Written by: Skottie Young
Art by: Skottie Young
Publisher: Marvel
Rocket Raccoon #4 picks up right where issue 3 ended, so Rocket is still being held at gunpoint while Groot stands helplessly, all tied up. Young throws us into the action immediately with some of his now signature art style—cool sci-fi weapons, tons of sound effects, and tongue-in-cheek words across panels (i.e. an arrow pointing at green goop; “not blood, promise”). I’m a huge fan of Young’s work, both interiors and those awesome variant covers he has been producing, so it comes as no surprise that I am thoroughly enjoying the art in this book.
While Bendis is having his own fun while writing the Guardians of the Galaxy team book, Young seems to enjoy just having this one small (pun intended) corner of the universe to play in. The story itself is fun, frantic, and engaging, like the art, if not a bit predictable at times. Rocket has been framed in this first arc, so we know that either A) Rocket has an evil doppelgänger, or B) someone is pretending to be like Rocket and dresses up like him, just to mess with him. I won’t give away what the reality is here, but suffice to say that these tropes can get repetitive when seen so often in our funny books. Which is a shame, because I want to love this book wholeheartedly, and right now I like it but that’s all.
I hope that since Young is only four issues into his run that we will start to see some other sides to Rocket and that his next adventure will be just as fun but with some higher stakes. While I don’t think this book is meant to be “heavy” or thought provoking, on the other side of the emotional spectrum we get a 7 page fight between Rocket and his ex-girlfriends. At $3.99, that’s about $1.33 worth of raccoon vs. girls, which seems like a lot to me, though your mileage may vary. Again, if you love Young’s pencils you’ll find a lot to love here. If you’re looking for a story that matters in the grand scheme of things, you may find this issue lacking. Rocket is a great character to have on a team, or always paired with Groot, because he can inject some humor and debauchery when needed. The question this series is asking though, inadvertently or not, is does a book need more than just humor and debauchery? Though countless Deadpool fans may disagree, I would argue “Yes.” A book needs more than that to survive, at least as far as an ongoing is concerned. As it stands, Rocket Raccoon may have been better off as a miniseries.
