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ABC > Episode Guide > L.o.E.G. > Vol. II #4

#4: All Creatures Great and Small   Writer: Alan Moore Artist: Kevin O'Neill Colors: Ben Dimagmaliw Lettering: William Oakley Design: Todd Klein Cover date: February 2003

Plot Summary:
Captain Nemo and Mr Hyde fight the Martian invaders on the river Thames. They destroy one of their tripods and save a little boy.

Meanwhile, traitor Hawley Griffin tries to explain to the Martians that they have to destroy Nemo's submarine.

Mina and Quatermain are in the woods, looking for a scientist. But they meet nobody except a very upset man called Teddy Prendrick. He tells them that he had met a man who can transform animals into humans (Prendrick is a character form H.G. Wells' 'The Island of Dr. Moreau'). The duo can't find the scientist, so they decide to stay in a guesthouse for the night. And there it happens: Mina Murray and Allan Quatermain have sex.

All the League members are getting more and more fragile characters, there is no real hero in the team: Griffin is a traitor, Nemo hates the people he's serving, Hyde is a sad and lonesome monster, Quatermain is a weak old man and Mina is suffering from the shadows of her past.

Comments:
This issue did hit the shelves very late, but it was well worth the wait! It's so far the best issue of Volume II. Alan Moore is a master of storytelling: effective jumps between the strands of the story, impressive characterization through few sentences, and a massive gain of pace and suspense.

The big surprise of this issue is of course the intimate action between Allan and Mina (which is told quite extensive and was received very controversially by the readers). I liked the fact that Moore handles this scene very ironically in the last caption which reads: "Gaze, children, on the unhappy fornicators in their sorry bed of sin and resolve to learn from their shameful example."

© 2003 LeGuy.
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