Moon Knight #5 (October 2006)

This issue puts us in the middle of a confrontation between Taskmaster and Marc Spector also known as Moon Knight.

Taskmaster is ready to execute Marc as a video from an organization known as "The Committee" Plays on his TV. The video is basically a long monologue, a message for Marc to hear before Taskmaster takes his head.

Fortunately for him, his close ally and ex girlfriend Marlene, along with the help of another close friend, Samuels, were able to stand up to Taskmaster and forced him into running back to his clients.

The three then head to Moon Knight's secret lair where he suited up and took the fight to The Committee's doorstep.

Although I can see that the writers got the basic premise behind Taskmaster's character correctly, it would seem that they did not take his recent character developments into account. The idea behind Taskmaster preferring to be non - confrontational was in his original design, but he has evolved over the years to become less of a "run away to fight another day" type of villain. And even then, I find the idea of him running away from a girl he disarmed, and a butler with a shotgun a little hard to swallow. This story arc was occurring very close to the Civil War event, and during those days he confronted and nearly defeated Captain America (Avengers Power Pack Assembled #1 June 2006). It shows the limits in research that the writers of this arc did when they were working on it.

This issue is a must have for my collection, but the story arc itself is not one that I am fond of.