The antepenultimate page (It's not often you get to use a word like that. If you've got it, you might as well use it.)
Things are finally calm. It is so calm that the only panel with background is the one where Mole Man is grieving over the loss of his moloids (alligator tears, it would seem to me, as he did not consider them worthy of being named--they were evidently his slaves). This may be one of the most plain and simple pages that Seth did, ever. After such a riot of action, counter action, and counter-counter action, finally here the crisis is resolved, the characters are relaxed, and the lack of background is just another sign of the fact that the story is over except for cleaning up.
But simple and calm does not mean thoughtless. Since the team worked together, all of them contributing skills and effort, each of them is shown in the top panels, side by side. But where they could have been lined up like actors taking a bow at the end of the performance, Seth gives them some action poses, different points of view, and in varied distances from the viewer. It's more subtle, more interesting, and tells more of a story.
The large close-up of Mole Man in the bottom panel leads to the postscript on the next page.
1 comment:
Interesting. It *is* an incredible simple page, for Seth. But it’s a great choice. A slight deceleration toward The End.
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