2 out of 5

Oh, yuk yuk, Garth, taking the piss out of manly men.  Haven’t seen you do *that* before.  Oh, except we have.  Countless times.  This Secret Wars spinoff – a big familiarly-named crossover event that’s allowing for a bunch of series / mini-series to take place in isolated worlds – reads like a retread of the Good Ol’ Boys Preacher one-shot, minus the Good Ol’ Boys.  In other words, the Garth version of the hero and the damsel in distress, meaning that the damsel is the capable one and the hero (called a “general jerk” in the intro-page summary text) is a moron.
Blended with “Where Monsters Dwell” B-movie world of dinosaurs and Amazons, this would be acceptable fare, especially with an ace art team: Russ Braun’s reliable art, which can encompass both this humorous style (reminiscent of Darrick Robertson) as well as Garth’s more serious war stuff, which this series nibs its initial setup from; new-to-me colorist Dono Sanchez Almara, choosing a warm but bright palette that really brings the various settings of jungles and tropical storms to life; and letterer Rob Steen, rendering the occasionally wordy pages into eye-friendly events.  …Except… well, frustratingly, our “general jerk” is none other than Karl Kaufmann, The Phantom Eagle, who Garth successfully matured from naive doof into a skilled and wistful realist in the Marvel MAX “War Is Hell” mini-series a few years back.  It’s true that the side of his character on display here – rather unskilled, and quite the misogynist – isn’t an unbelievable extension of a man from that era post the war, but it seems pretty clear given the strict ridiculous tone that there’s no redemption in sight for Kaufmann this time.  He’s just the butt of the joke.  So maybe Garth’s writing a completely different version of the character, a la the the divide between his Marvel Knights and Marvel MAX Punisher…?  …Except… he directly references his War Is Hell series via characters and events.  So, no.

It’s not really fair to give the series a lower rating just because it bums me out to see a character flip-flopped this way, but it’s a combination of that plus how typical of an Ennis story this is, especially since we steer away from the dinosaur stuff , which could’ve been campier fun, almost immediately, and careen toward Garth’s familiar poking-fun-at topic of gender.  It’s likely the “damsel” – who starts to turn into a bit of a jerk herself – will get a comeuppance of some type, and that Kaufmann will slink away in the end, perhaps minus another precious body bit.  Or maybe not.  Maybe I’m completely reading this wrong, and I’ll miss out on something hilarious or
affecting by bailing.  Maybe.  What’re ya’ gonna do, except write a review.  And slink away yerself.