Action Comics #866: I actually had to look back at the credits of this issue to check to see if Richard Donner was involved in its creation — and was surprised to find not even so much as a ‘thanks to’ credit. Odd then, that well after the end of Donner’s involvement in the writing of the series comes the single issue of any Superman comic I’ve ever seen that feels the most like the Donner Superman movies: it has the classic Daily Planet dynamic involving humorous scenes with geeky Clark switching to his alter ego; Zod, Ursa, and Non; Ma & Pa Kent back in Smallville. Hell, this issue even reintroduces obnoxious Planet sportswriter Steve Lombard, who was last a player in the series when those movies were first coming out. Writer Geoff Johns and artists Gary Frank and Jon Sibal are hitting on all cylinders here: pretty much every page is a pleasure both in terms of writing and art, even approaching the timeless quality of Morrison & Quitely’s All-Star Superman. Frank’s Superman looks like the perfect cross between Curt Swan’s rendition of the character and Chris Reeve — even Lois looks very Margot Kidderish at one point, and Ursa is so obviously based on the actress from the Donner movies that I got sidetracked wondering what the likeness rights issues would be with someone like that. I mean, would she have signed them away at the time of the film, or would they have to clear that with her now? Anyway, at least so far Johns & co. seem to be accomplishing that ever-rarer solid superhero story that would work equally as well for someone with no previous knowledge of the series as it would for someone with a Ph.D. in DC continuity. A promising kickoff to Johns’ long-promised Brainiac story and a great jumping-on point; it’s great to see DC’s flagship title is again one of its best.
Secret Invasion - Who Do You Trust? one-shot: It’s necessary to maintain a certain healthy skepticism about picking up any tie-ins branded with a big event banner that may not be….let’s be nice and say necessary. And the fact that Secret Invasion writer Brian Bendis didn’t write any of the five stories in this one-shot is, admittedly, not a good sign. However, as the lead-off story is a coda to the recent Captain Marvel mini-series (itself an SI tie-in) bridging directly into SI#1 and dramatically clarifying Mar-Vell’s role in the series, the Wonder Man/Beast story is pretty good, and the Agent Brand story tells us, uh, that Agent Brand from Astonishing X-Men is going to be involved in Secret Invasion, if you’ve been digging the main book you’ll probably find this worth your time. The Marvel Boy story is sorta incomprehensible, but it’s great to see Agents of ATLAS again — their miniseries was really good, and I’d like to see more. Their chunk of this book serves more to reintroduce them than anything else, so I guess that’s a good sign in that direction. Overall, Secret Invasion - Who Do You Trust? certainly isn’t essential, but it’s largely enjoyable.
Booster Gold #10: Johns and co-writer Jeff Katz begin winding down their run (next month’s #1,000,000 is their last, and yes, it’s a DC One Million tie-in) in a fashion that should please anyone reading this as a followup from 52 — in fact, of the several 52 spinoffs this is definitely the most direct sequel and the highest quality (along with The Question — I mean, 52 Aftermath: Crime Bible: Five Books of Blood — yeah, much catchier title, guys!). I can’t say I’m not disappointed the Johns/Katz team didn’t end up scripting more issues, but I guess they got a couple of solid trade paperbacks’ worth with consistent art and rock-solid scripts, and that’s about as much as one can ask these days in most cases. I just hope the next writer or writers remember that it’s always, always awesome when Skeets gets the big action hero lines. In any case, this penultimate issue was definitely satisfying, providing answers to many lingering questions ( I really hope the Black Beetle’s not who I think he is, though), and leading into their big finale in style.
Skaar - Son of Hulk #1: Mmm….huh. I wasn’t entirely sure what to expect of this Planet Hulk/World War Hulk spinoff, and after reading the first issue I’m still not entirely sure. It’s sorta Conan crossed with Star Wars, and intriguing, but Skaar #1 definitely suffers from first issue syndrome: there’s a lot of setup here as well as a lot of recap, and not much real meat. I’ll probably stick around at least through the first arc, anyway.
The Eternals #1 : The previews of this series Marvel stuck in the back of seemingly every book they publish didn’t do a good job of selling me on this series, I found the Neil Gaiman/John Romita Jr. mini-series this ongoing follows up on underwhelming, and the memory of artist Daniel Acuna crashing and burning on The Flash in two issues is still fresh in my mind, so I’ll admit was somewhat dubious heading in to this one. I have really been digging the Knauf writing team’s Iron Man work, though, so I was definitely holding out hope they’d pull it out. Just as with the New Gods at DC, tying Kirby’s Eternals elegantly into the rest of the Marvel Universe has always been something of a problem, and the attempts at it here come off as more than a bit gratuitous, frankly, basically amounting to nothing more than a series of single-panel cameos. Fortunately, Acuna’s work fits much better here than it did on The Flash, though this issue didn’t quite grab me entirely as I’d have liked. There is some indication the Knaufs are going somewhere with it (I recall not being entirely sure about their Iron Man run in the beginning, but that paid off in spades) but unfortunately pretty much the entirety of this issue is utterly incomprehensible — and I read the Gaiman/JRJR miniseries. The portrayal of “Reverend Lester” here approaches tragically-bad levels of cliche and caricature, and most of the rest of the issue is basically just gibberish interspersed with out-of-context cameos. #2 is gonna have to pick waaaay up if I’m gonna stick around on this one.
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