Immortal Hulk #5: The Roaring Beast

The Immortal Hulk #5, guest starring Alpha Flight’s Sasquatch, unleashes the monsters in a brutal, bloody battle. The truth will come out as the victor triumphs and it won’t be the Immortal Hulk! In many quest stories, “the other” is a different person from the hero who tries to deflect the noble efforts of the hero. As fans, we are familiar with the concept that Hulk consists of all of Banner’s desires, passions, and vices; and therefore, is twisted with evil and goodness of humanity. This issue takes the reader deeper into the interrelation of the unconscious and conscious mental and emotional forces that determine personality and motivation.

Bruce Banner’s gamma-powered alter-ego experiences a new level of horror based on an old evil, which Walter Langkowski, aka Sasquatch relates to a similar battle. Man’s duality is intriguing to the readers, and therefore; we explore it on a fresh level in this issue. Al Ewing begins Immortal Hulk #5 with articulating Langkowski/Sasquatch history and the recent dramatic events. Ewing reference the possession of Tanaraq that lead to the “death” of Sasquatch. Tanaraq has about 8 appearances throughout our comic book history. For the most intriguing fans, refer to Alpha Flight, Vol1, #23.

Al Ewing conveys such excitement each month with his ability to articulate themes with such a beautiful, horrific and graceful style. Each issue of Immortal Hulk, especially #5, Ewing clearly has done his homework to provide top-notch storytelling. He leads the reader with a mixture of Jackel/Hide relations to Banner/Hulk and Langkowski/Sasquatch. The most important is how well Ewing placed clues through this issue that the reader may not pick up on until the very last page.

Ewing provides an awesome twist that blows my mind! The emotions, the fear of the green gamma powerhouse are so psychological and impactful. No one scares the Hulk, except someone who really @#$% him up! No, I am not referring to Thanos from the Avengers: Infinity Wars movie adaption. Keep in mind what I said previously between Hulk and banner.

Many psychology research papers often note that a form of trauma is the key factor in a personality disorder. There are two people in every mirror. There’s the one you can see and there’s “the other” one. The one you don’t want to. “My devil had been long caged, he came out roaring.” – Robert Louis Stevenson. Ewing uses these themes with the traumatic experiences that Bruce/Hulk and Langkowski/Sasquatch has experienced to provide a fresh new direction for longtime fans as well as new readers. I am not going to give out any major spoilers as you just have to get this book and see for yourself!

Joe Bennett, Ruy Jose, and Paul Mounts continue to provide a strong horror theme art. The reader easily can relate and put themselves in each character’s shoes. These creative teams use numerous close-up shots to give the reader a real-world emotional feeling that connects with the ominous tones throughout the story. The colors enhance the details and excitement of the story.