Injustice 2 #43 - A Review

Civil War has broken out in Gorilla City, as Grodd leads a rebellion against King Solovar. Now, to prevent the destruction of what little he has saved since losing his base in The Amazon Jungle, Ra's Al Ghul must lead his Suicide Squad to aid in the battle. Will Ra's new secret weapon tip the balance of power?






Is there anything that speaks more to the power of comics than armies of great apes fighting? I think not. Yet even set apart from that standard Injustice 2 #43 is a darn fine comic.

Tom Taylor's script has everything. Action. Romance. Horror. Comedy. Often all on the same page! Gloriously brought to life by the pencils of Bruno Redondo, the insanity and glory of this story is perfectly completed by the inks of Juan Albarran and the colors of Rex Lokus. If you aren't already reading this series, start. If you are already reading this series, good for you! 

The Final Analysis: 10 out of 10.

Injustice 2 #7 - A Review

Harley Quinn is an unwilling accomplice to the new Suicide Squad. Determined to make things as difficult as possible on her captors, she is surprised when the man in charge - who is not the "worst Batman ever" - agrees to speak with her regarding his plans. Unfortunately, he has far greater leverage over Harley than a bomb in her brain and he means to use it to win her cooperation!


It's difficult for me to discuss this issue without giving away the game completely. Finding an image to use to show off the issue's artwork proved particularly difficult this time around. Still, I am trying to keep the secret identity of The Suicide Squad's new leader a secret, though astute readers may have already guessed it given some of the clues dropped before now.

What can I say then? I love how Tom Taylor writes Harley Quinn as the genius who plays dumb that she is supposed to be. I think he writes the mystery villain remarkably well and with the same complex understanding that he does Harley Quinn. And I think the artwork by Messrs. Sampere, Albarran and Lokus looks fantastic throughout.

The plain and simple truth is that this is one of the best books DC Comics is putting out right now. Even if you aren't a fan of the games that inspired it, this is still worth reading as a fascinating and well-thought-out Elseworlds tale.

The Final Analysis: 10 out of 10. 

Justice League United #11 - A Review

My hopes for Justice League United #11 all but died when I saw the cover. This may well be the worst piece of work I've seen from Tony Harris. I think the character in the middle is meant to be Animal Man, but it looks more like Gambit is angry about running out of styling gel halfway through combing his hair.


Gambit once ate a po'boy 'DIS big!
Things don't improve once we open the book and get to the story. Apparently Martian Manhunter, Supergirl and Green Arrow all quit the team at some point between this issue and the last one. Also, Adam Strange discovered that - rather than being an alien technological device - The Zeta Beam is some kind of force that unites all of time and space.

Oh! And he merged with it and can now sense impurities in reality that he calls Breakers. And he can somehow inform the rest of the JLU about these Breakers. And somehow they can travel around, pulling heroes and villains from key points in time to deal with these Breakers before they break reality.

Confused yet? I can't blame you. This is a dramatic departure from the classic idea of Adam Strange and, as such, should have merited a much more involved explanation. As it is, it's a prime example of that greatest of mistakes - telling the audience what happened rather than showing them. It might have felt more organic had we seen what happened to Adam rather than having the information dumped on us in a single page.


The artwork is similarly problematic. Travel Foreman is generally a fine artist but I think he's the wrong one for Justice League United. Foreman's use of forced perspective is disorienting and while that was effective in conveying the horror of Jeff Lemire's Animal Man, it doesn't work here. There's far too many panels where we see people talking in the middle distance, unable to tell who is who. Additionally, Foreman's fight choreography is sloppy and there is a complete lack of visual continuity. Consider how the the number of stars on Stargirl's sleeve changes from panel to panel below.


Given all of that, I'm done with Justice League United. The artwork is sloppy and doesn't fit the story. The writing is erratic. And with half the characters I liked in this book jettisoned in favor of a rotating roster of characters without their own comics, I have no other reason to keep reading.

Justice League United #7 - A Review

It appears that the cast of Justice League United are as bored with this crossover with The Legion of Superheroes as I am.  At the very least, Animal Man and Green Arrow are fed up with it.  Both of them make wisecracks about how many damned Legionaries there are and how hard it is to keep track of all of them in this issue!


Jeff Lemire tries his best to keep the story moving but the inertia of The Legion continues to hold him back.  It doesn't matter that he slips in some quick gags such as Animal Man and Timberwolf sniffing each other.  The story never bothered to explain who Timberwolf was for the readers who aren't already intimately familiar with every single member of The Legion, their powers and their personalities... or lack thereof!


The artwork this month is an improvement.  Neil Edwards' figures are still forced and stiff, but this is less obvious in the splash pages that dominate the second half of the comic.  Strangely, though this issue features two inkers, the finishes on the comic seem less erratic than they did last month when only one inker was assigned to the book.

Justice League United #6 - A Review

The one saving grace of Justice League United #6 is Jeff Lemire's ability to bring little moments of character into what is essentially one gigantic fight scene. It is these moments that have defined the series so far. And it is these moments with all the little interactions between the regular cast that make the book so interesting.


Alas, most of this book is taken up with the sort of Claremontian battles that have come to define any story involving The Legion of Superheroes.  There are no characters here - merely a loose collection of bodies attached to various superpowers.

These scenes consist of various characters standing around, explaining the action to the reader (Quickly, Ass-Kicking Lad!  Kick the ass of that big guy while I hold him in the grasp of my Magnetic Mind Grip!) while clumsily letting us know their codenames.  It's a shame because Jeff Lemire is capable of so much better than this and the scenes in which his Justice League speak to themselves showcase the difference between the two teams.



As before, the artwork is erratically mixed.  Neil Edwards is a clearly skilled penciler, but too many of his figures seem artificially posed. The best aspect of the artwork is the energetic colors added by Jeromy Cox.

Justice League United Annual #1 - A Review

The biggest problem with Justice League United's crossover with The Legion of Superheroes is that it is a Legion of Superheroes crossover.  The good news is that thanks to The New 52, readers will not have to worry about any of the cumbersome continuity problems that beset the classic LOSH comics.  The bad news is that the LOSH are still a collective of bland characters largely defined by their individual super-powers, with only Brainiac Five and Mon-El possessing any kind of personality. And those personalities are "know-it-all jerk" and "hot-headed douche-bag" respectively.


Writer Jef Lemire does what he can, but even he can't battle the inherent inertia of an storyline involving The Legion of Superheroes.  Too much time has to be devoted  to explaining who they are and listing off the individual members of the team. It also doesn't help the plot is strictly standard, with The Legion having come back in time to kill Ultra (Jonn J'onzz's adopted multi-ethnic alien son) before he becomes a world-destroying monster known as Infinitus in the future.

The subplot involving the rest of The Justice League trying to track down the body of a deceased Hawkman is far more interesting for a number of reasons.  Chief among these are the interplay between the team members and the little character touches that Lemire excels at. My personal favorite was the interplay between Supergirl and Green Arrow, with the inherently rebellious Oliver Queen struggling in a position of authority as he tries to reign in the equally rebellious Supergirl.  



The artwork this time is a bit of a mixed bag.  Neil Edwards is a skillful penciler and there are a number of Kirbyesque splash pages throughout the book.  The problem is that many of the poses of Edwards' figures seem overly forced and artificial, up to and including two women pointing their posteriors directly at the reader while curving their backs so we can see the profile of their chests!   The inks by Jay Leisten are competent but not particularly noteworthy. The best aspect of the artwork is the coloring, with Jeromy Cox using a vibrant, heroic palette that makes everything jump off the page in just the right way.

Justice League United #5 - A Review

I've spoken before about how Jeff Lemire is one of the few modern writers who seems to follow the classic rule that every comic should be written as if it were someone's first exposure to the characters.  It is for that reason - and perhaps because of the delay between issues caused by the Future's End specials - that this issue opens with a recap of just how the new Justice League came together and why Martian Manhunter has now taken on guardianship of a genetically engineered being born of multiple alien species known as Ultra.


This story - as well as the majority of the team going to investigate the sudden activation of the distress beacon of a recently deceased Hawkman - take a backseat to the main focus of the issue, which develops two heroines who haven't been seen in the book much so far and indeed haven't really defined themselves as heroines yet.  One is Alanna Strange, who despite having a space-suit, a brave heart and a ray gun, still isn't quite sure what to make of the destiny that has been thrust upon her and her husband, Adam.  The other is Miyahbin - a young woman who is about to discover her own special powers and her family's legacy as protectors and guardians.



The artwork of Timothy Green II and Joe Silver proves the equal of Jeff Lemire's amazing script.  Green is a grand visual storyteller and he has a gift for drawing interesting inhuman figures, such as J'onn J'onzz or the monstrous Whitago. Joe Silver is a soft touch with the ink pen, but that suits this bright, largely hopeful story just fine.

All in all, if you haven't been reading Justice League United, this is a good issue to start with.

Justice League United #3 & #4 - A Review

Through no fault of my comic shop, I somehow neglected to pick up the last two issues of Justice League United until this past week.  And I find myself wondering how I could ever have forgotten this book, even with my busy schedule.  Granting that it has been slow in finding its footing and in bringing its cast together, these two issues finally see our new Justice League united, including Jeff Lemire's creation Equinox and Alanna Strange - no longer a passive romantic figure but now a hero in her own right.


As always, the best parts of these issues are Jeff Lemire's grasp of these characters and his development of their personalities and the relationships between them.  The key sequence of Issue 4 sees these characters - working together but not yet a team - paired off and made to play off one another.  Green Arrow reaches out to Animal Man only to try and shrug off his olive branch with a joke.  Supergirl proves as cool and and jagged as Kryptonian crystal when Stargirl tries - and fails - to make a similar gesture of friendship only to stick her foot in her mouth.  And for the first time in a long while, we see the paternal side of J'onn J'onzz as he takes it upon himself to take charge of the newborn Ultra The Multi-Alien (long story) as well as the responsibility for failing to save an ally's life.


The book's weak point continues to be its artwork. Mike McKone is a competent penciler but the rotating team of inkers on this series do his work a disservice - particularly when multiple inkers are employed on a single issue and all hope of a consistent look is ruined.  I've noted before that McKone also seems guilty of recycling his panels but these two issues bring us a new problem - that of the artwork not matching up with the script. Consider this panel in which J'onn asks for Green Arrow to accompany him, Stargirl and Supergirl only for Ollie not to be included in the away team. For the rest of the issue, Ollie is seen standing in the background with the other half of the team, not saying anything or doing anything.  I blame the editor more for not noticing this problem before the book was printed but it is still a vexing point that takes the reader out of the story.


Despite this, the scripts are good enough that I can forgive the missteps in the art.  And it is gratifying to see so many characters that I enjoy in their New 52 incarnations being given a chance to shine.  So I shall be sticking with this book for a while longer.

Justice League United #2 - A Review

A madman named Blyth is kidnapping the beings of a thousand star systems for nefarious purposes and has hired the bounty hunter Lobo to keep his captives subdued.  The good news is that a new Justice League is aware of the situation.  The bad news is they're currently stranded on the distant planet Rann.  And even with Supergirl having stumbled across them and Hawkman launching a one-man rebellion from within Blyth's prison, it still seems that the new Justice League's tenure is over before it truly began.


I love this book so much.  And it is almost entirely due to how Jeff Lemire writes my favorite heroes.  Specifically, how he can portray them as being competent in a fight but still let the humor of their personalities conflicting with one another come through in a believable fashion.  This is most apparent in the snarking between Green Arrow and Animal Man, but it also comes through in Stargirl's first encounter with Supergirl.  And there is one glorious but amusing sequence where Martian Manhunter  gets a laugh-inspiring moment as he deals with a group of Rannians who have threatened to imprison him indefinitely.  


Unfortunately, I don't think the artwork is quite up to par with Lemire's story.  Mike McKone's artwork isn't bad but - as in the first issue - he is not above recycling panels.  A larger problem with this issue is the inking, which was overseen by three different inkers including McKone.  As a result, there are noticeable and distracting differences in the individual pages, with some seeming to have barely gotten any inking besides a black outline around individual characters!

  

Justice League United #1 - A Review

I love this book.  I love how it is funny and makes fun of the characters without being mean-spirited or making the heroes seem less than competent.  It reminds me of the good old days of the Giffen/DeMatties Justice League, save that the heroes here are actually good at their jobs.


What Jeff Lemire is doing here shouldn't seem so revolutionary.  And yet, it is.  We see superheroes who act like real teammates - not allies of convenience who tolerate each other, at best, because they need someone to watch their back during the next epic brawl.  This new Justice League truly is United and the team spirit lacking in other recent supergroup books by DC Comics is very strong here.


The artwork by Mike McKone is as enjoyable as Lemire's story.  McKones figures are big and bold and his action sequences well choreographed.  Really, the only flaw with the artwork is the palette used by colorist Marcelo Maiolo, who  uses an off-white for Caucasian skin that is not far removed from the same white color used for snow.  

Future's End #1 & #2 - A Review

After reading the lackluster Future's End #0 (which DC Comics released on Free Comic Book Day this year), I fully intended to give this series a miss.  I've had my fill of stories involving dark futures, the heroes failing to save the day and enough angst and ennui to fill a dozen Morrisey albums.  The fact that the story - at its most basic level - was a blatant rip-off of X-Men: Days Of Future Past didn't help matters.

Still, I happened to read a preview of Future's End #2 and learned that it would involve the funeral of Green Arrow.  Being as big a fan of Oliver Queen as I am, that was enough to pique my curiosity.  So I picked up the first two issues last weekend to see what I might see.

Not much, as it turns out.


Future's End #1 combines the worst aspects of Countdown and Brightest Day.  Specifically, we get to see a lot of heroes die horrible, random deaths and we get to see Ronnie Raymond act like an incompetent, entitled douche-bag.  Why DC Comics keeps forcing the unnatural Ronnie Raymond/Jason Rusch partnership is beyond me.  I don't know anyone who likes this version of Firestorm and the low sales figures/cancellation of the New 52 Firestorm series would seem to bear out that idea that more people hated it than not.

Indeed, Roy Harper says it best in Future's End #2 when he calls Raymond "a liar... As well as a fraud -- phony -- and a complete and total coward."  And he is not wrong.  Raymond is directly responsible for Oliver Queen's death and his actions in this issue do nothing to endear him to the reader.  Yet I somehow think we are meant to sympathize with Ronnie, because all he wanted to do was sleep with his girlfriend while on the clock at his day job as Oliver Queen was radioing for him, specifically, to help avert a disaster.

This doesn't work.  At all.

What does work is the funeral sequence, which has a hint of Jeff Lemire's writing about it.  There are so many wonderful, subtle details revealed here.  Roy Harper in a red costume modeled on Green Arrow's uniform.  Black Canary crying in the background.  And Animal Man's eulogy, in which he talks about Oliver Queen leading the rebellion against a second Apokoliptian invasion.



Now THAT is a comic I want to read!  Alas, that's the biggest problem with this series and - in many ways - much of the New 52 line so far.  We keep getting teased about stories that are far more interesting in abstract than the stories we've been given.

I want to see Green Arrow fighting alien invaders with nothing but sheer chutzpah and a madman's arsenal of trick arrows.  I want to see how Roy Harper became his staunchest defender and why Dinah Lance cries the hardest at his death.  But most of all, I want a story where the heroes are fighting villains instead of each other.

This is not that story.  Maybe Justice League United will become that story in the future?

I hope so.  I'd really like to read that story.

Justice League United #0 - A Review

I'd abandoned all the Justice League titles several months ago when it became clear during Trinity War that I would be expected to read them all if I were to make heads or tails of just one.  Throw in the fact that the entire line became part of the much-lamented Forever Evil mini-series and I felt little need to keep going.  Given the mess that story-line has made of the New 52 universe, it would take a lot to get me to wade back into that swamp again. "A lot", in this case, equaling one of my favorite writers working with some of my favorite characters to create Justice League United.


After an opening flash-forward showcasing the titular team in action, we cut to three days earlier.  The story truly begins with anthropologist Adam Strange approaching Stargirl and Animal Man (during a personal appearance at a comic convention) with evidence that aliens are abducting people - including his research assistant Alanna.  The two are eager to help but prove out-classed and out-gunned when armed aliens show up with homicide on their mind.  Thankfully, Green Arrow and Martian Manhunter respond to Stargirl's request for back-up.  Two interludes round out the issue - one giving us our first glimpse of new heroine Equinox and another revealing the fate of the alien's captives and how Hawkman is among them.

Jeff Lemire's grasp of the characters and gift for drama dresses up an otherwise drab premise for a superhero team's formation.  We've seen this scenario before - a big crisis forces a group of otherwise unrelated heroes together, uniting them when they realize how badly said alliance is needed - but Lemire makes it seem new by playing the characters off one another masterfully.  Green Arrow and Animal Man keep the proceedings from getting too dark and this new take on Adam Strange is a gripping one.  What little we see of Equinox seems promising as well.    



The artwork is more problematic.  Mike McKone is not a bad artist but he does a poor job of hiding his shortcuts.  There are a few obviously recycled panels and the thick inking on some of the character outlines leaves them looking like they should be in a coloring book rather than a comic book.  Even the usually stellar colorist Marcelo Maiolo seems to be off his game, with the Caucasian members of the cast being as white as the snow they are walking through.  Despite this, Justice League United looks to be an enjoyable series worth picking up.

Thursday Night Comic Con News Round-Up - Part One

* Neil Gaiman will be writing a six-issue mini-series bringing Sandman into the modern DCU. (Vertigo Panel) * Neil Gaiman also signed off on Tim Hunter, from his Books of Magic series, becoming part of the cast of Justice League Dark. (Bleeding Cool) * Frankenstein, Agent of SHADE will be crossing over with Animal Man and Swamp Thing in the upcoming 'Rotworld' storyline. "Frank" also be joining the Justice League Dark cast for a while, as will Amethyst from the upcoming Sword and Sorcery fantasy anthology book. (DC Dark & Edge Panel) * All Star Western #13 will offer an origin story for Jonah Hex. It will also involve him shooting a lot of clowns. (DC Dark & Edge Panel) * There are plans to bring back Rene Montoya into the New 52 universe, but NOT as The Question. Apparently, we've already seen "him" somewhere in the New 52 already... (DC Dark & Edge Panel)

Animal Man #1 - A Review

Confession Time – I’ve never read any Animal Man comics.

Of course I’m familiar with the character, thanks to his starring role in 52 and his cameo in Grant Morrison’s JLA. I know he’s a devoted family man and father of two – one boy, one girl. I know he draws his power off of a connection to the primeval force of animal life (a.k.a. The Red), allowing him to replicate the natural abilities of any living creature.

Thankfully, even that small bit of knowledge was more than I needed going into this book. Writer Jeff Lemire masterfully explains all of these details and more throughout the issue. We learn about Buddy Baker’s work as a stuntman and animal-rights activist and how he recently made a bid to become a real actor. We learn that his wife Ellen is supportive but worried about his life as a superhero. We learn that his son Cliff loves having a superhero father and is perhaps a little too enthused about the danger involved. And we learn that his daughter Maxine doesn’t understand why her dad’s job makes it impossible for her to have a real pet dog like all of her friends.

Most of the issue is devoted to establishing this status quo, as one might expect in a first issue. What really makes these scenes work is how relatable Lemire makes all of the characters. The children speak like real children, with Maxine telling her dad what she wants using her stuffed dog as a proxy (“Mr. Woofers and I have a great idea.”) and Ellen and Buddy talk to each other like a real married couple. At a time when superhero marriages are being dissolved right and left in the name of making characters more accessible, it is nice to see a title that runs with the idea of a superhero/family man.

The typical superheroic action is limited to one scene in which the family meal is interrupted by a news report of a hostage situation at the children’s ward of the local hospital. It is here that Animal Man is made into a unique figure among superheroes. Buddy prefers to use compassion rather than his fists and tries to reason with a man driven to desperation by the love of his daughter (a motivation Buddy Baker can respect), only using his powers to protect himself and only using them when all other avenues are closed.

At first Travel Foreman and Dan Green seemed like an odd choice for an art team on this book. Foreman’s sense of perspective is a bit odd at some points, with some panels depicting the characters as oddly thin and angular, almost like the old Aeon Flux cartoon. Green’s inks, for the most part, are unusually thin, with most of the book having a sketch-like quality. This isn’t bad by any stretch of the imagination – just different from what one usually expects from a superhero book.

But then again, Animal Man is not your typical superhero book and has never lent itself to expectations. This point is driven home in a nightmare sequence near the end of the book, where Foreman and Green’s style is eerie and appropriate. All of this builds up to one of the most shocking final pages in recent memory.

I think fans of the original Animal Man comics will be well-pleased with this issue. New readers, expecting a more traditional superhero story, may be put off by the artwork and the idea of a hero who prefers talk to fisticuffs. That is a true shame and their loss. For not only do I plan to keep reading this title, I plan to finally track down some of those Grant Morrison Animal Man comics everyone’s been saying I should read.