• Written by: G. Willow Wilson, Mark Waid, Saladin Ahmed
• Art by: Takeshi Miyazawa, Humberto Ramos, Andrea Di Vito, Victor Olazaba
• Colors by: Ian Herring, Edgar Delgado
• Letters by: VC’s Ariana Maher
• Cover art by: Kaare Andrews
• Cover price: $4.99
• Release date: July 12th, 2023

Fallen Friend: The Death Of Ms. Marvel #1 regales readers with three tales of grief and acceptance over the untimely passing of Kamala Khan, aka Ms. Marvel, in Amazing Spider-Man #26.

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Is It Good?

Following the disastrous “What did Peter do?” arc in Amazing Spider-Man, Marvel chose to make Kamala Khan’s death the centerpiece of the arc’s finale. Now, Fallen Friend: The Death Of Ms. Marvel #1 focuses on the aftermath of Khan’s death by exploring what her passing means to those who knew her best. Does this issue make lemonade out of ASM’s lemons? Well…

Kamala

Friends and family gather in Kamala Khan’s mosque for a khatm, a turn-based reading of the Quran, to honor those who died during Rabin’s attack on NYC.

Right off, readers may find this first chapter of the three-part tale confusing. The low-detail art makes it difficult to distinguish who all the civilian characters are, so if you’re not deeply familiar with Kamala Khan’s circle of supporting characters, you won’t know most of the characters as they aren’t introduced. Known characters show up to pay their respects (Wolverine, Captain Marvel), and that’s about it. This chapter serves as little more than a light prologue.

Champion

The Champions assemble at the khatm to pay respects to their fallen teammate. During the moments of sharing, Amadeus Cho encourage Viv to reactivate her “emotion chip” so she can understand what grief feels like. It doesn’t go well.

Mark Waid’s foray into grief through the eye of immaturity has its moments. The art is solid, and there’s plenty of emotional weight to give the khatm an authentic somberness. That said, this chapter vacillates between over-the-top memories of Kamala’s perfection to montage scenes of Kamala lecturing an assortment of Avengers to a lovers spat between Amadeus and Viv. In short, this chapter tries to do several things at once and quickly loses focus or purpose.

Avenger

The Avengers arrive at the khatm to pay their respects. As the service proceeds, Iron Man and Dr. Strange have a tense conversation about the price of resurrection through magic, Captain America’s speech is interrupted by a poorly-timed carjacking, and Spider-Man shows up late with an odd greeting for Kamala’s parents.

Saladin Ahmed’s contribution is an odd ending to an odd issue. The Avengers arrive to show their respect and contribute to Kamala’s life story from their individually unique perspectives, but the argument between Strange and Iron Man seems unnecessary (they’ve faced death together many times before), the carjacking seems unnecessary, and Spider-Man’s “she was my hero” greeting seems over-the-top (Spider-Man and Ms. Marvel barely knew each other).

So, what’s the verdict? The issue is a mixed bag of over-the-top praise for Kamala Khan, decent art, and manufactured conflicts that contribute nothing to the event at hand. Perhaps issue #2 will take the khatm somewhere, but this issue feels like a random collection of scenes to honor a fallen character we know will be resurrected in less than two months.

About The Reviewer: Gabriel Hernandez is the Publisher & EIC of ComicalOpinions.com, a comics review site dedicated to indie, small, and mid-sized publishers.

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Bits and Pieces

Fallen Friend: The Death Of Ms. Marvel #1 begins the slow, deliberate process of mourning Kamal Khan through a collection of partial scenes and vignettes of widely- and hardly-known characters gathering to grieve. Each chapter centers on a different group of characters in Kamala’s life, but the comic as a whole doesn’t have anything to say.

5.5/10