As you may have read earlier, issue #9 is available to purchase.

In this article I’m going to talk about what happened in it. So…if you don’t want to be spoiled, then do not read any further.

While we learned of Black teams’s death, we didn’t know who did it for sure. Now we find out.
They come upon the Didact who has impacted on the ground and hasn’t awoken yet. Quickly the Didact recovers and kills all of Black team.

Meanwhile a monitor of that installation, whom we learn later is “859 Static Carillon,” also comes upon the Didact. They exchange words. Then the Didact commands Static to take him to the Composer’s Forge.

At this point we catch up with Blue team who has gone through the portal that takes them to the very installation that the Didact is on. They find several non functioning Composers. Just then the Didact finds them. Master Chief orders “weapons free” which means fire at will. The Didact sets off a small quake under Blue Team’s feet. While they recover quickly, they are overrun by MANY Promethean Knights, Crawlers and Watchers.

While Blue team is fighting off the Prometheans, the Didact leaves to repair the newly arrived Halo ring. The monitor does not go with him. It banters a little with the Spartans not caring about them or humanity. However, it is very angry at the Didact and starts attacking the Prometheans. 

Blue team races away, with the monitor quickly following and the Promethean throng behind them. Blue team makes it back to the portal and goes through. They catch up to the Didact. This time however, he tires of toying with Master Chief. But before he can do anything, Chief is on him quickly and stabs a rather large knife into the Didact’s right eye.

The Didact roars, picks up Chief by the head, at which we see him ‘crunching’ the helmet. That’s the end panel of the book.

Now before I get to far into discussion of the book, that last part has me thinking THIS is wear Chief gets the cracked helmet.

Okay, so let’s look at the story here. The Didact is back, he’s even more pissed off at humanity. Instead of composing them for his own army, he is looking to wipe humanity clean out of existence.

Will this new monitor play any important role in the story to come? What is Blue team doing while Chief is being hung up in the air by the Didact’s hand on his helmet?

I saw one person on Twitter refer to the Didact as a Bond villain. Thinking about that,it’s not too far off. Why would the Didact toy with Master Chief instead of outright killing him? Why does he escape to get the ring ready? Shouldn’t he have stayed with his army to defeat these four measly humans? I do kind of agree with the notion that the Didact’s character has been diminished. I did enjoy this issue. However, I do not feel like there was enough story telling in it.

One way to get the Didact back on track as an ultimate baddie instead of a character of himself is to have him do something horrid. Killing the rest of Blue Team while Chief watches would do that, IMO. We’ll just have to wait to see what happens in next month’s issue.