Tweet
Jackboot & Ironheel #4
Released by: IDW Publishing
Released on: November 16th, 2016.
Written and Illustrated by: Max Millgate
Purchase From Amazon
“With the outbreak of WWII, Eddie Neale's life has been turned on its head. As a prisoner in Nazi castle 'Lungotz Luftzig' his dreams of being a footballer are a distant memory. His first valiant escape attempt fails and he is recaptured! In their formidable fortress however, not even the Nazi's are safe! Something supernatural has been awakened and even Kommandant Von-Kleist cannot stop the fear spreading through the ranks of his men like an unstoppable plague! An ancient legend tells of a doomed bell-maker and his obsessive creation of a giant bell, forged and forever cursed....in the name of the Devil!
Mother Superior's next plan has placed Sister Evangeline in mortal danger. Eddie has been incarcerated in Solitary Confinement Cell No. 9 and given the task of breaking into his cell Evangeline is discovered by a guard and is shot in the back! As she lay dying in our defiant heroes arms has all hope finally been lost....?â€
It all comes down to this!
Gunter is not happy that Evangeline is now a casualty of war. As he and other soldier carry her corpse out of Neale's cell, our hero manages to pilfer a Luger. The soldiers leave and Eddie takes out his frustrations on the ball they've left for him. He kicks it about the cell and then it hits a brick, opening up a secret passageway! He follows it down with only a lantern to guide his way, and eventually the passageway leads to a water way that takes him deep into an underground cavern.
In the cavern he finds a massive monolith made of ice - he sees something inside and smashes it out, discovering a hammer axe hanging on a wall with some writing carved into it that seems to tie things back to the bell. It isn't easy but he brings the hammer back to the castle grounds above. He makes his way to the bell tower, climbs the stairs and is promptly shot at by a tank and then attacked by a zombie - until he realizes he's not the tanks target, the massive Lovecraftian beast emerging from the lake is!
Has Eddie once again found himself in the wrong place at the wrong time or will he find a way out of this?
Max Millgate's darkly comic blend of WWII action and oddball monster mayhem comes to a more than satisfying conclusion with this fourth and final issue. It doesn't finish the way you expect it to but it definitely brings the story to a satisfying finish, particularly if you consider the arc that the character of Eddie Neale has travelled over the course of these four issues. Humor and horror are handed out in fairly equal doses but the story never loses sight of the point. This is lean, efficient storytelling done with some clever style. Millgate's artwork is also pretty great. Lots of detail is paid to not just the human characters but the inhuman characters as well. The monster designs are impressive and those creatures look great set against the World War II European backdrop.
Here's hoping we'll see more from Millgate sooner rather than later. He's got a lot of talent and if this series is anything to go off of, knows how to make some seriously entertaining and fun comic books.
