Martian Manhunter #6 Review and *SPOILERS*

Turning Against Yourself

Written By: Rob Williams
Art By: Eddy Barrows, Eber Ferreira, Gabe Eltaeb, Tom Napolitano
Cover Price: $2.99
Release Date: November 18, 2015

*Non Spoilers and Score At The Bottom*

It's been great being able to run around the streets and dance in circles, while singing "Martian Manhunter is Amazing" because for one thing, I never thought I would be able to say that and even if I did say it, I never thought that it would be true.  Now don't get me wrong here, I like Martian Manhunter, I just never thought that he'd be able to hold his own series and have it come off as entertaining and as it's been from the last five issues of this book....... I was wrong as hell.  Check this, Martian Manhunter, in order to save the world split himself into multiple people and gave them false memories so that the White Martians wouldn't be able to use him to bring Mars back from the dead, while killing Earth at the same time.  Too bad that these personalities have come together anyway and everything that is required to happen for the return of Mars seems to be falling in place like tumblers in a lock.  Hopefully our heroes will be able to stop the White Martians from resurrecting Mars before it's too late.  Let's jump into this issue and find out.

Explain It!:

Our issue begins where we left off with the living moon of Phobos shooting a beam down into an ancient crater on Earth and apparently this is the conduit to reactivate the White Martian weapon that is Martian Manhunter.  In order for it to work though, the White Martians need all the pieces of J'onn J'onzz to enter it.  Which at first glance wouldn't be that big of a deal because we only have Mould and The Pearl standing in front of the beam........ that is until we learn that the insane crippled kid Leo, who Agent Wessel brought with Mr. Biscuits and him is actually Ma'alefa'ak and even though I'm okay with this reveal.......... it's a little odd because we're introduced to Ma'alefa'ak in the third issue when he creates the Martian Man-Eater, but we were introduced to Leo in the very first issue and apparently he's been trapped in this human form for awhile........ So yeah, I don't get that.  Anyway, Ma'alefa'ak has been taking over the pilots minds in the plane that Agent Wessel and Mr. Biscuits have been on and has been making them fly toward the Martian beam and with Mould and Pearl down at the ground level taking on White Martians, who are persistent with their wants for these two to enter...... well, things don't look too good for planet Earth.

Okay, so the situation is fucked, but at least we have The Pearl taking on her true Martian visage to take on the White Martian threat and we've got Agent Wessel in the skies above trying to turn the plane away from the beam, while Mr. Biscuits fights off the mind controlled travelers......... It's not enough though.  I guess they don't teach you how to fly a plane in the FBI because Agent Wessel isn't able to divert it's course and Mould is a piece of shit because he pushes The Pearl into the beam before entering himself.  

So yeah, we're doomed and all that, but at least the true Martian Manhunter is reborn and apparently he's done with his friendly looking persona that we know him to rock and is going for a more Martian look from now on.  

In the end, with the pieces of J'onn J'onzz coming together and recreating the original form, it looks like Mars was able to be recreated and Martian Manhunter looks on at a Martian city that had been long dead, but is now reborn.  It doesn't look like he's going to have a chance to enjoy it though because for some reason his other selves that he was split into have survived the beam and are mighty pissed that Martian Manhunter just caused the end of the world.

That's it for this issue of Martian Manhunter and even though this is my favorite new series that has come out since June, I think that this is the weakest of the bunch so far because I don't know if things needed to be rushed to get the story where it is now, but not everything tracks.  I have no idea how Leo is supposed to be Ma'alefa'ak from what we've seen in this series and even though he was always off, I'd think that with Martian Manhunter being in the minds of all these personalities of his, he might have said something about this creepy kid not being up to snuff......  You could argue that Martian Manhunter secretly wanted this to happen, but even with that things felt forced to get us where we are.  Also, even though I'm still a fan of the art, some of the things in this issue were a little confusing to understand.  Now I'm still a fan of this book and can't wait to see where we go from here, but this issue in my opinion just moved a little too quick in trying to force all the pieces together and suffered a bit because of it.

Bits and Pieces:

While this series remains my favorite of the new books since June, this issue just didn't rise to the height of the previous books in this series.  Things seemed to come to a head a little too quick and felt forced because of it.  Don't get me wrong though, this is still a great series and I'm sure you'll get a lot of enjoyment out of this book, it's just not as solid as the others.  

6/10