Blackjack Vol. 2

Grade:

The excellent adventures of Blackjack, the outlaw surgeon, continues with the collection of 9 stories. Like the first vol. the stories range from adventures to statments about our life and philosophies about what should be. I actually found the mix of stories to be better than the ones in vol. 1.

The characterization of Blackjack is strong, you never know what he will do next, though you know he always has some sort of good intention behind his very cold exterior. It is too bad the other main character Pinoco comes off much worse. While the character was interesting in the orginal story detailing how she was attacted to her sister as organs, then removed, Pinoco has lost the impact she had in that first story. The first two stories revolve around her and they are, to be quite honest, annoying. Her characterization of being a brat, who wants everything and completely ignores anything anyone else tells her gets old very fast. She was more of a backround character in vol. 1, and after reading her stories in vol. 2, the backround is where she should have stayed. The second story is the reason the book is 4 stars not 4 1/2.

Starting with story 3, everything starts clicking. The adventure, science, and tense situations that were in vol. 1 are back, and even better than before. Story six, Dingoes, is quite good, probably the best in the book, although Assembly Line Care is a close second.

If you can get past the first two stories, you will find a lot to like in this BlackJack collection. Hopefully Viz wil release a vol. 3, maybe with a little, well a lot, less Penoco.