In this review of Hellhunters #5, the team lives up to their namesake with an all out brawl against the forces of evil, but what will their bargain with the demon Zarathos cost them in the end? Maybe another miniseries?
HELLHUNTERS #5
Writer: Phillip Kennedy Johnson (W)
Artist: Adam Gorham (A)
Main Cover: Jonas Scharf
Variant Cover: Marc Aspinall
Page Count: 32 pages
Release Date: April 30, 2025
This review contains spoilers
Hellhunters #5 begins with a raging battle between the hellfire-fueled Hellhunters and the demonic forces of former-Nazi-turned-demon Felix Bruckner, as Allied soldiers hold the line against an unrelenting horde of Nazi zombies on a frozen battlefield in England.
Sergeant Nick Fury, Soldier Supreme (Sebastian Szardos), and Logan (Wolverine) blast and slash their way through the demonic ranks, while teenage commando Bucky Barnes confronts Bruckner, but it’s Peggy Carter’s magic-enhanced shield that destroys Bruckner’s demonic form. Moments later, a giant-sized version of Calphael bursts up through the ice, his new body formed from the legions of his unhallowed demons.
The Hellhunters stand together against this new threat, prepared to go down swinging, but Ghost Rider ’44 (Sal Romero) arrives and rips Calphael’s forces apart with blasts from his hellfire plane (Screaming Eagle). Romero rams his plane through giant-sized Calphael’s body, blasting it apart, and sending the surviving unhallowed into the icy waters below, where Zarathos drags them down into the murky depths, trapping Calphael once again.
Two days later, the surviving Hellhunters return to the Allied base in France, and are chewed out by their commanding officer, but because of their heroic actions, the team are awarded medals instead of being locked up in the stockade for disobeying orders. Soon after the Hellhunters discuss the consequences of their deal with Zarathos, while wondering whether Sal Romero survived.
Hellhunters #5 ends with the Hellhunters walking into the sunset, as Sal Romero washes ashore somewhere else, with the deadly blizzard from Calphael’s invasion only a distant memory.
Analysis
Hellhunters #5 wraps up the series with a few nice touches, and a lot of cool action, but the entire story feels lacking, from the standpoint of character development. Peggy Carter is the prime example here, as an interesting character whose potential is squandered for the entire five issue series. Sure, Carter is given a couple of small moments in Hellhunters #5, but not enough to justify her presence in the series as anything but a bit player.
Writer Phillip K. Johnson (Incredible Hulk) crafts a compelling war story, heavy on action and horror. But remember, this is also supposed to be the origin story of Sal Romero as Ghost Rider ’44, yet we barely get any sense of him beyond his introduction in issue #1, as the series is saturated by a dearth of other characters, (some already well-known), who draw focus away from Romero, (unless it’s possible that he is just meant to be a supporting player.
Artist Adam Gorham (Darth Vader), delivers plenty of impressive action scenes for Hellhunters #5, with a few notable standouts including Ghost Rider ’44’s hellfire plane zooming through a sky filled with flying demons, the giant-sized Calphael bursting up through the ice and some cool sequences of the Hellhunters displaying their hellfire enhancements on the frozen battlefield.
Frank Martin’s colors work well to dress the scenes, from frosty blues for Calphael and the unhallowed, to the warm reds for Sal Romero’s return set against the setting sun, the slate grey skies also provide a haunting backdrop for battle between Allied soldiers and Nazi zombies, while the bursts of bright orange hellfire provides much needed contrast for the light-versus-dark theme.
Final Thoughts
Hellhunters #5, (and the series as a whole) is a thrilling, action-packed ride, that honors real-life efforts of the greatest generation (in a supernatural setting), but sacrifices true character development of the Hellhunters themselves in the process.
