Another Marvel superhero appears in this series, this time it’s NIGHT THRASHER, a very 90’s hero if there ever was one (although he actually debuted in 1989, which technically makes him an 80’s hero, but I digress). For those who are not familiar with him, check out this profile on the WORLD OF BLACK HEROES blog. He’s basically a young, Black BATMAN with a mix of Iron Man thrown in.

It’s been a month since the events of the previous issue, and Jeff has been active in the community again as Meteor Man. First time we see him in action in this issue, he’s busting up a new crack house. Meanwhile, the gang the DC Players have been making drug and weapons deals in New York, which has drawn the attention of Night Thrasher, who confronts them there, and then travels to DC to track down their mysterious leader, “Third Power,” whom we learn is Solomon Minh, the man Armand Skyy hired last issue to find and kill Meteor Man.

While on separate patrols one night, Meteor Man and Night Thrasher collide. And after the brief obligatory superheroes-fight-then-team-up scene, they go bust up another DC Players crack house together, and are then confronted by Mihn, as the Third Power. He basically has the power to split himself into three identical men with various super powers, and they all attack the heroes. This fight ends on a cliffhanger in which things aren’t looking so good for Meteor Man…

In addition to all of the action there is a subplot in which Jeff is told that the music program at his school has been shut down, in large part due to all of his “extended absences”, and therefor he’s been fired. This is where things get a little confusing in relation to the film’s continuity, as Jeff’s identity as Meteor Man was public in his community, and he still doesn’t wear a mask in this series, yte his absences were due to him being Meteor Man, and it seems like his bosses at the school must not know that (or else  you’d suspect that they’d cut him some slack). It’s also mentioned that he just got dumped by “his girl, Stacy.” Now, as I said when I initially reviewed the Meteor Man comic-book adaptation, I suspect that writer Dwight D Coye was working off of an earlier draft of the screenplay than what was filmed. In the movie, Jeff was initially interested in a fellow school teacher named Stacy (played by Stephanie Williams), but she had a boyfriend named Malik (played by Sinbad). And the recurring joke was that Malik, who told Jeff he never had a Black girlfriend before, was comically over-the-top afrocentric. Non of this was even in the adaptation. Now, Stacy seemed to stay with Malik in the film, but in the end of the novelization of the movie (which I will get to reviewing eventually), Jeff’s newfound confidence causes him to ask her out in the end. So at the time Coye and co-writer Bertram B Hubbard were writing this miniseries, I guess they were still working from the original screenplay, not the film, and therefor were under the assumption that Jeff and Stacy would be in a relationship. Either way, she hadn’t been seen in this miniseries before, and isn’t seen or referenced again, so I don’t know what the point of that was.

Overall it’s a decent issue, although unlike with Spider-Man, I don’t know if Night Thrasher was really necessary here as, in my opinion, his presence doesn’t really add anything to the story. There was nothing here that Meteor Man shouldn’t have been able to handle on his own. Still, I guess, it just further cements Meteor Man in the Marvel Universe, so that’s a good thing. Robert Walker’s art is nice here, particularly when he draws Night Thrasher in action. Chacebook rating: 4 STARS

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