8.27.2008

Patrick's Hat Trick: Don't You Know There's A Crisis Going On

by Patrick

Where have I been? Well, I've been off preparing my safe-house for the coming Skrull Invasion Final Crisis. And there are a lot of supplies you need for a safe-house. Bottled water. Canned Foods. And of course, reading materials. And by reading materials, I mean comics! Since I am getting ready for the Skrull Invasion Final Crisis, It might be good to read the comics leading into it. So this week we'll be digging into DC Universe: Last Will and Testament one shot, the first of the two part Superman Beyond 3D, and the second chapter of Geoff Johns' Final Crisis: Rogues' Revenge. Let's get started, shall we?


DC UNIVERSE: Last Will and Testament: Brad Meltzer finds himself slumming in the comics world again, this time teamed with Adam & Joe Kubert. Why give it a super long and slightly awkward title? I'm guessing it's because calling it "Geo-Force special" wouldn't sell as many copies. The main story-line follows the one time outsider as he plots killing Deathstroke while the world is coming to an end. And while I say a Geo-force comic wouldn't sell, the Geo-force vs. Deathstroke story was actually pretty good, with a good twist or two along the way. Where this book loses it is every time it goes away from the Geo-force story-line. I'm guessing they didn't let Brad Meltzer read any of Final Crisis, because just every big dog of the DCU is shown nowhere near where they were in Final Crisis. Wally West isn't with Barry. Green Lantern isn't imprisoned. Neither is Batman. Clark isn't keeping his wife alive with his heat vision. And that it so completely ignores what is happening with those those characters is annoying. The Geo-Force story gets a B+, while the rest of the book gets an F. So I guess it averages out to an unsatisfying GRADE Of :C-


Final Crisis: Superman Beyond 3D #1: If you are picking this up hoping to see the Grant Morrison who is writing ALL STAR SUPERMAN, you'll be disappointed. But if you are looking for Final Crisis issue 3.5, this might be the book you are looking for. Superman enters the fray and teams up with other Supermen from other realities to find something to fight the Crisis. And along the way we get some hints of answers beginning to form. Some of the mysteries of the Final Crisis start to unravel here, and we even get to see a place we havn't seen since Grant's run on Animal Man. GRADE: B-. It's nice to see this crisis stuff is all heading somewhere after all.

Final Crisis: Rogues' Revenge #2: And over here we have the fun corner of the Final Crisis. After telling Libra last issue, "Thanks for the invite, but we are not joining," Libra does the predictable thing and goes after them. Who he sent after them is pretty clever. And even more surprising is the perfectly logical reason Libra thinks he needs the Rouges on his team. Grade: A- Geoff Johns and Scott Kolins are making a great villain book, and I'm sorry we only have one more issue to go.

Well, that's all we have this week. I'll be back in a week or two if I can avoid the Skrulls Parademons. Take care.

4 comments:

The General said...

I'm limiting my DC/Final Crisis in-take to the main Final Crisis series, but knowing that Kolins is doing the art on the Rogues Revenge thing makes me interested in at least flipping through it. I'd sort of forgotten about him as an artist.

Mr`Orange said...

I'm not a fan of DC comics, but it is always interesting to see what is going on there. Thanks for the updates Patrick.

Brandon said...

Like Mr. Mister, I'm no fan of DC comics. However, I enjoy reading what other people say about their work. Somehow I think it comes off more cohesively in that setting tan it does panel by panel in a comic book.

KACH! said...

I liked Kolins more when he wasn't drawing directly onto his Wacom.

--J.