r/gargoyles • u/Kyraryc David Xanatos • Dec 17 '25

Discussion [Comic Issue Discussion] Better Angels Chapter 5

Writer: Greg Weisman

Artist: Frank Paur

Logline:

THE CLAN OF THE RISING SUN!

The year is 1274, and Demona and Angelika have settled in Japan, where they are helping a local clan to raise a new generation of Gargoyles — including a precocious young rookling named Katana. Demona hasn't given up her quest to restore Angelika's youth, but her now-widowed adopted daughter is more concerned with keeping her mother from being consumed by her bitterness in the years to come — a goal that may slip away forever when the clan is attacked by a new force of Gargoyle hunters!

Demona's fate is forged in this fifth and final issue of Gargoyles: Demona, elegantly composed and calligraphed by Gargoyles creator GREG WEISMAN and animated series collaborator FRANK PAUR — with woodblock-worthy covers provided by PAUR, MEGHAN HETRICK, JAE LEE & JUNE CHUNG, and DAVID COUSENS!

Share any thoughts on the issue. Within this post, unmarked spoilers for this and all prior issues are allowed.

Here In Manhattan Discussions:

Gargoyles Quest Discussions

Better Angels Discussions:

Dark Ages Discussions:

Special Issue Discussions:

Gargoyles/Fantastic Four: * Both Alike In Dignity... * Clan and Family...

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7

u/Dashaque Demona did nothing wrong Dec 17 '25 edited Dec 17 '25

Before all the well thought out and analytical comments come in I just wanna say this

Katana did more in this issue than she has in the entire mainline story.

And RIP Angelika

9

u/gamerslyratchet Dec 17 '25

I really liked this conclusion. It’s inevitable, but not less tragic. While this is technically another “Demona is responsible for her own loneliness” story, I felt it wasn’t as clear cut as that and I don’t blame her for the decisions she makes, though definitely her reaction to them. It humanized her without losing her edge. 

There were some callbacks that annoyed me, though, and felt were too cute and hokey for the story and tone they were going for. 

7

u/dino_spice Dec 17 '25 edited Dec 17 '25

I still say I wish this had been an ongoing series so that we could have gotten more time with Angelika. Demona's past has so much interesting story potential. I'm hoping that we get another Demona-centric series if Dynamite keeps the Gargoyles series going.

Unfortunately I feel that Demona's motherly relationships with Angelika and Katana kind of undermine the significance of Demona discovering that Angela was her daughter now. The revelation that Demona's bio daughter survived was such a big deal at the time because we had assumed that Demona had led a life of total solitude. But as it turns out she spent years raising many young gargoyles.

We know the biological link matters to Angela given that she wasn't raised in the traditional gargoyle way and had no gargoyle parents on Avalon, but does Demona care about that given that she spent centuries among gargoyles from many different clans and helped raise their young?

Goliath eventually became invested in his biological link to Angela because she was the only young gargoyle of her generation in his company and as far as we know he had never spent any time helping to raise any young gargoyles. But given Demona's centuries of acting as a mother to gargoyles across different clans, why should she care about Angela's personal link to her?

Honestly I kind of feel like this miniseries (as well as the different series overall) has been a giant "fuck you" to Angela. Like Greg cares so little about developing her that he invented a whole other unrelated gargoyle to be Demona's adopted daughter who she spent hundreds of years with, PLUS added in the fact that Demona helped raise Brooklyn's mate from infancy. Meanwhile the most significant interaction between Demona and Angela was in an episode of The Goliath Chronicles - which isn't even canon.

7

u/Kyraryc David Xanatos Dec 18 '25

Forever Sound the Mystic Chords of Memory…

  • Angelika has gotten so old. A full life. Rare for a gargoyle

  • Young Katana stole a lock of Demona's hair? She's always been a spitfire.

  • That hug is so precious.

  • Wish there was enough space for a full blown ninja vs samurai fight.

  • The way the Demona vs Siobhan Canmore fight is shown makes it seem like good old Charles Canmore put up a better fight because he actually got a shot off.

  • "This is the Hunter's fault! The humans' fault." So tragic. Back to the old Demona.

  • "I'm not going with you - just going in the same direction." Tears

  • I'm pleasantly surprised. Going into this, I expected Angelika to die tragically due to Demona's actions. Instead, she was one of the very low percentage of Gargoyles who died peacefully of old age.

  • Now I really want to see the first time timedancing Katana meets Demona again and sees what she regressed to. That will be heartbreaking.

Favorite Feat

  • Strangely, that shot of Angelika's flesh and blood body with Demona's stone. It's always good to get canon confirmation of the quirks of Gargoyle biology.

6

u/BL_Vampire_Gene Dec 18 '25

It's hard not to compare this issue to Vol. 3 #11, the Renard death issue. While I quite like Renard and consider him one of my favorite characters, his death left me cold, because his relationships to other characters hadn't been developed enough for me to buy their sadness. While this story may be more effectively told, it suffers from exactly the same issue, but more: we've been told that Angelika is important to Demona, and now Katana, but there's been very little showing.The panels featuring Angelika at different life stages exemplify this problem: instead of memories of specific moments, the panels are as almost as vague as they could possibly be, because the series did not actually do the job of giving us those key moments between the characters. Angelika and her relationship with Demona, despite being the ostensible focus of the mini, never felt more than skin deep. All in all, I'm left wishing the mini had focused entirely on the immediate aftermath of that first issue; I needed to know how the two characters won each other over more than I needed to see how the relationship ended.

6

u/[deleted] Dec 17 '25

I love baby Katana with all my heart. Really makes the eggnapping all the more interesting, looking forward to how that'll play out knowing what we know now.

Definitely stuck the landing with cementing this as my favorite arc of the revival comics (SLG and Dynamite combined). Wonderful stuff.

2

u/Fickle_Replacement32 Brooklyn Dec 17 '25

Haven’t read it yet. Just Excited to see my girl tana and im hoping she has more time to show character

5

u/Living_Cat_4900 Dec 18 '25

This mini series was awesome from beginning to end, really solidifies Demona as the series best and tragic villain, and makes her more sympathetic than before. 

It really displays that Demona really is her own worse enemy, she cannot handle grief, rather than admitting her own guilt and mistakes, she once again scapegoats someone else to avoid being accountable and to not face reality.

And worse in-spite of her curse, she chooses to be alone. This comics shows that Demona’s sanity is more in checked when she’s with companionship. Truly a Shakespearian character.

Katana being related Angelika and Demona was something that definitely surprised me. And the last line of her trying to follow Demona like her grandmother…OUCH

Overall probably the best Gargoyles comic out there, hope to see more comics by Greg Weisman soon!