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In my first review of the series, I compared Manhunter to Alias. Well, for the final volume of Manhunter, the art is by none other than Michael Gaydos, the principal artist of Alias. But far from making Manhunter feel derivative, hiring Gaydos reveals the differences between Manhunter and Alias... though sort of in a bad way. What I mean by this is that superhero action doesn't really play to Gaydos's strengths as an artist, and Manhunter is much more action-packed than Alias ever was.

In this volume, Kate ends up in El Paso when she hears about a lot of women going missing. To my immense pleasure, this means she ends up encountering Blue Beetle and La Dama! I was going to complain that Andreyko gets things slightly wrong in having Jaime's suit speak in English, but I think I'm slightly out of sequence here, so maybe this reflects events to come in future issues of Blue Beetle I haven't read yet. Jaime doesn't play a big role in the story, though, which sees Kate encounter the Birds of Prey and the Suicide Squad as she battles the evils of medical experimentation. It's a decent story, displaying Kate's stick-to-itivness and no-bullshit attitude, as she refuses to accept platitudes and non-explanations, and the way she handles things in the end nicely melds her two roles.

Meanwhile, Kate's grandfather has given Kate's son a robot dog, people keep assuming I care way more about the Manhunter legacy than I actually do, and someone who may or may not be the Joker is trying to kill off everyone Dylan Battles loves. I don't really care for the way Andreyko has handled the legacy stuff in Manhunter: the history of the various Manhunters is too convoluted by half, and he hasn't really tied it together as elegantly as James Robinson did the similarly convoluted Starman history in Starman. And making Kate be the descended of other Golden Age superheroes (though not Manhunter) weakened the character in my estimation, reducing her specialness.

The Dylan Battles storyline about the Joker ends up not going anywhere-- he goes to Gotham, and then the series jumps ahead for a "fifteen years later" coda. I get that Manhunter was cancelled, and Andreyko couldn't do all that he wanted to do... but this was a systemic problem with the series, which had a tendency to reshuffle and lose plotlines periodically. What happened to the idea that Kate was going to serve as a defense attorney to supervillains and win their trust? A big deal in volume 3, briefly touched upon in volume 4, and then not even mentioned here. So what was the point of all that stuff with Doctor Psycho? On the one hand, it's not Andreyko's fault his series got cancelled, but on the other hand, this was the third time it was cancelled (there was a four-month gap between issues #25 and 26, and a fourteen-month one between issues #30 and 31). One would think at a certain point, you'd learn and stop playing the long game by advancing four different plots incrementally every issue, and actually tie up something you set up as important.

The last two issues jump ahead fifteen years, giving us a flash-forward of all the characters-- and given that the New 52 came along a few years later, there's no reason to not believe that these events won't come to pass in the year 2025 of the post-Infinite Crisis/pre-Flashpoint DC universe. Kate's some Ramsey is graduating from film school, but his graduation part is disrupted by the return of an old nemesis of Kate's... not to mention the fact that Ramsey himself wants to become a superhero! It's a cute, surprisingly upbeat snapshot of all our characters. I wish that this series had ever lived up to its potential, but this was a nice way to go out.

(Interestingly, the solicit text for the last two issues on the DC website describes a completely different plot, so the decision to go with this one must have been very last minute. Eight years later, though, and no one's ever bothered to update it!)

Manhunter: « Previous in sequence

A disappointing ending to a series that had begun with promise.

Admittedly, it never recovered from the One Year Later gimmick, and the story still could have gone places interesting. But, instead there are a very large number of new plot threads introduced, and then either quickly either explained or swept aside in the rushed epilogue that marked the series' end. Not the fault of the writer, as he had no control over cancellation, but it still doesn't leave one feeling satisfied. ( )

Such good storytelling I am so sad this was the last of the series - I am anxious to see what Marc Andreyko will do next though. I found his writing so enriching for characters that generally just get superficial treatment - showing relationships in all their flaws and perfection. Gay couples were just another inclusive detail that made these books really sing. His willingness to tackle timely and socially significant issues like immigration and racism, along with very powerful family turmoil - and to do it all with a strong sense of human compassion and understanding. I will miss Manhunter very much. ( )