Black Panther and the Agents of Wakanda #3

By Jim Zub, Lan Medina, Craig Yeung, Marcio Menyz, Federico Blee, Jorge Molina, and VC’s Joe Sabino

A new story arc begins in Black Panther and the Agents of Wakanda #3 and with this new story the cast of agents grows even bigger. A concern for this book was that it may get too many characters that it loses focus and while the characters are handled fine in this issue, it is starting to feel a little crowded. So is this fledgling title still worth following? Let’s find out as we follow these agents in a new story involving something odd going on with the moon.

Jim Zub starts out this issue with some necessary back story regarding the events of Avengers: No Surrender and who the Gardener is. After that, we start to get a little introduction of Gorilla-Man and Broo. Getting to know these two was surprisingly fun and the whole issue could have easily focused on the two. Though our time with Gorilla-Man and Broo is cut short and we switch back to the rest of the agents who are training a new recruit, Mockingbird. The rest of the issue then mainly focuses on Mockingbird, with some screen time for the Black Panther. This shift in focus on characters can be annoying in that we move around too much but thankfully Zub can write these characters well and we can have fun with whoever the focus is on at the time. 

As with the other two issues, the art by Lan Medina, Craig Yeung, Marcio Menyz, and Federico Blee is what really sells the Black Panther and the Agents of Wakanda title. The action scenes are particular are a treat to see with each issue. These action scenes always have a sense of flow within them by using various effects. The most effective being the blurriness we see when the moon erupts into a waves of weird tendrils. The blurred effect takes up two whole pages and the space is certainly used well to give us a feeling that these giant massive tendrils are causing such destruction and danger for the agents. Colors in the form of energy effects also really stand out in this issue. There is a lot of contrast of lights and darks that will make the purple energy in Black Panther’s suit stand out or any of the green energy effects dealing with the moon coming off as eerie and cool. One thing that should be given attention to is the expert framing and planning for each page. Every page in this issue looks as if all of the panels fit together and colors fit together as they continue onto the next page. If the page starts off with a panel with a lot of dark greens and black, we will slowly phase into muted reds that continue onto the following page.

 If this series could just focus on a few characters that we care about then it would be a great team book. Hopefully these first couple issues will help the creative team figure out who they want to keep around and give focus to as the series progresses.