Sunday, December 5, 2010

Secret Invasion – Inhumans | Comics

Black Bolt is revealed to be a Skrull and Queen Medusa set out to find former king of Inhumans alongside Royal Family members.

To a group of young Inhumans, story of Kree-Skrull War and a tale of enmity between those alien races were being told by Karnak. Whereas Skrulls were blessed with evolution, Kree couldn't evolve any further and therefore set to experiment that gave birth to their race and they have strength of family bond that makes them strong.

Director of S.H.I.E.L.D., Tony Stark reaches out to Queen Medusa and her cousin Crystal to show them the Skrull corpse that was posing as Black Bolt. He admits that even he couldn't tell who it was and she angrily states that she is aware of secret meetings on Earth her husband frequently attends to but none is sure when he was switched.

Iron Man urges her that they all should prepare to fight a great looming threat but she simply walks away with the corpse. On Attilan, she presents it in front of Genetics Council and declares that they all are at war. She wants to bring her husband back at once but his brother Maximus suggests that Skrulls have most likely killed him.

This news didn't sit well with many, particularly with Gorgon who thinks Karnak could be an imposter as he sees things for what they truly are and he somehow couldn't detect these shape-shifting aliens among them. However, it took a little bit of convincing from Triton for him to eventually calm down and let his cousin go.

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Secret Invasion – Inhumans | Comics

That night, Medusa saw a shadow in her quarters that she thought to be Blackagar Boltagon but turns out to be a Skrull. She takes down her attacker and subjected him to vicious torture in Terrigen chambers for answers. More of their sleeper agents start attacking Attilan and their populace only to meet with serious resistance.

Medusa then leads a cavalry of Crystal, Gorgon, Karnak, Lockjaw and Triton into space to rescue her husband. Leaving their people to fend themselves, members of Royal Family heads to uncharted territory and arrives at Kree space. Medusa asks for help from Ronan the Accuser to find Blackagar but he is reluctant for an alliance.

Since they already lost to Skrulls, he is less interest in helping them but agrees to help them on condition of Crystal becoming his bride. Inhuman Queen accepts his terms despite objections from her sister. Karnak managed to work out a crack in Skrull communications and asks his family to split up in order to exploit its weaknesses.

Crystal and Medusa visits Earth to get a Skrull captive from Thundra but ended up fighting each other over their differences. Gorgon and Karnak are sent to Rigel 3 for retrieving a recording android to get necessary algorithm. Triton goes to watery planet Pelagia to find a secret beacon and also tackle an entire legion of its inhabitants.

Elsewhere in deep space, a wounded Black Bolt appears to be in captivity and a Skrull scientist working on using his powerful voice as a weapon for Skrull Empire. To learn more of his powers and invoke emotion within him, they reveal capturing his son Ahura as well, who is under care of a Skrull with powers of Emma Frost and Jean Grey.

His handler tries to locate what makes his emotion click and finds it in his queen who has been living with Black Bolt impostor. Held aboard warship Ryb'ik, Blackagar is being readied up to use his voice to destroy Attilan with a giant amplifier device.

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Secret Invasion – Inhumans 01

Secret Invasion – Inhumans 02

Secret Invasion – Inhumans 03

Secret Invasion – Inhumans 04

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Secret Invasion – Inhumans

With "Secret Invasion" crossover event taking over Marvel Universe, even Inhumans are not left out from taking part and a four-part limited series is conceived by writer Joe Pokaski (Ultimatum – March On Ultimatum, Ultimatum – X-Men/Fantastic Four) and artist Tom Raney (Black Widow – Deadly Origin, Dark Reign – Hawkeye).

Though Inhumans typically stay out of Earthly affairs but Skrulls have reached for them directly and replaced their leader Black Bolt. They had a plan to use him as a weapon to destroy his own people and then possibly against heroes of Earth.

Sometime after events of "Silent War", Blackagar was taken captive by an ambush when he was going to meet his friends in Illuminati and is replaced by an imposter. Then Hulk returned from his exile in space and attacked him. "World War Hulk" almost blew up cover of his replacement but it survived and become very close to Medusa.

For long, Black Bolt impersonator would not reveal its true self to anyone and play along until Iron Man would bring corpse of Elektra-Skrull to show off fellow Illuminati members (New Avengers – Illuminati). Although it took some efforts from the heroes but they successfully managed to kill it by impaling on a giant slab of rock.
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Saturday, December 4, 2010

Final Crisis | Comics

The Fourth World is diminished and "Death of the New Gods" did not stop the eternal war between Apokolips and New Genesis. Darkseid travels to time after his final conflict with New Gods and upon gaining Anti-Life Equation, he reaches Earth. His consciousness takes abode in a human body that starts running "Dark Side Club" in Blüdhaven. He becomes a leader of a criminal gang and going by the name "Boss Dark Side".  While investigating a case of a few missing kids, Detective Dan Turpin finds a dying Orion and sky turns red.

Green Lantern, Hal Jordan and John Stewart go to the docs for inspection of the crime scene and alert Guardians of the Universe about this incident. It is eventually discovered that a radiated bullet was fired backwards from future to kill Orion by an anonymous person. Batman and Green Lantern, Alan Scott gets engaged in an exploration regarding this murder mystery that puts them both out of picture for a while. Doctor Light and Mirror Master attacked the League of Titans to obtain Metron's Mobius Chair for Libra.

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Final Crisis | Comics

Libra, an agent and minion of Darkseid, is sent to escort escaped villains from prison planet "Salvation Run" to re-form Secret Society of Super Villains. He managed to capture and then murder Justice League member Martian Manhunter by burning him alive upon encountering him during his operation. Dan Turpin kept looking for answers, leading him to Boss Dark Side and his consciousness took over Turpin's body. Nix Uotan, the Monitor of Earth-51 is standing a trial and Multiversal race of Monitors sentenced him a human existence on New Earth, while this helps Solomon's own agenda to progress.

To face the fallen Monitor Dax Novu, Superman and his alternate-selves were called in for help. Dax would become Mandrakk the Dark Monitor and he is a threat because he will feed off the Multiverse itself like celestial parasites. Looking for Secret Society's hideout, The Flashes Jay Garrick and Wally West finds Mobius Chair, which opens a Boom Tube. They witness as the Radion Bullet comes through that portal, followed by Barry Allen and Black Racer on his tail. Frankenstein leads a S.H.A.D.E. strike team at Dark Side Club, while the Evil Factory in Blüdhaven was preparing a body for Kalibak.

Wonder Woman ran into Mary Marvel, who turned evil and exposed her to Morticoccus virus. With help of Darkseid's much desired "Anti-Life Equation", a major change happens worldwide when he released it over Internet. Seeing this, The Dark Knight decides to use the radiation bullet to finally take down God of Evil by breaking his Oath against using guns for a greater good. He does so but only mortally wounding the Dark God before being blasted with his powerful Omega Beams that apparently disintegrated him on spot.

For more information on Final Crisis crossover event, you can check out these links below.

Final Crisis (Comics) Wikipedia


Final Crisis (Comics) DC Wikia


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Oblivion Across Multiverse

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Final Crisis 01


Final Crisis 02


Final Crisis 03


Final Crisis 04


Final Crisis 05


Final Crisis 06


Final Crisis 07


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Final Crisis (Softcover)


Final Crisis (Hardcover)


Absolute Final Crisis


"Final Crisis" is a follow-up crossover comic-book event to "Infinite Crisis", concluded from its prequel and seemingly the last of line of Crisis titled events by DC Comics. This event took place in 2008, when writer Grant Morrison (All-Star Superman, Doom Patrol) came up with the core idea of this story along with artists Carlos Pacheco (Bishop, Inhumans) and Doug Mahnke (Justice League Elite, Major Bummer) to envision the plot. Major characters from DC Universe like Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman remained as primary focus of the story as well as threats as great as Darkseid and Mandrakk the Dark Monitor.

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A Dark Demise

Even today, "Final Crisis" is still considered as one of the most important crossover events of DC Comics in modern era that has changed major status-quo of Multiverse timeline with demise of a few popular protagonists and it is the last major event which took place before the biblical "Blackest Night" event. Though these events took place in the New Earth reality, following the reality-altering "Flashpoint" event, "Final Crisis" has been referenced a couple of time in The New 52 continuity. It also suggests that all major events does takes place in all different realities with a slight variation of outcome for each one.
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Wednesday, November 17, 2010

The Walking Dead – Here We Remain | Comics

After the bloody savage massacre at the prison led by the tyrannous manic known as The Governor with Woodbury forces, which did not go as planned, Rick Grimes narrowly escaped from the prison along with Carl with their lives in hand, also ridden with guilt over Lori and Judith. The group is shattered, most of them are killed in the battle and they don’t even know where the other survivors of the group are now.

After a couple of day’s worth of journey on foot they reach to a forest where they were looking for some shelter and they stumble upon a small, empty town. When attacked by a Zombie in a nearby store, Rick was barely able to handle it with his axe and Carl managed to kill the Zombie after some struggle while also looking for supplies. Soon, they took shelter in a nearby house where Rick takes a huge dosage of antibiotics for his bullet wound and fades.

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The Walking Dead – Here We Remain | Comics

At one point Carl thought that Rick is dead when he had not responded for long but found him unconscious from the drug overdose for his bullet wound. He even considered shooting Rick thinking that he is reanimating but then stopped as he saw his father breathe. After single handedly killing three Walkers banging outside of the door at once all by himself, Carl realized that he is his own man and doesn’t need to hide in his father’s shadow anymore.

He blames Rick for the death of his mother and baby sister as well as the entire group of friends they had back at the prison. Rick however doesn't hear any of this and momentarily wakes up and requests Carl to stay inside. After a few days of rest, he gets better and unexpectedly hears a telephone ringing which he answers to have a conversation with a woman who belongs to a larger group. Rick and Carl find an unknown suicidal survivor who is ravaged by Walkers and left a load of supplies behind.

Carl was surprisingly attacked by a Walker when Rick was trying to teach him to survive on his own but Michonne showed up to help. Glenn and Maggie Greene are found, who are staying along with Dale, Andrea, Ben, Billy and Sophia in their farm. Soon, they all meet three new survivors; Abraham Ford, Rosita Espinosa and Eugene Porter who are heading to Washington, D.C. with a mission to stop the apocalypse for good.

For more information on The Walking Dead – Here We Remain storyline, you can check out the link below.

The Walking Dead – Here We Remain (Comics) Wikia

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Carl Takes Down Walkers

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The Walking Dead 49

The Walking Dead 50

The Walking Dead 51

The Walking Dead 52

The Walking Dead 53

The Walking Dead 54

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The Walking Dead Vol 09 – Here We Remain

After the unexpected tragedy in the previous storyline “Made to Suffer”, The Walking Dead chronicles is succeeded by “Here We Remain” arc that took place in the issues #49-54 of the monthly ongoing series. As always, the story is cooked up by writer/creator Robert Kirkman (Battle Pope, Haunt) and artist Charlie Adlard (Judge Dredd, The X-Files). This one marks the eighth time these creator duo of Kirkman and Adlard has worked on a storyline for the acclaimed Image Comics series.

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Survivors With A Mission

Many aspects of this storyline were adapted into the Season 4 of AMC's hit TV series The Walking Dead, especially the introduction of Abraham Ford, Rosita Espinosa and Eugene Porter's character to the TWD Universe. Though the introduction part happened on the second half of Season 4, because the first half of the season was entirely focused on the conflict with The Governer that has led the story at this point. This story takes us to "What We Become" arc up next where the survivors face more undead adventures in this post-apocalyptic world.
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Monday, November 15, 2010

Secret Invasion | Comics

Skrulls have been planning to invade Earth for long and launches a "Secret Invasion" to replace all heroes with imposters!

For ages, Earth has been a major target of invasion by many alien cultures and races, including Skrulls. However, each time they attempt for assault has been successfully prevented by various superhero groups, most notably Fantastic Four. Nevertheless, they still believed the planet is rightfully theirs because of an ancient prophecy.

After Earth has survived Kree-Skrull War, a group of heroes formed The Illuminati to repel such attack in future and traveled to their homeworld, Tarnax IV to warn them not to make any further moves against Earth but not only their warnings are ignored, they captured and tortured the group before they managed to flee.

Emperor Dorrek VII ordered his men to create a new breed of Super-Skrulls for an invasion. He was warned by Princess Veranke of a prophecy but she and her followers of Dard'van religious cult were all banished to a distant planet. Her words came true in later years as Galactus decimated Skrull homeworld during Annihilation War.

Without a planet of their own and nowhere to go, surviving Skrulls have sought Veranke out and elect her as their new Skrull Empress, who planned an invasion on Earth. They slowly start replacing their agents among super-human community before "House of M" and Veranke posed herself as Spider-Woman to join New Avengers.

After "Death of Captain America" and Civil War coming to an end, they infiltrated every group of 50-State Initiative. With Scarlet Witch thinning out mutant population and Thor being dead, all they had to worry about was Doctor Strange and Sentry. World War Hulk took care of Hulk and Nick Fury went underground following Secret War.

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Secret Invasion | Comics

Things became more evident when Elektra is killed by Echo in a battle against New Avengers, she is revealed to be a Skrull and Spider-Woman informed Iron Man about this. Then Illuminati member Black Bolt of Inhumans came out as another Super-Skrull in disguise that fought all of its teammates before being killed by Prince Namor.

Tony Stark brought in Henry Pym and Reed Richards to examine the corpse of Elektra-Skrull to find out how to detect them as they are prone to magic, mutant powers and even technological scans. He then is called by Agent Brand of S.W.O.R.D. to inform about a Skrull ship crash-landing on Savage Land and leaves immediately.

Both teams of Mighty Avengers and New Avengers reached to crash site, where they see their counterparts from 1970 coming out of Skrull ship. At that exact moment, an imposter Dum Dum Dugan blows up S.W.O.R.D. headquarters and Iron Man armor starts malfunctioning due to an alien virus being uploaded to his mainframe.

As Tony collapses down, S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier lost control and Commander Maria Hill ordered everyone out. Another breakout at Raft occurs, freeing villains like Armadillo, Doctor Doom, Mandrill and Shockwave. Baxter Building of Fantastic Four gets sucked into a large portal of Negative Zone by a Skrull agent disguised as Susan Storm.

When Mister Fantastic finally figured out how Skrulls have managed to become undetectable, Hank Pym shot him with a laser weapon. Asking for help from the void of space, Agent Brand sees invasion fleet of Skrulls heading towards Earth.

Ares realizes this to be a trap and advises his fellow heroes to head for mainland but things quickly got heated between them. Two opposing sides assembled in Savage Land engage in a massive brawl that is soon broke up by a rampaging dinosaur. Tony gets busy to rebuild his armor in Mutate Citadel and sends Ms. Marvel away to fight.

A group of Super-Skrulls arrives at Manhattan and only members of Young Avengers were there to face them. Meanwhile, Fury has been assembling a team of new Howling Commandos and joins battle to turn its tide. As things starts getting intense, a certain God of Thunder appears out of nowhere along with a Star-Spangled Avenger.

For more information on Secret Invasion crossover, you can check out these links below.

Secret Invasion (Comics) Wikipedia


Secret Invasion (Comics) Marvel Wikia


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Skrull Impostors Taking Over

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Secret Invasion 01


Secret Invasion 02


Secret Invasion 03


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Secret Invasion – The Infiltration


Secret Invasion – Who Do You Trust?


Secret Invasion – Home Invasion

Secret Invasion (Softcover)

Secret Invasion (Hardcover)

Several years in making, "Secret Invasion" is a major Marvel Comics crossover event that is collected in an eight issue limited series by writer Brian Michael Bendis (Uncanny X-Men – Revolution, Uncanny X-Men – The Omega Mutant) and artist Leinil Francis Yu (New Avengers – Revolution, New Avengers – The Trust), published in 2008.

A number of mini-series and monthly ongoing series like Avengers – The Initiative, Black Panther, Captain Britain and MI-13, Deadpool, Guardians of the Galaxy, Incredible Hercules, Iron Man, Mighty Avengers, Ms. Marvel, New Avengers, New Warriors, Nova, Punisher War Journal, She-Hulk, Thunderbolts and X-Factor served as tie-in.

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An Event of Cosmic Relevance

Bendis actually worked on a lot of those interconnected books and it all finally comes together in the end. Building up a subplot from Kree-Skrull War to an encounter in Tarnax IV and then their destruction before setting sights on Earth again, all of that is explored in "New Avengers – Illuminati" five-part limited series from earlier.

A power dynamic that was shifted during Civil War was heavily manipulated by Skrulls and it took life of some characters. Many who returned among friends and family are having trouble coping with a world that sees them as impostors.

Aside from many fractions of Earth heroes, The Hood lead his criminal gang battling against invading aliens and even Norman Osborn has participated with his Thunderbolts team. When Skrulls were all defeated for good, another great threat slowly starts arising from shadows and a "Dark Reign" is ushered, leading to another event.
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Monday, November 1, 2010

Amazing Spider-Man – New Ways to Die | Comics

Spider-Man faces a new goblin Menace while being hunted down by Norman Osborn and his Thunderbolts.

For long, Peter Parker has been fighting crime as the Amazing Spider-Man and selling his own photos to J. Jonah Jameson at Daily Bugle. Even though JJJ was bashing his alter-ego, he was okay with the paycheck but ever since Dexter Bennett became his new boss, he has been feeling like being forced to cross a line and so, he quit the job.

Lately, he has faced a new goblin named Menace, who was vandalizing campaign ads for mayoral candidate Bill Hollister and had a run-in with him. They exchanged blows and then the hero is left under rubbles as it escaped. He sees a wave of people coming out of that building and takes some photos for the sake of a possible news story.

Since Dexter Bennett had him blacklisted at every paper in town, he goes to the office of Front Line, an independent newspaper ran by Ben Urich. They assume it to be an illegal sweatshop upon looking at the photos, even found links to it with another mayoral candidate Randall Crowne and they published a piece on him the next day.

Worried about his campaign, Crowne calls in his old friend who is the new sheriff in town, Norman Osborn and former super-villain Green Goblin. They agreed to a deal that Osborn will bring his parade of goons in Thunderbolts to apprehend the web-slinger. Plus, there is a story of a "Spider-Tracer Killer", which really makes it all easy to follow.

Bennett from DB sends Betty Brant to investigate a rumor of terminally ill patients getting miraculously healed in the homeless shelter at F.E.A.S.T. Center ran by billionaire Martin Li. She finds cancer patient and former host of Venom symbiote Eddie Brock residing there as a volunteer ever since Li has offered him a second chance at life.

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Amazing Spider Man – New Ways To Die | Comics

To capture Spider-Man, who is now a fugitive with murder acquisitions, Osborn led a raid on the apartment of Peter Parker with Radioactive Man, Songbird and Venom from his Dark Avengers team to interrogate him about how to contact the wall-crawler as he keeps taking his photos for years and must have some means to contact him.

Even though Os-Man has no idea about Parker secretly being the Webhead he is looking for, he suspects they have some sort of working relationship. However, Normie had to leave Pete alone upon the arrival of his policeman roommate Vin Gonzales. Meanwhile, Eddie has discovered that he's been miraculously cured of his cancer.

Director Osborn sends his Thunderbolts team looking for Spider-Man over the city but the hero sneaks into his lair to confront the madman after taking down his security officials and webbing up Bullseye. When he hears Mac Gargan heading to F.E.A.S.T. Center looking for him, Spidey immediately rushes after the maniac to save Aunt May.

Gargan ran into Brock there and the latter suddenly transforms into Anti-Venom in response to the presence of a Venom symbiote nearby when it tried to bond with him again. Brock starts attacking both Venom and Spidey at the same time but ultimately concentrating on the former to cure him off his symbiote, considering it a plague on humanity.

Brock then teams up with the wall-crawler to take down rest of the Thunderbolts, who were eagerly waiting to get a piece of them. From a nearby roof, Osborn was observing the fight and then has a run-in with Menace, who comes at him out of nowhere but the former goblin quickly turn things around into his favor and throw off the attacker.

He then calls of Songbird and the other with the de-powered Gargan and back at Oscorp, he produces a counter formula using Anti-Venom's white symbiote substance. He also reverse engineered a targeting system using Peter Parker's camera from the roof for his henchmen to have a lock on Spider-Man's chest and shoot him down.

While sorting out personal issues regarding his girlfriend Lily Hollister and her father Bill being hospitalized after an attack from Menace, Harry Osborn finds out that his father has not changed to normal at all and is back in his goblin persona. Each with their own goal in mind, Anti-Venom and Spider-Man teams up to take the fight to enemy.

anti venom vs venom marvel comics
Anti-Venom Vs. Venom

For more information on Amazing Spider-Man – New Ways to Die storyline, you can check out these links below.

Amazing Spider-Man – New Ways to Die (Comics) Wikipedia

Amazing Spider-Man – New Ways to Die (Comics) Wikia

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Amazing Spider-Man 568

Amazing Spider-Man 569

Amazing Spider-Man 570

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Amazing Spider-Man 572

Amazing Spider-Man 573

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Amazing Spider-Man – New Ways to Die (Softcover)

Amazing Spider-Man – New Ways to Die (Hardcover)

"New Ways to Die" is a six part comic-book storyline that took place in Amazing Spider-Man monthly ongoing series from Marvel Comics in 2008, collecting issues #568-573. Writer Dan Slott (She-Hulk, Silver Surfer) and Mark Waid (Daredevil, Fantastic Four) collaborated with artist John Romita Jr. (Avengers Vs. X-Men, World War Hulk) on this one.

Eddie Brock is no longer Venom and earlier, he was diagnosed with cancer (Spectacular Spider-Man – The Hunger). It happened because of his long exposure to the symbiote and it then chose former Scorpion, Mac Gargan as the newest host. Eddie has become Anti-Venom, latest member to the symbiote-family and an arch-enemy to the black suit.

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The Osborn Supremacy

As the events of "One More Day" takes effect, neither Brock nor Osborn knows who Spidey is anymore and in a situation like he is right now where almost everyone wants him dead, it is one of the blessings Peter counts on. Now, one of them chases him and the other becomes a temporary ally who offers a helping hand against an awful odd.

Following his transformation, Eddie became more powerful than ever and at the same time, became friendlier than his usual "Lethal Protector" style. Though Martin Li remained inert for this plot, he may have larger plans to execute in future as Mister Negative. Osborn will return with another of his scheme in the next arc "American Son".
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