Miss Mina and the Midnight Guardians: The Legend of the Golden Jaguar Part Two is a comic written by David Hedgecock with art by The Xong Brothers. Mina and her crew are accosted by Amazonians while searching for the Fountain of Youth. This is a supernatural science fiction comic with heavy drama, light violence, and a large cast of famous characters both real and fictional. The leading lady here is Mina Murray, she is the leader of this crew and she is a skilled fighter and strategist. She is accompanied by Ironclad Harker, a Frankensteinian man who was Mina’s fiancé, and the very prepared Fritz Fry. One of their compatriots Mamta Rai is off on another important mission. All of these people and others work for the Van Helsing Rail Company, an organization that investigates and handles the mysterious and supernatural. This story begins with Mina and her captured crew being interrogated by a jaguar-woman with a band of Amazons assisting her. After talking things over the situation cools and Mina receives some information about the Fountain of Youth. This takes place in a world with vampires, animal-human hybrids, fringe science, and literary characters come to life. Aside from one implied and bloody scene there isn’t any violence to speak of. The pacing here is overall steady with an adventurous and mysterious tone. There are many dramatically intense moments from character reveals to lore dumps. The dialogue is very conversational with good back-and-forth and narration. There aren’t any word-heavy pages here. This is an intriguing sequel that builds the suspense and expands on the many different characters while giving us insight into what the next installment will touch on. There is a bonus comic “A Brief History of Steam Part Two” that shows Hero and Attila the Hun as they wage a bloody and gruesome war against Rome. There is also a short story entitled “My Reach is Forever” which is about Hero and Fetia as they travel in search of certain books.
The art here is drawn in a smoothly detailed modern style with strong lighting and shading. The color range is very wide from gray and brown cold buildings to vibrant greens and blues in the outdoors. For scenery there are beaches, thick forests, waterfalls, and jungles with all of these different areas being very picturesque. There are really only a few locations here from a castle to the Amazon Jungle and a hidden laboratory. The backgrounds consistently show the actual surroundings which helps give each scene more life. The expression level here is high as these characters are constantly reacting to what transpires. Emotions shown are mostly fear and shock though there is some happiness. The faces have a level of detail that is a bit above average with large, round, manga/anime-like eyes. Expressions usually come across strongly and clearly. There are some weapons shown but none of them are used, and there is some blood but no gore. The lone action scene doesn’t show much and implies the real damage. All of the women here have large breasts and curvy bodies with most of them wearing varying levels of revealing clothes.
“Is this worth reading?”
Yes, if this is up your alley.
“Would I like this?”
If you like supernatural science fiction stories centered around a mythical location that stars a woman and her crew of unique being and featuring deep lore and well-known real and fictional characters then this is for you.
“What would this comic’s film rating be?”
PG-13. Nudity, implied violence.
“Could I get a quote from the comic?”
“He would never give it away willingly.”
Kickstarter Link: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/funtimego/miss-mina-and-the-midnight-guardians-golden-jaguar/description
***IN-DEPTH COMIC STATS BELOW***
Probably Contains Spoilers
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Actual Pages(not counting covers and credits): 46
Violent Pages: 11, for 24% of the comic
Sexy Pages: 3, for 7% of the comic
**The levels below aren’t necessarily maintained throughout the whole comic, but they were definitely reached**
Violence Level – 3
“Wasn’t no tussling at all.”
“Sometimes you gotta hit somebody.”
“I’m getting charged with how many counts of assault?”
“This was a tournament arc.”
“All my life I had to fight.”
Gore Level – 4
“The only thing leaking out your face is tears.”
“Looks like somebody spilled some ketchup.”
“Might need to soak that up with a bath towel.”
“That isn’t supposed to be outside the body.”
“This is a slaughterhouse.”
Death Level – 4
“And everybody lived happily ever after.”
“We might have gone to a couple funerals.”
“It just LOOKS like a serial killer was here.”
“Yeah this was a tragedy.”
“Think Gettysburg.”
Porn Level – 3
“Everybody kept their clothes on.”
“I guess it was too hot for a bra.”
“Sometimes you got to let everything air out.”
“This is like late night Cinemax in the early 2000’s.”
“Oh. This is porn.”
