Injustice: Gods Among Us #24 & #25 - A Review

I love this book.  No matter how uneven the artwork may be at times due to the rotating art teams, this is still a title I look forward to reading every week.  There's a few reasons for this but the chief one is that with so many cardinal rules of what should happen in a DC Comics storyline being broken as this story progresses it's almost impossible for me to guess what may happen next.  That's something that's largely lost in these days of Internet exclusives, Diamond Previews and superhero deaths being announced a day in advance on the cover of USA Today.


I can't deny there's an element of nostalgia behind my love of this book as well.  Though I've tried to be positive about The New 52 and have enjoyed some of the titles to come out of it, the vast majority of it leaves me indifferent at best and annoyed at worst.  No matter how much I might enjoy what Jeff Lemire does with his take on Green Arrow, it still doesn't change the feeling I have that Oliver Queen should have a beard and remind me of George Carlin every time he opens his mouth to point out the stupidity of the people around him.


The irony is that in presenting us with this view of a dark future where Superman makes killing the bad guys his first attack rather than a last resort and a cult of Superman worshipers sacrifice petty crooks in the name of their savior, writer Tom Taylor also pays tribute to The Silver Age of Comics when such things would have been unimaginable.  There's lots of nods to the glory days of DC Comics, with Superman and The Flash having a conversation at super-speed in the midst of a battle.  You've got Green Arrow and Black Canary as a couple again, kissing one last time in the face of what they think is certain death.  And I'm not sure precisely how Superman defeats all the Parademon hordes in Issue 24, save that it involves flying very quickly around the world.


As I said before, the art is this book's biggest weakness and it really would benefit from having a consistent art team.  At the very least, it would be better if the art teams rotated every few issues rather than every week.  Mike S. Miller - artist on Issue 24 - is a good artist whose simple designs lends themselves well to big, dynamic battles but tend to look somewhat silly in the smaller scenes of two characters just talking.

By contrast, Bruno Redondo seems to be capable of drawing everything well - action and conversation - in Issue 25.  Sadly, his artwork is ill-served by the coloring team.  The palette used by David Lopez and Santi Casas works against Redondo's inks.  This creates a washed-out, worn look that is completely at odds with Redondo's style.  Compare the work below to Redondo's excellent work on Injustice #5 and I think you'll see what I mean.


Despite all that, I still love this book.  Warts and all.  And barring some truly drastic changes, I'll be reading it until the bitter end.