Marvel Double Shot #3: Review

Mar 2003

Jai Nitz, Chifuyu Sasaki

::: click cover to ENLARGE it :::

Story Name:

The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit

Review & Comments

Rating:

Marvel Double Shot #3 Review by Peter Silvestro (September 28, 2021)

Review: The first tale, with its manga-inspired art from the people who gave us AVATAR THE LAST AIRBENDER and a lot of Marvel titles featuring Power Pack, takes on a very surprising topic, one you would think would be too much for the confines of a comic book, but this brief series has been known to address this topic before (issue #1, story 2). There the look at faith was a bit dark but here it’s a bit more positive. Reed Richards is not the stereotypical scientific atheist one would expect but a surprisingly tolerant fellow who has no trouble reconciling science and religion. He is starting from the standard humanistic account of the origins of religion, discounting several faiths’ claim to have received divine revelation (despite the strictly Christian title to the story), which means Reed’s beliefs don’t rise much higher than the merely human but the theology debate involved is more than this comic can accommodate, so I’ll just express my gratitude that the subject was treated with sincerity, humility, and toleration. Marvel is said to have changed a lot since this time.

The Ant-Man story, on the other hand, dispenses with any difficult questions and just goes for the funny, at which is succeeds admirably. Fathers worrying about their daughters growing up too quickly has long been a comedy staple and tossing a superhero into the mix just gives it a bit of a new patina. And it is funny.

Comments: Cover by Joe Jusko, with the Ant-Man drawn by Darwyn Cooke and Mike Manley. Title of the first story is a description of the Trinity in Christian theology. The second title is a play on the pop song, “Who Let the Dogs Out?” by the Baha Men, which is also sung in the story. Gurihiru contributed to the art on the first story.

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Synopsis / Summary / Plot

Marvel Double Shot #3 Synopsis by Peter Silvestro

After watching a TV news report about a terrorist bombing, little Franklin Richards asks his father, Mr. Fantastic, about God. Reed uses his pseudo-reality synthesizer to give the boy an illustrated lecture on the supposed origins of religion and science and how some believe they are closely related while others believe they are opposites. Franklin then asks if his father believes in God. Reed does, citing Galactus (!) as evidence of a higher power that unites science and religion. He then calls love the bridge that connects science and religion. Reed describes his love for his family as proof God exists. Franklin then asks where babies come from; Reed passes that one on to Sue….

“Who Let the Dad Out?”
Writer: Sean McKeever. Pencils: Darwin Cooke. Inks: Mike Manley. Colors: Loughridge.
Synopsis: Scott Lang is worrying himself to death over his daughter Cassie’s first date. He conjures up all sorts of scenarios about a boy named “Stang” and this party she is going to. He also objects to her skimpy outfit. When Stang arrives, he is a normal eleven-year-old boy so Scott questions him and leaves with a threat. After they leave, he gets to thinking about the party games he played as a kid, panics, changes to Ant-Man and flies Mara (a winged ant) in pursuit. An accident drops him into a spider’s web on the lawn and brings him to the attention of the family dog. Spying on Cassie, he realizes he needs to trust her and goes back to playing with the dog.