Stormwatch #9

Seems to me Stormwatch is more than a match against a single Red Lantern. Maybe they'll actually just meet up and have tea.

Peter Milligan has moved on from Justice League Dark to Stormwatch. When a writer has left any other title in The New 52 up until now, the book has taken a totally new direction. So let's see what Mr. Milligan does to Stormwatch and their Daemonite Headquarters.

I guess Stormwatch was too busy to notice when all of the different colored Rings visited the Earth in New Guardians #1.

Midnighter and Apollo are sent to Earth to investigate the Red Ring wearing alien, Skallox. Skallox has gone to Earth to investigate the creation of Rankorr. I think. Guy Gardner was also supposed to head to Ysmault to help out Rankorr but did he ever arrive? I don't think he did! Sometimes there's just too much stuff to keep track of, especially when characters are appearing in several books at once.

Apollo and Midnighter are dropped off in Devon, England, to face the Red Lantern alone. That's because Manhunter, Hawksmoor, and Jenny Quantum are currently in Rome, Italy, investigating a super powered person that looks like Da Vinci's Vitruvian Man.

Looks like Leonardo's drawings were based on this guy who must have worked for Stormwatch 500 years ago!

Stormwatch being the super secret organization Stormwatch is, they clean up their mess after bringing the Vitruvian Man aboard the Eye of the Storm. Engineer reprograms a satellite that caught the encounter. Martian Manhunter erases everyone's memory of the event. And Jack Hawksmoor rebuilds the city. That's a pretty efficient secret group! Suicide Squad and The Blackhawks and Checkmate and N.O.W.H.E.R.E. could take a lesson from them.

Back in England, Apollo and Midnighter meet up with Skallox. Apollo gives him the benefit of the doubt and tries to reason with him. I like this approach because he doesn't just assume a guy with a flaming red ring and a head shaped like an ox skull is automatically a bad guy.

Turns out he is. But at least he didn't assume it.

Midnighter quickly puts Skallox down by cutting off his ring hand. Skallox isn't completely dead once the ring is removed since Midnighter places the severed hand back on Skallox and Skallox resumes life functions. But cutting off the hand with the ring at least puts Skallox into some kind of coma. I think if the ring is completely removed from all parts of the body, Skallox would die. But maybe there's something in the way the ring works (or just Skallox's alien body) which keeps the host from dying simply by removing the limb with the ring.

And Skallox would die, as The Engineer later points out when they bring Skallox aboard the Eye of the Storm and remove the ring from his finger. Skallox is put into some kind of Empire Strikes Back liquid tank to keep him alive while Stormwatch experiments on the ring. But they have more important guests to tend to, so they leave Skallox alone for awhile.

The Vitruvian Man has calmed down and is more than eager to tell Stormwatch his history, as it ties in so closely with theirs.

Da Vinci must have been The Engineer in his Stormwatch.

The Vitruvian Man gets completely too worked up talking about how his comrades were ordered by the Shadow Lords to kill his love, Isabella. He explodes out of his bonds in a massive burst of energy, rocking the ship and helping to allow Skallox's ring to break free from its container. The ring flies off to create a Red Lantern out of The Vitruvian Man except Midnighter breaks his neck before he can accept. The ring then turns to offer itself to Midnighter!

Midnighter may have saved the day but he's definitely worried about his ability to kill getting out of hand. And though he claims his rage is in check, the Red Lantern Ring definitely though different. The Engineer traps the Ring in a field which simulates intense rage from all directions. This keeps the Red Ring in stasis as it cannot figure out which way to head. And Midnighter goes back into the Simulation Room to continue training and to ponder how long the Shadow Lords may find him, or any one of them, useful. What will they do when they have no need for certain of their powers anymore? Come after them as they did The Vitruvian Man?

Engineer ends the simulation here. But we all know this encounter is just a matter of time!

Stormwatch #9 Rating: +1 Ranking. I enjoyed the casual pace of this issue. A lot of minor details about the team and their relationships with the Shadow Lords is revealed amongst just a small amount of violence to keep the action set happy. I also like that Stormwatch now has a Red Lantern Ring in their coffers. I have a feeling it will become useful many, many, many issues from now, probably even a few writers down the road. A new writer will come onto the series and remember the Red Lantern Ring and make use of it. Or Peter Milligan will deal with it pretty quickly since the next issue of Red Lanterns is going to deal with Stormwatch! So, yeah.