Grayhawk totally Winter-soldiered the magic green fairy!
If you did NOT see that one coming… and you made any sort of audible exclamation when you got to the bottom third of this page… go ahead and send me $1 using that Paypal Donate link on the left. Accepted “audible exclamations” include but are not limited to:
“Holy Crap!”
“No way!”
“Whuuuu?!”
“Awww, yeah..!”
“Oh no he dint!”
I had this idea a long while back for how Kickman and Grayhawk could possibly defeat the Justice Rangers. Implanting hypnotic suggestions to take command of the magic green fairy that is the source of Green Ring’s powers…? Bullseye! I actually almost scrapped this entire strategy after I started the chapter and was going to have to re-think how this battle played out. Why? Because almost all of these heroes here were mind-linked together for about a month while they were strategizing how to defeat Superior Man… and there’s no way that Grayhawk would have been able to hide this from everyone else. Then I realized, Grayhawk actually did have possession of the fairy and was effectively the interim Green Ring for an indeterminate amount of time AFTER the battle against Superior Man, so he probably had weeks to install his little mind-control suggestion while the real Green Ring was hurtling through space.
Whew! Plot saved.
This page was drawn and uploaded from Leesburg, Florida where I am taking care of this handsome fellow… Dobby the Doberman.
It was surprisingly hard to get a selfie with him.
…….. (sound of jaw dropping)
YEAH!!!!!!!
That’s the reaction I was looking for
So who’s going to rescue Green Ring? (He’s a good guy)
And I still want to see Cecil (Alexander the 1st) with a cat in his lap while conducting business.*
*OK, I just want another appearance of Murder Cat. (Can characters cross strips like that??)
What kind of a cat? Classic white kind Blofeld-style or an overfed striped one akin to M.A.D. cat? Because I don’t think he could impersonate Vito Corleone, so that cat option is out.
Any flier! (including the shadow guy!) But if Luthor’s quick and if the mooks can run electricity through the targeting lasers (not impossible) he can disrupt the rescue, kill a justice ranger, and frame Team Kick in one shot.
…he can also hang back, and leak the footage to discredit the Justice Rangers- there’s no way for them to prove (even to themselves, if the Green Fairy forgot) they’re free of mind control.
Uh-oh. Archive is channeling his inner arch-villain…
Just trying to keep up!
The new team has a shortage of fliers. Blue Bat’s flight gear was EMPed, which leaves Sparta. Blue Streak can’t make a whirlwind, but Jade Detective might be able to but binding an air spirit takes so much time… Nah, he’s done for.
Oh, also Murder Cat is currently serving 7 to 10 years for Canaricide. It’s in cat years so he’ll be out in 14 months.
Obviously there were only birds or bird lovers on that jury, no cats or cat lovers..*
*It’s just what cats Do. (well, good cats not the worthless kind)
One risky thing in all this is Cecil now knows about this hypnotic command. Even if this one cannot be used by him (I assume Matt was careful enough to make it exclusive to himself), the vulnerability is exposed and can be potentially exploited in the future. This is probably something he wants out of this fight: Cecil knows that Grayhawk needs to use all the vulnerabilities of the New Justice Rangers in order to win and during the fight Cecil can get all that vital intel for free.
Exactly. Cecil is playing the long game.
Spending weeks with a teammate only to turn around and mind control her the second the threat’s gone? That’s the coldest thing I’ve seen in the strip.
It’s a good thing Grayhawk is a good guy…
Is he though…?
Holy cats well done!!!
Fearless, er, SUPREME Leader* declared him, and Kickman I guess, a villain so there’s that.
*the guy should know.