In BLACK COTTON #5, available from Scout Comics on September 8th, 2021, the consequences of Zion’s shooting are finally announced. Meanwhile, enemies of the Black Cotton family exact sword-wielding vengeance.
The Details
- Written By: Brian Hawkins, Patrick Foreman
- Art By: Marco Perugini
- Letters By: Francisco Zamora
- Cover Art By: Marcelo Henrique Santana
- Cover Price: $3.99
- Release Date: September 8, 2021
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Was It Good?
This one is a little odd simply for the tonal shift between the (not so) hypothetical consequences of a police shooting and the reappearance of sword-wielding, sibling ninjas.
Yes, you read that right… ninjas. Okay, let’s get into it.
Hawkins and Foreman, once again, hit the nail on the head creating an alternate version of our world that’s different enough to stand on its own as an urban fantasy yet feels authentic. This issue spends most of its time focusing on all the machinations happening around Zion to mitigate the damage to him and his family’s reputation. Zion does his best to be smart and play the situation safe for everyone involved. However, you can’t help empathize with his situation as the world’s conflicting forces of racial activism, class conflict, and opportunists all vie to have their way with as much (or as little) attention as possible.
Oddity strikes when we learn about Black Cotton warehouse managers cut down by the brother/sister sword-wielders from the Keshinomi family. Yes, the Keshinomi conflict is not new to the story, but it’s almost as if a different genre was re-injected into this urban drama/fantasy. At this point in the shooting conflict, it feels out of place, almost as if two completely different comics were spliced together.
The two storylines seem disconnected, and it’s a strange reading experience.
The art from Perugini and the team serves the story decently, but the problem we noted in the last review persists. Perugini uses a loose style, reminiscent of watercolor painting, and the looseness of the character designs, especially their faces, sometimes makes characters indiscernible from each other. You have to struggle to figure out which character is which by their hairstyle or which one has a beard. You get the gist of the characters and what they’re doing in each panel, but I couldn’t pick the characters out of a crowd if I tried.
In all, I like the two stories happening here, but I’m not sure I like them pressed together, and I wish the character designs were more consistent and distinctive enough to tell the characters apart.
What’s It About?
[SPOILERS AHEAD – Click here if you just want the score without spoilers]
Before you get lost in the drama, check out or BLACK COTTON #4 review to get caught up.
We begin with Taz Cotton entering a Black Cotton warehouse with alarms going off. He finds the Keshinomi twins inside, brandishing swords. The old adage of “never bring a knife to a gunfight” doesn’t apply here, and the twins get away as Taz is left seriously wounded.
Later, Elijah Cotton gets the bad news about Taz, and he discusses the situation with Jaleesa (Taz’s sister) as well as the pending announcement by the DA’s office concerning whether or not charges will be filed against Zion. Jaleesa is convinced Zion will be exonerated due to the public reputation of the shooting victim and the personal influence exerted over the DA’s office.
Meanwhile, Zion is visited by his younger brother, Xavier, who’s increasingly on the side of the protesters over the shooting. Their conversation gets heated, and Xavier stops just short of accusing Zion of shooting Nightingale out of racist motives. He leaves before the conversation escalates further.
After, Zion calls his sister to vent about what happened and to dig for information about what part their parents played in the smear campaign against Nightingale. his sister ends the call as she enters a restaurant where Zenith, Xavier’s girlfriend, happens to be working as a waitress. Their chance meeting is not a joyous one.
We conclude the issue with the DA’s announcement and an unpleasant meeting in the hallways of Back Cotton HQ.
Final Thoughts
BLACK COTTON #5 continues taut, complex, dramatic writing about a police shooting that parallels (sometimes uncomfortably) real-world events without picking sides, letting the characters’ actions speak for themselves. Adding in the previous plot thread about a grudge with the Keshinomi family works as a stand-alone story, but the two threads don’t quite mesh, making for a strange clash of stories in the same issue.
Score: 8/10
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