Captain America, The Bloodstone Hunt (AKA the Perils of Diamondback) Part 2

[kalindashepard]

First part is here http://scans-daily.dreamwidth.org/2889348.html?#cutid1

One cover & 5 2/3 pages from Captain America 358.


First, the cover. Cap in a deathtrap, always a good start, and a good representation of the first third of the issue, all spikes all the time.



So our story picks up with Cap descending deep into a cavern below NYC, tracking the signal from an emergency beacon. He finds the skeletons of some Mole people, and then encounters a series of booby traps. He weathers a storm of flying spikes from every direction, barely avoids falling into a pit of lava, encounters two falling doors threatening to trap him (spiked of course) and manages to escape by the skin of his teeth from a room with a dropping spiked ceiling and a spiked floor.

When he finally gets past all the death and sharp pointyness, he encounters this tableau.


I had to post this single panel simply because this is never explained or referenced again in the story arc. Is it a reference to another event? Another comic? A set up for a future story? Anybody?

Anyway, moving on. Cap finds what appears to be a bottomless pit, with a hole far above it that seems to lead to the surface. He descends into the pit and finds this.


The two travel back to Avengers Island to do some research. Well, Cap does research while Diamond moons over him and watches his butt.


Using the skull as a beacon they fly to the amazon basin and parachute out.

Remember girls, if you don’t lie about being able to do incredibly dangerous things like parachuting into trees, he won’t fall in love with you.

This turns out as well as one would expect, and she experiences some more self doubt.


Wow, high heels aren’t well suited to the amazon, who knew?




The Incas take them to a temple where they find that Batroc and crew & Zemo have been similarly overcome by guys with spears, and have been strapped onto a “Wheel of Death” Cap and Diamond are shot from behind with darts laced with curare, and the second chapter ends.

Will our heros escape? Will we find out how the Wheel of death works? Will Diamond get her costume torn more? Tune in next time to find out!

Comments

[arilou_skiff]

... "One dead dolphin"?

What...?

[squirle]

I remember what that bizarre scene is about! Actually, I remember stumbling upon their entry in the Appendix to the Handbook of the Marvel Universe, here :http://www.marvunapp.com/Appendix/conspira.htm

[kalindashepard]

Awesome! Thank you for the link. I figured it had to a reference to something, and the altar looked like the kind of place you'd put a gem that granted immortality, but the bodies were too decayed to have been killed by Batroc & crew.

It's actually kind of cool that Cap never finds out what was up with the bodies and altar, because why would he unless he runs into someone who's in the know? After awhile as a superhero I suppose you just get use to finding strange throne rooms and dead dolphins in your travels.

[icon_uk]

"Sigh.... another day, another probable cabalistic conspiracy from before the Big Bang concerning sentient crystalline entities."

"You ever think you're getting jaded Cap"

[tahngarth.livejournal.com]

Well, Ulysses was already dead by the time Bloodstone Hunt happened, so it would have been tough to find another person who could explain the Conspiracy. Heck, Ulysses himself didn't find out too much about them.

As for the "WTF", that's what Steve Gerber did best. RIP.

[wizardru]

I think most of this John Warner and Mark Gruenwald's deal. Steve Gerber came in to bat clean up for the last two issues of Bloodstone's story in Rampaging Hulk, but all of this craziness came from Warner originally and then Gruenwald afterwards.

[tahngarth.livejournal.com]

True enough on the Warner stuff. Though the resolution to the Bloodstone plot feels very typically Gerber to me. I don't even know anything about Warner.

[icon_uk]

Atlan the mystically empowered dolphin? Now HIM I want to see more of!

On the other hand Bubbles O'Day, the Bloodstone empowered stripper (Who can "floor an entire audience with her mind") is perhaps more of a longshot..."

[vitruvian23]

Hey, if Centurius is back (and he is, having been seen as a member of the Hood's crew multiple times), then any of that bunch are fair game, bodies in the panels above or no.

[midnightvoyager]

I kinda love how it seems that Cap is TOTALLY OBLIVIOUS to Diamondback's ladyboner for him.

[jarodrussell]

Diamondback reminds me of a comic book writer's limited impression of Vala Mal Doran.

[philippos42]

Gruenwald script, Dwyer pencils? Maybe? A friend of mine had these back in the day.

"Brazil's national language," Mark? You mean Portuguese?

[wizardru]

So, I just read Diamondback's entry on Wikipedia and....HOLEE CRAP.

What a tangled dang web. Of course her history is RAPEY. But I'm kind of stunned at the sheer amount of wackiness going on, here. I knew Cap had a lot going on back in the day, but I guess I had no idea how much.

[tahngarth.livejournal.com]

Before this spirals out of control into another rape discussion, I want to note that in the actual comics there is never any evidence that she is sexually assaulted.

She offers Trapster and Crossbones sexual favors in order to get what she wants, and in Crossbones' case it is with a great deal of reluctance. But still. Voluntary.

[recognitions]

I knew this was Gruenwald art just by looking.

You don't suppose Diamondback has a pack of Cerebus playing cards, do you?