Customer Reviews

The Pulse, Vol. 2: Secret War

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4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
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OK, First thing's first, this is a tie in. It's a tie in to the Marvel's new Secret Wars story arc, and that's it's biggest problem.

Bendis seems to get a lot of things right regarding Jessica in this that may have let down readers of Alias from the previous Pulse book, but, the trade off is that this story has the feel of those old star trek episodes that excluded the main characters with the intention of presenting a different perspective on the universe. You get the feeling things are going on without any idea what they relate to, but, by the end, the book never does clear this up.

As an Alias mini-series tie in to Secret Wars, this might have been an acceptable book, but as it stands, it's a mess. That being said if you're a fan of Alias, you've probably already picked this up, but if you're only experiance with Jessica Jones is the previous Pulse TPB and you haven't read the new Secret Wars series, then this is probably not the book for you.

I concur with the previous reviewer, Michael Schwarz. I picked up this book because I had read the original "Pulse" trade paperback and enjoyed it. But this book, as a stand alone collection, is not nearly as enjoyable. It's clearly a follow up to two other collected Marvel stories: "The Secret War" and "Alias" -more so than the original "Pulse" TPB. I am a fan of Brent Anderson, and his art here is it's usual excellent quality!

I have not yet read "The Secret War" or "Alias" collections, but now I'm going to check them out. Before you read this title, you may wish to consider doing the same. But even then, this collection seems like little more than just a follow up to a previous story. Skipping it probably won't make much of a difference.

When I first read this, I was pretty lost because I hadn't been following Marvel's "Secret War" mini-series. Now that the eternally delayed final issue of "Secret War" has finally been released, I got the rest of the issues and caught up. This book shows "SW" from Jessica Jones point of view. She's an investigative reporter, former super-hero, and Luke Cage's baby-mama. She's frustrated and angry that she can't figure out what's happening. Well we can't either!

Until now, of course. Check out the comic issues of Secret War (or wait for the graphic novel version) BEFORE reading this. I have no idea why they released this companion book so far ahead of the main story.

The best part about this book is the dark and moody artwork of Anderson and Lark. It's a huge improvement over Bagley's cartoon-y style in Vol. 1. His stuff works well in lighter books like "Ultimate Spider-man," but I'm glad someone at Marvel realized it doesn't work in this title. Jessica finally gets the hard edge that she deserves in Vol. 2. Die-hard fans from her "Alias" days will be pleased.

Following on from Pulse Vol 1, this vol 2 is a real let-down. As this is tied in with a Secret War Theme running in other Marvel titles, there is no further resolution of what this Secret War is about except that Nick Fury and SHIELD were responsible for Luke Cage to be injured by a mysterious woman. The whole volume centres on Jessica's on-going pregnancy and her hysterical search in trying to locate Luke Cage. The drawings are pretty ambiguous in showing locations and events. The whole point appears to be a muddled attempt to portray scenes of confusion.