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Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld, \u201cTangled Web\u201d We open in Fortress Opal as its evil master begins to \u2013 literally \u2013 weave a spell, and Carnelian enters in search of his father, finding himself startled and frightened as Dark Opal has truly gotten into the spirit of things and has taken on the form of a monstrous arachnid. Some Thoughts:<\/strong> Go here<\/a> for the Reread of Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld <\/em>#1<\/p>\n\n\n\n Go here<\/a> for the Reread of Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld <\/em>#2<\/p>\n\n\n\n Go here<\/a> for the Reread of Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld<\/em> #4<\/p>\n\n\n\n Go here<\/a> for the Reread of Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld<\/em> #5<\/p>\n\n\n\n Go here<\/a> for the Reread of Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld<\/em> #6<\/p>\n\n\n\n Go here<\/a> for the Reread of Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld<\/em> #6.5<\/p>\n\n\n\n Go here<\/a> for the Reread of Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld<\/em> #7<\/p>\n\n\n\n Go here<\/a> for the Reread of Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld<\/em> #8<\/p>\n\n\n\n Go here<\/a> for the Reread of Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld<\/em> #9<\/p>\n\n\n\n Go here<\/a> for the Reread of Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld<\/em> #10<\/p>\n\n\n\n Go here<\/a> for the Reread of Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld<\/em> #11<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Written by Dan Mishkin and Gary Cohn
Art and Cover by Ernie Col\u00f3n<\/em>
Edited by Karen Berger<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Carnelian has come bearing a fragment of the Citrine, the gemstone of the Witch-Mother Citrina, which Dark Opal stole from her years before. While its power is less than that of his own Opal, he intends to use the gem as a means of trapping Citrina, whom he will then use as bait to draw Amethyst to him.
Amethyst and Taffy, meanwhile, are on their way back to Earth, where Amy discovers that the few hours she spent on Gemworld translated into two days on Earth.
After Amy makes her appearance, the genial police officer the Winstons had called to investigate their daughter\u2019s (and dog\u2019s) disappearence takes his leave, and Amy is not able \u2013 or willing \u2013 to answer the questions her parents are asking. Marion \u2013 a child psychologist \u2013 attempts to coax some answers from Amy, but Amy has watched her mom work and knows her tricks.
Herb\u2019s less-professional attempts at gaining Amy\u2019s confidence backfire, as Amy shouts, \u201cYou\u2019re not my real parents anyway!\u201d
On Gemworld, Sardonyx has shown up to provide some exposition, explaining how two decades earlier Citrina had managed to spirit away the infant Amethyst to another world to be raised by adoptive parents, and had planned to slowly, and gradually initiate contact with her through the gift of the gemstone pendant that the little lizard creature had left for Amy back in the first issue. However, the arrival of the rape-minded ogre in the Winston household forced Citrina to accelerate her plans.
We also learn that Dark Opal has been unable to produce a suitable heir, as all of the children he has sired have proven to be hideously deformed monsters. After banishing his monstrous children, Opal sent one of his agents to another world to steal a child that he could raise as his own \u2013 Carnelian \u2013 and as it turns out, the world on which Carnelian was born was Earth.
It seems that as Opal\u2019s agent travelled to Earth, Citrina followed in his wake, leaving no magical trail of her own, which is how she managed to hide young Amethyst away without being detected.
Dark Opal\u2019s deformed children are a touchy subject, and while he\u2019s pleased with Sardonyx for providing this information, he warns him to never mention his kids again \u201cFor they are no flesh of mine!\u201d
This serves as the segue to Castle Amethyst where Granch informs the Witch-Mother that he is about to embark on a quest, driven by his personal animosity for Dark Opal, as it turns out that Granch is actually Dark Opal\u2019s first-born son!
He intends to travel to the horrible nether-dimension to which his siblings were banished by their father to set them free and recruit them to the cause of Amethyst.
To aid him, Citrina provides him with two fragments of the the Amethyst. One fragment will be left outside the entrance to the place of his siblings\u2019 imprisonment, while he\u2019s to hold on to the other. The connection between the two fragments will ensure that he can find his way back out.
On Earth, Herb and Marion wonder how it is that Amy has figured out that they\u2019re not her real parents, and we see yet another reference to Citrina. Marion refuses to believe that Citrina has come back for Amy and says that it was just a lucky guess on Amy\u2019s part. Herb isn\u2019t so sure.
At school, Amy is doing some research into gemstones, and we meet her friend Rita, who asks Amy to look up her<\/em> birthstone\u2026an Opal! (Dun dun dun!)
On Gemworld, Granch finds himself caught up by one of Gemworld\u2019s dangerous native creatures, a Wind Demon, which can tear him apart. Luckily, Wind Demons get bored with victims who don\u2019t fight back, so Granch lets it carry him along until it unceremoniously dumps him \u2013 rather painfully \u2013 against some jagged rocks. It\u2019s actually a net positive for Granch, as it\u2019s brought him that much closer to his destination.
There he finds a big, crocodilian monster which he has to subdue if he\u2019s to reach his goal. After a vicious struggle that ends the only way it can \u2013 with a KRAK! \u2013 Granch emerges victorious, and the dead monster swells up in size. It seems that the monster\u2019s mouth is the entrance to the prison where his siblings await.
(I remember finding this sequence to be really gross when I was a kid. I still do.)
Now the time has come for Opal to set his trap, and as Citrina sits musing about how all of her plans of the past twenty years seem to have taken on a life of their own, she hears a call for help that seems to be coming from Granch. Certainly, Citrina can detect no threat, so she decides to release her spirit form to follow the cry back to its source.
The reason she detects no threat is because the bogus call is being sent by Dark Opal through the fragment of Citrine, whose \u201cfriendly aura\u201d masks his true intentions. Citrina soon finds her spirit self trapped in Opal\u2019s web.
On Earth, Amy sits in her room sulking about being grounded and considers running away to Gemworld for good, though she knows she couldn\u2019t even if she wanted to at the moment, as the gemstone is still recharging after her fight with Carnelian. She has to wait for it feel warm to the touch before she can return which, as if by magic\u2026wait, not \u201cas if,\u201d but actually \u201cby magic,\u201d it does as she\u2019s holding it. Before she can bail on Earth, however, Herb comes by to have a heart-to-heart with her, and he promises her that \u201cwhen the time comes\u201d he and her mother will help Amy find out all about her birth parents.
Once he steps out to start making dinner, Amy concludes that she does need to find out more about herself and her parents, but she\u2019s not going to wait.
Deciding that he should have pressed her for more information about how she found out she was adopted, Herb heads back up to Amy\u2019s room just in time to see her stepping through a portal to Gemworld.
Up next, Amethyst comes face-to-face-to-face (there are a lot of faces involved) with Dark Opal at last, we meet members of some of the other Houses of Gemworld, and Granch has a family reunion that goes about as well as pretty much any<\/em> family reunion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Despite the (gross) sequence with Granch fighting the monster, this wasn\u2019t exactly an action-packed issue, providing more in the way of exposition than conflict.
What conflict the story does<\/em> contain is on a more emotional level, as Amy struggles with the issues of who she is and where she belongs. Despite how much the Winstons clearly love their adopted daughter, and how much she loves them, Earth isn\u2019t her home, and as much as she would like to be just your average teenager, she knows that she\u2019s more than that.
On the other hand, while the \u201cmore than that\u201d part comes with cool powers and instant adulthood, there\u2019s the whole issue of the powerful, evil sorcerer who\u2019s bent on killing her.
And, while there are no additional incidents like that ahead of her, the multiple occasions on which she was nearly raped certainly don\u2019t help matters any.
We also see the conflict raging within the hearts of Herb and Marion, as clearly Citrina\u2019s gift of a child to them years before was a blessing, but it brought with it the fear that one day their blessing might be taken away from them, and now they\u2019re finding that their worst fears seem to be coming to pass.
In this issue we also see that there are more connections between Earth and Gemworld than just the fact that it\u2019s where Amy has been living, given that it\u2019s where Carnelian is from as well, and with the strange \u201ccoincidence\u201d of the twelve Houses of Gemworld matching up with the birthstones of the twelve months on Earth, one wonders if there\u2019s even more of a connection between the two worlds. (Hint: Yes, there is.)
If there was ever any payoff to the coincidence of Amy\u2019s friend Rita having an Opal for a birthstone, it doesn\u2019t happen in the maxi-series. For various reasons, I didn\u2019t read much of the short-lived ongoing series that hit the stands a couple of years after these twelve issues, so I don\u2019t know whether or not it was something that was explored there.
<\/strong>The Art:<\/strong>
Col\u00f3n really excels at depicting the brutal, vicious action sequences featuring Granch, as well as depicting the strange and whimsical landscape and creatures of Gemworld. The lovingly-rendered saliva that Granch slogs through on the dead monster\u2019s tongue adds to the general grossness of that sequence. Yuck.
If I were less lazy I would add in some scans from the issues, but\u2026well, I\u2019m not<\/em> less lazy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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