Blackhawks #6

That might be Kunoichi on the cover. Maybe. Fighting with Mother Machine. Possibly.

Last issue wrapped up a lot of loose ends. Kind of. Everything about this comic is ambiguous! Also, why are they called the Blackhawks? Were they named after a military helicopter or a Native American? Or, you know, an actual bird? And why?

Nobody cares. Moving on.

The issue begins with the Blackhawks in Argentina fighting sentient Legos.

Or possibly sentient Polaroids. You know, Polaroids? Pretty much the digital camera for the first 9/10s of the 20th Century.

The intelligence of the Modular Creature (or Creatures?) grows as more of the creatures connect (like I said! Sentient Lego!). But they're going to take it out easily enough with an Electromagnetic Pulse before it (they?) reach a populated center. The only problem: Canada's plane does not have shielding to avoid being disabled by the pulse. But no problem, right? Canada says he can land a brick! Wow! He's good!

I'll let Mr. Schmidt wrap up the opener for everyone.

Also, the JLI is ineffectual while the Blackhawks have a pretty decent success rate. So maybe the wrong comic book was canceled?

I imagine funding is going to be pulled and everybody is going to make a big show about shutting down the Blackhawks program when it will really just go back to being a Black Ops program. It failed at being Black Ops before because it was being funded by the United Nations. There is nothing Black Ops or secret about the United Nations. The Blackhawks are going to have to secure some kind of private funding or get in deep into the dark government branches where the real decisions happen. The decisions that are so real that nobody believes they're real. The decisions that thrive on the status quo believing that "conspiracy theory" equals "fairy tale." And it will probably need Commander Lincoln to fake his own death!

That's not a guess. Mister Terrific #8 spoiled that for me. Stupid DC and their stupid World Building.

Even if I turned the page and this scene did not continue, it would be enough for me. I like this.

Irish and Attila are hanging out having a few beers, both healing from arm breaks and/or losses. And it looks like Irish has a prosthetic arm now. Or maybe the Blackhawks have some kind of super duper healing alien technology that they've stolen from somewhere. Or maybe it's a robot arm since he uses it later to grasp and lift his mug. Irishman continues the story and then Attila tells a story of his own. Three full pages of downtime with members just talking to each other! And it's not boring. Hey, other writers of the New 52! Look at this! Don't be afraid to let your characters do stuff instead of just reacting to physical violence!

Back at The Eyrie, Lincoln introduces Lady Blackhawk to the Black Razors side of the Blackhawks program. It looks like the main difference is the Black Razors track down Alien Technology and the Blackhawks just track down Human Technology. Yeah, seems like they really needed two teams for that distinction. It's just a few short issues before The Blackhawks are probably shut down and they can concentrate on the Black Razors work. It's a better Black Ops organization anyway since they only make cameos in other comic books.

But the downtime doesn't last for anyone. During this big Public Relations "Let's Meet The Blackhawks" press event, two cameramen have cameras sending out high level encrypted data. Wildman cracks it and discovers it's a message that says, "Greetings from Matteo Bischoff." The message also comes with a super secret special surprise.

The cameras Wildman was working with were also bombs. Ha ha! I mean, cri cri, no more Wildman.

Irish and Attila were also on a bit of a mission tracking down some guy who was selling weapons to the people attacking the Blackhawks. I'm not sure which people they mean since I'm either not following the story closely enough or they mean the guy who sent the Sentient Legos. But they find out this guy's name is Bischoff and let Lincoln and Lady Blackhawk know just before the camera bombs explode.

Blackhawks #6 Rating: +1 Ranking. At least half of this issue was given over to conversation. That's a good thing. And with a big group, that's a very good thing. One of the few comics doing a team correctly and it's been cancelled at Issue #8. I'm learning about each individual member of the team. I'm learning about the team. And even in a few of the action scenes, things are being revealed. The only real issue with this comic is the communication between the cover artist and the rest of the creative team! Here's another cover that makes absolutely no sense. Kunoichi throws the EMP to disable the Lego things and that's all she does in this comic. Never becomes a hunter or a prey. Never fights Cthulu's face. Never shoots a gun. She simply throws a backpack. Great job, editors!