Ms. Marvel, Vol. 8: Mecca (2017)

This is a great volume, an engaging plot with interesting themes, high emotional stakes, and good character moments.  I’m pretty much continually impressed with the storytelling in Ms. Marvel, and this is an excellent one.  I know we’re still waiting for Captain Marvel next year, but how long before we can get Kamala in the MCU?  (A few spoilers.)

Hydra wobbles, but it doesn’t fall down.  Kamala beat back Chuck Worthy in a previous volume, but he’s reared his head again, this time galvanizing some of the more prejudicial elements of Jersey City to round up Inhumans; Kamala looks out for her people and confronts past mistakes as the Inhumans try to find sanctuary.  Later, Kamala is surprised by the appearance of a certain crime-fighting ally she met on her recent trip to Pakistan.

The whole anti-Inhuman rhetoric is very familiar – the uniform baseball caps of the “Make Jersey City Great Again” crowd might be yellow instead of red, but they’re still quite on the nose.  However, I really like how the volume goes about it.  This is the best sort of “comic-book identity as stand-in for oppressed minority” storyline, because it tells it alongside real-world prejudice, not in place of it.  When Amir is detained as a suspected unregistered Inhuman, it has an extra ring of familiarity to it because he’s a young Muslim man, and since he’s also an immigrant, being an Inhuman puts him at risk for deportation.  I like that, that we see how being Inhuman creates additional barriers for those who are already marginalized, as well as brings those who are used to having privilege (such as those who are straight/white/cis) prejudice they haven’t experienced before.

This is an especially good volume for Amir, and he embodies this theme wonderfully well.  In particular, he has an amazing monologue in the second issue, two full pages of him talking about being profiled as a Muslim, the image of terrorists vs. the reality, and the issues that create a breeding ground for terrorism.  One of the best things I’ve seen in a comic that’s had a lot of great stuff in it.

The plot in the final two issues, with Kamala encountering Red Dagger again, isn’t as good as the first story, but I still like it.  It explores some neat ideas about how Kamala feels about being a public her0, and I like that the problem she and Red Dagger are facing isn’t some sort of evil plot.  Instead, it’s a random, almost mundane quirk of circumstance that nonetheless poses a major threat, as well as being something Kamala can’t punch her way out of.

Warnings

Comic book violence and strong thematic elements.