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Columnist Thunder Mod
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Join Date: Sep 2004
Location: Denver Area, between Asgard and Krypton
Posts: 21,364
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The Mighty Reviews 5/6/10
Wktf’s Reviews
Brightest Day #1
DC Comics
Written by: Geoff Johns & Peter Tomasi
Drawn by: Ivan Reis, Patrick Gleason, Ardian Syaf, Scott Clark and Joe Prado
Covers by: David Finch, Ivan Reis and Oclair Albert
Brightest Day continues following the inaugural #0 that came out a few weeks ago. DC Comics has promised that, despite the upbeat title, this will not be a walk-in-the-park, hand-holding period of happiness for those who struggled and persevered through or resurrected in Blackest Night. Most certainly, this issue #1 makes their point in spades. Why twelve heroes and villains were resurrected by the white light, the light from which the life of the universe was created, remains a mystery that Brightest Day promises to answer. But not yet. And why this issue focuses on the characters it does also still is not clear. As with the prior issue, we are treated to separate vignettes focusing on Green Lantern, Deadman (or, more appropriately, the very much alive Boston Brand), Aquaman and Mera, Firestorm, Martian Manhunter, the Hawks and, this time, a singular villain. And all most certainly is not well.
Green Lantern, Star Sapphire and Sinestro all find the white lantern immovable, as Carol points out like the Sword in the Stone (or, as some others might notice, like Mjolnir without Thor). But, if the white light has a chosen wielder, the mystery certainly remains as to who this chosen one is. Perhaps the most disturbing of the stories focuses on Aquaman and Mera where we begin to get a glimpse at what’s behind David Finch’s most disturbing cover for issue #2, as well as some proof as to Aquaman’s agitation last issue. Despite demonstrating some stunning powers (I didn’t know both Arthur and Mera were bulletproof), they find they may not be fully free from Nekron’s influence. Additionally, Firestorm, the Hawks and J’onn find themselves with mysteries that make no sense, even portend foreboding and, in The Hawk’s case, a very real threat.
While the continuous pain and ever-present danger is not as powerful yet in Brightest Day as it was in Blackest Night, the nature of these conflicts and mysteries most certainly have piqued my interest, especially with Aquaman. Johns and Tomasi’s writing styles seem to blend much better than last issue into a single, seamless style. And even the varying art styles seem to work together to create a cohesive effect for this narrative. Clearly, while the threat in each story is manifested in different ways it certainly feels like there’s a common thread running through them that we must wait to discover. All in all, this is a slower, far less desperate but, still, the beginning of a powerful build whose core feels terribly dark.
Superman: War of the Supermen #1 (of 4)
DC Comics
Written by: James Robinson and Sterling Gates
Drawn by: Jamal Ingle & Jon Sibal
Covers by: Eddie Barrows and Aaron Lopreski
For those who are tuning in for the first part of this major Superman event, please know that this past Saturday’s Free Comic Book Day’s War of the Supermen #0 laid down some pretty important ground work for this issue. It pretty neatly summarized events since 2008 that have lead to this point, got inside the motivations of General Zod (though anyone who knows the character, even from the Superman movies, already has a sense of his strongest motivation), and also revealed the basis of Lois’ own personal war against her father. In issue #0 Zod had declared war on Earth from New Krypton and Superman, who’d crashed Zod’s party, was overpowered and stymied by Ursa and Non. It’s hard to imagine anything stopping Zod from making his threat come true: the complete annihilation of Earth within a couple of hours at the hands of over 100,000 super powered Kryptonians.
And, even with the events of this issue, that threat may still be real. But General Lane did figure out a way to send a powerful shot across Zod’s bow, one that may well take one of our own heroes and turn her allegiance against Earth. And, potentially, even the reader’s as well. Admittedly, I didn’t see this one coming at all. Fully anticipating Zod’s strike force to hit Earth with a major wave of genocidal destruction, it’s now difficult to choose sides in this war or even sympathize with Superman’s antagonism toward Zod. The extreme level of destruction and the painful drama, especially as born out on Kal and Kara’s faces, is more shocking than I expected in this first issue. Hell, Ares wasn’t eviscerated until the second issue of Siege. This 100 minute war event has kicked off in the most dramatic and unexpected of ways and, if this level of intensity can be maintained, DC may well have and event going that should rival Blackest Night in scope, scale and destructive power.
Dawg’s Review
Uncanny X-Men 524 (Second Coming Chapter 6)
Marvel Comics
Written by: Matt Fraction
Drawn by: Terry Dodson
With the passing of time you can certainly tell that Marvel has re-invested in the X-Men franchise. I think it has taken a while to bring them back from the brink of disaster, but they have done it and they have done it in spades. The mid 90’s and into the first half of this past decade things were bogged down in new characters, rotating and inconsistent creative teams, not to mention Morrison...
I have collected X-Men comics since I was 11 or 12 years old and have never wavered in my devotion even through years and stories that I thought were ruining my favorite Marvel franchise. I, like many other die-hard X-fans continually longed for the good old days where the material mattered and the direction mattered. To me that seemed to be a bit of a pipe dream though as more years passed. There were bright spots too of course as much of the Whedon run on Astonishing X-Men was brilliant, and every few years or so we got more Alan Davis art. But for every up swing there was pain and sorrow too… Chuck Austen’s Nightcrawler origin and entire run actually comes to mind as does Claremont’s last run as well.
Slowly however the Franchise has trickled back into a direction that at least for me, feels right. You get writers like Mike Carey, Kyle and Yost, (and others like Brubaker and even Fraction 90% of the time) and stories involving characters I grew up reading with voices that actually feel in-character and you have the building blocks of an incredible rebuild.
The Messiah Complex story came out of nowhere… a franchise crossover 10 years in the making. To continue on with my “building blocks” metaphor, suddenly there was a house standing there all framed in. The future of the dying mutant race was born and she would either be the species salvation or the end of mutants period.
Cyclops emerged as a leader and his son Cable, was charged with taking Hope (the new mutant child) into the future and raising her until such a time where she was in control of her destiny.
The X-Men have since moved to their own island and have been desperate to save their race ever since. Some would even say they are at war.
With the “Second Coming” story, Cable and Hope have returned from the future and Hope has reached the age where she is to be manifesting her powers and allowed to shine as the mutant messiah. The only problem with this, is there are a whole lot of bad guys out to make sure that this does not happen, and to ensure that mutants simply die out altogether. Bastion, William Stryker, Cameron Hodge and others all seem to be out to see Hope and other mutants eradicated.
There have been “important” character deaths promised in this story and last week in X-Force #26 this promise was delivered on, and I for one think that it was handled extremely well. This character was a personal favorite of mine since I first started collecting X-Men comics in general and I am saddened to see him go, even if we know that comic deaths are never forever. This one sure feels on par to me, like the first death of Jean Grey. It was handled that well. The character died doing what he has done best for 30 years, being an unwavering and selfless hero.
We cut to this week’s Uncanny issue and because of this death, all hell busts loose as we see the fallout. There is barely any time to bury their fallen teammate as forces are still converging around the X-Men to get at Hope. But, bury him they do as we go around and see and hear the reactions of the characters teammates. None were more interesting that Wolverine’s. I am trying badly to not give anything away but Wolverine was written and drawn so well and perfectly given that we as fans should all know what the fallen has meant to him.
The Beast even shows up on short notice to remind Cyclops rather pointedly, that he has to “own this” and that this death is on him. Hank is not a Cyclops fan and it’s good that his anger is being channeled and he is joining the Avengers again, because his dream is now different than Cyclops version.
We have other great moments too, as Cyclops finally gets to meet Hope as Cable introduces him as his father. Hope gets to meet her “Grandpa” if you will.
This issue was so good that I can’t stand it. All the while we have Bastion hovering ever so dangerously on the periphery. He has mutant blood on his hands so big now that I can’t imagine it will end well for him at the end of this story. I certainly hope that it is Wolverine that gets the final deathblow, but I have a feeling it could be anyone at this point given how many Bastion has truly hurt.
This crossover is shaping up to blow Messiah Complex out of the water folks. It might be worth dipping your toes just to see what you are missing.
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