Moon Knight [2021] #11 - Marvel Comics

MOON KNIGHT No. 11, July 2022

Whilst Issue Eleven of “Moon Knight” certainly starts out with a satisfying mixture of barbaric beatdowns and villainous comeuppances, the vast majority of Jed MacKay’s narrative may well have surprised many of this comic’s readers with it somewhat sedentary storyline. Happily however, despite the fact that all of the titular character’s interplay with his new arch-nemesis takes place over a personal phone, there is still plenty of nail-biting tension ‘on show’ between the two masked mavericks to keep this publication’s audience well and truly riveted.

Indeed, the moment Zodiac shows up outside the Midnight Mansion with a heavily-armed cartel and starts threatening to kill all of the haunted residence’s hapless neighbours in a number of horrible ways should Reese be unwilling to surrender herself to his tender mercies, it becomes clear that anything could happen within this tensely-penned twenty-page periodical – and somewhat shockingly does; “This is the path. But we’re not welcome. The way will be dangerous. So whatever you do, don’t stop running.”

Foremost of these surprises has to be Marc Spector’s decision to consult his former god, Khonshu, and beg the imprisoned Egyptian deity for assistance in his “race against time to save a life.” Bereft of his Mooncopter, his flying drone and even his Angle Wing, the superhero’s emotional upset at the deadly predicament of his vampiric secretary some seventy miles away leaps off of the printed page, to the point where even a perusing bibliophile can almost taste the desperation in the air as he drops to his knees in heavy-hearted supplication.

Nobly helping the Canadian writer pack his word-heavy script with as many eye-catchingly dynamic set-pieces as possible is Alessandro Cappuccio, whose slickly-pencilled series of panels depicting Moon Knight and his friends stealthily battering their way past Billy Russo’s henchmen in New Jersey, definitely sets a savage tone for the rest of the book. In fact, arguably one of the highlights to “The Killing Time” is the well-sketched physical tension between a distraught Reese and clearer-headed Soldier, who almost go toe-to-toe with one another inside Spector’s magical headquarters when the ex-Hydra operative attempts to stop her from going outside to face Zodiac alone.

Writer: Jed MacKay, Artist: Alessandro Cappuccio, and Color Artist: Rachelle Rosenberg