrestrial parasite” is quickly overshadowed by a significant amount of gratuitous violence and the surprise appearance of the Demogoblin. Packed full of blood, spinal cord and limb-ripping brutality, this pulse-pounding sequence genuinely grabs the audience by the throat, and in many ways it is disappointing that Knight’s ability to escape Cletus’ clubhouse is over so quickly.

Similarly as inconsistent as this comic’s penmanship is its storyboarding by Flaviano Armentaro, which disconcertingly lurches from the somewhat sedentary religious nature of Carnage’s congregation within the bowels of Ravencroft to Mercedes’ sense-shattering shenanigans in a jarringly clumsy manner. Indeed, the Italian artist’s pencilling at the somewhat static start of this book appears to contrast greatly with the far less restrained sketches at its conclusion, where his drawing arguably bears an uncanny resemblance to that of John Romita Junior…

The regular cover art of "ABSOLUTE CARNAGE: LETHAL PROTECTORS" No. 1 by Bengal