HULK! MAGAZINE #17, #18, & #20

”NIGHTS BORN TEN YEARS GONE” | “SHADOWS IN THE HEART OF THE CITY”
”A LONG WAY TO DAWN”
Script: Doug Moench | Art: Bill Sienkiewicz
Inks: Klaus Janson (#17-18) | Colors: Olyoptics® | Editor: Rick Marschall

The Plot: (issue 17) A serial killer called the “Hatchet Man” buys a hatchet and mask and murders a nurse, the ninth in a string. Jake Lockley learns that the latest victim had a note pinned to her body, threatening “Lisa and her lover” and realizes who the Hatchet Man is. Later, Steven Grant explains to Marlene that ten years ago Marc Spector found himself hunting an unstable fellow mercenary named Rand who killed a nurse. Spector beat Rand, but caused him some brain damage in the process.

Marlene insists on helping Moon Knight draw out the Hatchet Man and dresses as a nurse. She walks a path proscribed by Moon Knight and sure enough, the Hatchet Man assaults her. But the police arrive and open fire, winging Marlene. Hatchet Man escapes with her and Moon Knight gives chase into Central Park, where his quarry delivers a hatchet to Marlene’s back. As the Hatchet Man escapes, Moon Knight vows vengeance on him, invoking his real name: Randall Spector.

(issue 18) Leaving Marlene with the police, Moon Knight pursues his brother deeper into Central Park. Hatchet Man kills a wino and takes a nurse’s assistant hostage. Moon Knight saves her, but is injured in the process. Hatchet Man then escapes into a rocky ramble. Moon Knight unmasks himself to appeal to his brother, but the Hatchet Man charged madly at him. Unable to properly counter the attack due to his wound, Moon Knight dodges instead. Hatchet Man is impaled on a gnarled tree branch.

Moon Knight travels to the hospital, where he is informed that Marlene is in critical condition and may not survive the night.

(issue 20) Despondent, Moon Knight wanders the city, encountering alcoholics, swindlers, junkies, and pimps. Finally he saves a homeless woman from being mugged. She tells him the morning’s sun holds great promise for the day. Moon Knight returns to the hospital, where he's informed that Marlene will live.

Continuity Notes: For the first time since the character’s debut, some of Moon Knight’s past is fleshed out via flashbacks. Obviously the biggest revelation is that he has an insane brother named Randall.

Crawley and Gena put in appearances early in issue 17, Crawley informing Lockley about the note on the nurse.

My Thoughts: The greatest Moon Knight story of all time, and Terry Kavanagh would go on to ruin it. But we’ll get to that shortly.

If it was the "High Strangeness" mini-series which got me interested in Moon Knight, and it was the Lupinar story which made me a fan, it was this two-parter and its coda which cemented Moon Knight -- Doug Moench's Moon Knight -- as one of my favorite Marvel characters. It features all the melodrama and pathos you'd expect from the best of Stan Lee, transplanted into a story decidedly more mature and disturbing than anything the Silver Age's constrictions could have allowed.

Moench uses Central Park, that enormous playground for stalkers, rapists, and murderers, as the backdrop of the story. I don't know if the place was as vile as fiction from the era makes it seem, but it's well ingrained in my mind, and I assume in the minds of many others, that if a story produced or set in the seventies enters the park, terrible things are going to happen. And that's certainly the case here, as Moench has a hatchet-wielding stalker routinely killing nurses who dare to walk too close to the park at night.

The twist, however, as noted above, is that the stalker is none other than Moon Knight's brother, Rand. Sure, it's a coincidence, but if you can get past that one tiny issue, this is a fantastic story. We get the usual Moon Knight bits, such as a visit with Gena and Crawley, and Marlene serving as our hero's gal Friday. There's no Frenchie to be found here, but his presence isn't missed, nor is it required for the tale Moench is telling. In fact with the helicopter at his disposal, Frenchie would make tracking the Hatchet Man simpler for Moon Knight, no doubt the reason for his exclusion.

"Nights Born..." is a poignant and gritty Moon Knight classic, and easily my favorite story starring the character. The script is tight and the artwork is brilliant. Bill Sienkiewicz may not quite be ready to ink himself yet, but the Klaus Janson collaborations are truly moody and beautiful. If I have one complaint against the story, it's simply that I find the coda a little aimlessly muddled and unnecessary. But that's a tiny blemish on what is otherwise a masterpiece.



...Which was completely and utterly destroyed a decade-plus later when then-regular MOON KNIGHT writer Terry Kavanagh revealed that the Hatchet Man was an imposter, modified by plastic surgery and implanted with Rand Spector's memories, sacrificed to allow Rand to secretly join a cult, gain superpowers, and plot a way to kill his brother.

Ugh.

Seriously, Kavanagh. What did comics ever do to you?