Doctor, Heal Thyself: Reviewing ‘Doctor Strange’ #10

In a Doctor and General Strange clash, there is only one force that can make a true difference: Wong. Get ready for a truly trippy affair, as the Agents of W.A.N.D. join the fray in the concluding chapter of this game-changing story arc.

Magical spoilers abound ahead, so beware.

The stage is set for what comes next in the transformative Doctor Strange #10 from Jed MacKay, Pasqual Ferry, Heather Moore, and Cory Petit. 

One thing that can be said about any MacKay story is that solutions to any issues that arise are never going to be fully expected. Once the resolution stands clear, even the simplest probably-should-have-been-staring-you-in-the-face answer ends up being a pleasant surprise. A zig following a zag that maybe made us think that the book would follow a zag with another zag.

In this case, it wasn’t magic or experience with magic that saved the day. We witnessed Doctor Strange take on dark powers in a dark deal, assuming that was the key to defeating the General. No, the true solution was, in fact, to be a doctor. The answer to trauma is not killing, but healing. Thanks to the arrival of Wong and the psychedelic Doctor Zee, they were able to confront the General with everything he lost in that war for the Vishanti.

No matter what, the core of MacKay’s work always comes back to the characters. What we know about them, what their roles are, and who they are as individuals. While magic is his focus, Doctor Strange is a doctor in heart and soul, and he uses that. Instead of some super prolonged battle, we get a trippy gorgeous emotional healing session that quickly ends the threat. In many books, this would feel like being short-changed, but not here.

It fits the story and the characters, staying true to the idea of character development over wanton action.

It also gives Ferry and Moore plenty of room to do what they do best, creating truly out-of-this-world, yet also grounded, gorgeous artwork.

These folks were truly meant to work on this book. I mean, just look at these first few pages appearing in the review. There is such emotional weight and depth to every page, littered with imagery, beyond what we could ever expect in reality. Trippy and colorful, hitting hard as it can.

I love how Ferry can move from a page that is a more common style of panels, right into various pages where the boundaries of the page or panels mean very little. Giant circles, polygons of varying shapes, tons or a little bit of negative space, black borders, and so much more. Each page has a personality and power of its own, a strong uniqueness that cannot be tamed. Even without Doctor Zee’s psychedelics in play, the magical elements of the story allowed us to be in this mind-bending space.

So many colors swirl around, from the wildly vibrant to the increasingly dark to the very light neutral. Moore brings everything together so smoothly, like a colorful orchestra. So many contrasting choices stand together on the page, without actually confronting one another. There is almost a watercolor or even stained-glass sort of feeling in some pages, where these pages would look gorgeous framed, and hung without necessary context.

One of the neat beats that stands out is the shift in colors as magical psychic surgery is occurring. They are naturally heavier and darker as the situation begins to unfold. As Doctor Strange performs his work, healing his foe/other self, they dramatically instantly shift to something far lighter because the darkness is being healed away.

Beyond the unbelievable imagery are very believable characters. Every bit of the emotion these characters experience is clear on the page, within their facial expressions, their body language, and movement. There is weight to everything on the page, none of it feels unnecessary or superfluous. None of it is simple though, with plenty of sharp rough angles in play that remind us of the darkness that is behind everything.

Sometimes there are moments where dialogue must be delivered in a story in very precise ways. To maximize whatever emotional impact is desired. Petit is someone who handles those moments so well, knowing how to allow everything to flow logically and powerfully. Words in single balloons spread out to create dramatic pauses, colorful borders that give words a bigger impact, words becoming distorted, and bursting from bubbles. All this and more allows the aforementioned beats of the story to hit even stronger than they might have if the words were just added in any old fashion.

Minor shifts to fonts and bubbles do so much to clarify key points in the story. There are ways to change tone or volume without really deeply altering either of those, but the best letterers know how much those things add. Creating natural-level speaking voices that are distinguishable instantly from the whispers or screams. Again, it reinforces the emotional impact a story needs.

Doctor Strange #10 is now available from Marvel Comics.