ACW #627 – Secret Six

Action Comics Weekly #627 (Secret Six)
“A Bird in the Hand”
Writer – Martin Pasko
Pencils – Frank Springer
Inks – Frank McLaughlin
Letters – Albert DeGuzman
Colors – Carl Gafford
Editor – Robert Greenberger

Ya know, I been having more and more trouble coming up with pre-rambles for these pieces of late.  Uh… did I mention that Nightwing and Speedy are back this week?  Yeah?  Hmm… did I show off the new trade-dress for their feature?  Yeah?  Hrrrmm…


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We open with tail end of Luke wrestling his way free of the Agency goons.  Once they’re kayoed, he swaps clothes with one of ’em so’s he can tour the facilities without being spotted.  I guess he supposes the rest of the Agency won’t realize that the bald fella has been replaced by Matt Murdock… er, a tall blonde dude.  At that moment, over at the Secret Six Bunker, the rest of the team has begun putting all of the pieces of this mystery together.  “The Agency” is run by Walter Fenady, who they believe was responsible for sabotaging the original Six’s VTOL… which might seem to let Mockingbird off the hook, at least for this.

Also, TechnoDyne, that corporation from alllll the way back in ACW #601, was contracted by The Agency to transmutate the V74 virus that original Sixer, August Durant had into the less treatable, and thereby more fatal V75.  So, I guess that wasn’t a misprint all them weeks ago!

As the Six readies to head into the belly of the beast to find their pal Luke, we shift scenes back to our Geno and Mockingbird cliffhanger from last week.  Turns out Rafe knew he was being drugged… and so, he “flushed” the parts of his meal that contained the sedative.  How he was able to figure out which portions of his meals contained the drug… I couldn’t tell ya.  I am very tired of this storyline, however, so I don’t think I’m going to press for things to make sense.  Anyhoo, Mockingbird then…….. unmasks!  Er, with his back to the camera, naturally.  Geno is, however, quite shocked.  Something tells me we’re not going to be quite as shocked or impressed when we finally see his face.

Back to Agency H.Q. (the “Workshop”), Luke-in-a-suit relieves an Agency goon from their shift in front of the monitors, and proceeds to get to work procuring as much information as he can, in order to wrist-radio it all back to his team… which he does, with the quickness!

The Six arrive on the roof of the Agency Building just as an “Intruder Alert” alarm begins to sound.  Luke finds himself surrounded by, and caught in a firefight with the Agency Army.  Meanwhile, Mitch uses his robo-mitts to punch through a door.

We wrap up with the Six busting into the Agency’s H.Q. with reckless abandon… just opening fire on anyone in their way.  Bout time, right?  Mitch notices a Records Room and decides to once again lets his robo-fingers do the walking.

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Welcome to the “home stretch”, my friends!


Things are finally moving forward, and despite there being a bit of confusion over who’s the real big-bad here, and who “knows” what… I’m hopeful that we’re in for at least a semi-satisfying endgame.


There was a bit at the beginning of this chapter that I kinda glossed over… mostly because I wasn’t sure what was supposed to have been said.  I will never deny that I have the potential to be rather dense, and miss things that are completely apparent to the next reader… but, the way the Sixers were talking… I couldn’t tell whether or not they knew Mockingbird had been listening in… and so, they said exactly the thing he wanted to overhear… or, if I’m just reading too much into Maria’s semi-vague monologue?  I dunno… and, I suppose for this chapter, it doesn’t really matter all that much.


The Agency and Mockingbird are clearly “bad” guys… so, they’re both going to have to be dealt with before we put this one to bed.  Speaking of Mockingbird… boy, are we being led down the “primrose path” with this one.  I’ve kind of avoided talking about this… it was kind of the “elephant in the room” all along… but, I mean, no matter which “Original Sixer” is under the hood (though, it’s pretty obvious which one it’s going to turn out being), who’s gonna care?  Is anyone on the edge of their seat for this reveal?  Like I said during our discussion of the very first chapter of Secret Six:

This is a very obscure property… and one that had been dormant (after only seven appearance) almost two full decades at this point.  What are the stakes here?  We’re going to find out that one of six people most of us couldn’t point out in a lineup on our best day is the one responsible for the whole magilla?  Just seems like this was destined to be underwhelming… and if that’s the case, what’s the point?  Ya know?  Oh well.


Overall, I’m happy to see this one edging ever-closer to its conclusion… fingers crossed we get a measure of satisfaction when all the dust settles!


Tomorrow: Black Canary… no longer the ACW Anchor?!