Enter Natt the Hat! Only two main characters left to introduce: Sixpack and BAYTOR!
Hitman #4 (August 1996)
By Garth Ennis, John McCrea, Carla Feeny, and Willie Schubert
Cover by John McCrea
Edited by Peter Tomasi and Dan Raspler
It's possible I've never read this issue of Hitman before this. I purchased it a month or two ago for five bucks at my local comic book store because my collection began at Issue #5 and the 1997 trade only collected the first three issues of the series. I'm sad that Natt the Hat's first appearance was only worth five dollars. I mean, it's probably worth less than that if I'd bothered to shop around. Pretty sure you could find this entire series in a dollar bin if you don't mind searching for it across several years. I didn't want to wait so I shelled out the big bucks to get my hands on it.
This issue came out thirty years ago and I'm having trouble getting past just how easy being alive thirty years ago felt, both personally, socially, and politically. Fox News wouldn't even exist to begin melting the brains of the idiots who didn't have enough brains to melt in the first place for another half year or so. I think this was the year I graduated from San Jose State after a really lackadaisical six or seven years of off and on enrollment and various school transfers. I transferred credits and changed schools enough that I would up taking English 1B, a freshmen course, my last semester of school because somewhere along the way, my AP high school credits for the course were lost. Or maybe they had a limited shelf life? Anyway, I fucking ruled that class! It's where I first encountered Vonnegut (on my own since no other class I'd had taught him and I chose him to do my big research essay on even though my student professor (who I was probably the same age as?!), Mr. Malchow, encouraged me to do my project on Cerebus (as he'd noticed my Cerebus pins on my backpack)). Magic the Gathering was refreshing and fun and my group of friends had yet to realize how expensive some of the cards were so we still often played for ante. It wasn't until my friend Stephen brought that fucking Scrye magazine into our midst that our enjoyment of the game really took a fucking turn. Oh, also fucking Fallen Empires. What a shit set that was!
Oh, also in 1996? I was young! Holy god was being young sweet! As good as people always say it is! I had landed ass-backwards in a great paying job managing the office supply warehouse on the Netscape campus in Sunnyvale (directly under the giant Libby's can water tower which I was already well familiar with being that there was a place nearby called The Wave where we used to skateboard). I got my first car: a 1972 Volkswagen Panel Van. My friends called it my Stranger Danger pedo van because of the lack of windows and maybe also because of the Sailor Moon figures on the dashboard? The first night I was designated driver after owning this car, fucking "Fireball" Bob Henline, the Well-Done Comedian, broke the inside handle off the sliding side door making it even more of a Stranger Danger van since the kids, um, I mean my friends couldn't get out of the back on their own after that.
But getting back to being young! It's not hard to say what I miss most: the wild potential of the unknown years ahead. Close second had to be the constant discovery of new mind-blowing things. For me, in 1996, that was mostly literature. Douglas Coupland. Catch-22. Grant Morrison's Doom Patrol. I haven't really gotten to the age where I feel my body has betrayed me. Other than the crackling knees when I go up stairs and the occasional back pain (which is more the fault of my cheap sofa and ancient mattress. I guess I should fix those before I really do some harm to my poor stupid meat casing). Maybe passion? I do miss passion. I miss unrequited crushes no matter how painful they could be. I miss the first time a person puts their hand down the front of your pants. I suppose I could have the Non-Certified Spouse wear a wig every now and then and pretend to meet me in the Erotica aisle of Powell's Books. But it's just not the same! Part of that experience is the absolute fucking surprise that it even got to a point that it could happen! Sometimes you didn't even know it was going to happen until three seconds before your cock was in their hand!
The year 1996 may have also been the first year I really wound up on the Internet. Like my own home connection and not winding up at my cousin's house drunkenly hanging out in AOL Chatrooms after a bender in Los Gatos or hitting the college computers to check college email. My first Internet identity was The Red King because of Through the Looking Glass. The whole conceit was that while I was online, I was dreaming. And when I woke up or "logged off", everybody would go *Poof!*, out like a candle! Anybody who remembers the Internet when it was the wild frontier can't help but be saddened by the rank disappointment it's become with a handful of sites that people use. To speak of it sounds like you're gatekeeping because the people on the Internet at the time wanted to be there or had something to share or say (no matter how stupid, offensive, or fucking throw-up-immediately-and-have-mental-scars-for-the-rest-of-your-life disgusting). Now everybody is on it and, well, it hasn't made it good!
By Garth Ennis, John McCrea, Carla Feeny, and Willie Schubert
Cover by John McCrea
Edited by Peter Tomasi and Dan Raspler
It's possible I've never read this issue of Hitman before this. I purchased it a month or two ago for five bucks at my local comic book store because my collection began at Issue #5 and the 1997 trade only collected the first three issues of the series. I'm sad that Natt the Hat's first appearance was only worth five dollars. I mean, it's probably worth less than that if I'd bothered to shop around. Pretty sure you could find this entire series in a dollar bin if you don't mind searching for it across several years. I didn't want to wait so I shelled out the big bucks to get my hands on it.
This issue came out thirty years ago and I'm having trouble getting past just how easy being alive thirty years ago felt, both personally, socially, and politically. Fox News wouldn't even exist to begin melting the brains of the idiots who didn't have enough brains to melt in the first place for another half year or so. I think this was the year I graduated from San Jose State after a really lackadaisical six or seven years of off and on enrollment and various school transfers. I transferred credits and changed schools enough that I would up taking English 1B, a freshmen course, my last semester of school because somewhere along the way, my AP high school credits for the course were lost. Or maybe they had a limited shelf life? Anyway, I fucking ruled that class! It's where I first encountered Vonnegut (on my own since no other class I'd had taught him and I chose him to do my big research essay on even though my student professor (who I was probably the same age as?!), Mr. Malchow, encouraged me to do my project on Cerebus (as he'd noticed my Cerebus pins on my backpack)). Magic the Gathering was refreshing and fun and my group of friends had yet to realize how expensive some of the cards were so we still often played for ante. It wasn't until my friend Stephen brought that fucking Scrye magazine into our midst that our enjoyment of the game really took a fucking turn. Oh, also fucking Fallen Empires. What a shit set that was!
Oh, also in 1996? I was young! Holy god was being young sweet! As good as people always say it is! I had landed ass-backwards in a great paying job managing the office supply warehouse on the Netscape campus in Sunnyvale (directly under the giant Libby's can water tower which I was already well familiar with being that there was a place nearby called The Wave where we used to skateboard). I got my first car: a 1972 Volkswagen Panel Van. My friends called it my Stranger Danger pedo van because of the lack of windows and maybe also because of the Sailor Moon figures on the dashboard? The first night I was designated driver after owning this car, fucking "Fireball" Bob Henline, the Well-Done Comedian, broke the inside handle off the sliding side door making it even more of a Stranger Danger van since the kids, um, I mean my friends couldn't get out of the back on their own after that.
But getting back to being young! It's not hard to say what I miss most: the wild potential of the unknown years ahead. Close second had to be the constant discovery of new mind-blowing things. For me, in 1996, that was mostly literature. Douglas Coupland. Catch-22. Grant Morrison's Doom Patrol. I haven't really gotten to the age where I feel my body has betrayed me. Other than the crackling knees when I go up stairs and the occasional back pain (which is more the fault of my cheap sofa and ancient mattress. I guess I should fix those before I really do some harm to my poor stupid meat casing). Maybe passion? I do miss passion. I miss unrequited crushes no matter how painful they could be. I miss the first time a person puts their hand down the front of your pants. I suppose I could have the Non-Certified Spouse wear a wig every now and then and pretend to meet me in the Erotica aisle of Powell's Books. But it's just not the same! Part of that experience is the absolute fucking surprise that it even got to a point that it could happen! Sometimes you didn't even know it was going to happen until three seconds before your cock was in their hand!
The year 1996 may have also been the first year I really wound up on the Internet. Like my own home connection and not winding up at my cousin's house drunkenly hanging out in AOL Chatrooms after a bender in Los Gatos or hitting the college computers to check college email. My first Internet identity was The Red King because of Through the Looking Glass. The whole conceit was that while I was online, I was dreaming. And when I woke up or "logged off", everybody would go *Poof!*, out like a candle! Anybody who remembers the Internet when it was the wild frontier can't help but be saddened by the rank disappointment it's become with a handful of sites that people use. To speak of it sounds like you're gatekeeping because the people on the Internet at the time wanted to be there or had something to share or say (no matter how stupid, offensive, or fucking throw-up-immediately-and-have-mental-scars-for-the-rest-of-your-life disgusting). Now everybody is on it and, well, it hasn't made it good!
The home page of my and my friends' site from 2003 (thanks to Internet Archive!). Design by me. Pixel buttons by me. Skateboard my actual Hosoi from my youth (signed by Steve Caballero. For reasons).
Shit! I'm supposed to be reading a comic book and instead my reminiscing led me to fall down a rabbit hole of my own making on Internet Archive! I even found an old letter from Soy Rakelson that gave me goosebumps! Not because it was good but because hearing his voice and terrible debate skills from out of the past was like seeing a ghost that I thought had stopped bothering me and asking me where my faith was ten years ago! I bookmarked it to discuss later! Oh boy!
Anyway the point is that it was nicer being alive 30 years ago than it is today! But I'm assuming being alive today is better than being dead so I'll just stick around and complain, I guess.
This issue begins with Tommy agnositicating¹ on a roof in the rain like Rutger Hauer discussing the C-beams at Tannhäuser Gate. He's crying about having lost his best friend so I guess Natt's a replacement for Pat? Is that why it's Natt the Hat because replacing Tommy's old best friend Pat for a guy named Natt is putting a hat on a hat? Or a black hat on a hat, maybe? Does that make sense? Do I care? Let's move on!
The second page reverts the story to ten days previous so that we can all figure out why Tommy's so Batty. Tommy's awakened by a home invader who knows who Tommy is but seemingly doesn't realize Tommy's the kind of guy who sleeps with a gun between his legs. I mean, duh!
Anyway the point is that it was nicer being alive 30 years ago than it is today! But I'm assuming being alive today is better than being dead so I'll just stick around and complain, I guess.
This issue begins with Tommy agnositicating¹ on a roof in the rain like Rutger Hauer discussing the C-beams at Tannhäuser Gate. He's crying about having lost his best friend so I guess Natt's a replacement for Pat? Is that why it's Natt the Hat because replacing Tommy's old best friend Pat for a guy named Natt is putting a hat on a hat? Or a black hat on a hat, maybe? Does that make sense? Do I care? Let's move on!
The second page reverts the story to ten days previous so that we can all figure out why Tommy's so Batty. Tommy's awakened by a home invader who knows who Tommy is but seemingly doesn't realize Tommy's the kind of guy who sleeps with a gun between his legs. I mean, duh!
This guy claimed to have made at least two dozen previous hits but with bad guy monologuing that bad, I think he was lying.
Tommy rolls over and goes back to sleep with the corpse leaking blood and brains through the floorboard. I guess that's some kind of subtext or character building? Like Tommy's either so chill that a corpse leaking various gruesome biles across his floor can't bother his sleep or he's just a lazy asshole who makes Pat clean up the corpses.
This issue re-introduces us to Moe Dubelz and his, um, brother Joe whom we haven't seen since The Demon annual during Bloodlines.
This issue re-introduces us to Moe Dubelz and his, um, brother Joe whom we haven't seen since The Demon annual during Bloodlines.
If you want to know who the antagonist is in a Garth Ennis book, it's the one who keeps getting more and more physically fucked-up.
Moe Dublez's butt still hurts from Tommy killing Joe and his dad. But he can't find anybody good enough to murder Tommy. But that's when Johnny Navarone strolls in and claims he can do the job for half a million dollars. This guy's a clean-cut kid from Miami in a slick white suit who's probably killed way more than two dozen people. He kills two guys just during this job interview! I don't know if he's better than a Nazi gun demon from Hell but he'd better be because Tommy just kicked the snot out of one. Seems like a slick dude from Miami'll be nothing compared to that.
Johnny knows about Tommy's powers but he's got a plan to circumvent them. I mean, the Nazi gun demon from Hell also knew about those powers and had ten guns from Hell and had the element of surprise and he got his little bottom spanked anyway. It looks like Johnny's going to go into hitman no-man's land here and use Pat to lure Tommy into a trap. That's my supposition, anyway, seeing as how this began with Tommy dropping tears in the rain about his best friend being killed. Oh, and also about losing the second date to Wendy. And you know what happens on second dates! Applebee's!
Apparently Tommy hasn't been staying with Pat so I guess the corpses Tommy leaves are just shit the landlord's going to have to deal with when Tommy sneaks out on the rent and moves on. Tommy doesn't want Pat getting in trouble with Batman so he's crashing elsewhere for awhile. Seems like in Tommy's business with Moe Dubelz after him, Batman is the least of Pat's worries.
In the meantime, Tommy needs money so he phones up a bent cop to ask about a job murdering a super.
Johnny knows about Tommy's powers but he's got a plan to circumvent them. I mean, the Nazi gun demon from Hell also knew about those powers and had ten guns from Hell and had the element of surprise and he got his little bottom spanked anyway. It looks like Johnny's going to go into hitman no-man's land here and use Pat to lure Tommy into a trap. That's my supposition, anyway, seeing as how this began with Tommy dropping tears in the rain about his best friend being killed. Oh, and also about losing the second date to Wendy. And you know what happens on second dates! Applebee's!
Apparently Tommy hasn't been staying with Pat so I guess the corpses Tommy leaves are just shit the landlord's going to have to deal with when Tommy sneaks out on the rent and moves on. Tommy doesn't want Pat getting in trouble with Batman so he's crashing elsewhere for awhile. Seems like in Tommy's business with Moe Dubelz after him, Batman is the least of Pat's worries.
In the meantime, Tommy needs money so he phones up a bent cop to ask about a job murdering a super.
Gonna resist looking up "Nightfist" on Urban Dictionary.
I scanned that page because I didn't want to do a boring synopsis of the Nightfist job so now it feels too soon to scan the pages with Tommy and Wendy's at Applebee's. Bah, you'd probably rather look at it than have me describe it!
Oh yeah. You gotta love a good neighborhood hang.
My brain kept wanting to make that caption "Love that chicken from Popeye's!" because my brain is fucking stupid. And it apparently wants Popeye's. Which isn't surprising as it never, ever wants Applebee's.
Wendy and Tommy have apparently been dating for two months and she still doesn't know what he does for a living. Or where he lives. Or why he won't ever take off his sunglasses. I don't actually know what constitutes a red flag but I have a sneaking suspicion that all three of those are Guinness Book of World Records-sized flags. Which means he must have the greatest cock in the DC Universe.
Soon we're finally introduced to Natt the Hat, on run from some terrible gang shit that went down in Detroit. He doesn't get a lot of time to explain why he's in Gotham because Natt and Tommy are attacked by motherlovin' ninjas.
Man, I forgot how much the word "motherlovin'" shows up in this comic book. It's to Tommy as "frag" is to Lobo.
Oh, also, it only takes one panel for Natt the Hat to say, "My mom died which is why I'm back in Gotham." So the ninjas kind of needed to attack quickly before Garth ran out of things for Tommy and Natt to talk about. They also discuss Nightfist (and Natt's first reaction isn't "No homo" like Tommy's was) and how fat Natt has gotten. I guess Garth didn't get to use all of his fat jokes in The Demon annual.
Oh yeah, the ninjas. Turns out they're not the kinds of ninjas who can dodge bullets.
Wendy and Tommy have apparently been dating for two months and she still doesn't know what he does for a living. Or where he lives. Or why he won't ever take off his sunglasses. I don't actually know what constitutes a red flag but I have a sneaking suspicion that all three of those are Guinness Book of World Records-sized flags. Which means he must have the greatest cock in the DC Universe.
Soon we're finally introduced to Natt the Hat, on run from some terrible gang shit that went down in Detroit. He doesn't get a lot of time to explain why he's in Gotham because Natt and Tommy are attacked by motherlovin' ninjas.
Man, I forgot how much the word "motherlovin'" shows up in this comic book. It's to Tommy as "frag" is to Lobo.
Oh, also, it only takes one panel for Natt the Hat to say, "My mom died which is why I'm back in Gotham." So the ninjas kind of needed to attack quickly before Garth ran out of things for Tommy and Natt to talk about. They also discuss Nightfist (and Natt's first reaction isn't "No homo" like Tommy's was) and how fat Natt has gotten. I guess Garth didn't get to use all of his fat jokes in The Demon annual.
Oh yeah, the ninjas. Turns out they're not the kinds of ninjas who can dodge bullets.
One hundred thousand dollars might seem like a lot but not when you have to split it between 10,000 ninjas. Oh, also not great when you're dead and didn't earn it even.
After murdering all the murder ninjas, Natt and Tommy bust each other's balls for a bit before deciding to team up to take down Nightfist. And that's when Tommy is all, "And just like that, I signed my best friend's death warrant." Oh, okay! So Pat gets to live for a bit more (I thought this was way too early to lose Pat) and we get to be faked out by Natt's death. Which totally seems plausible because as a comic book reader, it's easy to understand the whole "new character with loads of meaning to the main character introduced just to see them die". It's a variant on fridging but not too much of a variant. Also if Natt the Hat ended up in a fridge, Tommy would probably make a fat joke about it.
The Ranking!
Super awesome, dude!
__________________________________________________________________________________
¹ You know. When a person goes, "Hey God, are you there, it's me, Roy Batty?" Or, more understandably, when somebody questions the existence of God in a moment of dark despair. It's probably a real word, right? It should be.
The Ranking!
Super awesome, dude!
__________________________________________________________________________________
¹ You know. When a person goes, "Hey God, are you there, it's me, Roy Batty?" Or, more understandably, when somebody questions the existence of God in a moment of dark despair. It's probably a real word, right? It should be.
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