Right, like Beef Knuckleback wasn’t going to die in his first chronological appearance. Dying is kind of his thing – he’s good at it.
Not totally obvious in grayscale comics – Beef’s “natural” skin tone is gray, and newly regenerated skin is pink. His unnatural coloration is a side effect of genetic engineering. He is a prototype, and a marked inability to blend in is one of the many quirks in the mid 1990s ETL black-ops “cocktail.”
Beef’s taciturnity and big derpy smile may or may not be side effects. The dude volunteered for cutting edge prototype genetic augmentation – he’s either an idiot or a sociopath. Whatever his intelligence and disposition, he’s not much of an orator.
Also, it’s nice to finally have a solid sense of scale for the U-238 – I’ve mentioned previously that it’s roughly equivalent to an {AC|C|EC|HC|KC}-130, and it’s definitely the size of one! The cargo bay can easily fit the Beefmobile, though the trucks are well above the cargo hold’s Max Headroom. The far background of panel one really drives home the size – West and Tantek on either side of the ramp with a truck between them and the vehicle has a good couple of feet to spare on either side.
They’ve got their orders, they’ve made their objections, and they’ve been given a Beef. Next up – the Templar implement the WGP!
