CAPTAIN ULTIMATE #5

WRITERS: Benjamin Bailey & Joey Esposito
ARTIST: Boy “Boykoesh” Akkerman
COLORS: Ed Ryzowski
LETTERS: Adam O. Pruett
PUBLISHER: Monkeybrain Comics

Previously: CAPTAIN ULTIMATE #4

This issue opens in Milo’s classroom, they’re having a Show And Tell presentation. We see Milo’s classmate Lisa showing the class pictures she’s drawn from her homemade Captain Ultimate comic-book, retelling his adventures from previous issues. Next up is Milo, who decides to show off his new dog, Ulti-Mutt, who comes crashing through the wall. Next up is an unnamed girl, who shows off a a plastic case containing “mystical ooze” that her father, who happens to the Grim Avenger, from the Super Revenging Society, first introduced in Captain Ultimate #1. Grim Avengers is actually in the class, sitting in the back with teammate Venus De Muscles, whom we discovered in last issue is Lisa’s sister. Against her father’s warning, the girl takes the lid off the case, and the mystical ooze jumps out splashing against some posters of the alphabet on the walls, bringing the letters to life.

Giant blocks of letters jump off the wall and start attacking the kids, Grim Avenger and Venus try to fight them, and then Captain Ultimate arrives. Cap helps the kids fight the “Sentient Ninja Alphabet”, but when the letters have them surrounded, Cap comes up with a challenge for them: the kids will take a spelling test and if they all get an “A”, they’ll stop fighting and help repair the damage to the school, and if not Cap will let the Alphabet go without trying to stop them. The alphabet agrees and the kids, and Captain Ultimate, take the test.

I won’t spoil the ending. Once again, this is a fun little story. A nice adventurous and educational story for children, with nice cartoonish illustration. Very nice work by this creative team.

This issue also contains some extras in the back. Benjamin Baily writes a short article about how he came up with the idea for the Sentient Ninja Alphabet. Then they give a behind the scenes look at how this series is made. We get a look at a written script page from issue #1, then a look at the early penciled version of that page, and then the inked and colored versions, giving us a step-by-step tutorial of the creative process. That was pretty cool.